The CRPG Addict has come around to reviewing the original Multi-User Dungeon, the first of many. Because PLATO predated so many networked computer games it wasn’t the first online multiplayer game, but it was one of the first that could be played by many people. The Addict links to an extensive Digital Antiquarian article from 2017 explaining MUD’s history.

That Antiquarian article is pretty amazing. In the original MUD, if you got enough experience points you could become a wizard, basically a moderator yourself. If you killed another player they had to start over from scratch, and you got 1/24th of their experience points. Other ways to gain points was to find treasure and drop it into the swamp. Once treasure was swamped it was gone until the next server reset, which only happened when nearly all the treasure was so disposed. While you could find and use weapons, there was a limited number of most of those in the game so most players had to be satisfied with basic stick weapons.

But despite these limitations, players managed. Wizards could crash the game easily (there was a command specifically for doing so!), so mostly they didn’t. Customs were decided on; it was improper to kill a player more than two levels below yours. The game continued, and players largely came up with their own solutions to social problems.

The CRPG Addict explains that the original MUD is still in operation at british-legends.com, and that you can even join him there to play today! Times are in his post.

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