Although it is now dated, BL is still fun to play, continues to attract new players, and is well managed. Its atmosphere is good, and its players generally responsible (40% are female -- the highest published ratio of any MUA).
The MUDDL interpreter that underlies BL is hardwired for a fantasy style world, and is limited in the complexity of commands it allows to be defined. Objects, rooms, mobiles and players are all stored using different internal formats, which makes the writing of generic routines difficult. Room descriptions take no account of whether the player is able to detect the sensations listed, so it's possible to "hear" sounds when you're deafened and not hear them when you're blinded. However, the system is still capable of being expanded in certain directions -- the "act" command, for example, was taken from MUD2.
Despite its simplicity, BL's parser is remarkably robust and user-friendly -- better than MUD2's, in fact. The game's depth is average, although its breadth still beats that of most MUAs (on account of its age -- over the years, just about everything has been tried in it).
Perhaps the worst thing about BL is the fact that there is a 7-second delay between the processing of commands. This condition was imposed by CompuServe -- BL works asynchronously, and is thus normally one of the fastest MUAs, even though the DECsystem 10/20 hardware upon which it runs is hopelessly out of date now. In the UK, a 7-second delay in a commercial game would be intolerable -- 4 seconds is about the limit -- yet since CompuServe impose similar constraints on all their multi-player games, the USA market is presently conditioned to accept such artificial limitations.
Due to its age and the size of the CompuServe user base, BL is the single most-played MUA in the world.
"The initial attitude of the Americans was to be politely skeptical that any games software from the UK could be worthy of their attention. But once they saw the program running on their system they could hardly believe their eyes. So far as I know, this is the first British program ever to be taken by CompuServe."
-- Simon Dally [MUSE managing director]
"British Legends is better suited to the occasional user [than is Gemstone], with its simpler entrance requirements and a universe small enough to enable most players to get around adequately by memory."
-- PC Magazine
"The kinder, gentler [than Gemstone] British Legends makes a quick command summary available, along with some rather general hints."
-- PC Magazine
"Solving a puzzle for the first time is the most exciting part of the game."
-- Ron Fitzherbert [player]
"Adding a multi-user environment to the basic adventure game adds a whole new dimension."
-- The Guardian
"The first time I found myself in the swamp, a character called Monkey came up to talk and scared me so much that I immediately quit the game. I didn't know it was another person. I thought it was a monster about to destroy me!"
-- John Starr [player]
"Todd Carter is 22, a computer addict from Miami who was left blind by a gunshot wound in high school. On CompuServe, he called himself Blinddog when he played an adventure game called 'British Legends'. He was so hooked on the game that he dropped about $8,000 in on-line charges playing it."
-- The Miami Herald
"Not only are the wizards and witches helpful to novices, but many mortals also can show a kind word or gesture. Make friends!"
-- CompuServe [promotional material]
"British Legends is the most-played multi-user adventure game in the world."
-- The Observer
Gemstone III is primarily a role-playing game, which makes it popular among Americans. To this end, it requires that people beginning the game flesh out their persona by choosing between various personality characteristics, races, occupations, and many other details right down to eye colour. Few of these have any real bearing on gameplay, but they do make new players think they're getting value for money.
The game has a 25,000 word manual, which must be downloaded and read because there is no on-line help while playing. This, and the barrage of persona-defining questions at the beginning, combine to make Gemstone III very daunting for all new players except those in whom a thick rulebook induces excitement.
There are many rooms in Gemstone III, including streets and shops. As with the rest of the game, it seems that size is regarded as the most important facet, and that detail must be provided whatever the cost and no matter how irrelevant it is. It's the classic role-playing problem: whether to provide a loose framework in which players can develop personae their own way, or a tight one where players' options are limited by strictures imposed by the game dependent on the role they have chosen. MUD1's descendents tend to favour the freedom of the former; Gemstone III comes down heavily in favour of the latter, and in this respect is more akin to Island of Kesmai.
"Gemstone is the one for people who want to escape reality and really get into playing a role in an incredibly complex world."
-- PC Magazine
"The sheer number of options involved in getting started can be so intimidating that a simplified setup process is also provided."
-- PC Magazine
"In my roamings through Gemstone, I never saw the same place twice. Drawing a map is definitely necessary to navigate effectively."
-- PC Magazine
As in the last subsection of the section on UK MUAs, the MUAs presented here are known to exist; however so little information is available concerning them that no detailed reviews or summaries are given.
Brief Description: A basic multi-user adventure game.
Notes: Bundled with the Galacticomm Bulletin Board system. These are expandable MSDOS machines intended for commercial, multi-user conferencing and the like.
"A version of Kyrandia is reachable via US Minitel at 'ALLA'. I've yet to meet anybody in it, so usage seems light. And at $0.20/minute, exploring the world is very expensive."
-- John Nagle [player]
Brief Description: A basic multi-user adventure game.
Notes: See Kyrandia.
"A multi-user, interactive text adventure game."
-- Galacticomm [promotional material]
Location: none
Brief Description: A multi-user adventure game, fantasy setting.
Notes: A game called Milieu was written in the early 1980's under Multi-Pascal for a CDC Cyber used by high-school students in Minnesota for educational purposes. Klietz ported it to an IBM XT in 1983, and renamed it Scepter of Goth. Klietz later wrote a MUA called Screenplay, which incorporated building, using an interpreted command language reputedly more powerful than those available on the InterNet today.
Scepter was influenced by AD&D-style role-playing, and incorporated many of the ideas concerning character classes and skills presently gaining popularity in commercial UK MUAs like Avalon. Combat was blow-by-blow, and multiple identical objects were numbered (the same approach taken by MUD2).
Scepter was sold to a company called InterPlay in Virginia, which licensed out the software but was liquidated after its executives were charged with tax evasion. The game was sold off to creditors, and is no longer available.
Although many players loved the game, Scepter earned a reputation for enforcing artificial friendliness among its players, with ruthless consequences for "troublemakers". Thus, all sparks of originality were snuffed out, but the game worked well for people who didn't "misbehave".
"Scepter had the best atmosphere of any multi-user game I've played."
-- Bill Wisner [player]
"In Scepter, you just offer an item for sale several times to get an idea of the price, then sell it when you hit the maximum again. Nobody I knew in Scepter ever bartered. They just took the first offer. They had better things to do with their time."
-- Andrew Thomas [player]