An abandoned MUD (Multi User Dimension), unearthed by hackers in the year 2017 where you play as a wizard in a once lively MMO world. The new tenants of WizMud have taken to tossing priceless artifacts (old junk) from this forgotten MMO into the fishing pond, along with its conventions.
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Sometimes I just need a break, y'know?
I played Final Fantasy XIV for around 4000 hours. It's alright. Like, earnestly. It has a lot of positive qualities to it. It's pretty. Cool music. I have a soft spot for the lore and worldbuilding, and the story can be a lot of fun at times. If nothing else, there's plenty of neat-looking gear to play dress-up with. But gameplay-wise FFXIV is, like so many other MMORPGs out there, roughly equivalent to a bowl of unseasoned oatmeal. It's edible, but it doesn't make me happy. It was not XIV's qualities as a game that kept me coming back. It was the people who inhabited it.
I have a borderline obsessive fascination with shared virtual worlds. Not just MMOs, but MUDs and other multiplayer games, 3D or 2D chatrooms, forums and image boards and what have you. Yeah, even some of the metaverse stuff has caught my eye from time to time. There's something remarkably romantic about the idea of a place where you can present yourself as pretty much anything you want and interact with others who are doing the same. I could dive into some philosophical exposition on escapism and enforced anonymity and blah blah but I'll refrain. I just like the idea of a bunch of people congregating in a quasi-extant space and interacting by whatever means provided.
I played Runescape as a kid and I spent a reasonable number of hours in the towns of Gaia Online. I got up to plenty of shenanigans in Team Fortress 2 and dipped my toes into my fair share of MMOs before finally settling into XIV. I've made a lot of connections in the meantime - some better than others. But most of them have left a mark on me in some way. It's easy to knock these kinds of experiences as merely being a distraction from (or at worst, a replacement for) real life, but when you remember that behind every avatar is a real person with real thoughts and feelings, the appeal becomes a lot more understandable. Online games, and the Internet in general, serve as a nexus where people from all different walks of life can join together. At their best, these spaces are a place where we can be liberated, however briefly, from the inequities of the world and coexist free of prejudice and expectation.
Alright, so I guess I waxed on a little bit anyways. Look, the point is, I have a lot of affection for places where you can just go be yourself - or completely unlike yourself - for a little while and be free. So when this 2003 browser MMO lookin'-ass game popped up on my socials I pretty much dropped everything to go check it out. It's barely been touched since 2017 and there's almost nothing to do or see. But you can be a wizard. That's already enough incentive for me to at least stick around for a little bit.
Over the last week or so I've heard some stories, been tipped off to some new music and even had a few laughs. I stay pretty busy these days, not just with work but keeping pace with friends and family as well. I was never the most social person when I was young, so the fact that I now sometimes like to blow off steam by picking the brains of strangers on the World Wide Web is a bit hard for me to process. Even still, these moments never get old for me. The world is a weird, wonderful place, and watching people be their weird, wonderful selves makes me happy.
I'm not gonna claim to know what's really running through the head of WizMUD's creator, but I hope their feelings reflect mine to some degree. The Internet desperately needs more strange little holes in the wall like this.
I played Final Fantasy XIV for around 4000 hours. It's alright. Like, earnestly. It has a lot of positive qualities to it. It's pretty. Cool music. I have a soft spot for the lore and worldbuilding, and the story can be a lot of fun at times. If nothing else, there's plenty of neat-looking gear to play dress-up with. But gameplay-wise FFXIV is, like so many other MMORPGs out there, roughly equivalent to a bowl of unseasoned oatmeal. It's edible, but it doesn't make me happy. It was not XIV's qualities as a game that kept me coming back. It was the people who inhabited it.
I have a borderline obsessive fascination with shared virtual worlds. Not just MMOs, but MUDs and other multiplayer games, 3D or 2D chatrooms, forums and image boards and what have you. Yeah, even some of the metaverse stuff has caught my eye from time to time. There's something remarkably romantic about the idea of a place where you can present yourself as pretty much anything you want and interact with others who are doing the same. I could dive into some philosophical exposition on escapism and enforced anonymity and blah blah but I'll refrain. I just like the idea of a bunch of people congregating in a quasi-extant space and interacting by whatever means provided.
I played Runescape as a kid and I spent a reasonable number of hours in the towns of Gaia Online. I got up to plenty of shenanigans in Team Fortress 2 and dipped my toes into my fair share of MMOs before finally settling into XIV. I've made a lot of connections in the meantime - some better than others. But most of them have left a mark on me in some way. It's easy to knock these kinds of experiences as merely being a distraction from (or at worst, a replacement for) real life, but when you remember that behind every avatar is a real person with real thoughts and feelings, the appeal becomes a lot more understandable. Online games, and the Internet in general, serve as a nexus where people from all different walks of life can join together. At their best, these spaces are a place where we can be liberated, however briefly, from the inequities of the world and coexist free of prejudice and expectation.
Alright, so I guess I waxed on a little bit anyways. Look, the point is, I have a lot of affection for places where you can just go be yourself - or completely unlike yourself - for a little while and be free. So when this 2003 browser MMO lookin'-ass game popped up on my socials I pretty much dropped everything to go check it out. It's barely been touched since 2017 and there's almost nothing to do or see. But you can be a wizard. That's already enough incentive for me to at least stick around for a little bit.
Over the last week or so I've heard some stories, been tipped off to some new music and even had a few laughs. I stay pretty busy these days, not just with work but keeping pace with friends and family as well. I was never the most social person when I was young, so the fact that I now sometimes like to blow off steam by picking the brains of strangers on the World Wide Web is a bit hard for me to process. Even still, these moments never get old for me. The world is a weird, wonderful place, and watching people be their weird, wonderful selves makes me happy.
I'm not gonna claim to know what's really running through the head of WizMUD's creator, but I hope their feelings reflect mine to some degree. The Internet desperately needs more strange little holes in the wall like this.
this game reminds me of my first experiences with runescape, a magical time in my life, that has since passed. i think it perfectly captures that vibe of innocence, carelessness and mystique, and the magic of interactions with other players.
if that was the intent of this game then damn did it succeed, it feels surreal. i didn't expect to do anything when i booted up this game, walked around for a bit and met another real person, had a nice chat with them and more wizards started to show up and it left me with a strange feeling of being connected with no judgements, expectations or responsibilities. little did i realise how much time had passed.
moments like this i love, and i wouldn't have any other way.
if that was the intent of this game then damn did it succeed, it feels surreal. i didn't expect to do anything when i booted up this game, walked around for a bit and met another real person, had a nice chat with them and more wizards started to show up and it left me with a strange feeling of being connected with no judgements, expectations or responsibilities. little did i realise how much time had passed.
moments like this i love, and i wouldn't have any other way.
welcome to wizmud please enjoy your stay
if u practice your technomancy enough you can put skeleton gifs into the WizTV video queue
some of the best online interactions i've ever had have been from this
be a wizard online for FREe