A month or two back, I was joking about with some folks on an IRC channel. We got to talking about retro things on the intertubes, which isn’t a stretch given the general topic of the channel. Eventually, the topic of MUDs came up. Now I used to run a MUD myself so it piqued my interest.
First, I looked around hard to see if I could find the old source code for that MUD I used to run. Alas, one two many hard drive moves before the era of terabyte plus hard drives for less than a C-note means that unless I somehow get instanely lucky and find a burned CD somewhere or somebody out there has the source on their hard drive, the source code for AugMUD (the MUD I used to run) is long lost in the great bitbucket in the sky. But I didn’t let that stop me, for I remembered that AugMUD was based on the CircleMUD codebase.
The first thing I did was download the version AugMUD was based on and discovered that it doesn’t build on a modern system. I looked at a newer version and found that it was all cluttered up with portability cruft. I wasn’t happy with either option. Fortunately, I have a decade and change more experience with C programming since then and I had this brilliant notion. I thought to myself, “I can write a MUD!”
I cranked up my text editor and set my programmer-fu loose on it. In relatively short order, I had a function communication framework. Then, using the CircleMUD code base as a guide (since I wanted the general CircleMUD feel), I rapidly fleshed out the system until I had a playerable game. I even managed to build a tool to import data files intended for CircleMUDs and convert the areas that came with CircleMUD 2.2. Then, finally, just around Christmas, I completed the last showstopping missing feature (magic). That meant the game was now playable.
Since then, I’ve done various updates, expansions, and renovations to the world, but it has remained playable. So with that, I am happy to say to anyone who remembers the old days of text based multiplayer dungeons or anyone who wants to try one out, NostalgiaMUD is open for business.
You can connect to NostalgiaMUD on port 4000 at nostalgiamud.l-w.ca. (This link might work if you’re lucky: telnet://nostalgiamud.l-w.ca:4000.) You will need some sort of terminal program that supports the telnet protocol, or, if you want the heyday experience, a MUD client. Anyway, feel free to drop in and check it out.
Edit 2016-01-19: There’s a web site at http://nostalgiamud.l-w.ca now.