My name is Mud. (1601 hits)
Category: Computers & InternetRating: 0.22 on 13 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Korthrun McBloodlust <korthrun.at.korthrun.net> (View user info) at 2004-01-20 17:24:44 EST
"Gyah! 2 a.m.", I thought to myself, "time to get to bed, I have school tomorrow."
Two hours later, the glow of the monitor was still illuminating my face with the sickly green of the text that scrolled by on my screen. 'Cheekdemon falls to the ground DEAD!' the screen told me. Again. Lots of things seemed to fall to the ground dead. I grinned, doing the math, I would need to slay 4 more Cheekdemons before I would have the points train my weapon skills up another 5%.
"Well shit, it's 4 a.m., gotta be up for school in three hours, no reason to sleep now." How many times did I have that thought? How many times did I tell people, "Sorry I have chores to do." or "I don't feel up to going out tonight." I felt fine. I felt like going out alright. I felt like taking a trip to the land of RedDragon, and being a little goblin rogue. If I got tired of that, I could always get a cleric to reincarnate me and I could maybe become an evoker of the elements (oooooo ahhhhh).
The possibilities seemed endless. So many combinations of 'guilds' (warrior, evoker, healer, harmer and so many more) and races. Each with thier strong and weak points. It wasn't like the other 'online games' comeing out around 1995. The endless lag, the horrible graphics. Good lord did it attract smart people.
Programmers especially seemed to enjoy this. What started as a little game a friend showed me, became so much more. There were so many of this type of thing running out there on the internet. there was something special, something different about RedDragon. Something about the folks who decided to play there. My did the world grow. Islands were added, guilds expanded, rules made, rules broken, rules remade.
This whole time I was doing something I had not done much of in my previous 15 years of life. I met people. I met people who did not enrage me. People with a sense of humor, and a certain style of whackyness that showed thier intelligence, but allowed them to act like complete dipshits. Oh did I love that. So much to learn.
After a time, the game becomes quite repetitive. Slay slay slay slay. Join up with other players, slay bigger creatures. Oh those Cheekdemons went down with one skillfull strike from my poison tipped dagger. What next. Oh the long lost isle of Darkcaverns has been discovered, with it, the ancient dragons. You spent hours in groups with these people, each casting thier spells, useing thier skills. Hours upon hours. After a bit of practice slaying took very little thought, and you ended up mindlessly hitting buttons while you talked with these people about everything. Everything.
Conversations about anything from philosophy to government to why cherry pie is better than bananacream pie and about how "It's my dick, and my soap, and I will wash it as hard and fast as I want to." U.S.A., Finland, Sweden, Australia, Japan, Croatia. People logged in from all these places, and this taught me a lot. I mean hours of talking to peopel from different cultures, of different walks of life, of different ages. No matter your differences you all had two things in common. When it comes down to it, we were all just people. The second thing being Adventureing. Exploring new areas. Discovering and solving quests. Hours and hours and hours of slaying.
This was the common bond. Each of us had spent endless hours doing these things. After 7 years of playing, my time spent logged in is over 1 year. Many hit the 1 year mark long ago and are nearing 2 years. Fads went by like the wind. Games came and went, each adding more polygons, more sounds, more effects. Still the scrolling text called to me. The slaying soon became a side effect.
I logged in not to train my new skill, but in hopes I would get to see 'Uno' do one of his much loved rainbow humps as soon as I logged in (the different channels of communication each had different colors, and he would hump you on each one in a matter of seconds). I wanted to see 'Energystar' accuse 'Quillz' of being a "Butt Humping 'FAGGORT'" (usually with a nice [chat]: Energystar goes, "AHOY FAGGORT!!" at Quillz.)
There has never been another thing in my life like this. Never. No group of friends, no hobby, no game, no music, no job. Nothing that has influenced my life as have these people, via this game. I have my present job at an ISP because of things these people got me interested in. I met my present girl friend on this game (a lot of people form hawaii have somehow found it, which is odd). My twisted and sometimes rediculous sense of humor. My love of the word uber. Oh. Can't forget. Hot damn can I type fast. My handle. My domain name. Damn, this will be everywhere.
Today I said good bye. I know, it sounds silly doesn't it? I said goodbye to a game. No, I said goodbye to the best and largest group of friends I have ever had. Probly will ever have. I said goodbye to something that has been a pillar for me. Something that has always been there. It is still there, I am not. All of my windows have 1/2 inch of space at the bottom. Rarley maximized. So I could always see the last few lines of text. When someone sends me a private tell it would shove a little beep out my speakers. So much has involved this little thing. Always the first program started on my computer.
What do I do? What do you do when a major part of your life is gone? A part you don't want to be gone, but is gone due to your own choice? How do you find another something? Do you even try? What on earth will I do with all this insomnia?
Korth
User Reviews
Submitted by XtremeMooCow (user info) at 2004-04-03 16:51:21 EST (#)
Ranking: -2
..why are u named mud..
Submitted by CanucksFan (user info) at 2004-04-03 16:13:46 EST (#)
Ranking: -2
I don't get it..
Submitted by Dojjan <dojjan83.at.hotmail.com> at 2004-02-03 07:46:03 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
U kick ass Korth!! I miss you.. Hope to see you on the mud sometimes again!
Submitted by Grasfer <grasfer.at.korthrun.net> at 2004-02-03 07:28:34 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
You rock Korthrun!!! Hope to see you on mud one day :D
Submitted by Kale (user info) at 2004-01-30 23:25:08 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
agh, don't insult everquest!
Submitted by pgaur (user info) at 2004-01-20 20:21:51 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
"'Graphics are for wussies ;)"
Damn straight!
I quit once.... lasted about 4 years. Then one day just out of sheer curiosity/boredom I logged back on. Now I'm hooked again :(
Submitted by Y3D (user info) at 2004-01-20 19:09:52 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
www.majormud.com
Submitted by korthrun (user info) at 2004-01-20 18:15:47 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
We used handles like people on here do, so I dunno. A few people have shared thier real name but no, no jay darkson. Islands Of Myth (Previously 'RedDragon') is one of many 'M.U.D.'s so who knows what he is playing. Everquest is similar in it's game play, but the 'culture' of it sucks and is nothing like this place. Plus it has graphics. Graphics are for wussies ;)
Korth
Submitted by Phinch (user info) at 2004-01-20 18:05:15 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
i think a friend of mine is caught in the same addiction. i never see him anymore. ever run into a jay darkson or something like that?
Submitted by korthrun (user info) at 2004-01-20 17:54:39 EST (#)
Ranking: 0
Phinch.
Not enough gets done. You remember how before you could go hang out with your friends you had to do some chores? Maybe accomplish a goal or two? I would go from car to room to mud. There was always moderation.
If someone made plans with me in advance they were never turned down in favor of mud. Though if they expected me to drop what I was doing to goto the bar or something silly like that they were in for dissapointment.
Exploiting bugs is strongly frowned upon. A friend of mine found a nice little bug and I was grouped with him while he was using it. Because I was aware of waht he was doing, and I didn't leave the group or tell any Admins about it, I was forced to reincarnate, at a loss of 25% of my total worth ('points') and my character was frozen for 30 days. I decided to take this opportunity to try to find something a bit more productive to do with my time. We shall see.
Submitted by Yes (user info) at 2004-01-20 17:50:33 EST (#)
Ranking: 1
aye... you could do crack...
Submitted by Phinch (user info) at 2004-01-20 17:31:42 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
why are you leaving it behind?
Submitted by otizzlebizzle (user info) at 2004-01-20 17:27:24 EST (#)
Ranking: -1
I didn't even bother to read this. I thought it was going to be about Les Claypool or Primus. Please don't fool me like that.