Commercial MUDs are already a minority within a tiny niche market and with many quality free games struggling to attract players, who in their right mind would think that a commercial MUD could be successful?
This certainly seems to be the prevailing view over at TMC, but I believe commercial MUDs are far more viable than many people might think.
It would be unprofessional of me to quote detailed figures for Maiden Desmodus given that I’m no longer involved with the game, however the company accounts are a matter of public record so there’s no harm in discussing overall numbers.
The accounts for the first year of trading (to June 2010) showed a turnover of just under £7000 and given that the running costs for a MUD are minimal, this was almost all profit. This may be a far cry from the likes of Simutronics or IRE but I bet it’s more than many people would have imagined and not bad for a part time business in its first year.
It’s also worth noting that this revenue was achieved with very modest player numbers and a charging model that was considerably less aggressive than some competitors.
Maiden Desmodus used a pay for perks (p4p) charging system with the most popular perks being faster skill increases and private housing.
There are commercially successful subscription MUDs (eg. Simutronics, Avalon, Skotos) but you can achieve an ARPPU far in excess of a typical monthly subscription with the right p4p model. If Maiden Desmodus had been a subscription game at $5 per month for example, we’d have needed to maintain almost 200 subscribers to bring in the same revenue.
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