Why MUDs Aren’t Taken Seriously

MUDs 1 Minute

It’s been suggested that New Worlds Ateraan is using uncredited artwork on its website. I spent a couple of minutes on google image search and it looks like pretty much all the art on the New Worlds website has been taken from other sources.

Perhaps New Worlds have permission from the artists to use their work in which case that’s great and there’s nothing to see here, but given that there doesn’t appear to be any attribution it seems unlikely that’s the case. In fact the only credit I can see on the website is a copyright to New Worlds Ateraan and there’s nothing to suggest that the artwork isn’t theirs too.

New Worlds is a large game with hundreds of players and operates as a business using a pay for perks model. It’s one thing to grab the odd image from a google search for a personal website but quite another to use commercial artwork without the artist’s permission on a business website.

Unfortunately we can’t expect people in the wider gaming community to take MUDs seriously when one of the largest commercial games is involved in this kind of copyright infringement.

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Published by Matt

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4 thoughts on “Why MUDs Aren’t Taken Seriously”

  1. Are you sure New Worlds is p4p? They do have a donate button but the disclaimer says it’s strictly out-of-game.

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    1. See here, here and here. Because it’s so unlike a commercial MUD to be coy about their charging model, amirite?

      This was from a player in 2011:

      Donations buy you “tokens,” which are treated as in character objects you can buy, sell, and give to other players. The administration will sometimes give out free tokens as rewards for special events as well. Tokens can be exchanged for in-game money or experience, or saved up and used in this special market (still to be seen what it offers) to buy special items and stuff.

      There are also donation levels. Starting at the minimum 10-dollar mark, and at progressively higher cumulative dollar amounts (25, 50, and so on, up to 1000), you get special perks in addition to these tokens. You get this signet ring, which signifies that you’re a donor (it’s treated in character as if you’ve done some kind of nondescript great service to your character’s kingdom and been recognized), that starts out copper or bronze or something and becomes a more expensive metal with each donation level. You get access to a special market where you can buy things with tokens. You get extra inventory capacity, extra maximum storage capacity, special features in your house, the ability to buy munitions for a boat more quickly and a couple of other things you can’t get any other way. Nothing game breaking, but definitely a pay-for-perks system. The administration is still presenting it as an optional donation system with minor thank-yous attached, but it’s clearly perks for cash.

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  2. Disregard the fact that the codebase (read lib) that NWA uses ontop of the driver itself specifically forbids commercial usage.

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