Enter the (Multi-User) Dungeon

By Zachary Flower

It’s been 2 years since the creation of The MUD Coders Guild, and I couldn’t be more excited with the state of this community. In that time, we’ve grown to nearly 300 members, launched a popular (for the genre) monthly newsletter, and even started our own open source MUD. One of the goals of the MUD Coders Guild is to support the nearly lost art of text-based game development, and after months of talking, planning, and nail-biting, I am proud to announce our next endeavor: Enter the (Multi-User) Dungeon, the first-ever MUD Coders Guild game jam.

Enter the (Multi-User) Dungeon will be hosted by itch.io (specifically at https://itch.io/jam/enterthemud), an indie game marketplace. While itch.io is primarily a marketplace for independent creators to publish and sell their works, they also have an excellent service for hosting and running game jams. All submissions and voting will be handled by the itch.io platform, however if you have any questions feel free to ping me on the official MUD Coders Guild Slack channel—I’m happy to help!

Now, with all of that said, head on over to https://itch.io/jam/enterthemudfor more information about the Enter the (Multi-User) Dungeon game jam, or continue reading below.

Best of luck, and may the odds be ever in your favor!

Enter the (Multi-User) Dungeon is a game jam by The MUD Coders Guild for the graphic-averse. At Enter the (Multi-User) Dungeon, you will build an open source text-based multiplayer game and rate other creators’ games. As text-based game enthusiasts, we wanted to host a game jam that promotes this not-dead-yet genre in a fun and engaging way.

> timeline

Enter the (Multi-User) Dungeon will be a month-long game jam running from April 15, 2018 to May 15, 2018.

> theme

The theme of the Enter the (Multi-User) Dungeon Game Jam​ is: Procedural.

In computing, procedural generation is a method of creating data algorithmically as opposed to manually […] In video games, it is used to automatically create large amounts of content in a game.

Procedural generation is a wildly popular method for creating vast and deep video game worlds, but it is a process that has been relatively underutilized in traditional text-based game development. With that in mind, make a game that takes advantage of procedural generation in some way; whether that means you are generating something as simple as room names or as wild as your entire world is up to you.

> ​ rules​

  1. Multi-User Dungeon ​ ​s Only  — The generally accepted definition of “Multi-User Dungeon” is a text-based multiplayer roleplaying game, but with that said, feel free to stretch that definition to whatever limit you see fit.
  2. ​Use Any Language ​ — Seriously. Any programming language. Go wild. Or not. Your choice.
  3. Libraries A-OK  — All third-party libraries and services are considered to be fair game. If it helps you make your game, then you are free to use it!
  4. ​Document, Document ​ ​, Document ​ — Anything needed to know to run the server. Configuration/compilation steps, tools, caveats, etc.
  5. ​Open Source Licenses ​ — For the sake of being awesome, all submissions should be licensed under a valid open source license.
  6. Teamwork  — You can work solo or on a team, but be aware that winning games with multiple developers will still only receive one prize.
  7. Pokemon Go To The Polls  — Games require a minimum of 10 ratings to place in the top 3, so don’t just submit, but also vote on each others games!
  8. Serve It Up  — Multi-User Dungeons are, by definition, multiplayer. As a result, be sure to provide a way for multiple players to connect to your game server! From Telnet to WebSockets, the sky is the limit here, all that we ask is you document how players and testers can try your game out.

NOTE : If you need somewhere to host your game, this DigitalOcean referral will give you $10 in credits to start with. Otherwise, Microsoft Azure, Amazon AWS, and Google Cloud all have fantastic free tiers for new users.

> social

  1. ​ Please join our Slack channel and introduce yourself or team and share your progress once the jam starts.
  2. Follow us on Twitter @mudcoders.
  3. Use the #enterthemud hashtag on social networks.
  4. Subscribe to our monthly newsletter! Winners will be announced via the newsletter on June 1, 2018.
  5. Check out the MUD Coders Guild blog for occasional updates and game development tips and tricks.

> criteria

  1. ​Theme ​ — Does the game fit with the specified theme?
  2. Gameplay ​ — How well does the game… play?
  3. ​Creativity  — How creative is the game, given the constraints?
  4. ​Story ​ — Pretty self explanatory, doncha think?
  5. Codebase  — What does the codebase look like? Is it clean and organized, or slapped together haphazardly?

> winners

The top three games will be selected based on the community voting criteria above.

​> prizes ​

Each winner will receive a free digital copy of ​ MMOs from the Inside Out by Richard Bartle, the godfather of MUDs himself. In addition, the first place winner will receive a free Fire 7 Tablet with which to read it on.

Additionally all three top winners (1,2,3) will receive a full access key for the Humble Book Bundle: Game Studies and there will be two additional esoteric category winners (who can not come from the top three) whom will also receive similar keys.

Those categories will be Most Procedural and Esoteric Magnificum , the latter of which more-or-less translates to the best use of absurdist situational humor.