• Add Review
  • Subscribe
  • Nominate
  • Submit Media
  • RSS

Tedious at times, but an overall good experience.

The Unofficial Squaresoft MUD (Multi user dungeon) is a text-based adventure game. I'm not sure if LockeZ is the creator (this is an old game), but he is the head admin of the game now. It merges several worlds from Squaresoft games and uses their Job system to create a huge world to explore.

This MUD has no actual graphics. All actions are taken by written commands. Rooms and enemies are described in short (or long) descriptions. This method of playing a game can be a challenge, especially if you've never played anything like this before - it's easy to forget certain commands you need, or get lost in big maps. Luckily a tutorial is included at the beginning of the game to help players through this.

An important feature of this game is the Job system. There is both a character level (same for all jobs) and a job level (for the specific job you're using). Each job learns different skills by spending AP earned from fights. This adds a great amount of replay value to the game - you can play it in many different ways, with different specialties. However, you also gain less AP from lower level monsters, which makes it difficult to play new jobs as your character level increases.

The MUD is quite well balanced. There are enemies somewhere for characters of any level, and the jobs are well made with both specialties and weaknesses. For example, one job called the Caller deals strong AoE damage to every monster in a room, but also has low defenses, health, and speed. Also, to make sure that you don't accidentally fight things too strong for you, there is a command that allows you to look at a monster and gauge its power to see if you can defeat it or not.

There is a level of player interaction here - it's certainly not just a single-player RPG. When a player dies, other logged on players can revive him with a Phoenix Down. This halves the EXP penalty of dying, which is quite severe. You can also give items, trade, and make a group with other players.

Another feature is the game length, and almost limitless amount of things to do. There are at least 100 areas to go to, each with their unique enemies, shops, quests, etc. You also don't need to worry about not knowing where to go next - there are several NPCs that tell you locations that are appropriate for your level, and a wiki that can tell you how to get to those areas.

My only real complaint is that leveling does not feel very rewarding when you are already high level. Early on, your stats are low, so getting +2 or +3 to a stat is significant. Later when they're high and you're still only gaining +2/+3 to a stat, you don't notice much power difference between the levels (though they continue to cost significantly more EXP), which leads to a feeling of repetitiveness.

In total, I rate it 9/10. The Unofficial Squaresoft MUD is entertaining, especially at first, and if you really love it, there's enough content to keep you busy for however long you want.

Posts

Pages: 1
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
07/03/2015 01:13 AM
Thanks for this kind review! MUDs aren't exactly rpgmaker.net's main focus, so I was surprised this game got a review.

The original creator of the game was Kesac, who was eventually absorbed into the FF11 hive mind and replaced by Mecha. I joined the development team at about the same time, which was about eleven years ago (oh my god seriously?). And I became the third head admin about three years ago by overthrowing Mecha in a bloody coup and usurping the MUD. Yes, this is an old game.

That we are still updating and adding content regularly is honestly more than a little astonishing, and is the reason why it seems like there's no end of stuff to do. I'm worried sometimes that new players can easily get overwhelmed - I'm glad that, to whatever extent that happened, it at least wasn't something that bothered you enough to complain about in the review! It means it's probably not as big a problem as I think.
Pages: 1