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Permission to visit with 15 responsible college students

Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 3:45 pm
by carbonel
Hi,

For several years, I have taught a course on the ethnography of virtual worlds at Trinity University. In previous years, students have explored game-worlds such as Everquest, WoW, and Everquest II. This semester, they will be investigating Vanguard: Saga of Heroes.

Syllabi from previous courses are posted on-line at http://www.trinity.edu/adelwich/mmo/students.html and http://www.trinity.edu/adelwich/worlds/students.html. A copy of this semester's syllabus can be downloaded from http://www.trinity.edu/adelwich/vanguar ... llabus.pdf.

I am seeking the community's permission to bring my students into MUME between 6:30 and 9:00 p.m. (CST or UTC/GMT -5 hours) on the evening of Wednesday, September 3rd. The exercise is intended to give students first-hand experience with MUDs, and it is also intended to prompt reflection on the relationship between visual display media and the experience of game-play.

The students have already read some of Bartle's work and they will have read a bit of the "State of the DIKU" thread on Terra Nova (http://terranova.blogs.com/terra_nova/2 ... he-di.html). These are respectful students, and I will make sure that they understand all of the community rules before entering into the world.

Please let me know if you have any objections to a student field trip in MUME tomorrow evening. My e-mail address is: aaron.delwiche@trinity.edu, and I will be sure to also keep an eye on this forum.

Thanks!
Aaron Delwiche

Re: Permission to visit with 15 responsible college students

Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 7:49 pm
by Fror
Dear Aaron,
as a long-time MUME contributor and administrator, I'm happy to welcome you and your class to Arda and share our virtual world with you.

If you are a newcomer to MUME, some aspects of the game might take some time to learn. I recommend you and your students read our tutorial: http://mume.org/session.php

The place where you start your life in MUME depends on your character's race. Everyone can start the game in Fornost, as shown in the tutorial; if your students choose to be Elves of Half-Elves, they also have the option of starting in Lorien or in the Grey Havens, which would show you a different aspect of Arda. Note that some races are only available to experienced players.

One key rule in MUME is that each player can own one and only one account. You can create multiple characters in your account; MUME enforces a five-minute delay between "renting" one character and connecting with another, which becomes a 30-minute delay if you change from one side of the War to another (e.g. from being a Dwarf to being a Troll or vice versa). You should take this into consideration when planning your visit.

I hope you and your students will enjoy the experience, and I'm looking forward to receiving your feedback!

Regards,
Fror

Re: Permission to visit with 15 responsible college students

Posted: Tue Sep 02, 2008 11:17 pm
by Turd
Why couldn't I have a class like that in school? Sounds awesome! ;)

Re: Permission to visit with 15 responsible college students

Posted: Wed Sep 03, 2008 4:44 am
by Jahara
Since you are examining the relationship between visual displays and game play you might be interested in looking at the community generated mappers that have been written to convert the abstract room world of a MUD to something tangible for the average user. If you are interested in trying this for your class there is a installation guide available for one of the two major mappers.

Re: Permission to visit with 15 responsible college students

Posted: Wed Sep 03, 2008 4:23 pm
by science
I actually think this is a fascinating thing for a class to study. Virtual worlds are an interesting world, and the comparison of mume and world of warcraft can say a lot about how the human imagination works. As well as the nature of addiction :)

I'm run some online communities, and love looking at how communities form in virtual environments. Wow's guild system shows how much drama can be involved with organizing a group. Mume lacks built-in support for clans, but communities still exist between (especially) higher level characters, helping each other recover from death, form large adventuring groups, etc.

Anyways, if you have any lovely insights, please share! :)

Re: Permission to visit with 15 responsible college students

Posted: Thu Sep 04, 2008 5:25 pm
by carbonel
Hi,

Just wanted to thank everyone in this thread for the gracious replies and offers of assistance. A friend suggested that the Aardwolf MUD (with the mapping tools in the pre-configured MUSH client) might be easier for first-time players, and so we explored that world last night instead. Unlike students from previous versions of the class, last night's students really seemed to enjoy the text-based MUD experience and many indicated a willingness to engage in further experimentation.

Thanks again for all of your help. If you're interested in reading the research journals of the students as the semester unfolds, they should soon be accessible via the following link:

http://www.trinity.edu/adelwich/vanguard/students.html

We're still setting up the blogs and student accounts, but the link will be fully functional within the next week or so.

Aaron