This must have gone down while I was not playing or checking forums. I haven't read the old threads on our forums, but did read all the comments on that thread. Crazy stuff.

One thing that stood out to me, that put some light on something I could never figure out was the lady who said:

"I've been following this thread for a bit with great interest trying to understand why the CF community seems to be 'different' or at least a bit more attentive and concerned about its gamers than the players of other MMORPGs seem to be. Don't know how I missed the part about CF being a MUD. When it finally clicked, it finally clicked.

The thing with MUDs is that they require more thought and creativity by virtue of them being a text environment and because you are typing constantly, I think you tend to get more personal with other players than you would when you hide behind a cartoon avatar with flashy colored armor. In EQ and WoW and other games, it's all about the 16 million colors, flashy items, epic armor, fiery swords and the high quality digital professionally recorded audio sounds and speech. Sure, those things are nice to look at and listen to at the beginning, but they do get boring after a while. It doesn't matter how flashy a character looks or how much his weapons glow - If it's a boring human being behind the avatar, then 'bling' only goes so far."


I was particularly struck by the "more attentive and concerned about its gamers" part. It's true, really. I don't know too many other games that have fostered so many long term friendships, marriages, and general well wishing as CF. Or like, when some vet posts that he had a baby and there are like 20 replies of congratulations from people who have known this guy in some online capacity for a decade or more.

If you think about it, it's truly a remarkable thing. It's just too bad it's such an unconventional activity that no one but another CFer can get it.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/01/2009 04:06PM by The_Joker.