The rise and fall of the English language in MUD2

What's that u say m8? I carnt talk proper? or is it just a luv h8 thing?

What is MUD2? Apart from an obsession, or a stress relief, it is above all a text game. Written in English, and more precisely British because, to quote one source, " ... MUD was created by a British author, it uses British spelling and grammar throughout". If you doubt that, let the game speak for itself:

defn american trap
[American trap]
        NOUN A puzzle deliberately placed in the game which users of
American English will be unable to solve. For example, in MUD1 a "voice
speaking inside your head" would tell you "a prize will open the tomb". As the
voice was inside your head, the spelling of 'prize' was arbitrary, and the
solution was to 'prise tomb'. Americans tend to be ignorant of the word
'prise', preferring to use 'pry' instead. They were therefore unable to solve
the puzzle.

So far so good, all this wonderful prose makes for a rich atmosphere. What then is the first thing an experienced player does? That's right, they type SB, SuperBrief. It gets rid of those "annoying long descriptions". Well, that's a good chunk of the language gone out of the window.

Now by the nature of the game, where speed is often of the essence, abbreviations are common, an integral part of any players game. For example, why shout out "Does anyone want to help me do the first task, because if you do I will share the treasure with you?". Much simpler to shout "Icons anyone?". Similarly north is n, south s, etc. pointers are ptrs, and k kk f wp will make sense to most of you - which, if you imagine you had never played MUD2 before, is quite scary.

Is it English? No. But it is mudish, it is a common language shared by the players, and of course a source of endless confusion for newbies. However once it is explained to them, they rapidly embrace the terminology, because lets face it when it takes you half a reset to get a glow, getting 300 plus points for sleeping somewhere at the right time is a rather good deal.

But there is also a tendency not just to abbreviate but to slaughter the very language that the game is written in. There was a section for example in the game BB (Bulletin Board, not Big Brother!!! It's what people used instead of online forums) for insults. Some of these were of the normal "x is a git because he attacked me" type, but many were very amusing. For example:

I have no idea who it was referring to, but it had style. An insult today seems to be "You smell." Or if you have been very annoying, or very good at pk'ing you might get promoted to "smelling of wee!". It may or may not be technically correct, but it's certainly lacking in inventiveness.

Onward. To my own personal hate, the fact that rather than talk (type) to people when in online conversation, it is more like a texting excercise - but without that annoying little keypad. Hi m8 how u doin? u owe me. warez ur warlock?

I don't really have a point to make. Other than that for a game so well thought out, using language as its only means of defining atmosphere, it seems a shame that players don't attempt to use the language properly more often. For example, how do you expect to succeed in a mobile bash if you insist on trying to "wh itchysoreus". And now for a truly spectacular demonstration of the title to all this. I have changed the name, and no the player was not drunk at the time:

*congradulate hawumph
I don't know the word "congradulate".
*congragdulate hawumph
I don't know the word "congragdulate".
*congragulate hawumph
I don't know the word "congragulate".
*congradgulate hawumph
I don't know the word "congradgulate".
Hawumph the onomatopoeic wizard says "its congratulate - but CG works faster :-)".
*say congrats
Namechanged the superhero says "congrats".
Hawumph the onomatopoeic wizard rolls on the floor, laughing.
*gr
Namechanged the superhero grins.
*say i never spell it write!
Namechanged the superhero says "i never spell it write!".
Hawumph the onomatopoeic wizard says "you never spell anything right :-)".

My parting shot is this. If u carnt spell, or dont no wot the wurds meen, get a dikshunary!