Too Old To Play MUD?

Now I have not played MUD2 for, what feels like at least, a substantially long time (although it perhaps only equates to a number of months). Mudspeke provides us with the term ‘drift away’ with which there is ‘never usually a conscious effort to stop’ but a tendency to play less and less often. This certainly rings true in part; I have found the real world an increasingly cumbersome burden upon my MUD playing activities. In attempts to find reasons for ‘drift’ it is to MUD demographics that I must turn, although it is important to note that no current survey has been produced to provide age or occupation data so what follows is my own personal speculation.

When I began to play MUD2 I was a significantly different person in two ways, the first being that I was younger and the second was that I had a much greater interest in computer gaming (or even computers in general). If I were to make a general assumption upon the demographics of Mud II it would be that most players at least first begin the game in their youth, and I would suspect that younger players still strongly dominate the game. There are obvious reasons for this; younger players have much more time on their hands and younger players are going to show a greater exuberance for computer gaming in the first place (I just find it impossible to believe that many over-60s are out there enjoying such internet niche gaming as MUDS). There is, of course, an argument that older gamers are the ones to feel nostalgic of the by-gone text-gaming era but I find little evidence to substantiate this claim (although I feel that I am one of these nostalgic gamers).

Older gamers are obviously in existence, and some of them have fallen into MUD2 gaming. However it is important to distinguish those who have played MUD in their youth and continued playing, those who player in their youth only to drift away before returning as they got older and those who have never play before in the their youth. I find the most plausible options to be those which suggest that the game was somehow picked up on in youth and then returned to, perhaps from curiosity, at a later date. Real-life concerns must dominate the reasons for drift as people grow-up, with age comes greater pressures and a diminished leisure time. Although I suspect that some drift through a disillusionment with the game, a lack of funds or an overwhelming sense of pessimism towards their future progress. It could be suspected that ‘virtual world’ problems are easier to overcome than those of the ‘real life’ and perhaps those afflicted by them are easier to return.

Perhaps I am just too judgemental and will receive a barrage of angry e-mails from the over-60s MUD house, but I suspect not. MUD is a game that should make us all equals, age and sex barriers broken down by an anonymity created by our avatars. But, personally, age is now the biggest barrier to re-entering a game that I no longer have time for. So, to our young demographic enjoy MUD, while you still have time to ...

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