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TriadCity Reviewers' Guide
Notes and Suggestions
Thanks so much for your interest in reviewing TriadCity! We appreciate it
greatly!
If you have questions, be sure to contact
Mark Phillips. He can answer most of them, and can arrange online
interviews with Poobah, our main world author, or Mark, our main coder, if that
will be helpful.
These are suggestions for topics or other things worth noting, if
you're interested. We mention them because we think these are some of the things
which are most important about TC right now:
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Big, but small.
Although TriadCity opened on 10/1/01, it's still a small environment.
There's lots and lots of game world, but, the player
base is quite dinky. We're not actively advertising at this time, so growth
is largely via word-of-mouth -- like your review!
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All-original code base.
The code's entirely new. Plays like a Diku/Circle derivative,
but with very different emphases, for instance, the imposition of
elaborate subjectivities on character experiences.
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Stable code.
Although the code is "beta", meaning there are very
many features not yet implemented, it's an extremely stable
environment. The server doesn't crash, and the bugs are small
and subtle.
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Lots o' rooms online.
There are currently -1 rooms built
of c. 100,000 projected. All totally original.
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Infinite scalability.
These projected 100,000 rooms are just within the City walls; the
server architecture allows infinite transparent networking of game
worlds running the Triad code base, allowing evolution of a
combined virtual world with no limits on growth.
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Unusual themes.
TC's themes are unique in our experience. For instance: there are very few
monsters; the ones that exist are hard to find; violence is
available but downplayed; the setting is urban, not
"medieval" and not below ground; and there's no identifiable
temporal context, e.g., you'll find knights and cowboys and
Greek philosophers and astronauts together in the same bar. What's the point?
We're not telling.
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Authored by real writers.
TriadCity's lead author,
Mark Phillips,
is sorta kinda widely published in Europe and America, including
some of the most respected online literary journals. He and Gary Smith,
SmartMonsters' CEO, are well-enough regarded to have been invited to
speak at the
Richard Hugo House 6th Annual Inquiry
on literature and games in 2003.
In 2004, TriadCity was cited in The Cambridge Companion to Postmodernism
as an example of new, emerging literary forms.
Not bad for a little game company.
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Literary references.
There are bezillions of literary references and in-jokes,
including NPCs who are more understandable if you've read the
book.
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Helpful bookstore.
The SmartMonsters online
bookstore is a helpful resource,
containing many of the works of fiction, history and other sources
on which the TriadCity game world is loosely based. You can browse
or search the book categories online; and when you logout from TriadCity,
you'll be shown a list of the available books which your visit referenced.
Pretty slick.
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Players are friendly and helpful.
TriadCity is intended for adults with reasonably rich
cultural and educational backgrounds. The players so far are
nearly all grownups with professional careers. The TC ethic is
collaborative, and all the folks without exception are helpful
and friendly.
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Online players' guide.
A comprehensive Web-based
players' guide
is in progress. Currently
about 100 pages, with more added regularly.
Nicely hyperlinked and cross-referenced. Written in relaxed
conversational English, like the rest of the SmartMonsters site.
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Helpful characters' bulletin boards.
There are a number of
characters' bulletin boards,
allowing players to post lore and wisdom, share
strategies, and answer questions. There a growing store of very
helpful strategy insight there, mostly posted by the more experienced
players.
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Java applet.
The TriadCity client is a nice-looking Java applet which is pretty
easy to figure out. It's a small download, too.
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Windows and Linux, Mac System X.
The client runs on Windows, Linux, and the Mac under System X.
Cool.
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