Review Submitted By: Nai
Author Status: Player
Started on Ivalice: 1998-1999
Submission Date: Jul 28, 2006
TMC Listing: Ivalice
The following review is the opinion of the review's author [Nai]
and in no way represents the opinions of this website or its staff.
Well, IvaliceMud has changed a lot, and here's my review for what
has been happening for the last few months.
The world of Ivalice has expanded significantly. Several new areas
have been added to the world since my last review, providing an even
greater amount of exploration, unique challenges and rewards to the
players.
In addition to the world's expansion, the rules of Ivalice have been
relaxed, especially the naming rules. The naming rules now allow
common-word names, and variations (Such as Blackhawk, or SilverEye)
provided they do not disrupt the IC world. (With names such as
FluffyDwarfHunter)
For the staff, their numbers have dwindled slightly, but there are
still three immortals who handle the basic functions of the mud well
enough. The owner of the mud is working on something big, which
I'll bring up later.
As for the helpers and players, there are ususally enforcers(AKA:
Trusted Players) around at some time of the day, and the range from
all ages, creeds, and origins. There's no discrimination among who
is chosen, provided they can effectively use a keyboard without
having to resort to the frequently used 'Computer Shorthand' and
they prove that they are willing and able to help maintain the peace
in Ivalice.
Further on the helpers, the builders(Players with Building
permissions) are few, but are hard working. Training is available
for new, inexperienced builders. Builders who know what they're
doing may build, but will still need to have atleast one character
at level 100 in order to demonstrate knowledge of IvaliceMud's
layout and general atmosphere. The immortal in charge of building
projects has left for service in the American military, so some
requests are delayed but not ignored, as other immortals are capable
of handling it.
Further on the player side, Ivalice has a diverse range of players.
Players join in world-wide to participate in the events,
roleplaying, and hack-and-slash goodness. Our players are ususally
so different from each other that it's impossible to really give a
review for them as a whole, as they come from all places with their
own stories to tell.
On a more technical standpoint, Ivalice's system has recieved a
memory upgrade, meaning less lag due to an overburdened RAM. Which
is good for all of us.
Switching from hardware to software, Ivalice's Coder and Owner,
Raum, is working on a series of massive changes to Ivalice. This
includes, but is not limited to, new classes, complete skill revamps
for ALL current classes to encompass all 500 levels of play, new
battle systems and style, a unique way of getting new skills and
abilities, a new leveling system, a dynamic HP/Mana system based on
current Stamina, Magic and level instead of the previous method
of 'gains' at time of level up. And there's still more, and tons of
mystery and rumors going about that have people on the edge of their
seat, waiting for the reshaping of the world.
As for the IC world, there are RP events in the making, and there
are goals to have an event every month by the immortals and trusted
players(Enforcers) of Ivalice. For regular, non-IC events, I and a
few of the other players host our own brand of trivia to spread the
wealth of gil, but occassionally you'll see the staff of Ivalice
getting into the game by preforming various OOC games.
For the website, Ivalice has changed their main website for a more
appealing look. All roleplay(either the gossip channel, or rooms
flagged as 'roleplay' by the players) is logged and stored for
everyone to see on the website. Also, most of the quest reward
information is also displayed for players to use as a reference.
Ivalice also has its own forum, which is run off of the website.
The forum contains various bits of information about the game,
upcoming changes, general banter, Forum games, as well as some
information about the players themselves. Additionally, there is a
name generator for the convenience of new players/new characters, as
well as an Al'Bhed to English translator, for those players wishing
to play Al'Bhed characters, right down to the language they speak.
Overall, Ivalice is headed for a major upgrade, and has been
building up towards it since it was announced on Ivalice's Forums.
Some of the problems of the past still linger in Ivalice's current
state, but are being addressed.
For now, I say Ivalice is a great mud, but will soon become one of
the best, despite a few hauntings of problems from the past.
We'll have to see what the changes do to the game, and I'll give my
thoughts again when that happens.
