Genius redditor created a multiplayer 2d game, where everybody edits the world | Hacker News Reader

Genius redditor created a multiplayer 2d game, where everybody edits the world

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129 pointsfizz97221 comments

Reminds me of Tim Sweeney's (yes, he of Unreal fame) ZZT - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZZT - but in multiplayer form!

As an aside, there was an awesome interview with Tim Sweeney last year that's worth the read, I think it made HN at the time - http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/4035/from_the_past_to_...

I love ZZT. That's what got me into programming. That interview link was a fantastic read, too.

Amazing how groups of "destroyers" and "creators" assemble.

Epilogue: I made a friend then I got disconnected. We were building a fort. :(

Same, we were building a maze :]

It's amazing to see social interactions popping up with such limited communication. The lack of a chat feature is actually good imo, makes the whole experience more friendly and imprevisible.

Very cool, but not new at all. There's a 3D online multiplayer game in which all participants edit the world, called Minecraft: http://minecraft.net/

The idea of user-created content in games is much older, player-edited worlds go all the way back to MUDs, MUCKs, MOOs, etc.

I alos enjoy the developer's blog. Earnest.

http://notch.tumblr.com/

I am still waiting for the metaverse

I found out about Minecraft sometime late last year and I'd highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys these types of games. Right now Notch (the sole developer) is working on adding multi-player support to the latest version of the "survival" game. Essentially, there are two versions of the game, one is a sandbox mode where you can build anything you want with unlimited resources and the other is a survival mode where you start out with nothing and have to collect wood to create tools to collect stone and so on. Even without any external interaction right now it's amazingly fun to create huge fortresses in the mountains and cliffs that are generated with a new level.

He's also very open with the community and readily takes suggestions and implements them. At one point he'd released the map format (based on his custom NBT format) so community developers could create tools of their own. I'm sure the format has changed drastically by now, though, since he changed the levels from a fixed size (64x64x32 blocks or variations of that) to an unlimited world size. I can imagine multi-player servers for this springing up and having huge cities being built by players.

Although the concept isn't new (I have spent several days scrolling in http://yourworldoftext.com/ ), applying it to a game platform like this is very creative.

Strangely, I like the "map" function better than the actual game.

Looks like it'll have a great future, but it's not too entertaining right now.

Extrapolating from yourworldoftext, this game could have been more interesting if it was unlimited universe. And the same as ywot, the more people there are the more interesting things get.

I've witnessed an ASCII reenactment of 9/11 on that among other shenanigans

The instructions omit a critical piece of information: not only do arrows move and mouse actions edit, but spacebar jumps. So you don't have to put arrows or dots in every pit so you can get out, as I thought for quite a while.

I wish you could paint faster. I dont like clicking all over. I also wish you could chat.

That'd probably result in things getting ruined quicker.

Exactly

http://www.bluem.net/en/mac/cliclick/

Just sayin'

The world I was in had a long roller coaster run around the outside. Nothing special, just a big counter clockwise loop. I worked my way up to the top, then made a wall in the run and started pitching people off it into nothingness (a bunch right arrows, then a pit. And I would shove people off as soon as they came within editing distance.

So I was sort of playing King of the Hill for a while.

Then I decided to start exploring the world without movement keys, ie only adding movement arrows, pits, and slow-down dots. I got pretty good at it. Every now and then I would land on someone and bring them along for the ride, until they hit a key. Sometimes we would land on some interesting loops other people made.

I was just trying to keep my speed up. That was kind of like Rollercoaster Tycoon.

Kind of reminds me of playing Load Runner on a Tandy back in the day. You could create your own levels and than play them. We used to make really really difficult levels and try to beat each other's levels.

I just saw someone write a Ycombinator logo :)

Like Conways game of life, only the rules are random and unpredictable... create a pattern, and something might evolve

This is totally AWESOME

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