Urbandead MMORPG (zombies and humans, made by 1 person) dead to moderarion laws

The game offered a sandboxed world made of tiles where players could roleplay as zombies and humans - who were in a constant battle. Zombies could turn humans into other zombies, while humans could heal ("revify") zombies back to human form.

The game was simplistic with 50 action turn limit per day, but also fun.

Humans would barricade inside their buildings, collect weapons and healt kits + use radios to coordinate (or spam), while zombies usually just made attacks in big hordes coordinatee via external websites, forums or IRC.

The game was simple, but was increeibly impressive since it was done by just one person (Kevan), yet could host thousands of players at the same time.

Perhaps due to simplicity - the individual tiles probably used some event based system.

Here's a random video (which does not makr the game look impressive, but it was never about the graphics... also it had a peak around 2005 and then was just played by dedicated regulars).

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nNtX_t-ndGA

The censorship / moderation laws in UK mean that games like this cannot be done by one person anymore. I guess someone should always be watching what the chars are talking about. Tbh I always wondered if spies could talk in games to communicate with each other.

RIP urbandead. Playing as a new character who tried to find shelter was just fun. Even if the game had basically no graphics nor music.

Discussion (105 points, 13 days ago, 32 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43245147

Title is misspelled, should say “moderation”.

I recall now the shutdown of Nekochan.net, which had been the main hub and message board at the time for SGI retrocomputing for several decades, due to concerns about the GDPR. While that might have been an overwrought reaction, and that laws like the GDPR and the Online Safety Act _can_ be followed by a dutiful webmaster, I can't fault any webmasters who choose to throw in the towel when they look at the potential penalties for failing to do so quite right. FAANG and the like can of course make the investments in compliance.