Multiplayer Uru

Archived from groups: alt.games.myst (More info?)

Okay, I know that Cyan has officially thrown in the towel on their
online community version of Uru. Damned shame. I'm sure they were
just too overloaded with... well, data I guess.

Still... it would be nice to get SOME form of multi user capability
working. So, here's my idea. See what you think;

I'm sure there's a LOT more to hooking up two players than there was
back in '93-'94 when Doom became 4-player capable via modem. But
still, I think it would be worth the effort to implement something
similar.

Two people with Uru installed want to play simultaneously, so they
decide which of their machines has more muscle, and that one becomes
the "server" machine that handles the stuff that Cyan's servers were
supposed to maintain beyond the simple "Player A is at these
coordinates and Player B is over here" stuff.

It could maybe even be possible to save an Age's state (this bridge is
up/down, the water cannon is pointed at this angle, the location of
each and every kickable item, like the orange DRC cones) on the
"server" machine at the end of play.

This way, up to, say, 8 people could play cooperatively. They could
either converse with one another about how to tackle the current
puzzle, or take "vacation photos" with their KI. (Are KI screen grabs
currently accessible for use as wallpapers and such?)

Anyway, if Cyan is willing to try, I'd like to seem them try to
re-implement the multiplayer capability, even in this sort of limited
style.

Dennis