LitRPG Short Story from 1985?

Just finished pt1, not sure if its showing the log of what she chooses to do first, or if its showing her commands or expected commands: as she gets interrupted when trying to talk to the thief and make a move for the pack.

Its a bit of a confusing mechanic but the first example I've seen of commands or even game logs. A bit text input like, and with a better monetary system than RPO in just the first short part.

 

pt 2

"If log off now, Lunae will seek shelter and attempt to fight off attackers like a dim-witted robot programmed and operated by the computer. Her only real chance for survival is for her to find shelter under her own power."

Damn this is exactly how my own story works if I read this part right, her character is persistent, I call the offline mode "meta-mode" and haven't really started in on American LitRPG to know how many people use it. The LitRPG podcast had Luke Chmilenko as an author that used an offline system, but think in his interview he said it was limited and used mostly for tradeskilling so players didn't have to do stuff they didn't like / work a second a job to make it anywhere in VR.

Pt 2 dispensed with the log / command reports for the most part. Not sure if the first part was meant to establish a command system or just to establish that it was a game familiar to peeps in 1985.

 

Pt 3

"A strong scent of spices and vinegar drifted in from the kitchen. Judith smiled at the thought that Lunae's sensitivities were infecting her own. She had seen other kids mimic the dress and habits of their on-line characters. But she wasn't going to start carrying a dagger up her sleeve!"

God-father of Cosplay title to be awarded to Henry Melton?

(Yes I'm doing live updates as a I read 1985 LitRPG at 4am, sue me!)

"Barton Creek Mall had changed over the years. Judith didn't particularly like to shop there with her mother. It was a fun place if you went there with friends, but mothers were different. Most of the larger department stores had gone on-line and were gradually deserting the shopping malls. Sears and Penneys had left, leaving their areas subdivided into an Arabian maze of market stalls. The mall was the place to go to sample a dozen varieties of egg rolls, to buy hand-carved earrings, or to lose a few hours in a COMMANDER booth."

Holy balls this is straight out of Stealth of Nations: the Global rise of the Informal Economy by Robert Neuwirth and exactly what I based my Alt History mall system on. Rad to read this so many years earlier as just a logical course for things to take...

 

Pt 4
"
<MOVE LEFT FOOT FORWARD> It worked! <MOVE RIGHT FOOT FORWARD> She moved. Okay Simple actions only.
<MOVE LEFT FOOT FORWARD. MOVE RIGHT FOOT FORWARD. MOVE LEFT FOOT FORWARD. MOVE RIGHT FOOT FORWARD. MOVE LEFT FOOT FORWARD. MOVE RIGHT FOOT FORWARD. MOVE LEFT FOOT FORWARD. MOVE RIGHT FOOT FORWARD. MOVE LEFT FOOT FORWARD. MOVE RIGHT FOOT FORWARD. MOVE LEFT FOOT FORWARD. MOVE RIGHT FOOT FORWARD. MOVE LEFT FOOT FORWARD. MOVE RIGHT FOOT FORWARD>"

Its a command system now.

"No one who prowled this world could have any pretense of a moral position, but knowing what kind of person he was, it made it a little easier to do what she planned."

Damn this guy nailed MMOs and their players back in 85. His D&D group must have had some pieces of work.

"Lunae added some protective coloration. Her mouth slowly opened, and a trickle of spittle drooled out. Consciously, she checked every muscle to make sure it was relaxed. She made no effort to watch what he was doing, relying on her ears to place him."

She went full "horned lizard" with her camo lmao "I'm leaking!"

 

Pt 5

"This was supposed to be entertainment? She was feeling depressed."

MMO fatigue, the struggle is real.

"the end"

Guy did a better story in the space of most LitRPG kindle samples than most people do in a whole story.

 

Ask him what was his inspiration to write the story?

 

1. Did you feel in the mid 80s that an economic contraction was coming that would justify the diminished presence of major chain stores in Austin TX, was this based on personal experience with the city or just a hope on your part for a return to more "personal" shopping (in regards to hand made objects being sold in the bazaar / market stalls).

1 cont: Do you feel that the economic situation of the 80s drove the presence of Kiosks in malls and digital peer to peer sales and bartering like Craig's List and Ebay, and in spite of the (possibly forecasted) diminished economic output of US big business in the story, did you, then, still feel (& hope) that advanced gaming like the games from CATACOMB were coming or will come regardless?

1 cont: If you had personal experience with Austin, did you see it going further to centrist politics back at the time of the writing, and did that color your worlds economic situation? For example virtual part timers as the result of either protectionist or more internationally focused trade: how wrong/right do you feel you were?

1 cont: Do you think there are any parallels between virtual part timers and the more diffuse and anonymous ways of making a living today compared to the mid 80s (call centers, digital curating sites & news aggregators, lobbyists, blogging, food trucks, etc): is there a happy middle ground between traditional work and the modern scrabble that you would put in a story and not just as a setting to help expedite the story you want to tell?

2. Are you a gamer, or were you a gamer? Once a gamer always a gamer?

2 cont: The story doesn't explicitly describe just how the gaming experience worked, and there is a definite feed back and "delay" or lag in the commands that allows the players, and Judith specifically, to adapt: regardless of the game platform used, is a perfectly reactive game the end-game for players, or do you feel the classics (like Chess, D&D, and Asteroids) will have their place alongside the VR simulations or other perfectly reactive games of the future?

2 cont: Would you rather: navigate a virtual dark catacomb with only a glowstone and a bent sword where your characters death was permanent, or play a game with instant travel and character resurrection but with less game-play options and a focus on balance rather than constant vigilance.

2 cont: Can a fully immersive gaming experience satisfy all parties if one sided player vs player or monster confrontations are the norm? Would you say bringing friends and having player based resurrections in an otherwise hardcore game would be more of a saving grace for the fun of such a game? Or would mastering a harsh game universe on ones own be more in line with your idea of a good time?

2 cont: Can a balanced game world with fast and dirty fun be an economic vessel compared to a game where one really has to work and master a harsh environment: and just how protected do you think Virtual Barons should be in their virtual Fiefdoms? For hardcore or fast and fun game titles.

3. How exactly did you envision your game tech and game mechanics working back in 1985, how would you envision it working today? How far into the future would you have placed CATACOMBS at the time, or did you view it as more of an immediate jump forward in the same day and age: and Judith was just experiencing what you felt was going on in '85?

3 cont: Judith and her brother did data entry for their allowances, or just out of filial duty (and maybe fear of their father), is a networked home a happy home, or should parents (and kids) have their own secret partitions?

3 cont: in your game the operating company paid out the reward directly, would they pay from their cut while monopolizing item and gold sales between players as the central hub of the game, or would subscriptions / time-played fees provide the "pot"? Do player participation fees then keep the game company from becoming insolvent by scaling the game economy with their available resources, or would the game company just make available all of the players loot through the game system as he checked out, and allow other players to provide his payment as they skimmed money from the top and acted as the intermediary? The primary difference between the systems being that Tor beasts appeared because enough players (that paid) were present, and contributing to the game economy, making the game companies arbitrary pre-set buyout for items that the game company valued personally, possible: the other system is either fixed in the same way by prices being decided by the game company, but with no need of a constant reserve as players provide the real world currency themselves. (way more simply put: Where do you think the games profits come from? There are play time fees involved, but clearly there is a game "pot", is it like risk-sharing systems where everyone pays in and only the fortunate (unfortunate?) ever get their money back, or is it all player interactions with the game company getting gravy from game access and taking a cut from player sales?)

3 cont: would cryptocurrencies be more ideal in the short term for a modern gaming company that made payouts, that also needed a reserve of currency that would "grow" in value based on the health of their game and the money coming in which would further increase the currencies value? How do you think a game waning in popularity and with competing game currencies would fare when players started to "jump off" and cash out their chips, or just exchange them for a more popular games currency at a less favorable ratio to protect their investment in a growing market? If Games Crypto-currency trading (like stock trading) becomes a market unto itself with cascading effects (like with food speculation), could existential forces outside of a game companies control eventually ruin a perfectly healthy game and its economy? How much of a monopoly should game makers have over their creations and the profits from their creations... and how much control should players have over the fruits of their own labor: as the interests of part timers and the interests of the game owners are out of alignment in the scenario where any temporary game "recession" could cause a bank-run scenario. Do your sympathies lie with the gamers or the game owners and designers? (this is a kill the golden goose sort of question I guess)

4. Can a writer do anything other than tell their audience, "This is how it works" and jump in, or does establishing as much of a worlds backstory as possible help you to make the decision of what to tell the audience and when to tell them? Are good writers magicians with an infinite amount of rabbits, or are they illusionists with one rabbit and finite options for misdirection? Who do you consider good/great writers?

5. Would you consider revisiting Judith and the thief, or are you happy with where you left their characters in 1985? Would Judith be impressed by our technology in 2017?

6. Would you consider doing a more modern story based on a game or game culture?

7. Do you prefer your serial work or novel writing, how many of your outlines / concepts ever make it to paper, and what do you feel is your best personal work.

7 cont: is your best personal work your most commerrcially successful? (feel bad asking something like this because I just browsed over his web-pages links, your call Paul!)

all I got for now. I don't have a perfect memory so just went off the details I recalled, hopefully I don't put egg on my face if you ask something and it was actually in the story and I just missed it...

 

Looking forward to the result! Wonder how many more gems like this will pop up the more popular the genre becomes. I wouldn't be surprised if there were some Japanese 80s game stories out there...