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We currently live in the period where some MMO-RPGs (Massive multiplayer online - Role playing games) dominate the gaming era. These titles include the all too famous World of Warcraft, Hellgate: London and even the amusing MapleStory. However, if any gamer were to perhaps spend some time investigating the origins of these genre of games, he would probably find out about one of the earliest kinds of RPGs ever invented, MUDs, which is exactly what Imperian is.

MUD refers to Multi-User Dungeon, or more recently, Multi-User Dimension. In a nutshell, imagine you are playing an RPG based on text, with no graphics at all. The text-driven game is identical to any RPGs in terms of gameplay, allowing you to interact with other players, objects, events as well as non-player characters in a typically fantasy world. Since having appeared in 1977, MUDs have evolved into the more popular graphic games that are so common these days, however, a market still exists for MUD players today. The successful company behind Imperian, Iron Realms, owns 3 other similiar MUDs, with a new graphical RPG in the making as well.

The first impressions of a text-based game would be, “That’s so shallow! What can I do in it, what’s the fun of not being able to see anything?” On the contrary, Imperian offers depth and an immersing environment. Within the game, world which you can explore in is huge, numbering to over ten thousand rooms to roam about, with intricate political system based on the concept of role-playing, as well as a complicated combat system. The combat system is structured in such a way that a newer character, if he knows what he is supposed to do, could easily defeat an aged and experienced character within the game, making the focus on individual skill rather than the quality of equipment your character carries, cropping the advantage the older players would be expected to have.

However, the complicated systems and the compulsory rule for role-playing within the game causes the learning curve for Imperian to become extremely steep. Newer players would find themselves easily overwhelmed and find the complicated gameplay hard to understand at first, as well as being unable to adapt to the role-playing requirements of the game. In addition to that, despite Imperian being free to play, the game uses a skill system where you need to gain lessons in order to learn such skills. Only a very limited number of lessons will be provided for you as you progress within the game, so in order to make the fullest of your character, you would need to spend a considerable sum of money on the game to purchase “credits”, which you use to convert into lessons to learn all of your skills.

Despite the steep learning curve for combat, as requiring a decent monetary capital in order to be able to fully enjoy all aspects of the game, Imperian serves as an addictive game which will simply draw you in for more once you get the hang of things. It is not surprising that some of the players describe the game as being “more addictive than drugs”.

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