1. THEME
Medieval/fantasty

2. FOCUS OF THE MUD
Optional roleplay, optional PK, exploring, hack'n'slash, quests,
character development, politics... Most focuses covered.

3. FEATURES AND QUALITIES

- The original SMAUG MUD running a currently exclusive codebase
- Code constantly being modified/added to
- 13 in-game races, 13 in-game classes including one pk-only class and Barbarians
- Clans, Orders, Guilds, Nations for players to join and associate with other players
- Optional roleplay with player-run Nations
- Optional pkilling with player-run Clans (Immortal aided)
- In-game quests and Immortal-run quests for glory
- "Hero" system awarded to outstanding players each year
- Multiplaying permitted
- Player-composed Newbie Council designed to assist new players with any needs
- Player-composed Symposium council designed to propose player's ideas to the Immortals
- Player-composed PKill Conclave designed to further the "Deadly" side of the game
- Over 150 original, exclusive areas totalling to over 20,000 rooms

4. STATUS
Open since 1995, realms.game.org:4000

Realms of Despair has always been, and will always be 100% free and will never ask for donations.

Adventures Unlimited
telnet: tharel.net port 5005
website:

1. Theme: medieval fantasy

2. FOCUS OF THE MUD : Roleplay encouraged/ borderline enforced

3. FEATURES AND QUALITIES :
- Religious system with tracked advancement (highly rp oriented)
- Political system in the main city of Naerlan with monthly elections for Mayor, Sheriff and Deputy Mayor
- Nobility system with customizable manor houses and other benefits.
- Mostly original world with over 80% original rooms built exclusively for the land of Tharel
- Days of Redemption competition every other month between clans for control of the bank taxes.
- Original dream system with over 100 unique dreams.
- Multiple quest systems - automated, soul collecting and mob list quests.
- Regular updates to the codebase.
- Dedicated longterm staff and players

4. STATUS: Open since December 1998, fully functional.
telnet: tharel.net port 5005
website:

Serene, while you are free to advertise whichever MUD you wish - please do so in the right place. Icesus sells perks for money and therefor really has no place in this particular thread. Thank you.

Oh, I apologize, I didn't mean to advertise. I was just saying that altho it does have the organization you can join and get the perks you can get the same perks by a little hard work sometimes too such as typo and bug reports, ideas and area coding if you know how. Of course it takes a bit longer but you are still able to get the same thing for free.

That still doesn't change the fact that they are selling perks for money, Serene.
And this list was specifically created to promote high quality Muds that don't.

Here are the criteria and the updated list again:

CRITERIA
1. No in game advantages are sold by the Administrators for RL money
2. The mud is fully operational and well established
3. The mud has qualities that distinguish it from the large mass of mostly-stock muds

ESTABLISHED FREE QUALITY MUDS
4 Dimensions - 4dimensions.org:6000 -
Aabahran - 216.136.9.8:1848 -
Abandoned Realms - 204.209.44.8:9000 -
Accursed Lands - 66.249.19.206:8000 -
Adventures Unlimited - tharel.net:5005 -
Arcticmud - mud.arctic.org:2700 -
Armageddon - ginka.armageddon.org:4050 -
Avendar - avendar.com:9999 -
Awakened Worlds - awakenedworlds.net:4000 -
Carrion Fields - carrionfields.com:9999 -
Clandestine - mud.clandestinemud.com:9476 -
Discworld - discworld.atuin.net:23 -
Dimension 2 - asj.mudmagic.com:6666 -
Everwar - everwar.dune.net:4242 -
Harshlands - muddled.harshlands.net:5555 -
Legendmud - legendmud.org:9999 -
Medieval Times - mud.lordtrox.com:8500 -
MUME - mume.pvv.org:23 -
New Worlds - -
Realms of Despair - realms.game.org:4000 -
Resident Evil:Outbreak - tyro.genesismuds.com:5300 - ?
Shadows of Isildur - middle-earth.us:23 -
Shattered Kingdoms - mud.shatteredkingdoms.org:1996 -
Sloth mud - slothmud.org:6101 -
The Dragon's Den - dden.discordia.org:2222 -
The secret of Atlas - atlasmud.com:4445 -
Wheel of Time MUD - 207.234.147.46:2222 -
Unwritten legends - -
Zebedee - -


UPCOMING FREE QUALITY MUDS IN ALPHA OR BETA TESTING
Godwars II - godwars2.com:3000 -
Resident Evil: Reincarnate - zombies.servebeer.com: 8428 - URL?

Three things about RE: R -

I think Resident Evil: Outbreak is not a MUD any longer, if it ever was.

Due to feeling too restricted by sticking to the Resident Evil world(and since we are still in alpha, and such changes are manageable), we've decided to change the name and theme of our Survival Horror RPG; with George A. Romero's blessings, we're renaming it to "World of the Dead: Survival RPG" or "World of the Dead". Just thought I'd shoot you some updated information - thanks for posting the list again!

The website's still not posted until we release for open-testing, though the server (zombies.servebeer) is still the same.

Information for .Dimension 2, sorry it took me a while to post this, I'm less directly involved with this specific EdgeE project;


1. THEME: Amalgamation of Final Fantasy, .Hack, and Diablo gameplay

2. FOCUS OF THE MUD: Hack 'n Slash, Mini-games, Popular Gameplay

3. FEATURES AND QUALITIES:

- 100 Levels, with 240 areas comprising monsters, champions, uniques, super uniques, and an End Boss.
-A balanced, classless system with few boundaries.
-All original spells from 8 elemental spheres.
-A unique system for emmerging equipment with over 4 million randomly generated possiblities.
-Face nearly one thousand different monsters, ranging from various elemental spheres and classes.
-Many 'mini-games' and collectible items including monster cards for every single monster in the game.
-Unique AI 'simulated players' called Locales that adventure along side of you. Trade with 'em, group with 'em and even play cards!
-An equipment based system. Equipment can do anything from causing fire elemental damage to leeching life.
-24 different limit breaks and the ability to hack and datadrain mobs make combat anything but boring.

4. STATUS: .Dimension(2003, closed), .Dimension 2(2006, open)
Telnet: asj.mudmagic.com:6666
Website: (Re-opening Soon)

AVATAR Mud is also free

Carrion Fields
telnet: carrionfields.com port 9999
website:

1. Theme: Medieval fantasy.

2. FOCUS OF THE MUD : Roleplaying and PvP.

3. FEATURES AND QUALITIES:
- Finely-tuned PvP and PvE combat with a large variety among characters. Race/class-based character generation where every choice is viable and offers a unique set of advantages and disadvantages.
- Enforced roleplay with player-run organizations (cabals, thieves' guilds, more), religions, and ongoing quests and stories. All characters eventually die, meaning leadership positions rotate frequently and can be earned by new players.
- A huge world comprised entirely of areas written expressly for Carrion Fields. Hundreds of automated quests ranging from those aimed at new players, to those that remain fully or partially unsolved to this day.
- Diverse experience-based advancement system incorporating combat, quests, roleplay, commerce, exploration, observation, skill advancement, and more.
- Highly interactive staff of 30+ members, all of whom (except the founder) were recruited from the playerbase, with over 200 years of collective experience as staff and even more as players. Rewards for exceptional RP are given out every day, ranging from small boosts of experience or recognition up through skills custom-coded for the rewardee.
- A high level of challenge well-suited for keeping the interest of the most veteran player. A deep help system (both automated and staff-run) to help you get there.
- Code and areas are typically updated every day in some fashion. Development has not slept during our 12+ years of operation.

4. STATUS: Open since April 1994, fully functional.

Dragonball Evolution

1. THEME
Dragonball

2. FOCUS OF THE MUD
PK, Questing and Roleplaying

3. FEATURES AND QUALITIES

*17 unique races
*Over 100 skills to learn that can upgrade as you level and transformation
*Fast paced PK system that has multiple PK zones and rewards
*Original Questmaster system
*Over 50 other quests that involve multiple steps to complete
*Almost unlimited amount of levels to gain
*Over 12,000 original rooms that spread across 7 planets, heaven, hell and outer space
*An advanced scouter system
*Gambling that includes slot machines, craps, ring toss and the squirt gun game
*Pet system that is similar to the way it's done in Pokemon
*Unique inventory system
*Multiple types of bonus gains earned from fighting and using your skills
*Unique sparring system
*And a list of equipment so large that you WILL find a set you love

4. STATUS
Opened in July of 2002 and planned to stay open for well over 10 years. Currently the longest running Dragonball MUD online and it will stay that way.

Address: raider.mudmagic.com
Port: 1874
Website: