| A Tale in the Desert | |
| Publisher: | Desert Nomad Studios |
| Released: | Tale 1: 2003 Tale 2: 2004 Tale 3: 2006 Tale 4: 2008 Tale 5: 2010 Tale 6: 2011 Tale 7: 2015 Tale 8: 2018 Tale 9: 2019 Tale 10: 2021 Tale 11: 2023 |
| Genre: | MMORPG |
| Modes: | Multiplayer |
| Platforms: | Windows, Linux, Mac |
A Tale in the Desert (ATITD) is a massively multiplayer online roleplaying game (MMORPG) set in Ancient Egypt. The initial software download and all new content are free, with a monthly subscription required to play beyond the first 24 hours.
During the 7th Annual Interactive Achievement Awards, the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences nominated A Tale in the Desert for "Massively Mutliplayer/Persistent World Game of the Year".[1]
A Tale in the Desert is a social MMORPG which does not include combat. Instead, a variety of social activities provide for the basis of most interaction in the game. The game's main focuses are building, community, research and personal or group challenges called "Tests". ATITD has a global foregame, midgame, and endgame: on average so far, every year and a half the game ends, achievements are tabulated, and a new "Telling" begins, with certain modifications requested by the player base, or by arbitrary developer choice. To be clear about this, the game actually ends; a wipe is performed, and the game (and all players) start from scratch using the mechanism that it is now a couple of player generations removed. Within a Telling, players can write, introduce, and pass laws (including player bans), and make feature requests.
There is an in-game economy, including an amount of regional or global trade; however, there is no official, backed currency. Players can mint their own currencies but these have never had widespread adoption. Additionally, there are sufficient activities to be learned and performed that it is considered exceedingly difficult to be a Jack of all trades: this too leads itself to a much more social aspect.
A recurring theme is a "welcoming island" which established players can enter at any time: this allows them to train new players at their own leisure, and introduce them to the specifics of the game. After completing a series of tasks given to them, players may make their way to the mainland and begin the real game.
When a new player exits the welcoming island into mainland Egypt, they may immediately begin trekking around to look for a suitable settlement location or community. Upon reaching the mainland, the first goal of most players is to begin the central challenges of the game (Tests), find public resources, and expand upon what knowledge they have while integrating themselves into the community at large.
ATITD has a legal system, a controlled variant on Nomic which is generally restricted by what the developers can code, as well as the nature of such a system. With the legal system, players have the option to create petitions of any kind, like the redistribution of expired accounts' materials, the direct ban of a player, or even a change in an avatar's sex. The legal system as currently defined can only restrict players' options, alter ownership rights, or change a minor portion of a challenge; however, within those options, the possibilities have not been exhausted. Finally, the legal system also requires a great deal of cooperation between players, as a petition must be spread, signed, and returned with a certain threshold of signatures.
This game has no physical combat system, however, the psychological combat of social PVP can be very intense. While players do not engage in direct combat, the social tests in the game (many of which require community votes) encourage social combat which encourages the best and worst social behavior in players. More than one player has wondered (correctly) if this game is a sociology experiment in progress.
The majority of ATITD challenges take the form of 56 defined "Tests", separated into several groups. Of these, the first in each group is a trivial request, intended to introduce players to the discipline - the group that challenge is in. Beyond those initiations, seven challenges exist for each discipline, arranged into themes:
Upon completing a Test, a player advances in rank for that discipline. The various ranks range from Initiate to Oracle, and determine one's proficiency in the discipline. At the Oracle rank, where the player has completed all seven Tests, they may build a Monument to celebrate that discipline. Furthermore, if 127 disciples are found to take part in it, the players may create a challenge for the next Telling, to replace one of those used before.
The ultimate goal of the game, therefore, can be summed up as "having enough players cooperate and complete the Tests for every discipline so that seven Monuments can be built before the end".
The First Telling was released on February 15, 2003, after approximately three years of open testing. While considered to have more bugs than the others, it also had a tight-knit community, formed in part by the crossover of various guilds during the beta. So far, this is the only Telling to have "won" the game, by completing the main challenges; it lasted approximately one and a half years, and ended on September 2, 2004.
Kemet was a German server running concurrently with the first Telling, although released on February 1, 2003: while the international version was produced solely by eGenesis, much of the work on Kemet was done by MDO Games, an overseas publisher.[3] Ultimately, due to the extremely low population of the version, it was dropped for the second incarnation, but the result carried over into the next international version. Additionally, the majority of MDO's translations from English to German were kept. Kemet ended at the same time as the first international Telling.
The Second Telling began on September 3, 2004, with a host of changes: one new challenge was released for each discipline to replace an old one, over the course of the game, as well as a second test for the discipline of Worship. This Telling implemented changes to various technologies from the first, as well as an overhaul of the GUI; a different tutorial for newcomers replaced the old midway through. The players did not manage to complete the challenges in the second Telling, but did finish Monuments for the disciplines of Architecture, Body, Leadership, and Worship. The Telling ended on May 24, 2006, roughly 627 days after its inception.
The Third Telling, released on approximately May 30, 2006. A relatively loose leveling system was added as a means to connect with gamers who are more familiar with mainstream MMORPG design. The Discipline of Conflict was dropped in favor of a new discipline, the Discipline of Harmony. Mining was returned to something more like the first tale, but with its own mysterious workings. The Test of Mentorship was modified to fix an issue that made it more challenging for those who began to play late in the tale. Additionally, an in-game event calendar was added, so that developers and players could more easily communicate events without the need for a third party website. A player named Orchid received Oracle of Seven (finished all seven tests of every type) and was first to do so. The Telling ended on December 11, 2008, roughly 926 days after its inception.
The Fourth Telling was released on December 13, 2008.[4] New graphics were introduced and the user interface was updated.
eGenesis launched a second shard, called Bastet, on February 20, 2010[5] This server ran concurrent with the main shard for the fourth telling, and used most of the same code, but with the exception that all of the tests were unlockable immediately - thus making the speed of this tale completely player-controlled.
The Fifth Telling was released on August 7, 2010.
The Sixth Telling was released on December 3, 2011.
In early 2014, Pluribus Games, took over ongoing development and operation of ATITD. The game at this point remained basically the version as defined by the prior ownership. From a player perspective, no gameplay changes were felt until the next telling.
The Seventh Telling was released on September 11, 2015. From a player perspective, the game changed ownership with this telling. All Tests from past and current Tellings were made available, as opposed to only seven per discipline, and seven new challenges were added.
The Eighth Telling began on March 2, 2018, and ended on August 30, 2019. The game changed ownership to player-run Desert Nomad Studios.
The Ninth Telling started on August 30, 2019, and ended on May 25, 2021. Levels (reached by passing tests and principles) were replaced by experience points, earned by using crafting skills. The telling also introduced talents: specializations ("soft classes") that let the player spend talent points (earned by doings tasks and tests) on stat bonuses and special abilities. For example, The Weaver received bonuses to endurance, focus and dexterity and one of its traits was "Offline Flax: Adds the ability to gather flax offline".
The Tenth Telling started on May 29, 2021.
Because of the social aspect of A Tale in the Desert, players tend to react more strongly to events which break or strain social mores, even when these events are introduced by the developers rather than rogue players. Because, in the legal system, players can implement punishments or bans against others, the effect is most often caused by characters played by eGenesis staff. Some examples include: