What's that, Furcadia?

As I’ve been working on this website, coming up with ideas for stories, talking to people about what they do on Furcadia and securing interviews, it occurred to me that Furcadia has changed a lot over the past ten years. I’ve not been around Furcadia for nearly that long, (just four) so I asked Amfortas to tell me about his experiences on Furcadia. He was kind enough to sit down with me and lay out his experiences, thoughts, and opinions on how Furcadia has morphed to him, and to everyone else.

Amfortas began playing Furcadia back in 1997 when a real-life buddy of his talked him into using the game. They, like most people, came to Furcadia looking for a place to tell the story of a specific character. Not necessarily a furry character, either. As he put it, “A friend that I know IRL used to talk about it and how I should give it a try. Back then, RPing was a bigger thing on Furc (there was consent/storytelling RP and dice/D&D style RP). He was a consent RPer and our mutual love of storytelling led him to recommend it to me.

“I’d never even heard of Furries before I started using Furc, and even after being exposed to them, I never really dug the scene. For he and I, the storytelling was what kept us around.”

It’s not like Furcadia has stayed the same over the years, either. It has changed and evolved into what we now know. People have come, and gone. “In later years, when RPing started dying off, my friend abandoned Furc, but I stuck around to chat with all the other friends I’d made. Furc is, after all, not much more than a glorified chat program,”

I wanted to know what Amfortas’ specific opinions on how Furcadia had changed at the start of the interview I had with him. He had the following bits of information to pass along that offer an interesting insight into the evolution of a Furcadia player along with the game’s evolution itself.

“Furc, as a whole, has changed in the sense that it’s not as tightly nit a community as it used to be. With so many main maps now, people segregate themselves to a particular map and never leave to go anywhere else. Back when I first started playing, we’d be all over Furc, bouncing back and forth between Meo, Therio, and the IC-only Area (no one ever used the Jigsaw Joint for anything other than yiffing).”

From there the topic of conversation turned to the creators of Furcadia. The changes in Dragons Eye Productions are numerous; going from two staff members to eight full time staff members and several part time staff members.

“For those that run Furc, they seem to have become preoccupied, in recent years, with two things: money to fund Furc, and gaining new players. The money is an understandable thing, and for the most part I don’t hold that preoccupation against them.

“My real beef is with DEP’s obsession with gaining new players, while seeming to not care much about keeping the players they already have happy. Sometimes I think they must just figure that there’s no need to cater to the long-time users, because they think that if they haven’t lost us yet then they’re not going to lose us by ignoring what we want.”

His point about DEP trying frantically to gain new players made me wonder if he thought that an influx of new blood into the community was a bad thing. So, I asked him what he specifically thought about the new players.

“As far as the players, themselves, I don’t know they they’ve really changed very much beyond the the fact that when I first started playing Furc, there really didn’t seem to be very many furries around, and nowadays they’re really coming out of the woodwork.

“The only other difference is that now people seem to focus more on using Furc as a chat program and all the RPers have been shunted off to obscure corners of the world. Since I don’t RP anymore though, that doesn’t really bother me, and I don’t exactly have anything against furries either, so long as they don’t make the assumption that I’m one of them.”

This is a well known truth, too. Dreams have steadily become more popular, more and more drawing RolePlayers away from the main maps and into private domains that are more suited to the kind of Roleplay that they want.

There is a common thread of debate often propositioned on the Furcadia Forums. It centers around the idea of human avatars. The argument tends to quickly boil down to, “FURcadia is for Furries.” Amfortas had insight into this specific issue, and it actually has a good insight into the ideas of the rest of the Furry culture that might agree with the people who say, “FURcadia is for Furries”.

“I don’t have a problem with the idea of furries having a place to congregate, and Furc certainly seems like a logical choice for it, but the idea that it’s specifically “for furries” seems like some intolerant elitism. Furthermore, I think it runs counterproductive to the common furrie sentiment that they just want to be accepted by people. If you want to be accepted by non-furries, you shouldn’t alienate them.”

Naturally, our conversation eventually moved to the future of Furcadia. With a bit of humor, Amfortas popped off with what he’d like to see added to Furcadia next.

“That, my friend, is a long list. Spending as much time as I do on Furc, I come up with things, all the time, that I think should be added to the game, and I have trouble saying which idea I think should be implemented first. If I had to choose though, I’d say something needs to be added to make Furc more competitive among the other MMO communities out there, and that means a slicker interface with better graphics.

“A specific idea comes to mind, which I was toying with the other day: I think Furc needs a complete overhaul, with – and I mean no offense to the creators of the current artwork – a new set of default graphics (walls, floors, objects, avatars, ports, etc.) which people can use in place of the current ones, giving people the option to choose whether they want to run in “Classic mode” or “Sleek mode”

“I think that Furc’s current style and default graphics, and especially avatar movement, seems a bit dated and hokey, and as new avatars are released, it just makes the old ones seem more dated by comparison.

“Another thing that I think Furc needs to be seriously competitive with other MMOs is a real battle system. DEP can talk all they want about wanting Furc to be a friendly community, but the fact is that we’ve already chosen groups and segregated ourselves. Adding a battle system won’t hurt us anymore than we’ve already hurt ourselves, as a community, and it would go a long way towards attracting new users, as well as satisfying the current ones.”

That got me to thinking about the various different people who complain and criticize what is given to us, when it is given, and how it is handed out. I wondered if Amfortas happened to agree or disagree with the statement, “Furcadia is free and you should accept whatever DEP hands you,” and in typical fashion he handed out a multi-layered in-depth answer.

“I’ll agree that whatever DEP hands us is something to say “thank you” for, but that’s just because I have a certain amount of etiquette. I don’t mean to sound like an ingrate, but I think that the people who shout from the mountain tops that “we wouldn’t have Furcadia without DEP, so you should be grateful and shut you mouth” have a seriously skewed perspective. It’s worth noting that there wouldn’t be a Furcadia without the people that play it as well, and so I think DEP has a certain obligation to those players. As it is, most of the good stuff (though some of the bad, as well) that DEP comes up with is stuff that they expect us to pay for.

“Lets take the avatars, for example. Now, I myself, am really not too keen on any of the avatars that DEP’s come up with since NewFurc went up in ’99, but let’s be honest here. Dragons and Griffons (no matter how lame their “special” abilities) are way cooler than a lapine (which is, singlehandedly, the lamest and most annoying avatar to date).

“There seems to be a “if you want cool things, then pay us” mentality goin’ on. What about the people who’ve already bought stuff from DEP? Aren’t they staunch supporters? Don’t they deserve more incentive than a lame ass rabbit to keep playing Furc? Are the special [ed] abilities of a phoenix, dragon, or griffin supposed to entertain those people indefinitely, and thus shut them up forever? I hardly think so.

“Rather, I think DEP should come out with more free stuff to 1) Attract more users, 2) Pay back those people who’ve already been dumping money into Furc all along, and 3) As a thanks to long-time users who’ve stuck by DEP through the good and the bad; people who’re always counted among the total number of users whever DEP releases a “We’ve just reached XXXX number of users!! We’re more popular than ever!!” statement. Just because someone has used Furc for a long time does not mean that they’re completely satisfied with their Furc experience.

“I think that rather than talking so much like we’re all one big happy Furcadian family, DEP should be working towards making that a reality.”

When he mentioned that DEP should be giving more back to the players who’ve supported DEP for a while, I was reminded of the Hero Series avatars and how they were meant to be aimed specifically towards the older, more established Furcadia players.

“I’m all about it, but I’m disappointed that it’s going to be a pay feature. I’m suspicious of the fact that for a long time, DEP used to say that they were against gendered avatars, pointing fingers at the old game, DragonSpires, saying that gendered avatars only lead to sexual harassment. Now, personally, I never saw much logic behind that claim, because it’s easy enough to divine someone’s gender from their port or description, but DEP stuck by that explanation for a long time. Now, they’ve conveniently pulled an about-face on their stance and have decided to charge money for the service.

“It leaves me wondering if they really changed their mind about the effects of gendered avatars, coming to the same conclusion I reached long ago, or if they’re just willing to compromise their ideals for more money. Also, I think it’s kinda lame to offer people the choice of gender when creating a character, but making them pay extra for an avatar that reflects it.”

I decided to ask Amfortas about the Beekin program next, and this was the most interesting answer I’d heard from him so far.

“What beekin program? I was sitting in Mycroft’s, the other day, and a Welcomer wandered in with someone they were giving the tour to. I don’t quite recall what the Beekin said Mycroft’s was, but it was quite apparent that he had absolutely no idea that Mycroft’s was supposed to be a bar/restaurant. Quality control is seriously lacking if we’re trusting the Furcadian tour to be handled by people that have no idea about what they’re giving a tour of.”

To cap off the interview, I asked Amfortas what he thought about the HP community forum links being removed from the third-party section of the Furcadia Forums. As a long standing member of the HP forums, this wasn’t the first time he’d come under fire from DEP. The excuse of the forums not being “Family Friendly” left him with this to say:

“ I think that it wasn’t a legit reason. I think that the real reason was because the person who deleted the links (Emerald Flame) didn’t like the things that get said about DEP – herself, in particular – around the HP forums, being just another in long line of attacks against the HP boogeyman. “Family friendly” – I laugh at that excuse. HP fits the common mold of most any forum that isn’t zealously policed by those with a “can’t we all just get along?” attitude, and forums that get policed like that are few and far between. Generally, people know what they’re getting into when they visit HP. In fact, due to the way they’re talked about by those who act like HP is some sort of anti-DEP rebellion, most people visiting HP for the first time are expecting something much worse than what they actually get. Moreso, now that EF has done what she can to eliminate the links.”

As a final note to readers, Amfortas thought that he’d leave you all with the following thoughts on the Furcadia that was, that is, and that will be.

“ When it comes to the Furc that was, it’ll never be like that again, and the things that made it what is was is just something for old-timers to talk about when they get all misty. For the Furc that will be, I couldn’t tell you. Lamentable though it may be, I have no power over what DEP chooses to turn Furc into, and the best I can do is give suggestions where I think it needs work, or criticize where I think they’re going wrong. For the Furc that currently is, I’m one of those factionated people that I was talking about, and so I only know about the things pertaining to my particular corner of Furc. Anyone that hangs out there already knows what the current deal is for us, and anyone who doesn’t is probably disinterested in the Meovanni local news. When it comes to the current Furcadia, at large, there really isn’t much to talk about, other than what I’ve already said.”