Though I've only been playing on TI for two and a half months as of the writing of this review, I can say with full sincerity that this is one of the best MUDs I've ever played on.

I've been mudding for about 7 or 8 years now. I've been RPing a lot longer. And the moment I found TI, I realized that this is the exact sort of MUD I've been looking for all this time.

The RP is phenomenal. Though writing styles and abilities have a fairly drastic sort of range, I think in all this time I've been playing so far, I've only come across one IC interaction where I felt so uninspired that I made up some excuse to leave the scene. Here, I feel like I'm actually writing quality stories with people as opposed to pouring my heart and soul into a pose and getting some one line 'say' in return.

The crafting is the most in-depth I've ever seen. I spend far too much time crafting. I sometimes just log in simply to craft while I'm watching a movie IRL because I want something fun to do in the background and I'm like OH HEY. LET'S GO CRAFT SOME MORE SHIT.

The theme is great. The lore is extensive. There's over 1000 helpfiles, though, so I would definitely say there is a learning curve. But most of the older players are help- ful. I say most, but definitely not all. I think within my first week, I just stopped using 'visnet' (the OOC help channel) altogether as I got tired of oldbies chiming in with really scathing replies to my newbie questions. I now use it very rarely as I prefer to just ask those oldbies who I know to be nice and helpful my various questions in private.

The staff is very helpful and responsive as well. I've seen some oldbies complaining about staff fairly regularly... which leads me to believe these oldbies have limited experience with other MUDs and the sorts of staff that can be found there. I've played on MUDs where the staff got their jollies off on just killing people without rhyme or reason or trying to seduce all the female players for mudsex, etc. The eyeroll-inducing shenanigans are endless, but I've yet to see a staff member on TI do anything that would make me consider leaving the game.

They've always been very quick to respond to my problems or concerns. Everything ranging from a, 'Oh shit. I just destroyed my entire keyring full of really important keys. Is there a way to get that back?' to a three page private message (known as a 'pboard' here) that I once sent with some concerns I had for a certain issue within the game. On any other MUD, I would have expected a message like that to have gone unread and unconsidered. But on TI, it was taken into account.

Is TI perfect? No. But, honestly, most of what I would offer up as imperfections have to deal with other players as opposed to anything having to do with TI itself. But if you're looking for a RPI with a setting perfect for writing really deep stories that has a little bit of everything from combat (which I know little about; I play a non-combatant) to crafting to religion to class politics, to medieval plotting and intrigue, to DRUGS AND CODED ADDICTION, then I would definitely consider giving TI a try :)