Do not waste your time with this game. The admins consist of the owner and one other god who was allowed to keep his original character unlike all of the previous gods. The owner refuses to handle administrative issues , rather favoring the approach of allowing unfettered abusive behavior and the other admin is now of a mind to use his original character to harass players while utilizing his admin powers offensively against anyone who criticizes even if they are defending them. Thanks to that sort of lack of administration, I have been harassed by the primary troll on the game for actions which had absolutely nothing to do with me, but instead of rebuking said troll whom has ran off the majority of our existing playerbase, they would rather nuke players who do not approve of using the ooc chat channel to spout politically divisive troll arguments. If you do bother to try, whatever you do do not become a spawn, a cyclops, a dwarf or an orc. You will be the only active person in your city, or continent, and if you make the mistake i did and create a spawn the prominent troll will throw you out, as a newbie, and permanently enemy you in the city you must regularly visit or be severely handicapped and the gods will not help or enforce any sort of rules breaches . It is not worth it.

This game seemingly had potential in a past tense statement, because it has for a long time not been what it's advertisement portrays. While every mud owner and its small player base community ideally would like to advertise their game to attract new players, it seemingly doesn't accurately depict the problems with the mud making reviews rather biased and skewed .

The game ideally suggests that you can be an emperor, however what it doesn't tell you is while being such it turns into a second job requiring countless hours to pick up the slack for a coded system that is designed for the aide of about 10 active players per city. There being 9 cities, at a minimum that requires 90 players, this game's never seen over 20 at a time, so you're picking up the slack for that.

It indicates that you're able to join an order to serve a god. There are six gods to choose from, however four of them quit and the owner has refused to replace them for ten years now, so you're basically in an order by yourself.

It indicates you can be a guild head and learn wonderful skills, of those skills you can only have up to six and are subjected to being thrown out the guild from the guild head at their calling. There are about 16 guilds and of them about 70% quit years ago or are alternate characters to players mains to allow only their friends inside.

A lot of muds have an admin staff and then a player staff, here the admins are both, so therefore are biased on their decision making. If you're in the order of a certain 'role play god' they will not subject you to punishments as an admin, because they can't separate the difference of their admin duties from their character in game performances, so be beloved by their order. This becomes problematic when in game order wars are occurring, because gods abuse admin powers on mortals for the enemy order. The game owner himself is a coder, and doesn't provide role play with his order because he's too busy and finds his admins to be flawless in their privilege abuse. They all began as regular mortal character players and when turned into gods still had friends from before and simply couldn't separate the difference which ruined the game.

A lot of things on the game require coins to get done, such as buying items, ships, warmongering, running a city, donating to poor citizens, treasuries. A fully functional city as previously mentioned requiring about 10 active people would split this cost up, however when on one person it's roughly 80,000-120,000 per day to keep afloat at max capacity for some cities and the most common way to get money is to bash crystals in the game which give about 250 coins per five minutes or so. Those cities that have been funds about 10 years ago used a bug to duplicate money and a cargo system that's not even in the game anymore. They made anywhere between 200,000,000 coins and 1,000,000,000 coins..all of which aren't available to do in the game anymore and your new player to come will never see that much money unless an older player gives them some.

There is no PvP in the game what soever, hasn't been for about 8 years, for those seeking PvP it's nonexistent in the game. When you attempt to, you're instantly harassed by the admin's on the game and told not to. They encourage what they refer to as 'Role playing drama', which refers to a few shout matches, and a more weak person to attack a strong person to invoke a fight, stronger isn't allowed to attack more weak, and this can only occur once every 14 days.' Anything else is subjected to admin punishment, bannable offenses, etc etc, to ensure there isn't a lot of PvP, so players just adapted to play with no PvP.

Due to the games community being so small in player base a lot of the players have out of character emotions towards one another, makes for horrible roleplay. It's suppose to be a role playing game, but it's more like an AOL chat room where people can bicker at one another. Not many people actually play the game, instead they use it for in game baby making with the females, who use out of character methods to win over the admins and everyone else simply idles. Idling is when the character is online, but not there as a new player you will see 99.99% of people doing this, and it'll not provide you aide in any shape or form. You're pretty much on your own as a newbie.

Life as a new player is hard on this game. Most people will presume you're an alternate character from a previous account and expect you to just simply play that account or that you're up to no good. As I said before money making is really hard and comes to the point that the money isn't really useful unless you run a city, which there are only 9 to run, some are inactive emperors some aren't, but a newbie becoming one is unlikely. The game in itself as a newbie is very confusing because the maps are outdated, there is no real game website because the owner is too cheap to provide a detailed in depth one, instead it's designed many by old players that wanted to help newbies. The original website still has the things back from 1990s on it in 2017. There is a guide in the beginning, but he only helps you for the basics, once you are done with the basics and quests there's literally nothing left for a newbie to do. It's designed to then include your character into the story for role playing, but in a game that doesn't have role playing, pvp, lacks admins, has biased orders, inactive emperors and guild heads it's very hard to see what to make of an elysium life.

A lot of us as gamers who have been on games that have gone belly up can tell when it's time to find a new game, with potential and more promising future to invest our time. Games are suppose to be fun and provide that as such, this game doesn't do that. You'll learn quick through the admins and drama of players on the game and the idling that goes on that there's nothing to gain on Elysium. The owner has had several years to change and he won't, therefore the game won't, nor the direction in which it's going. 1000s of muds since the early days of mudding have come and gone, some are still on their last leg..this is simply one of those muds that are on its last leg. I wouldn't recommend this game if you're looking for a long term game to get into. The game owner here doesn't appreciate nor respect his players and as such slowly over the years has lost all of them but about 10. It's no coincidence that you will view through orders, guilds, cities a list of names that range into maybe 1000 or more player profiles, yet only 10 realistically remain 20 years later.

I have been playing Elysium for about 13 years.Never has this game disappointed.

With multiple races to choose from, 3 continents to live on, 9 cities to live in and endless skill combinations to acquire, Elysium doesn’t seem to ever lose my interest. The administration is regularly working to improve the game by adding new features, quests, and areas to explore. We the players own most everything that exists within the realm. We run the cities, we own the land and industries, we run the guilds where one learns skills, amongst many other things.

If you are looking for a new game and enjoy role-playing, come give Elysium a shot. You won’t be disappointed! If you come and give Elysium a try, please ask anyone online at the time for help with anything you may need.

I have been around the world of Elysium for some 14 years. All the time I have spent playing Elysium it has been very rewarding. The MUD constantly changes for the better as the administration continue to put hours and hours a day into building a better world for it's players.

In Elysium there is no limit. If you want to do something, do it, become whatever you wish to be, this MUD has no limits to what you can accomplish. The combat puts the action in your hands and you can tweak your character however you wish. There is nothing like it!

I have enjoyed playing in Elysium so much and felt I should let everyone else know about the realm and tell everyone about the great experience you will have in the realm. I hope to see everyone who reads this review there!

Thank you, Ace Luckstar

I'd simply like to say that, if you haven't at least tried Elysium, you're honestly missing out on a lot. I'm not going to tell you about the game, because Doogan and Vardonyth's reviews are very adequate descriptions, but I will say that this is, indeed, a game like no other out there. -Honestly, if there is something similar to this, please comment this review and tell me what it is.-

Like the other reviewers said, you're free to be who you want. If you're a Bard with kleptomaniac tendencies, then learn songs and thievery. There are no levels, no experience. It all boils down to lessons.

But the most important thing that will keep you in Elysium is the roleplaying. City politics, guild politics, friends, and enemies are what has kept me coming around for 9 years. If you've never played a game where you actually had an opinion about which city is the strongest, which Emperor is the greatest, or which God is the right-est (*grin*), then it's never too late to try Elysium.

As a tip for a new guy starting out, when you're done with the newbie academy, hit 'cwho' to see if there's anyone in your city online, and ask 'em some questions. I guarantee you, they're dying to answer.

Elysium has the potential to be a highly addictive mud. The mud has a large number of features that, when utilized, can help any new player gain a foothold, and basic understanding of the game.

The areas are all completely original, as are the mobs. Many of the players are friendly, and you have a 'newbie' flag to keep you from getting butchered right out of the gate as well.

The game over time has become, in my opinion, a great deal more forgiving, and you don't focus on basic survival as a new player anymore.

The Gods are motivated and work to create subplots within the game, but try to stay out of the way to a certain degree. The game is, for the most part, player run. The industries are run by the players, the cities are as well, and you even have to chop your own wood for building ships with.

The many unique features of Elysium are worth the time spent in-game. Speaking as someone that has floated from game to game over the years, I always find myself coming back to Elysium. It's hard to get away from a game so unique, and demanding.

Elysium is an excellent mud. I urge any new players reading this to disregard all previous reviews, as a great deal has changed and the most recent posts are either downright incorrect, written by players that have not played seriously in quite some time, or that just have no idea what they are talking about.

---Starting Out--- Elysium is 100% custom and is 100% free (you may pay to study offline, which will allow you to gain some lessons while not connected [see skills for a lesson explanation] but with a penalty). The 9 cities are completely player run (outside of some very minor Imm influence in the form of patroning), with one emperor and 8 positions (5 ministries and 3 helpers) for players.

The 15 guilds are completely player run. A large majority of them are auto-inguilding and most newbies will be able to join the guild of their choice right out of the gate. If a newbie knows their place, they will be helped openly when they ask questions. If they demand that people cart them around, or act improperly (like using IC globals for OOC chatting) they will irritate many of the veterans and probably not receive a whole lot of help. The main reason for this is not because we don’t want new players, but that there is a huge problem with alts and it seems that almost every newbie is just someone else’s alt.

---Skills--- There are numerous skills in the game (roughly 30, give or take a few) which you can mix and match as you wish. Many RP’ers will look down on folk that learn skills just because they are powerful or pick skills that have nothing to do with each other (for example, a thief-mage-warrior-bard-crafter) there are no restrictions on your set of 6 skills that you can learn. Each guild has 3 skills. You do not lose skills when you leave a guild (unless you purposely forget them). You can also learn skills out of guild (at +50% the lesson cost). Lessons are how you learn skills. You receive one lesson every 2.5 hours you are connected to the game. If you choose to study offline, you get one lesson every 6.66 hours while you are not connected. This may seem like a long time between lessons at first, but believe me—they come a lot faster than they seem, unless you are waiting for that last lesson to learn a skill—then it takes ages!

---The World--- The world is divided into 3 large continents housing the 9 cities. Occid, the northwestern continent, is home to the dwarves, goblins, and orcs. Orien, the northeastern continent, is home to the specter and the Cyclops. Polaris, the southern continent (and the largest) is home to humans, elves, hamakei, and spawn. Skilled mages can teleport between continents using magical artifacts, but most people will simply choose to sail, using a variety of ships. Sprinkled throughout the large ocean are several islands, some of which hold powerful items that will give you assistance, such as a necklace that gives you more hitpoints or a ring that will let you locate people or objects. You might choose to be a fisherman and make your money by sailing your trawler over the ocean and selling your catch to the city of your choice, but beware… as you travel the sea, you may encounter great sea serpents that are fiercely territorial, and will likely not appreciate your presence in their areas!

---Sins of the Past--- I’d like to point out that the administration has tightened the screws on the two huge complaints in the prior reviews: Aurora[good] and Silathis[evil]. This pair, a bit overzealous in the past, have been reigned in and very rarely act out, and even rarer is it that they are visible. Alaric[good] has seemingly disappeared, though his order is far from dead. The new law around the mud is Velarq[neutral], who isn’t really new but people are quickly learning that they need to follow rules. Many will call what she does harassment; but let me ask you this: If you broke a rule and got killed for it, and you broke the rule again, and got killed for it again, and you kept breaking rules and kept dying, would you consider this harassment? I wouldn’t—I would consider it stupidity on the rule-breaker’s part. She’s more lenient than I would be, were I an imm.

This review is already long enough, but has barely even scratched the surface of what Elysium is all about. The features are far too numerous to list here, but connect and give it a try, and you’ll find yourself quickly learning the ropes and all that this mud has to offer. It'll be worth your time.

I've been playing Elysium for awhile now and I'm still learning new things day by day. There are many things this MUD can offer to you as a player. You can own your own shop or guild, become the leader of a city, or become the head ranking member of your order. You could be an average citizen within Elysium and still have plenty of things to do, or live the life of a sailor and who knows, maybe discover new land. You don't need money to have a good time, it helps but isn't necessary. I've played 100 or so other MUD's and those don't even compare. I've tried leaving several times but I can't help but come back for more. Try it out, I'm sure you'll like it.