Cantr's birth

[Lone Wolf]

Okay I've heard how cantr started as a game that was played in the basement with Lego's But who's idea was it to start keeping track of things and such.

The only reason I ask, is that I've seen many many RPG games and MMORPG games, and they just can't compare to this, I don't care if they have the coolest graphics in the world. The fact that in this game you can do almost anything makes it so much better. I'm just wondering who was responcilbe for the birth of Cantr?


Also roughly when was Cantr started...Month..day..year lol
I think we should hold a Birthday party for this great game

[nitefyre]

Cantr is timeless. =D Apart from time freezings and relapses.

I dunno the answer.

[Lone Wolf]

Cantr is timeless. =D Apart from time freezings and relapses.

I dunno the answer.

Yeah I know about the time freezes, I was around back when it would go down for a month, and way before the time limit was added


But thanks for the help Nitefyre lol

[rklenseth]

Cantr was created by Jos Elkink to continue a game created by him and his friends back when they were young that involved legos. Cantr I was a play by e-mail game that from what I heard never really took off but then Jos learned html, databases etc... and he then created Cantr II and as you have seen has taken off. Still a small game in comparison to other online games that have thousands of people playing but we have a few hundred dedicated players and growing and that is enough.

But if you want a true accounting of what really happened then your best bet would to get it from Jos.

[creepyguyinblack]

I started around turn 30 or 40 of Cantr II when hopping around the web looking for free online games almost two years ago. Been hooked every since and have also infected a few others with the cantr plague, including my roommate Cosmo, and then his brother Ryan.
The early days were weird. Few people, few projects, no weapons, violence or even talking to someone specifically. I doubt I had more than a few characters at a time the first few months too so I didn't see alot of the world, two of my first chars ended up in the Knatr Mountains so I thought it was a major location but it was just an isolated cesspool, heh.

[Bran-Muffin]

Blojt, first town i was ever in around the 200 era, thought that place was a major location. Look at the cesspool it is today though

[west]

It's a nice cesspool. Or was when I left. >_<

[Lone Wolf]

I know about Cantr II and Cantr I, what I was hoping is that if someone knew or if JOS would look on this thread, he could tell us how he and his friends started it in the basement


The reason I ask is because some friends and I had started something similar with little minitures that we would paint and we even started to mold them oursleves, but once we had 6 people in total it slowly fell apart, because of one friend who moved and others always wanted to introduce things into the game and if they didn't get it, they trew a fit.

[Jos Elkink]

It's funny how stories change ... who ever mentioned a basement?

In any case, Cantr II is indeed based on our lego game, as is probably well known. Did you read the background story that is online? It gives a lot of answers, I think. This description, I mean.

The starting date is, for as far as I can remember, October 17, 2001. First only me, then my mother and Sico and some others, then Wim, and then the first strangers ... Of which TJ is one of the first. My mother quit playing soon enough ... Especially after I explained to her that violence really has to be implemented .

Knatr was actually a key location, one of the four initial spawning locations. But it was a horrible place to get spawned, so I removed it from the spawning locations later on. Most people there died in the mountains and I had one char for a long time, who then travelled all the way to Naron, only to be then killed when the Lad Empire attacked Naron. Poor guy .

Well, read the description I gave you the link to, and tell me if you still have questions about the origins of Cantr. I'm always willing to rant about it ... But before becoming too repetitive, it would be nice to have a more specific question .

[Jos Elkink]

Ah, now I see your question more specifically ... Again that basement ... alas

First of all, it was not too many people that were involved. It was essentially me and Sico, with a lot of times also his younger sister, and sometimes my younger brother. And later on another of my friends got involved sporadically. But the key group was only three people and we had a sort of informal rule that we could play whenever at least Sico and I were present ...

How did it start? First we just had our town. And we built nice buildings for ourselves etc. Then we decided that is was too easy, and we introduced monopoly money so that you had to pay for what you did. Now, the really key thing was that we did not give each player monopoly money, but each character. We thought that was logical and didn't give it any second thought, but looking back that was really the key thing and that is really what is missing in stories I hear from other people who played similar games with friends. So we had a bookshelf full of little piles of banknotes, with little notes on them with the name of the owner - the character.

Over time we created more and more requirements. E.g. you had to pay for services, for building permits, for traffic fines, for ... whatever. But the starting point was that we were thinking from the characters and not from the players (which many, many years later evolved into the 'capital rule' of Cantr II). We didn't have a 'capital rule', but a clear implicit understanding about this, which we never thought of as being a very important issue. It was obvious, most of the time ... But now I think it is what forms the basis for what makes Cantr cool ...

And who came up with that idea? I don't know - either Sico or me ... or both. Perhaps Sico can remember, his memory is much better than mine ...

[Lone Wolf]

yeah we did have money, the problem that we had, and that you didn't have, was the "Understanding" of certain rules. I mean there were many fights because of our game and it was finally ended.

The other part was the characters, I mean we got to create thier look, so one friend painted a suit of armor on on of his char's and said it was "he could not be hurt because it was made of a rare metal" This kind of thing is what caused the violent fights. Most of which I won

Thanks Jos for the information. But one other thing....Do you remember approx. when you started the lego based game?


I have to say this game has come a long way, I mean we may not have traffic fines, but we are evolving slowly. Some towns faster than others.

[Jos Elkink]

Yes, I think an important part was simply that Sico and I really like very similar kind of games. Which is why we like the same game still, twenty or so years later ...

When we started our lego game? Hmm. I can't remember life without it ... A long time ago. Perhaps Sico knows. Introduction of money / society was a bit later, of course, but at least way before we had any clue what a bank did etc. ... But we could read/write of course. I don't really know. When Sico's family moved, we restarted our game, and I think we played that one city for about 10 years or so. One history line - we even had history books. Now, we only have the notes left - several boxes full of notes ... Really cool to browse through now (which is the original reason for our no-note-destruction-policy in Cantr, but I think we'll abolish that one soon).

Cantr is, although based on our lego game, quite different. For one, we did not have the whole medieval kind of feeling - we had cars, helicopters, computers, satelites, submarines (which were very annoying ...), etc. We tried to simulate a more contemporary society. With Cantr, that is also the intention, but it takes much, much longer because it has to look a bit natural ... But we'll get there, eventually ... I think Cantr will look completely different years from now, even though it will be the same history line. I'm quite looking forward to that ...

[RyceLandeer]

Cantr was created on my birthday!

[Lone Wolf]

"no-note-destruction-policy "

Dont get rid of that Maybe we could have an option to make a note that can or can not be destroyed. The reason being is when my chars get into a town where there are notes on the past of the town or a person, I like to read them. It would be good for history of the Cantr World.

I would love to see some of these notes you got lol, I think it would be good to see who this great game started off like.

I agree that in years to come things will look a lot different, it already does. When I first started playing, the game had no time limit, you could dig iron and steel. But that is only the programing changes. However if you look at the towns. The first town I was ever spawned in was Krif. It was a real nice place to live, and you didn't have to wait 2 min. to open the activities page. Then there was Siom, where I had a char, that many seem to remember, John Boy. Both towns have changed over the long time that I wasn't able to play. Both for good and bad. I can't wait to see what it looks like in another 5 years

[Jos Elkink]

notes you got lol, I think it would be good to see who this great game started off like.

They're scanned, so it would be easy to upload some, but ... they're all in Dutch ...