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pretty much it. Now, of course, if you use the same description over and over again, you're asking for your players to grouse about it and, perhaps, lose interest in the game, so you have to keep it relatively unique for each new place they visit.

Environment can be the most difficult thing to do, but you can actually take a look at MMORPGs such as World of Warcraft to see the best way to describe your environments. "Jimmy and Susan, likley brother and sister, are running along the dock in Lakeshire. Susan has her long blond hair tied with three bows, and Jimmy is trying with all his power to take those bows from her hair.

"Along the lake shore the water gently glistens as light from the dusking sun gives the water life. A light misting begins as you cross the bridge from the far side of the lake, although the clouds seem to be light enough, and you know you will need to be inside, soon, or your armor will begin to rust." Again, your environment is full of action and description; just as structures build on terrain, so too does environment build upon structures.

In the previous paragraph, I used Jimmy and Susan, who would obviously be NPCs (non-player characters) to help describe the environment. The action of Jimmy trying to pull his sister's hair-ties out is part of the environment, but in order to describe it, I had to use NPCs as active parts, and in this case they are more a product of the environment in your game than interactives, which is the primary definition of an NPC, 'someone or something to interact with'. Admit it, you're not going to be able to get Jimmy to stop long enough to pay attention to you to get information, and Susan is too busy running from Jimmy to care what you want, so they become non-interactive environment pieces. Finally, I used the device of the kids running from you, and down the dock, to draw your attention to the water of the lake, so I could provide that description for you.

As previously stated, NPCs are parts of the world you can have a direct, give and take, interaction with; whether they are enemies you must vanquish or a local leader with information for you, any interactive thing, animal, monster, or person within the game is an NPC. These are the most active portions of the world, and what will have the most effect on a player getting their character to move along. You should describe only the NPCs your players might be required to interact with, and only when the players will have to do so. Describing too much at one

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