Yeah, it's not easy to do it yourself but unfortunately if you're not willing and able to do the lion's share of the work yourself, you're gonna have a hard time drumming up enough interest to support it. It stinks but I'd rather be honest than blow smoke. It's (a little) different if you've got a core of people interested and dedicated up front. However, when you're starting from scratch, you've got to have enough of a framework built to attract interest from people who will actually be of help...and even then, don't hold your breath.
Oh, quite familiar. It's what I expect, really. Merely hoping that there is (or will be) interest enough to make it worthwhile. Although given the popularity of the books, I can't imagine it not existing!
I intend to continue slogging away on mine but it's largely because I want to see if I can code up some of the crazy ideas I've got in my head. It's just gonna have to wait awhile longer before I can get back to it again.
That's at least half the reason I want one to play with again, myself. My latest I was playing with craft systems, plants that grow over time, and all the like. I didn't have a concrete theme, though, so it eventually lost aim and direction.
I think the sad fact of the matter is that these sorts of games are dying. Most of the people who still play them already have homes and there's very little new blood coming into the community.
It's definitely tough. There's no easy way to spread the word to all the fans of the setting, to perchance pique their interest enough into giving it a whirl. And even those with the potential to be interested, as you say, may have a comfortable home already.
All that gloom and doom aside, this world is nearly perfect for a MU* and it's a shame that it's not happening.
That's another reason the Dresden world appealed to me. I've been angling towards something more modern - it's easier for people to immerse themselves that way, if they're unfamiliar with the setting - yet with the flair of magic and otherworldliness.
I'm booked through the next week or two, but my rough-cut plan is to start on some of the core concepts and code thereafter. It seems the DFRPG is based off FATE 3.0, so I'll likely do some research into that to familiarize myself with it all (I found a useful link somewhere here to the HTML version). I hope to work something out, get a workable framework into place and ideally find some more steam to launch from there. May start a blog to report progress and all. I have generic code I wrote before that would port nicely - mail/item delivery, fully functional banks with wire transfers (add USD and other currencies, or stick with just the one...?), and so on.
Someone in this thread (sorry for the lack of credit at the moment!) suggested using a smaller town, as opposed to a big city. To allow the game grid to be more dense in usefulness and value, instead of an immense spread of largely useless rooms. I'm fond of this idea and hope to work with it some.
That makes me wonder about some general questions. What are some DresdenVerse features that one might consider essential to the theme?