Right, yes, some of these features were added to various MUDs with some amount of success.

The big difference I'm arguing for is scope, and engineering.

If you have NPC chat bots that can learn, and an adjectives and typologies system for object, combine them so that chat bots can talk about objects adjectives and typologies. That sort of thing, really engineer the hell out of it.

In the end it would all be a massive NLP problem. As major advances in NLP happen the possibilities for MUDs is massive.