Just to give you an idea about what you are up against. These pages list 120+ other MMOGs in development.

[edited by - HenryAPe on July 4, 2002 7:44:10 PM]

I had my summer holiday early! Well my school broke up cause it was bombed. Anyway, I now have 6 weeks to purely devote to my pet project, and now work is going to start on it, even though it may be only me.
Having mulled over having a 3D world, I have decided that it would be far too difficult to create something this large in 3D. And thats not taking into account the large amounts of space 3D models and effects would munch up.
A 2D isometric game would do 2 beneficial things for this project.
1. Would allow me to put FAR more detail into people, buildings, flora and fauna.
2. Would allow a larger world with more interactive features.

Besides the features I already have PLANNED on including, I have taken steps to more realistic and easily attainable goals.

I am now looking for a single web designer and an artist to help me. As for the server, I have a friend who will be hosting it(T1 connection), and is currently capable of 128 people on at any one time.

If anyone is interested in helping, email: the_tankard@yahoo.com

Tankard

Tankard

Empty tankards are no good. Full they must be to be enjoyable.

If your network programmer is good enough then you can cluster an infinite number of servers, and through judicious use of load sharing, and a buttload of bandwith you could, in theory remake reality. However the executable would be a monster in itself. Also, if you are going to make this game as large and encompassing as your original post describes you should strongly consider making it 3d. Once the engine is written, you will drive the rest of the game with data, so forget all the problems with 3d you are expecting. Server Clusters can run synchronously, which means computational power is a non-factor, just make sure to write a very thin client, and of course i too have heard at least a hundred similarly worded proposals, but that does not mean that your''s is destined to fail. Best of Luck.

Hey

Hey

Hey..

Tankard...that is a GREAT idea, and I''ve had ideas much like it many times before. If you CAN do it, then do it, I''ll play it, and I''ll love you for it. It''s the game I''ve always dreamed of...a game that actually promotes teamwork! GO YOU!

Why?!?

In regard to what Tankard wrote about his idea,

I thought of doing something very similar to that about a year ago. In fact, I plan to do it!

It doesn''t seem totally unworkable, but some of his ideas smack of 6th-graderism - not realizing that all of his whiz-bang ideas have implementation costs assosciated with them or being only vaguely idea of what that implementation cost entails.

Implementation cost is not merely talking or writing a "full design doc," which, when written by wannabes is anything but. Implementation cost is what it takes to make the game a bona fide reality.

I know all this because I''m writing a game called "Urban Jungle" right now. (some of you may have seen some members of our crew wandering about the LA convention center at E3 a few weeks ago sporting long-sleeved black sweatshirts bearing the logo.) And although it''s still a work in progress, it''s developed enough that we''re being taken seriously by publishers after they saw what we had. Things just aren''t to the point that any of them are cutting us checks yet.

Anyhow, I''ve paid enough dues to deserve to be put in the ranks of professionals who know what a pain in the ass game development can be - not the fanboy wankers professionals are so rightly contemptuous of. And when you''re talking about weather systems and making everything in the world "interactive" in the sense of being able to move and break it and it having some function and especially blasting holes in the ground to make mines, that''s when my wannabe radar goes off. It''s not that any of these ideas are unworkable, but a lot of them are such pains in the ass that they''re just not worth the effort. In the engineering world (and make no mistake, that *is* what this is) you have to consider how cool an effect would be versus the implementation cost. My rule of thumb is if I''m not willing to implement it myself, it''s not worth it. Therefore, most of the ideas presented by Tankard are stupid.

What *does* work is having a very simple initial landscape covered by trees and rocks and whatnot. My idea was to make people start out all caveman style so there wouldn''t be too much work for modellers to do and no one would have to implement anything except a 3-D world, (being done for the current project) maybe a dozen initial "technologies", and a server system to make it MM. And actually the game would probably suck at first beause there was so little to do. And then each week or so, we''d add a new technology to the tree making some obsolete and possibly radically-altering the social dynamic of the game. Maybe we could even offer incentives to enlist the efforts of the modding community. I also think there should be tremendous incentives given to players to cooperate on big projects like building a fortress. And then there''s lots of ideas I have on top of that, but the point is, doing it this way with the evolution actually *saves* development time and cost by allowing the team to implement new features gradually *after* the game is already online. Also, it will recycle the graphics engine from UJ.

Anyhow, I think the idea I just put down is workable and would be fun, especially as the world transforms from caveman to medieval to modern to space. Think of it as Civlization online.

Tankard,

First and formost, I think you have a great idea for your game. I think the gaming industry where it stands today needs a lot more innovation rather than repetition as we are seeing so much of. However, I just think you need to be cautious. The first thing to be worried about is the fact that 90% of games these days are just a rehash of a previous game with a new name and a few bits added or tweaked (in my opinion at least). This means that in reality publishers aren''t giving money money to developers of innovative ideas as they are too risky, and when there is a lot of money involved, no one cares if a game has been done before, they care if they are giong to make money from it. This is sad, but unfortunately true. So although you are far from trying to get a publisher yet, just be warned you will have that problem in the future at some stage if you want this project to really take off, as I see it has the potential to do.

The other thing I think you need to be careful of (which I am sure you would know, as any Software Engineer does) that you need to make your world incrementally. Start out with just the most basic parts of the game and get them working, then build upon that. Some of your ideas (such as the whether system) are great, but there is absolutely no point implementing them until a lot of the rest of the game is completed. I think the way you mentioned it so strongly in your post makes people believe you want to implement it almost straight away, and have that as almost a basis for the game. I am not sure if this is what you intended or not, but I would just be careful with which parts of the system you create first.

Anyways, I think you have a good idea, and my advice is perhaps to put up a webpage with all your different thoughts, you will probably get more constructive criticism this way, although there is the fear of your ideas being stolen. I for one would like to see some more details you had planned for the system.

Good luck with it all.

Doolwind