According to 99% of posters on this site. Just thought i would point out the observations that that 99%, have no clue how much effort and work goes into a production the size of a MMO.

My favorite line is where a poster acts as if some developer somewhere is trying to punish the player base, that one gets me every time. Where in the 9 levels of hell does that make sense? at all? I can guarantee every developer in the game industry, and the subgroup that is mmos wants people to enjoy their game.

Have some respect people.

(i make exceptions for games and development houses that have no respect for others in the industry)

The customer is always right. Except when he's wrong.

Making MMOs is easy, when they exist only in your head and you don't have to worry about cost, technological limitations, network stability, target audience, profit, pacing, goals, subscriber retention, quality, deadlines or publishing it.

So once you get past the few minor issues you can start making them in no time.  And by the way why hasn't a company made the transendental life simulator that I wanted, what is up with that, developers are just lazy.

Indeed.

These are the same people that end up actually trying to make an MMO themselves and make a post on some forum somewhere along the lines of: "I want to make a kick-ass MMO can any1 help pliz?"

After a few dozen replies suggesting that they take up a programming course, try their hand at some basic C++, network coding etc. they mysteriously disappear...

 Wonder where they go...

Most the people on this site don't even know what goes into DESIGNING a MMO... let alone the rest of it.

the Logistics of MMO server setup alone would boggle the average Server IT... I've seen it happen before, it's not pretty.

The mind numbing process of animating dozens of different characters so they look fluid would probably drive you insane... I know it drives me insane, I'm not sure how those guys do it!

The insanely elongated process of "Quest Writing"?  Not as easy as you'd think.

...And none of that is the business portion of the matter...

Originally posted by CaesarsGhost

The insanely elongated process of "Quest Writing"?  Not as easy as you'd think.

This one I know about first hand, being a person who designed a few quests in a NWN custom mod.  Not only does it take forever just to come up with the story, quest dialogue, and the forks (hopefully the quest forks!), you then have to place all the mobs, objects, create custom items, etc etc.  Now you also have to go back and write custom scripts for the action and 'cut scene' part of the quest.

One good quest can easily take a week's worth of dev time.  Probably more like 3, depending on the complexity and experience with the tools/language.

I did love every minute though.  =D

Very true.

A lot of things are easy to do so long as you're content to do them really badly.  I could make an MMO that doesn't actually run, for example. 

 This must be the "I post in this thread if I am superior to my peers" thread...

Originally posted by Zayne3145

These are the same people that end up actually trying to make an MMO themselves and make a post on some forum somewhere along the lines of: "I want to make a kick-ass MMO can any1 help pliz?"

After a few dozen replies suggesting that they take up a programming course, try their hand at some basic C++, network coding etc. they mysteriously disappear...

Yeah, we see quite a few of those people on the programming forums too.  They just finished their first "Hello World" program and wonder what that has to do with creating the next Quake.

I'm hoping most of them are just kids who don't any better.

Originally posted by demalus

 This must be the "I post in this thread if I am superior to my peers" thread...

No, this is the "We are tired of armchair quarterback game designers" thread.

Originally posted by CactusmanX

Making MMOs is easy, when they exist only in your head and you don't have to worry about cost, technological limitations, network stability, target audience, profit, pacing, goals, subscriber retention, quality, deadlines or publishing it.

So once you get past the few minor issues you can start making them in no time. 

Yarrr! Well said, matey!

Well, the coding is realatively easy anyway...

The hard part is making the content that you have to plug into that code. And the real headaches start when you have to set up the different SQL servers. Actually, the headaches start while you try find rackspace that's 1) reliable 2) cheap and 3) won't force you sign an agreement that gives the server owners the rights to everything you store on them.

Other than that it's a breeze.....

Technically it is easy, but just extremely time consuming.  Once you've learned programming languages, it's all about recalling input and output commands.

Originally posted by Mrbloodworth

 

... I can guarantee every developer in the game industry, and the subgroup that is mmos wants people to enjoy their game.

Have some respect people.

 

(i make exceptions for games and development houses that have no respect for others in the industry)

 

With what do you guarantee? Who are you to guarantee things? I mean what are you gonna give me if I prove you wrong?

I 'd rather be in the ninth circle of hell than to have to design an mmo. 

Originally posted by Gravarg

Technically it is easy, but just extremely time consuming.  Once you've learned programming languages, it's all about recalling input and output commands.

You sir, are wrong. Anyone who uses the word easy to describe video game development, has no clue what they are talking about.

Do not be part of the problem.

Originally posted by dave6660

Originally posted by demalus

 This must be the "I post in this thread if I am superior to my peers" thread...

No, this is the "We are tired of armchair quarterback game designers" thread.

What? This entire site is designed for armchare quaterback game designers. Why are you here? This isn't Devmaster.com.

Originally posted by Mrbloodworth

Originally posted by Gravarg

Technically it is easy, but just extremely time consuming.  Once you've learned programming languages, it's all about recalling input and output commands.

You sir, are wrong. Anyone who uses the word easy to describe video game development, has no clue what they are talking about.

Do not be part of the problem.

 

Everything is easy once you've learned it... sort of....

The rules for coding games is a little bit different from making spreadsheets and databases, but not by much. As time goes on, games become more and more data driven and less code driven. Not that you won't have to be fluent in several different scripting languages. Python and Lua are the big scripting language trends in indie developement right now.

Having said all that, you don't even need to try to make an MMO unless you've at least set up a MUD or Rogue server. In fact, I probably wouldn't recommend that someone makes the attempt until they've done at least three Quake 3 mods using ioquake or some other mutation of the quake 3 engine. At the very least you should have made a simple platform game or JRPG.

From personal experience, I was involved in a total conversion private server a few years back. Since the five of us involved in the project were unemployed at the time, we were able to get it running in about two weeks. Of course, we had to modify a shit ton of content, develop world maps and dungeons, write quests and I also had to track down bugs in the emulator then fix and recompile about a hundred dozen times. It wasn't "easy," but it also wasn't as impossible as some people around here make it out to be. Then again, we were running on one server with four instances (quad-core server). If it had been more than that then we would have need considerably longer and went through way more stress. And we were never short on stress during those two weeks.

You are still trying to use that word.

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Originally posted by Mrbloodworth
 
According to 99% of posters on this site. Just thought i would point out the observations that that 99%, have no clue how much effort and work goes into a production the size of a MMO.
My favorite line is where a poster acts as if some developer somewhere is trying to punish the player base, that one gets me every time. Where in the 9 levels of hell does that make sense? at all? I can guarantee every developer in the game industry, and the subgroup that is mmos wants people to enjoy their game.
Have some respect people.
 
(i make exceptions for games and development houses that have no respect for others in the industry)
 

---

Unless you're SOE then you have fun punishing your player base and then denying it.

Originally posted by Mrbloodworth

Originally posted by Gravarg

Technically it is easy, but just extremely time consuming.  Once you've learned programming languages, it's all about recalling input and output commands.

You sir, are wrong. Anyone who uses the word easy to describe video game development, has no clue what they are talking about.

Do not be part of the problem.

 

True, bad coding is easy, great coding requires expertise developed over many years.

Quake is an example of great coding for it's time. Graphic and network achievements that blew away what others were doing. WoW is another example of great coding.

Originally posted by Hashbrick

 

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Originally posted by Mrbloodworth
 
According to 99% of posters on this site. Just thought i would point out the observations that that 99%, have no clue how much effort and work goes into a production the size of a MMO.
My favorite line is where a poster acts as if some developer somewhere is trying to punish the player base, that one gets me every time. Where in the 9 levels of hell does that make sense? at all? I can guarantee every developer in the game industry, and the subgroup that is mmos wants people to enjoy their game.
Have some respect people.
 
(i make exceptions for games and development houses that have no respect for others in the industry)
 

---

 

Unless you're SOE then you have fun punishing your player base and then denying it.

Your one of those then a?

I'm not referring to some corporate entity, I'm talking about people, you know, the individuals that make the game(s). You do know people, not companies make the games right?