If you really are interested in proposing a UNIQUE AND PLAYABLE idea for a game, try Activision. I've read on several sites that they are looking for original IP.

They need something to do with the gobs of money they get from WoW.

Originally posted by Dioren

If you really are interested in proposing a UNIQUE AND PLAYABLE idea for a game, try Activision. I've read on several sites that they are looking for original IP.

They need something to do with the gobs of money they get from WoW.

Starcraft MMO? WoW 2? Mechwarrior MMO? Diablo MMO? Do they actually need new ideas?

Originally posted by chill808

 

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Originally posted by paulscott

 

It still costs a bit of money even if you never spend a dime.
Quite simple put if you are skilled enough to compentantly work on a MMO of any sort, you're skilled enough to work on faster indy/micro-indy/solo-indy projects that actually pay out for much less work.  Instead of working on one of the 99.99% of cases of NOT being "The Miracle group" that some how manages to work together for a few years when they blatently don't have to.
Of course there are a lot of sucesses, but that just gives a glimpse into how many other failures there are.
There's also a few sucesses of companies spending much less time on the project.   But once again these are edge cases of people with extensive libraries, knowledge of them, and extensive real experiance.

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Alright now we're talking paul. Yes probably true if you're skilled enough to do that then you're probably at somewhere that pays. How do you know if the person is to young to work but skilled enough to program well. How do you know they don't have friends who help them for no cost. The biggest thing here is that you acknowledge there are successes, what determines success well I happen to believe through my own work and watching others that genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. Who's to say that your final project is an amazing mmo that wows the world, or it gets you the experience you need to get into the world then who's to say one day your idea from long ago doesn't come to be. The main point I'm making here is that the tools are there and available to anyone, the knowledge is available to anyone. Who are you to say it can't be done, instead why not encourage and see where it takes you.

 

"Hi, my name is chill808. My head is in the clouds. I live in a fictional world where anything is possible as long as you really, really try. And we can all be really, really, magical friends together!"

Listen Chill. If we were all on your Doctor subscribed happy-pills, we'd sound just as mentally crippled and overly optimistic as you. But we aren't. We live in a real world. With statistics, rules, and a governing god called Money.

OP. I will venture to say that every single person that visits this site has thought about an MMO they'd like to create and be on the market. 5% of those people work with vigil on their products in hopes for something more. 0% of them ever make it out of these forums with a realized dream to write about.

I'm not saying it isn't possible. But you need more than what you got. And you need more than what you'll be able to get without proper funding or a good bunch of connected people.

If you do happen to make a good shell of a game, even a polished product. Look at the market right now, how much competition do MMOs have? World of Warcraft being the reigning champion. A tyrant like Blizzard is able to roll new features and content out in the blink of an eye, this alone keeps their player base thriving. Take a look at Warhammer, a fantastic game with emphasis more on the PvP side of things. If Warhammer came out 'before' World of Warcraft, what do you think would have happened? Warhammer would have been able to compete much better with WoW, having a much large player base, and a whole lot more money to work with.

Simply put. The well of players is running dry for the MMO market. Unless you can create "The Next Big Thing", (and trust, the well of money required for a phenomenon like that would be as deep as the sea,) there simply will be no reason or way to pull the majority of players away from their current loves, for a new romance.

Elaborating a bit. Warhammer pulled the players away from WoW that wanted more wide scale PvP content, and maybe the players that thought WoW had too many fluffy kittens in it's programming code.

Lord of the Rings Online took players from WoW (and MMO virgins who simply love LotR) because of it's specific story and maybe some of the gameplay promises.

My question would simply be. Even if you were able to put together an actual game and pitch the concept.

Where would you draw your player base (read: profit) from?

Game publishers know this. Unfortunately it is rare that a game is created based solely on design and concept, (allowing the development of the genre and maybe gaming industry as a whole) rather than what kind of cash flow you can gain from it.

Lets see:   Force of Arms project,  Vajuras(real status unknown), techlord, and one or two Realmcrafter MMOs.

The first project and person has "removed themselves" most likely due to the fact there there are "too many potatoes" on the forum.  Lets see for Force of Arms they left shortly after showing a "lets have fun" reel and got flamed by the pub(who's surprised).   Vajuras was a reletivly high skilled person(who I think left the game industry) who had some awesome demos.

So it's not 0% just pretty close. 

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For gamedev.net I can confirm 2 projects that are actually going somewhere(not really into community there though), and then another 5 or so that are actually micro-bussiness looking for fresh skill.   Needless to the "help wanted" forum generates anywhere from 5 to 30 threads a day with new projects or people looking to work on a project. 

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Needless to say "The Internet" isn't a good place to find "Good Internet people" to work on an "Awesome Internet" project.

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If I were to find a competent team I'd work on opensource for a year or two.   Then recruit people I've worked with and/or their friends.    There's soo many places you can draw from and tons of general-apps/network apps/graphical apps/ and similar.

Sold! Checks in the mail.

So it's not 0% just pretty close. 

Rounding down.

Still, you see my point.

First question...how much do you believe in your story/concept? 

Then how complete is it?  Lore, background etc etc.

Leonardo Devinci, to understand the human body and reproduce it correctly in his art took to disecting the human body to see and study every part of it.

Tolkein first invented a new language and built his story from there.

I think if you take an 'idea' to a company you probably will hit walls.  Ideas, concepts are a dime a dozen.  However if you have a deep rich story, a full story, then from that draw the game and all it's proposed mechanics etc, you might get your foot in the door at least enough times to learn a bit and further progress with knowledge and understanding of the industry.

I don't think you necessarily need to design a game to sell it, but you will need to at least get an artist on board with you to storyboard it.

The MMO business is huge and like writters and actors there is just such a big pool for companies to pull from that you need something that sets you apart from the crowd.

If you believe in you and what you have, don't let the 'can't do's' and the 'no's' get to you.  You are gonna need a thick skin, but use the time to improve, expand on while selling the story.  It's hard work and you will definately have to pay your dues but if you believe, you can do it.  =))

A storyboard is just as useless as a 'great idea' when pitching an MMO. At most it could indicate a good story, but it offers little or nothing in the way of whether it would make for a good game or not.

Originally posted by chill808

People used to say Edison was crazy, wow so glad he knocked out those light bulbs.

 

By the time Edison started making lightbulbs he was already a very rich man with a large team of engineers and scientists at his disposal.  He actually got his start inventing improvements to telegraph systems and selling the patents to the telegraph companies.  He was able to do this because he worked in the telegraph industry for years as an operator and technician. 

As far as the lightbulb goes, to make the mass production of ligthbulbs economically feasible Edison pretty much had to build the electircal power generation and distribution systems from the ground up.  He also spend a fortune developing a lightbulb version that was efficient enough to be economically viable. 

Edison was a crook who knew how to steal.

If your game isn't a WoW clone developers are not interested.