Where to start? MMORPG Dream

Community Community & Industry Discussion
21

[QUOTE=;102135]
I think that may just be the most in-depth response to a question I have seen Archibold! Kudos to you for taking the time to explain it in such great detail! :slight_smile:

^

As far as developing an MMORPG, it definitely can be done but you need to start small before jumping to the goal of creating a game that harbors 1000’s of players at once. I would recommend aiming to simulate your game on a server with as few as 8 players (i.e. friends / family you know) to test that your game works and feels fun the way it is suppose to. The exception to being if you need to have a minimum number of people - like 40 people to achieve the game idea - then aim for that before trying to create a game world meant to hold 1000’s of players. And as others recommended, look up the basics for what is involved in making MMO’s and especially the networking aspect of it as I am sure that coding for an MMO includes far more than the coding that is involved in a single player game.

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To summarize: ?v=T437DdmFNPU
Give it a go. Make something amazing and we will all sit up and take notice. At the very least, you will learn a ton of stuff. Do it. :slight_smile:

23

My MMO doesn’t need thousands of players.

In fact if I make a small instance to show off the game 3 - 5 players are more than enough, even 2 could make it work if I make AIs. But 4 -6 if only PvP.

For 1 map it would need around 50 - 100 online at a time to make it work

24

I’d say, why not just start by working on it?

When you want to make an MMO, you can’t just pull it out of thin air, of course. You need to make… literally everything. What genre is it? I’ll assume Fantasy for my examples. First you need your character. You need movement. UE4 starts with , if you want.

What else do you need? Basic combat. Work on adding an attack.

Add something to attack. A basic enemy. Let it die.

A quest system. Make a journal. A basic quest to go kill an enemy.

The UI/HUD. Inventory. Something that keeps track of character health, etc.

These are all things you can work on without needing to venture into any of the more complicated networking areas that cause people to say " is impossible just start small". I guess, in essense, I am saying start small as well, but from a far different direction I think… work on the pieces that will eventually go into your MMO.

Even basic networking isn’t too hard, following the content examples and tutorials.

So 's where I suggest you start. Instead of spending money on school or whatever (I’m not saying don’t do btw), just start your MMO. And start your MMO by making a working alpha. Have alpha contain all the very basics, basically the stuff I listed above. a small level with some terrain, two players (complete the level without networking first then add networking, imo, but you can start with networking if you really want. Just keep in mind you will be peer2peer until your game is set up for servers - but even if you were a full studio, that’s a bit down the road. Don’t worry about that until you have a working multiplayer game, the change isn’t that hard)

Allow the two players (or one) to talk to a block/NPC, get a quest. The quest asks them to go kill 5 of the NPCs. go to it, complete quest, give player credit rewards.

Once you have all of in the alpha, you basically have what you need to get started. It’s just a matter of adding content, and iterating on what you have/making it more complex. Instead of making the player attack do 5 damage, make the damage a variable. Make that variable increase by 1, every time the player kills 5, 10, 25, 50 etc monsters for a basic levelling system. Make the quest give an item reward that increases attack damage by 20. Create a basic UI to show all to the player.

Iterate and expand on all of . Add more quests. More terrain. etc.

is how I suggest you go about it. You’ll get experience by actually doing it. is all stuff you’ll need to learn anyway, and it’s all stuff that does need to be done for the MMO. Plus, once you have working alpha, you can post it as a demo or wherever, and say “hey so 's proof I know what I’m doing, I’m looking for some people to help increase my efficiency and speed, and contribute” and people will be a lot more interested than, and I mean with absolutely no intent to cause offence, another person who’s relatively new to game development and wants to make an MMO. I’m not questioning you or your devotion/ability - everyone starts from 0 - but it is true that isn’t uncommon, and so many people don’t take it too seriously without an alpha or demo.

Hope helps! Best of luck on your projects.

25

Thanks! I have an idea of what I will do.

I want to create the first scene of my MMO.

Like a “trailer” type thing, like how the MMO starts. I know exactly what it looks like and the terrain isn’t too big, it’s an instance.

When I have that done I hope I can post it , do you think I should start with character design, rigging etc? I’ll do that.

26

Hello fitness, I think you’ve gotten a good amount of feedback already, but I figured I’d add in my nooby and limited 5 cents, so take it with a grain a salt to speak.

Anyway, it’s always good to have a huge idea, it keeps you working hard to get towards that goal.

Unfortunately, as others have said, mmorpg games do require an enormous amount of work, in both assets, leveling system, gameplay, etc. Server cost would be pretty high even if it’s just for a few thousand people or so, depending on how many servers you decide to run, I did a bit of googling and found a company called steadfastnetworks are their plans ://www.steadfast.net/services/dedicated-servers.php .

I don’t know what sort of server you’d need, but assuming it’s an mmorpg, I’d assume you’d need something chunky.

Anyway, mucking with their build, you could find yourself shelling out 2,179 dollars per month plus 1,500 dollars for set up fee.

So for the first year, you’d be dropping 27540 dollars on the server, never mind that, but you’d also have to be paying for coders artist etc, than each year you’d have to find 2,179 dollars a month in your budget to pay for server rental.

If you have 2k people playing and paying 5 dollars per month that should cover server rental on the build I did, but you absolutely have to keep a minimum of 2k people playing, so you have to be consistently coming out with new DLC’s worlds etc for users to play to keep them interested, and alternately, more levels for extra leveling, or make leveling extremely hard and long which gamers really don’t enjoy.

I think your idea is doable, BUT, I think for short term you should lower your expectations and just learn things and help with other people’s projects on a royalty/paid basis and release your own smaller games and develop more of a name, than once you have networked a bit and elsewhere, I think you should definitely look at doing your mmorpg game, who knows, in a year or two of doing work for other people and releasing your own smaller games, you may have access to a publisher who can market your game.

Keep your head up, don’t get discouraged, mmorpg games are big and expensive but can be very lucrative once you’ve broken the market.

Good luck!!!

27

Just remember, when calculating. Everything will run at least 1,5x as bad as it should have ran. Propably more likely 2,5x. It’s just that even proffesionals trained in are often not seing many problems, or think “Why should that hapen, I would have to really have bad luck for to happen”.

So when you calculate, that you’ll need let’s say 250.000$ for each year of production, beter raise it to 250.000*2.5 = 625.000$.

And if you think it’ll take you let’s say 6 years, raise it to 18. And then think about it. “If I develop a game with these days technology, and try to sell it in 18 years, will it work?” The naswer is usually no.

So, better try to make something small, with part of the gameplay in the planned MMO. Make some money of it and see if it sells, then hire more people, and with the present (now future) technology make something Epic!!! Good luck :slight_smile:

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I’d just like to add since no one else has mentioned it yet but it can’t be done. Start with games like snake or android games; start with simple games!

Remember, start simple, don’t do big projects.

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Hi , I believe I%20had%20MMORPG%20Dreams%20too.%20In%20fact,%20they%20inspired%20me%20to%20become%20a%20Network%20Engineer.%20I%27m%20all%20for%20producing%20modular%20content,%20but,%20the%20key%20factor%20for%20MMO%20is%20the%20Networking.%20All%20other%20game%20systems,%20rendering%20techniques,%20etc%20are%20equally%20applicable%20to%20a%20standalone%20single%20player%20game.%20UE4%20handles%20most%20of%20these%20requirements%20out-of-box%20to%20include%20a%20Server/Client%20model.%20Anything%20is%20possible%20for%20you%27re%20MMO,%20if%20you%20understand%20Networking%20and%20the%20rendering%20features%20of%20the%20chosen%20Engine%20Platform.%20I%27d%20argue%20understanding%20networking%20should%20be%20where%20to%20start%20on%20your%20path%20to%20MMO%20Dev%20greatness,%20no%20matter%20the%20game%20dev%20discipline%20you%20choose.%20%20MMOs%20utilize%20on-demand,%20turn-based%20and%20real-time%20networking.%20Sporadic%20on-demand/turn%20based%20networking%20has%20looser%20requirements,%20compared%20to%20the%20demands%20of%20real-time%20networking.%20For%20real-time%20networking%20between%20multiple%20players,%20its%20all%20about%20Replicating%20the%20input%20of%20all%20the%20players%20connected%20to%20the%20network%20between%20each%20other,%20and%20updating%20the%20audio/visuals%20for%20each%20player%20to%20perceive%20the%20affect%20of%20this%20input.%20How%20you%20optimize%20collecting%20player%20input,%20replicating,%20transmitting/receiving%20packets,%20processing%20packets/updating%20A/V%20is%20where%20the%20magic%20happens.%20The%20faster%20these%20steps%20can%20be%20performed%20with%20minimum%20%20lag,%20the%20more%20players%20can%20be%20supported%20on%20the%20network%20simultaneously.%20%20I%20favor%20utilizing%20internet%20protocol%20suite%20for%20interoperability"]understanding networking should be where to start on your path to MMO Dev greatness, no matter the game dev discipline you choose. The key factor for MMO is the Networking. Server Administration, Server-to-Server Communications, Client Content Updates/DLC, Real-time Player Input Replication, Remote Database Queries, etc. All other game systems, rendering techniques, etc are equally applicable to standalone single player games. UE4 handles most of these requirements out-of-box such as Level Streaming & Server/Client. If you understand Networking and the rendering features of the chosen Engine Platform, you can build the MMO of your dreams.

30

If you start big, you will constantly find yourself having to redo lots of your game as you realize poor design choices as you work on the project. You won’t know what these choices are until you made smaller projects and learn from them. Also, while you could become a ‘jack of all trades’, you might find yourself an expert in none. I suggest choosing a passion whether it be on the artistic side of games with 3d modeling ect, or it be in the programming and focus mostly on one. While its definitely recommended to understand both on some level, you’ll be wasting time if you try to learn it all. Share your ideas and network, find someone else who shares your passion for an MMORPG after you have learned something and work with them to make you dream come true and fill in the missing pieces. It will be a lot easier to make your dream come true then, and the final result will be a lot better too.

31

Hey guys thanks for the input, I will be researching more about networking.

I do have a question though, I want to start by designing 1 instance. As a showcase to start a community recruitment theme, is LONG LONG away as I won’t be asking anyone to join a team where their manager doesn’t know anything.

So I will be learning more, about everything a little bit, and a lot about managing and networking and in what order to produce content in.

However in order to do that I want to first create a showcase. is what I will need:

  1. A cutscene trailer at the start (I will produce by myself)
  2. An HD Cave with dramatic scenary and more, a character to move inside with a few different things
  3. A couple of assets
  4. 2 Voice actors maybe 3 or 4
  5. 2 Enemies to show some gameplay mechanics
  6. 5 Different combat moves and animations, then a bunch of ingame animations

Example of cave:

Can be done? Where would I start? Which assets would I start producing? Can it be done on my own or with 1-2 other people?

32

You got a lot of great answers but is my 2 cents as well.

1 Find out what you want to do, Programming, Art, Animation, Sound m.m.
2 Get a good skill in your feald.
3 Get a team.

If you want to make a good MMORPG or evena decent one (or any game at all realy).
You can`t do that alone. Thats my opinion/ understanding on the subject.

33

Yep I know I can’t do it alone, it’s just I have no idea where to start. I will contact some other indie publishers and ask them for advice on where to start to produce 1 level.

34

The server side of Game development: ://blog.m2h.nl/2012/01/server-side-of-game-development.html
mby it’s useful for you :slight_smile:
328€/month~ for 1000 concurrent users~

35

[QUOTE=Sleicreider;102697]
The server side of Game development: ://blog.m2h.nl/2012/01/server-side-of-game-development.html
mby it’s useful for you :slight_smile:
328€/month~ for 1000 concurrent users~

is completely wrong information. I know a bit about servers, my friend hosted a private server with 2,000 concurrent users for 50$ a month because it was a cheap game. While my other friend hosted 100 users concurrent at 150$ because it was a 30gb game which needed loads of server power to run.

I believe the average cost, if you look for good servers is around 200$ for around 500 concurrent users.
If we estimate players play 2hours per day, let’s say 10% of the day, then that means 5000 total players.
If we estimate that each player spends 1 $ per month thats 5000$ / month from only the activate players who play over 2 hours.

If we estimate 1 hour per day and 25% of players are inactive. Then we get 10,000$/month from active players and 2,500$ / month from inactive.
Total 12,500$ a month while spending 200 - 300$ on server.

Server costs are cheap if you compare them to how much return you get. was an estimation of the game being free and costing 1$ per month.
A more realistic model is that the game is free and 10% of players donate 10$ a month which ends up being the same amount.

EDIT:
Worse case scenario 5% of the revenue goes to server costs.

EDIT2:
And that really isn’t the for me right now, of course as an indie producer I would have to severely optimize the game for bandwith and speed reasons to not only drive the cost of the servers down but also allow more players to play the game.

36

328 $/€ month for 1k~ users wrong info?
you said so yourself, 200$/€ for 500 concurrent users :slight_smile:
Most likely server farm provider give a discount the more you want.

Well, you’ll need more than just one server. If you really want to make an mmo, you will need lag / delay free servers, otherwise people won’t play the game.
The big mmo games out there have server farms on each country (actually 2++ on each country).

Edit:
except you are just focused on players of your continent

37

[QUOTE=Sleicreider;102722]
328€ month for 1k~ users wrong info?
you said so yourself, 200$ for 500 concurrent users :slight_smile:
Most likely server farm provider give a discount the more you want.

Well, you’ll need more than just one server. If you really want to make an mmo, you will need lag / delay free servers, otherwise people won’t play the game.
The big mmo games out there have server farms on each country (actually 2++ on each country).

Sorry I didn’t mean your price is wrong, I meant there is absolutely no way to estimate price without knowing exactly what the game is, and even then it’s tough because it all depends on what type of server, which company, how it’s optimized etc.

I am not trying to make an MMO with millions of players right now. My ultimate goal is an MMO with maybe 1,000 - 2,000 concurrent users, that is all that is needed to make the game fun. Any more I would need to open different servers. 2,000 is the absolute I believe.
Since around 200 - 400 per map is good, assuming I make 5 - 10 maps it’s around 2,000 players that the game will be fun to play.

Also is really for the future, at that stage where I need servers I better have TONS of funding.

First my goal is to make a simple cave singleplayer, then add a 2 - 5 players element over LAN, then over internet using a small server.
From that I should be able to get funding as long as my idea is unique.

EDIT:
I suppose my timeline will look a bit like :

2015 : Learning more about engines, games and starting to create a few assets, finishing my current websites and projects to try to get some funding
2016: Producing the first instance of cave and tweaking it, learning more and more and adding 1-2 members to my “team”
2017: Getting funding from my cave and planning to go to US or canada in 2018 anyway, so I will try to get nice funding and kickstarter to produce the first level. Open a team and try to get 10 - 20 members ish. Outsource everything possible such as small asset creation, scripts and more.
2018: Try to start producing the MMO and release a short single player version for testing
2020: Release a fully made MMORPG

These are just what the timeline might look like if I am successful.

38

if you get people playing your game for a fair price/fee or whatever, it should be no problem to cover the costs.
But even if your game is well designed, developed and you have 24/7 up servers, the marketing of the game will be another point.
you need to make the players pay attention to your game(&crowdfunding campaign) (unless you wanna publish it via steam-greenlight, or something else afterwards)

EDIT: mby someone else already mentioned point

39

My marketing idea will work like :

  1. Youtube marketing, I already have a youtube channel and will make it into a blog for the whole process of the game, should work pretty well
  2. Have a blog, facebook, twitter and website throughout the game development
  3. Pay other youtubers and facebook pages to review the game and offer it to everyone for beta for free
  4. Make an adword campaign possibly
  5. Market it offline
  6. Make it free to play, with a microtransactions that in no way affect any part of gameplay, just for cosmetics etc…
  7. Make a ton of gameplay videos, a few trailers and more

should work to get a few hundred players or even a few thousands, after that word of mouth should help.

I am not making an MMO that will get millions obviously, but I do think marketing is easy to get a few thousand.

I think quality speaks for itself.

40

a website could be also a good idea.

~Slei