quote: Original post by Landfish

(sigh of relief)

It''s not an *impossible* dream then?

...

Thank you for contributing to my delusions. It''s only a matter of time before Kylotan shows up to ruin my party, but if he doesn''t, my party will never happen... so where is he?

"The unexamined life is not worth living."
-Socrates

Humm.. can i be the first then to poke holes in your sudsy bubble and watch you try to repair them before the air leaks out? I give this one the rating of a modern blimp. The pressure is little difference between the inside and outside, and it''s going to be hard to poke a big enough hole to drop your ship outta the air, landfish but let me try.. ::sigh::

Free software is.. well.. unwise. 5 bucks or even 10 bucks. You need to make up the cost of printing the CD, at least, if they buy it like that. And to be fair, you want to charge everyone the same way. That way people are apt to go buy the CD at a local store or off your website instead of eating bandwidth to download it. This is a major factor in your internet bandwidth

I like the idea of the ghost thing. I''m not totally sure how it''d work out. I''d say restricted to certain areas, so that way if players want, they don''t have to be around them. This happened in Tanarus, the game where the EQ graphics engine was beta tested.. which I was a part of Now, in there, the "shareware" people could go to any of the chat rooms, but none of the game arenas except for the shareware ones. Anyone else could go to these areas, as well.

As for newbs creating personalized characters, it had better be a small game or a designer like you, landfish, who has 24/7 to spend deciphering people''s rants about "i want a super-warrior!". good luck! LOL.

The town of premade characters is interesting. would they be AI scripts, or encased in some kinda cryogenic thing where the player looks around like a soul looking for a body and then touches the one they want? "oohhhh.. ::reaches out and touches fighter body:: ... You feel yourself suddenly pulled inside the body which becomes alive around you!" that''d be one wicked way of picking a character class.. hehe Quest for Gloryish

Making a better game REQUIRES money, as you''ve found out. Unless the server is run in your home with a few people connected at a time.. then you''ve got to have major cash to do it. I''ve priced out that a general sever is around 450 a month with a T1 leased line being 2000 bucks startup for line and server and around 500 a month for 10 gigs of transfer per month. So that''s 2k down and 950 a month just for the server, ONE.. co-located at a regional POP. Now, you''d need a web server AND a game server to properly run a game of any magnitude if you planned on having people download the stuff. That''s a fractional T1 for the web server and a full T1 for the game server totalling around 3500 start up and 1.5k per month, roughly.
Tell me how, without subscription costs, do you plan on raising 1.5k per month, assuming you don''t go over bandwidth limits and maximum transfer limits?

Landfish, i''d play it alrighty.

quote: Original post by Nazrix
Just a note: I think booting should be a last resort

Deffinately. Booting is an out of character response to an often in-character problem. If they''re roleplaying, then it''s all what you asked for. However, if someone is being rude or obnoxious with disregard to in-game roleplay, then i''d say kick them. But do a three-teir system like I suggested elsewhere landfish. Warn, Threaten, Boot is all it takes. Sometimes people DO make mistakes, and if you don''t account for that, then you''re as bad as those stupid people you want to get rid of. No one will play your games if it''s "Landfish''s dictatorship" because you''re an imperfect human and you can''t judge when others are right and wrong based on a single instance. Otherwise i would think many people have judged you to be a jerk by now, landfish.

quote: Posted by Annony..
oh? They very well could run them without montly subscriptions. Diablo II is all the proof I need. Diablo II, unlike Diablo I and Starcraft, is a server based game.

Well, actually.. Starcraft is a server-based player game. A person CREATES a server, and then others join him/her in that game. Mplayer.net and Battle.net are simply a collection of places to find people who have servers on their own machines for games like these and C&C. They''re both basically an advanced chat room for games. They also allow people to show active games on their servers so other players could join in. This is not a novel concept
I''m not 100% sure how diablo II is working in respects to servers and clients. Is Blizard hosting a Diablo II main game server? I was under the impression Diablo II was like Diablo I in that you could play single or multiplayer. Yserbius had an online and offline version, with characters the same for each. The puzzles were different online, and many required two or more people to work them creating an atmosphere that promoted socialization. The Sierra Network, the network it was on, charged a monthly fee for a TON of games ranging from Larry''s Casinoland to Hoyle games to RedBaron.. or the Yserbius series. It was the first real network and games network to be immensely popular. It also featured a 100 dollars per month unlimited playing option. Somehow we went backwards when we got the 5 hours of play and a huge charge after that.. thanks to AT&T and AOL. For info.. AT&T bought out TSN and made it the ImagiNation Network. From there it flopped due to AT&T raising the prices to 5 free hours per month for 10 bucks, or 50 bucks for 25 hours. AOL bought out INN and was to make it part of the "games channel" which ended up flopping, as well. There''s a small group of people dedicated to re-creating the Yserbius online servers or acquiring them from AOL.. WON (sierra''s current network) has even attempted to buy back the rights to Yserbius and other old Sierra games and has been denied by AOL. You want to talk devotion to a game.. try www.delphi.com/lostinners. There''s a set of people who sorely miss what was the first true online roleplaying game, which honestly kills every game today.

Ok, enough nostalgia..

quote: Oringinal post by Nazrix
One note...if there''s a way, I think that an alternative to only using a credit card to pay should be implemented. There are plenty of potential players that don''t have a check card or credit card.

yes, this is true. Check, EFT, etc should be accepted as a form of payment with strict rules of fines and punishment for bounced checks. Money Orders should also be allowed for those who cannot have a checking account, either. Many young people wish to pay for their own things today, as it gives them a level of freedom never before heard of to youngsters My girl''s lil sis is 14 and she''s dying to pay for her own stuff and do her own things. I try to tell her that when she''s 20, like me, she''ll be beggin to live at home hehe. Well.. on with the rants people..!

J

There will be 2 ways to play Diablo 2 multiplayer. The first is the same way it was played in Diablo. You connect to B.net and either start a server on your own system that others can join, or join a server running on somebody elses system. In that manner, B.net is merely acting as a gateway to servers. The second way is to create a character on the B.net servers that can be used in games running on the B.net servers. In Blizzard lingo, these are called closed characters and closed games. You system will only be responsible for graphics display and input. All handling of character and game information will be taken care of by the battle.net servers. This is entirely new, and this is the first game that Blizzard has set up this sort of system for. It is still free, but it virtually eliminates the ability to hack characters or games. And yes, it does indeed impose the same bandwidth and processing loads on the Battle.net servers as any of the MMORPGs to date. Instead of one game with thousands of players, you have thousands of games with several players each. And don''t think for an instance that the scope of Diablo II won''t be that massive. It''s a powergamers dream, and it will be very very popular for a long time to come.

I was Diablo 2 stress tester and I believe Blizzard didn't have to to pay from maintaining their servers, they got them *probably* without any price, althought there were one flop, Telia(Swedish Telephone/operator/cellphone company in 80% owning from Swedish Government), whose SERVERS WERE MOSTLY DOWN at betaEurope, but UsaEast and UsaWest worked very well.

My point is that such a famous title which sells double gold before release date attracts advertisers which means that blizzard has server keepers/donaters for at least next 10 titles even if they do some flops before it. Donating a free server is a very small sum from good commercial.

I think AC, EQ and UO are just hauling (You better know that even they aren't paying a dollar from their servers so costs are almost zero if you don't count in game staff)you guys which is one reason I won't vote them with my wallet. Blizzard has right tactic and it works.

So, Landfish, If you manage to create good enough game with enough, the fame servers WILL come to you, not vice versa.

Time comes, time goes and I only am.

Edited by - Arch@on on June 28, 2000 11:47:02 AM

If you code it, they will come

As a fanatic table-top gamer I *want* to play this game right now. Sadly, I also see a design that will not scale well, and will hurt the wallets of the investors. Everyone has mentioned the servers and dedicated lines, no one has mentioned that most support staff get paid as well. The system you are describing needs more administration and will take a lot of staffing to do it right. UO and EQ have 4000+ active users. In your game that would be 4000 (and then some) character stories reviewed, revised, accepted or rejected. Ugly.

If you are planing a smaller scale, then maintanence of the equipment is going to hurt you. Assume that you only need one game server, one web server, a dedicated T1 and one full time employee to handle your days off / 2nd shift. What does this come to in $$$ ? Assume $1000 for the T1, and minimum wage for your relief (they are a gaming zealot) 40 hours at $6.00, or about $1000 a month... So not taking rent, utilities, you yourself getting paid for it, or any other realistic business expense, your at $2000+ a month. If you charge a modest $10 a month to players you'll need 200 players to break even. Assuming load and turnover are fine, just you and one other guy to moderate 200 people will not be too fun. At $75 the 25-30 players is much more manageable, but losing 4 or 5 of them hurts a lot more...

I'm not trying to bust your balls, just playing the devil's advocate. If you can do it in spite of the burden, I AM THERE!

ManaSink
Support your local LandFish Convert...(uhm)...Cultist...(damn it)....Victim

Edited by - ManaSink on June 28, 2000 5:48:39 PM

I''m the anon from before who brought up the D2 thing. It doesn''t concern me how you guys do things or even if your gouge customers. My main point (which is somewhat off topic I''ll admit, but in response to another anon) is that UO/EQ/+AC don''t need to charge a monthly fee. Ok now to respond to some stuff

"Well, the big RPGs have like 10 or more servers, each supporting over 1000 players."

Last I was on EQ (two weeks ago maybe, using a friend''s account) it had 40k people which is quite respectable, though I have seen 80k on bnet. Keep in mind that EQ is mainly a peak hour type game, usage cuts to less than half for much of the day. On the other hand Diablo II will be a 24 hour game, since it has international popularity. Americans and Canadiens make up under 10% of the people on bnet right now, I expect it to stay that way. In the past blizzard said that it will have ten powerful servers (each with capacity for 10,000 players) at release, and more will be bought as need be. That''s 100k at release, EQ had like 20k at release.

"Well, actually.. Starcraft is a server-based player game. A person CREATES a server, and then others join him/her in that game. Mplayer.net and Battle.net are simply a collection of places to find people who have servers on their own machines for games like these and C&C. They''re both basically an advanced chat room for games. They also allow people to show active games on their servers so other players could join in. This is not a novel concept"

No SC is not a server based game. It is peer to peer, which means that all players involved act as both server and client. Myth on the other hand is a server based game. In the case of both games bnet (battle.net/bungie.net) is a matchmaking service. From a non technical point of view the only real difference is that on a server game lag hurts you, while on a peer to peer game things are fair, the lag is sort of hidden behind latency, decreasing command reaction time for everyone

"I''m not 100% sure how diablo II is working in respects to servers and clients. Is Blizard hosting a Diablo II main game server? I was under the impression Diablo II was like Diablo I in that you could play single or multiplayer."

Nope, in D2 the server is run by blizzard except in the case of open games, in which case the player runs the server.

"I think the major difference between b.net servers (for DII) and the servers for UO/AC/EQ is that the "game life" for DII is much shorter than for one of the other three MMORPGs mentioned.
MMORPGs have a 10 year playability (last I read). DII has a limited life"

all popular games have essentially the same game like: until the sequel comes out. Paying for the same pathetic game for ten years does not appeal to me at all. It would take a million patches to turn EQ into a semi playable game, so far they only have about a hundred. Well I better stop now before I go into a lengthy rant about how everything about EQ is so horribly wrong. Oh except they have good names for their character classes, that''s about all I can throw them.

Another point it that blizzard has far more players than customers. The majority of SC players play in game rooms, they don''t own the game. Thus each copy is kept in use 24 hours a day seven days a week (SC is *extremely* popular in korea). This sucks up bandwidth, yet blizzard only gets one sale out of this. On the other hand EQ has an account system. 24 hours of player bandwidth probably comes out to 10 accounts at least, since not everyone plays every day. So every year EQ gets upwards of $1000 dollars in monthly fees for the same bandwidth that blizzard gets nothing. Heh, I sure with I owned Verant and was the one draining money from people who play my bad game.

Yet after all that here''s something you might not expect: battle.net makes a profit. Yes, somehow those ads are enough, though I doubt it will still be all that profitable after D2 sucks up their resources.

Suddenly, there is a flicker of movement at the window. Then, a loud smash as a cloaked figure crashes through it to land crouching on the wooden floor, shards of glass scattering across the room. The figure rises swiftly to his feet and reaches inside his heavy cloak, drawing a pitch-black broadsword. Stalking across the room, turning his hooded gaze on any who dare to look him in the eye, the cloaked figure approaches the table around which the Council Of Landfish is gathered. With a hefty kick, the table is overturned, previously-filled goblets spilling their liqueur across the design documents and drafts that the Council had pored over for days, nay, weeks. The figure turns to observe the startled onlookers, ensuring none would challenge him. Then, facing Landfish himself, his free hand moves up to push back his hood, revealing his identity. His expression bears no malice or evil, but instead shows a quizzical, and perhaps cynical demeanour.
"I am the one known as Kylotan," says the cloaked figure, "and I shall speak."

*cough* Excuse the indulgence. It''s been a long and boring day at work.

Er... Application only MMORPG? Well, drop the first ''M'' from the acronym, first You''re not gonna get tens of thousands of players if they are all somewhat screened in the first place. But that''s just a technical issue, I know.

Subscription costs... I think this is the way to go. Allow people to pay for as much or as little as they like. But probably give them an option to suspend an account: ie. zip up their details and stick it on a backup server somewhere. That way, they still have the option of coming back if they can''t afford to play your game for a while.

Part of the benefits of the screening would actually be a sort of feedback effect - mature players who want a mature environment would not fear such a system and might be drawn to it because they know that annoying players will not be there, or will be in much smaller quantities.

And another positive effect: the kind of mature players you could be aiming at here, are perhaps the kind who are better placed to be able to afford the subscription costs.

One danger is that, in a highly regulated environment, people expect you to act swiftly. If someone pushes at the boundaries of what is acceptable, they will be more likely to ask for something to be done about it than they would in a more ''free-for-all'' game. And certainly more than they would in a non-paying game. People will expect a better service throughout simply because you made that initial effort.

Drawbacks? (What you were waiting for )

These games are hard to get going. Why is Player #1 gonna want to join your heavily vetted game when it''s nearly empty? You''re gonna have to really pitch your marketing well, cos there''s nothing worse for a roleplaying/social game than having no=one there to roleplay or socialise with.

You may find that, despite the different type of player base you''re aiming at, that they may find themselves to be lacking direction. What can a player do when their friends aren''t around? In many games, you can just go off and level. Does it suit the solo player? Do you want it to? Is there any ''barrier to exit''? How are you going to keep people on your game when other similar ones become available, possibly at a lower cost?

Hmm, I think you were hoping for more criticism But since I''m aiming at running a commercial MUD, we''re probably going to agree more on this subject than any other...

Apologies again for the opening passage