Interesting Powerpoint Presentation on Creating an MMO Without a Massive Budget

[ShenMolo]

I searched around to see if this had been posted already and couldn't find it.

Scott Brown of NetDevil's Presentation at GDC 08 on Creating an MMO Without a Massive Team or Budget:

http://static.netdevil.com/cms-images/gdc2008_brown_scott_small_teams_big_dreams.ppt

[Torinak]

I searched around to see if this had been posted already and couldn't find it.

Scott Brown of NetDevil's Presentation at GDC 08 on Creating an MMO Without a Massive Team or Budget:

http://static.netdevil.com/cms-images/gdc2008_brown_scott_small_teams_big_dreams.ppt

Some interesting bits, but some very depressing ones (because they seem like Software Development 101, but were apparently important enough to call out for their audience):

* Don't spend all your money on rent
* Client-server is harder than just-client
* Actually test your game, and have other people test your game too
* Dev/build environment is important
* Actually fix crashes
* 3rd party tools/middleware usually suck and make your project fail

And a few  bits:
* Dev time is better spent on adding grinds than missions
* Design graphics first, then build gameplay around that

I'm not going to hold it against NetDevil that they haven't had any major successes lately (Auto Assault), because they are trying fairly different things and are probably failing much more cheaply than most other MMO companies. Plus, I'm glad to see any encouragement for companies to fix crashing bugs and have decent development and build systems.

[Slyfeind]

* Dev time is better spent on adding grinds than missions

Goddamnit. How about this: Ten-thousand crappy missions are better than a hundred good ones. Geez, games can be crammed full of hand-crafted content if it's thrown-together iterations of Kill Ten Rats. Know what? That's one thing that, in my opinion, is good enough. Few people are going to notice because few people read the text, and most that do read it will forget about it, those that remember will forgive it for sucking because there's a zillion other missions to go through, and those that don't forgive it for sucking will bitch on message boards then carry on with their lives.

Sure, put grinds in there, but not in place of missions.