Anonymous Mythic employee dishes dirt on WAR and SWTOR

[Mrbloodworth]

Excel is the front end for every systems designer. Sara Jensen Schubert (Lietgardis) gives some very good, and very popular talks on the subject. Here's the latest. Note how everyone SHUTS UP as they learn things:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NdP1PdOEpFM

That's why I didn't get the comment. The person ether does not know this, or had seen someone editing the sheet and said "LOLZ OMG you have no tool!!!" thinking that some custom, GUI thingy-ma-bob was a standard instead of a nicety. I bet turbine has one, but they have three titles that use the same systems and likely do not use delphi :p.

[Ghambit]

One has to believe if WoW wasnt such a money-maker that MMO devs. would be more likely to use at least standard industry workflows to produce a game.  It's almost like studios think that if one game can bring in THAT much cash for the moneyhats then it'd behoove said studio to produce everything from SCRATCH, taking as loooong as possible to produce said product.  This way, they can bring in at least a respectable sum for the codemonkeys and lower management.

Problem is, this never happens. Errr, has only happened once.  I remember watching AoC's dev. cycle(s) and giggling as they nearly "hand-modeled" and textured everything in that game on top of using a completely custom game engine and level designer.  And that was a $100million+ game as well yes?  In dev. over 5 years, etc.    

[naum]

Excel is the front end for every systems designer. Sara Jensen Schubert (Lietgardis) gives some very good, and very popular talks on the subject. Here's the latest. Note how everyone SHUTS UP as they learn things:

That is indeed sad, and indicative of the sorry state of design…

[Mrbloodworth]

There are many MMO midle-wares out there. None have shipped a title.

[bhodi]

Coding everything in Delphi probably didn't help. Hey, I like Delphi.)

You bastard.

Actually, this is a prime example of the aforementioned sorry state of design. You don't let people do this because it creates a hodge-podge of cobbled-together unmaintainable frankencode. Things like this are a good indication of poor overall direction, since decisions like "What language should we be writing code in" should have been made at the outset.

DaoC was a special case; I remember that Lum, you were brought in mid-stream, but this is bad bad bad from a design & management perspective. Don't let people on your projects do this. Quash it, and quash it hard.

[Mrbloodworth]

His app was not mission critical, it was a nicety (as I understand it)

[bhodi]

His app was not mission critical, it was a nicety (as I understand it)

Wrong.

It doesn't have to touch the customer to be mission critical. All internal programs (unless handled by an outside department) should fall under the same purview and design umbrella as everything else. Obviously, creating something that helps in the way that Lum's app does is terrific from a usability/convenience perspective, but when you introduce something like that, and it's useful, it very quickly worms it's way right into the 'mission critical' category for all the users. Then, when Lum leaves, and the schema changes slightly, the people who were using it are fucked.

It's a thing that seems easy enough to do "I can solve this problem very quickly by making a widget with ruby on rails on grail on carrier pidgeon" but, for overall consistency, even if it takes twice as long, any tools that are created should be created with maintainability and consistency in mind.

I say this as a system architect, and I fully admit it's a peeve of mine. No, random developer #37, you can NOT code that linker using the new Dev hotness. I don't care what you saw in annoying dev trends magazine, we are not using a random framework you saw on the internet because we still have to support that shit long after you've gone. No, random developer #64, you are not allowed to write that munger in LISP. I don't care if it'd be faster. We'd have to hire my grandpa when something breaks.

That's not even bringing up the fact a lot of this stuff is in heavy, heavy development and all that implies - API shifts/inconsistencies, security holes, poor documentation, and zero support.

[UnsGub]

His app was not mission critical, it was a nicety (as I understand it)

Tools determine speed of develoment along adding or subtracting human errors that go with software projects.

They are mission critical or we would still be workng with vi and no source control.

[Typhon]

His app was not mission critical, it was a nicety (as I understand it)

Tools determine speed of develoment along adding or subtracting human errors that go with software projects.

They are mission critical or we would still be workng with vi and no source control.

Which is why something like, "no one else has cycles so lets let the new guy do it... in his spare time", would be a good example of poor technical project management. 

A reinforcing example of poor project management would be, "now old/new guy is leaving, no need to do a thorough knowledge transfer and risk assessment, adjusting/budgeting the schedule where necessary, so that any critical components that only he knows about aren't left dangling".

[of course I don't know what really happened, but speculation is fun!]

[Modern Angel]

I think we should stop talking about a 300 million dollar budget.  That's just a figure from EA Louse guy, so it's likely just a rumour from within the Mythic offices, better if we maintain some perspective and use Lum's 150 million figure, that's wild enough.

Right. If the dude had said "most expensive game ever made" the conversation would be far more serious. As it is everyone goes no way to 300mil, wanders off and talks about something else.

[Mrbloodworth]

In the above scenario. Boss says: "Excel still works. Get it done".

[Arthur_Parker]

It's a thing that seems easy enough to do "I can solve this problem very quickly by making a widget with ruby on rails on grail on carrier pidgeon" but, for overall consistency, even if it takes twice as long, any tools that are created should be created with maintainability and consistency in mind.

I say this as a system architect, and I fully admit it's a peeve of mine. No, random developer #37, you can NOT code that linker using the new Dev hotness. I don't care what you saw in annoying dev trends magazine, we are not using a random framework you saw on the internet because we still have to support that shit long after you've gone. No, random developer #64, you are not allowed to write that munger in LISP. I don't care if it'd be faster. We'd have to hire my grandpa when something breaks.

That's a lot of what I was indirectly getting at, mmo design just needs to catch up with the real world.  I'm most familiar with PVCS, there's no reason why WAR had to launch with the wrong stats on items, no reason why adjusting exp gain should be more complicated than turning one dial, no reason why the same company would need to develop an auction house from scratch more than once.

[Chimpy]

If the variables were supposed to be changeable, you would think they would call them something descriptive. You know, some new fangled word like ... oh wait.

[Lum]

Just to clarify, for the record I fully agree with all the slamming of my Lone Gunman bizarre non-maintainable app coding, speaking as someone who graduated to a project management role and got to worry about it a bit more from the other side of the fence, and who currently works with a team of coders who cross-train on each others' projects to avoid exactly that situation.

And yes, most tools that aren't budgeted, or just get slung over to the fence to "the new guy" or "the crazy guy in the corner office who no one can actually talk to but for some reason craps out code quickly no one understands" (hint: that was me) are unmaintainable by definition.

[HaemishM]

Coding everything in Delphi probably didn't help. Hey, I like Delphi.)

You bastard.

Actually, this is a prime example of the aforementioned sorry state of design. You don't let people do this because it creates a hodge-podge of cobbled-together unmaintainable frankencode. Things like this are a good indication of poor overall direction, since decisions like "What language should we be writing code in" should have been made at the outset.

DaoC was a special case; I remember that Lum, you were brought in mid-stream, but this is bad bad bad from a design & management perspective. Don't let people on your projects do this. Quash it, and quash it hard.

I can kind of forgive DAoC since it was done on a $3 million budget by what was essentially an indie house. It was the first and last real garage band MMO.

WAR however? WAR gets no such credit because yeah, fuckers should have known better by the time they built it. That goes for a lot of other things as well, like not restricting beta by level band, not increasing leveling experience required a week before release, etc.

[bhodi]

It's just one of those bullet points that I'll add when I publish my book - Warning signs: Quick and easy ways to see a project is headed for disaster.

It'll be a pop-up book so non-technical managers can understand it.

[Ghambit]

There are many MMO midle-wares out there. None have shipped a title.

Your statement hinges on how you'd define middleware.  These days, standard workflow is yesterday's "middleware."
But yah, you're right...  in the abstract senseofitall.

[Lietgardis]

If I had to wait for official, approved tools to be built before I could do my job, I'd never get anything done.

(uh, in general, and not speaking on behalf of any employer.)

[Mrbloodworth]

There are many MMO midle-wares out there. None have shipped a title.

Your statement hinges on how you'd define middleware.  These days, standard workflow is yesterday's "middleware."
But yah, you're right...  in the abstract senseofitall.

The ones that aim to address all the stuff above. Client, server and tools packages. Many MMO's don't use midleware, with a few exceptions on the client side, but that's mostly rendering and art tools, not aware of any that are the full shebang.

[Samprimary]

It's just one of those bullet points that I'll add when I publish my book - Warning signs: Quick and easy ways to see a project is headed for disaster.

It'll be a pop-up book so non-technical managers can understand it.

- Is a new MMO

[Moosehands]

Ah artists!   

If this dude was still working he'd be too busy forgetting his source control password (it hasn't fucking changed!  it never changes!) and being dumbfounded that his Active Directory username isn't "gokuFAN88" to have time to write.

[UnSub]

You mean Activision not EA. And Kotick had nothing to do with the success of WoW -- that all happened per-merger. Also Vivendi still controls Activision Blizzard so Kotick can not fuck with WoW or Blizzard for that matter with risking losing his job. Unlike some other companies Vivendi very much knows they have a goose laying golden eggs for them.

Yes, my mistake. Agreed that Kotick had nothing to do with WoW's success, he just benefits immensely from it being part of the portfolio.

You could not get me to comment on the rest of the EALouse blog if you tortured me with hot pliers.

We need Lum, a chair, some rope and Prokofy Neva, stat. 

[Ghambit]

There are many MMO midle-wares out there. None have shipped a title.

Your statement hinges on how you'd define middleware.  These days, standard workflow is yesterday's "middleware."
But yah, you're right...  in the abstract senseofitall.

The ones that aim to address all the stuff above. Client, server and tools packages. Many MMO's don't use midleware, with a few exceptions on the client side, but that's mostly rendering and art tools, not aware of any that are the full shebang.

Only ones I know of are Multiverse (now defunct it seems) and HeroEngine.  Then there's Cryptic of course (who 'self-middlewares').  And Perpetual went into the middleware business also, 
RTW INTENDED to go middleware using APB as a biz model - they failed.  (well, technically it's an Unreal game right?)

One could consider UDK the best 'middleware' package ever made, with Unity perhaps a close second.  There are MMOs out there that use either.  Granted, they're heavily instanced and 'lobbied.'  Any giant "level editor" like UDK or Unity that allows streaming info. out of the level can be considered as MMO-middleware yes?

[Sheepherder]

... Ultima I believe used 7 engine, and of course had its back end custom.

UO was Ultima 8 based.  Ultima 7 used the Voodoo memory manager and is incompatible with any OS after MS-DOS, and with MS-DOS's extended memory management (EMM386) which had to be disabled to get the goddamn game to run.

You could not get me to comment on the rest of the EALouse blog if you tortured me with hot pliers. I have burned enough bridges in my nascent game development career, I'm trying to remain at least partially employable.

You actually did publish that defense of Mark Jacob's character, we know you're mancrushing on him and your talk of employability is just a ruse to hide your true feelings.

[Arthur_Parker]

I can kind of forgive DAoC since it was done on a $3 million budget by what was essentially an indie house. It was the first and last real garage band MMO.

I was going to hunt out a link to Turbine being based in someones house, but got distracted reading about Turbine's founder Jon Monsarrat instead.

[5150]

It's threads like this that make me [occasionally] wished I had a head for coding.

Partly so I could be earning the big bucks (yeah right!) but mostly so I could more fully relate to the content of the leaks.

I'm still waiting for a leak from an MMO systems guy that includes choice quotes like "they made us use AVG free edition, expected the users to keep their machines up to date with patches AND all the core servers were on 100MB hubs with DHCP addresses!!!!!!!!!!WTFOMGBBQKOS"

[Stabs]

"they made us use AVG free edition, expected the users to keep their machines up to date with patches

Yes because developing a game on PCs that ressemble the machines the game will eventually be played on....

[5150]

"they made us use AVG free edition, expected the users to keep their machines up to date with patches

Yes because developing a game on PCs that ressemble the machines the game will eventually be played on....

I'm trying to decide if thats a troll or if you were actually serious.........

[Paelos]

If the thought remotely enters your mind, it's always always a troll.

[5150]

If the thought remotely enters your mind, it's always always a troll.

Maybe, just remember that I deal with end users 

[kildorn]

If I had to wait for official, approved tools to be built before I could do my job, I'd never get anything done.

(uh, in general, and not speaking on behalf of any employer.)

That's the crazy balance you need to find anywhere. If there's a need for something then yes it's urgent and needs to be addressed immediately, but there also needs to be a tool or a functional change management system built next to it for future use.

The problem is developing a sustainable operation as well as meeting the current business needs. Sadly "I can crap this out in an hour in X random language" is usually good for immediate productivity, but absolutely terrible for long term sustainability.

I learned system administration by counting the number of times we duct taped a proof of concept together in the last minute, only to watch it immediately become the production system that would be crashing it's way through the next 3 years. Since then, I found it's better to not be completely honest about how fast you COULD get that POC up, but tell them how long it would take to get it up properly and in compliance with your shop's standards. Because the person asking you isn't being entirely honest when they say it'll just be in use for a week and then retired so you can stand up the real proper system 

[Pendan]

Only ones I know of are Multiverse (now defunct it seems) and HeroEngine.  Then there's Cryptic of course (who 'self-middlewares').  And Perpetual went into the middleware business also, 
RTW INTENDED to go middleware using APB as a biz model - they failed.  (well, technically it's an Unreal game right?)

One could consider UDK the best 'middleware' package ever made, with Unity perhaps a close second.  There are MMOs out there that use either.  Granted, they're heavily instanced and 'lobbied.'  Any giant "level editor" like UDK or Unity that allows streaming info. out of the level can be considered as MMO-middleware yes?

Fallen Earth uses a engine that I believe they were trying to get other developers to use. They do some very nice instant instances such that you have no zoning time on the client.

[sam, an eggplant]

Fallen Earth uses a engine that I believe they were trying to get other developers to use. They do some very nice instant instances such that you have no zoning time on the client.

SWTOR does the same thing. Seamless instancing is a neat feature.

[Modern Angel]

KOTORO is done on the HeroEngine, I believe.

[Stormwaltz]

KOTORO is done on the HeroEngine, I believe.

Confirmed, though I've heard it was extensively modified.