Engine

[Slide]

Originally Posted by Vatoreus

So can Ogre files be imported to MV?

Should imagine so, considering Axiom is a direct port of Ogre, or was last time I looked. Ogre doesn't really have it's own files - rather it has a bunch of converters and importers for stuff like MAX. Honestly haven't looked at it in any depth or even looked at Axiom for a couple of years so who knows. Can't imagine it will have diverged much tho.

[Slide]

Originally Posted by Vatoreus

Have you looked at Torque?

Don't know how Torque is these days, but there were some fairly serious licensing gotchas in place on the whole framework - i.e. as soon as your project becomes anyway commercial then you have to pony up additional revenues, look at it cerefully before you commit anything - do you want to give them money if at some point you ask players to contribute to running expenses?

My feeling, is that the MMO server architecture and network programming isn't the hardest piece to implement, and definately the most interesting piece to do from scratch. I'd look around for a LGPL graphics engine and do the rest myself. If you get stuck there's plenty of projects such as Nevrax, L2J, even Muds to look at for how to lay out the server.

95% of the effort will be content and making tools for the content anyway.

[Fattyfat]

I don't have any experience with MV, and honestly I don't really want to spend the time learning about it. While it looks like a good thing, I need the ability to sell what I work on. That is just a personal requirement for myself, which is why I went with Torque. For someone who is serious, a one time $150 investment is pocket change.

There is also a lot of support for torque through their wiki-ish page and the forums. GG employees usually get back with you pretty quick on any questions you have, or you can find resources to do common tasks. There are also books based on Torque complete with tutorials and all that shit.

The most important thing, Torque is proven. There are plenty of published games built on the torque engine. In particular, Minions of Mirth. The first MMO built from the ground up using torque.

Torque has 2 licenses. The first is the Indie license and costs $150 per seat (if you spent $100 back in the day, its only a $50 upgrade now) and entitles you to royalty free commercial use of their engine. If your product makes more than $250,000 a year, then you must upgrade to the Commercial version for another $600 per seat. You still get all the same royalty free junk.

I'm not sure what "licensing gotchas" you are referring to. In addition to an engine, GarageGames will also help you publish your game on their site.

---

Starting from just Torque, we would have a LONG ASS way to go before we had some sort of MMOish game to dick with.

That's where Minions of Mirth comes in.

Minions of Mirth is made by Prairie Games (PG).

PG is creating 2 different products right now.

The first is the Minions of Mirth modkit. This project gives you all of the non-engine code for Minions of Mirth and allows you to make any modifications outside the engine. I'll call this the "modkit".

The second is the MMOKit (NOT Dream's queer ass shit). This project is a stripped down version of the first product, but will include the engine source when it is released. This is what you want to use as a baseline to create your own MMO.

You would use the modkit for example code based on what is available within minions of mirth.

PG has a subversion of both products available while they develop them for people to test and play around with. I have been actively playing around with both because I want to begin prototyping some of my MMO ideas. You can setup the MMOKit as a singleplayer game or host mmo servers with what they give you.

At the moment you DO NOT NEED a Torque license to access the current beta of the MMOKit. The kit does NOT include the engine source code, just a binary of the engine. The only modifications you can make to the MMOKit are outside the engine, however in most cases this will be enough to get something off the ground and running. All gameplay and content are stored outside the engine. Note, when the release is final, you will need a torque license.

The MMOKit contains the engine binary, Torque Script, and python.

Here is the website for the kit:
MMOWorkshop - Trac

Here is the documentation for shit like how to set it up:
Documentation - MMOWorkshop - Trac

If you spend time setting it up (extremely fast) you will start with a basic mmo game in about 15 minutes. You could extend this with content and have a fully working game based on Minions of Mirth rules.

Trust me, you screw with this and you will feel like you are getting somewhere IMMEDIATELY.

Faille, if you spent time dicking with MV (and I believe you have) you should probably spend some time trying the same shit with the MMOKit before you make an engine decision. I'm around to help you out if needed.

[Faille]

Nod, when I get some free time I'll have a look at it.

The cost is a concern given the nature of this project. I'd rather avoid any upfront costs as much as possible for the time being until the project has solidified a bit more.

It definitely looks like Torque is more polished atm and the support system is fantastic.

How much hassle would an engine change be down the track? At least how far down is the point of no return in choosing an engine?

[Slide]

Originally Posted by Fattyfat

I don't have any experience with MV, and honestly I don't really want to spend the time learning about it. While it looks like a good thing, I need the ability to sell what I work on. That is just a personal requirement for myself, which is why I went with Torque. For someone who is serious, a one time $150 investment is pocket change.

There is also a lot of support for torque through their wiki-ish page and the forums. GG employees usually get back with you pretty quick on any questions you have, or you can find resources to do common tasks. There are also books based on Torque complete with tutorials and all that shit.

The most important thing, Torque is proven. There are plenty of published games built on the torque engine. In particular, Minions of Mirth. The first MMO built from the ground up using torque.

Torque has 2 licenses. The first is the Indie license and costs $150 per seat (if you spent $100 back in the day, its only a $50 upgrade now) and entitles you to royalty free commercial use of their engine. If your product makes more than $250,000 a year, then you must upgrade to the Commercial version for another $600 per seat. You still get all the same royalty free junk.

I'm not sure what "licensing gotchas" you are referring to. In addition to an engine, GarageGames will also help you publish your game on their site.

Well it looks like the "licensing gotchas" have been removed in the past couple of years, when the product was first launched there was a requirement to publish any game made with the engine through torque games with terms and rates being determined by their discretion. Thats a pretty heavy gotcha.

The current license isn't clear, but it appears if any member of your team - be they writers, artists, programmers are employed by a company with more than $250K revenue (not profit, turnover) - which is basically anyone then every person must pay $750 for a seat license.

$750 * 10 or 20 or 30 people interested in a hobbyist project is a lot of money.

[Lenardo]

that licence has to be for a company using the PRODUCT, any company with more than say 10 employees that sells services or a product will have morethan 250k revenue.

my company has 8 employees full time and a few consultants...we regularly do 750k a year in revenue.....

currently the project is a nonrevenue generating enterprise, if it gets to the point of release and charging, then it'll trip that license...because,, say 5000 people buy the product and you charge 10 a month to play...5000x10x12=600,000 in gross revenue, not including the box price.. in order to not trip said license you'd need 2083 paying customers(average for the entire year) or less if you charge for the software intitially.....

[Slide]

(b) Licensee may not use the Indie License if the annual revenue of the Company employing, partnering, or affiliated in any way with the Licensee is greater than $250,000 annually. Companies that grow to greater than $250,000 annually must upgrade to the Torque Commercial Product License for each seat of the Torque.

It may not be anything more than a cover their own bases term in the license but it's fairly clear.