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you know how they say " you can do anything you set your mind to"?
Allhallows
Member Posts: 43
Well that's a crock of crap. There is no way possible I can make my number one dream come true: creating an mmo.
Let me start off by stating that I'm almost 30 and have 10 years of mmo playing experience. I'm not a 13 year old kid fantisizing about making a video game. I know what mmo'ers want in a game. I have literally hundreds of "reasonable" ideas that when strung together would both blow players minds and bring the mmo world back from the crypts.
The only experience I have is reading about what mmo'ers have wanted for almost 10 years on forums. I have no programming or art experience, so I'll never be taken seriously. I wouldn't even know where to start if I wanted to even attempt to create a game. All I have is an 80 page notebook filled with ideas that would take an mmo to the next level, and a dream.
I guess I'll just leave the game creating to the devs with experience; the unoriginal teams out there that are hard at work creating the next wow clone.
So to all my former teachers and my parents who always told me that nothing is impossible; I say up yours. Try to create an mmo.
Let me start off by stating that I'm almost 30 and have 10 years of mmo playing experience. I'm not a 13 year old kid fantisizing about making a video game. I know what mmo'ers want in a game. I have literally hundreds of "reasonable" ideas that when strung together would both blow players minds and bring the mmo world back from the crypts.
The only experience I have is reading about what mmo'ers have wanted for almost 10 years on forums. I have no programming or art experience, so I'll never be taken seriously. I wouldn't even know where to start if I wanted to even attempt to create a game. All I have is an 80 page notebook filled with ideas that would take an mmo to the next level, and a dream.
I guess I'll just leave the game creating to the devs with experience; the unoriginal teams out there that are hard at work creating the next wow clone.
So to all my former teachers and my parents who always told me that nothing is impossible; I say up yours. Try to create an mmo.
Comments
stop Whining, I'm not being rude, because yes that is what you're doing, whining. You said that you have this 80 page notebook filled with Ideas. That shows you actually have proof that you seriously want to do this and you actually have something going with that. If you have the money, you can enter a good school such as SCAD(Savannah college of art and design, the college I currently attend) and start in their interactive game design major to get yourself some artistic skill and to learn some 3D modeling programs such as Maya and 3dstudio. Now that you've done that, you have a good background in art design so you can start creating concept art and visuals for your MMO idea along with all your ideas with that notebook. Huge start there. Employ some coders or just get some like-minded people with you(thats what the internet is for, aka asking people on forums) and bam, you've started your own MMO company. whether its small or not, its still a start.
Btw college should take a total of 4 years or slightly more out of your life but you say being 30 is like the end of the world. The Creator of the MMORPG Alatheya is 47 or something and he is trying to start one up.
oh yah... You can do anything if you set your mind to it....
DISCLAIMER: I may not know exactly how to start in the MMO industry, but saying its completely hopeless is BS.
Hi! My name is paper. Nerf scissors, rock is fine.
MMORPG = Mostly Men Online Roleplaying Girls
http://www.MichaelLuckhardt.com
Money --> Get Designer / Programing Team (you will be lead supervisor guy) ---> Develop MMO ---> Get bashed by MMO Nerds on how much it sucks during OB ---> Cancel MMO ---> Suicide?
You forgot ---> Sell to SOE
You forgot ---> Sell to SOE
Lol oh yes, Selling to SOE is one of the main things you do when you know you're already going downhill and there is no return. SOE will always take you in
.
Hi! My name is paper. Nerf scissors, rock is fine.
MMORPG = Mostly Men Online Roleplaying Girls
http://www.MichaelLuckhardt.com
I'm pretty sure you could use realm crafter or make some kind of 2d mmo. And you know.... you could run your own private server of anything (not that I support this evil behavior)
But shouldn't you just publish those 80 pages of ideas instead of whining? If you really have good ideas like you claim, some developers will likely use some of them.
lol so you've been following mmo for 10 years and nearly 30 yo, so what, you think you're more inteligent then the company out there?
do you think those people out there arent gamers like you? but you see its a business, they need to make money. have you got money?
even if you were a programer/ designer or wathever , its easy to write on paper then doing the actual thing.
sorry but that post is stupid, stop dreaming, come back to reality
Where would you get ideas published? Or do you mean create on paper then shop around?
Most in-roads to game production either come from self-publishing your own game and getting discovered or else climbing the ladder.
I certainly believe that "you can do anything you put your mind to" is not applicable to everyone but in this case, I think you have a shot. The difference is, at 30, don't be expecting to publish your own mmo by 32. Start taking the steps in the right direction. Enroll in school if you cannot code and then take one of your ideas and start developing it on a small scale, single player game. As a visionary and a manager, you need to appreciate what's feasible and be capable of managing resources (time, people, money) to make the game (i.e., skip art school ; ' )
Where would you get ideas published? Or do you mean create on paper then shop around?Why don't you give us a basic summery? Who better to rip it to shreds.......errrr........discuss it with, then us?
j/k, seriously, give us an outline.
(yes, you can do what you want in life, you just gotta know what and stick to it....nothing comes easy)
Try getting involved with one of the open source projects.
MMORPG
Not very aspirational I know but might be worth playing around with NWN editor. The D& D element sucks but you can design your own mod, or have a persistant world of 80 people I think.
There was an article some time back and is one of the things industry guys suggested to get a start.
My old sig used to say
Whiners never quit
- Quitters never whine.
All in all, learn a language and listen to Paul Barnett,
it's all possible and nothing is impossible, you're just a quitter.
Played so far: 9Dragons, AO, AC, AC2, CoX, DAoC, DF, DnL, DR, DDO, Ent, EvE, EQ, EQ2, FoMK, FFO, Fury, GW, HG:L, HZ, L1, L2, M59, MU, NC1, NC2, PS, PT, R:O, RF:O, RYL, Ryzom, SL, SB, SW:G, TR, TCoS, MX:O, UO, VG, WAR, WoW...
It all sucked.
heres the simple fact, ideas are a dime a dozen but I don't think you have any idea how incredibly complex and hard an mmo is to make, or how much money you need to make an mmorpg.
If you want to make an mmorpg, then find a way to get rich and fund it yourself, or get the appropriate amount of experience needed to get hired to lead a team.
To be mad that you can't create an mmo with no experience or assets is like a someone with a high school education being mad that a pharmaceutical company won't give them millions of dollars to find a cure for a disease even though the person thinks they have really good ideas.
Almost 30? So you're almost in the prime of your life? You're not even old, but almost in your prime, but can't study heavily on programming, perhaps get a degree in it (4 years?) and find a team, get your idea out there, find a producer, or at least TRY?
You CAN do anything you set your mind to, WITH hard work, patience, and a lot of effort. If you really really wanted to, you could learn a programming language in a month by cramming scores of books in your brain, or goto college fast-tracking to get a degree, and throw your idea out there, find a team somehow, throw your idea out there, or do whatever it takes.
You might even be 40-50 in the end after you finish the MMO if you run into a lot of stumbling blocks and bad circumstance, or get a late start, but from my knowledge I don't think there is an age limit to being a game developer.
If you have the desire, the motivation, and the courage to not give up no matter what, you CAN do it.
It is completely possible. You just gotta always keep dreaming and always putting effort to reach that dream.
And if you believe in God, or even if you don't, whatever, cause all things can be done through Christ who strengthens you, and nothing is impossible with God. Philippians 4:13 Luke 18:27
30 isn't old, 30 is the beginning of the prime of your life.
Youth is when we're retarded compared to the experience, knowledge, and maturity we get by growing older. You don't even begin your prime until 30+.
Where would you get ideas published? Or do you mean create on paper then shop around?Why don't you give us a basic summery? Who better to rip it to shreds.......errrr........discuss it with, then us?
j/k, seriously, give us an outline.
(yes, you can do what you want in life, you just gotta know what and stick to it....nothing comes easy)
lol, yea that's true. MMORPG.com is the place to get your idea to be destroyed...er I mean get constructive criticism... yea that's what it's called....constructive criticism.....LOL
Constructive Critcism- adj. statement- Definition: "Being Flamed to Death by Negativity"
Example: "I was given Constructive Criticism as they metaphorically burned me at the stake yelling about witchcraft."
you're off to a great start... I mean you have 80 pages of stuff in a note book and the first thing you write is this post.
sacasm aside even a programmer can design an MMO, design doesn't take much. good design can but you got there by doing other stuff first.
in an indy sub $3000 production MMO a pure designer is utterly useless if you care do something, pick up a few newbie OO based programming books or something, atleast you can debug if you follow it through. learn texturing, this makes the largest difference to a finished game cartoony, bland, sucky looking, not gonna touch that, to realalistic.
I find it amazing that by 2020 first world countries will be competing to get immigrants.
An education does wonders. From reading your post, you seem very passionate about it, just a little lost. If you feel no one will take you seriously because you don't have the experience, get the experience. If you have a dream, you have to follow it. I'm 30 years old and never worked in a kitchen in my life, BUT I LOVE TO COOK! So I'm going to school to learn about it. To do what you want to do, you can even take courses at home. The people who succeed fail much more often then they succeed. They just don't take no for an answer.
If your giving up at the bloody concept stage and you only have 80 pages of work in a notebook and your posting here of all places for advice I'd say a 13 year old dreaming about making a game has a better chance than you in all honesty, there are two things you need to make it in the games industry and this was said on a podcast at this very site and it's true, you need contacts and some experience, that's all it takes. My games design teacher is designing a game he's been designing for longer than you, he's got hundreds of pages on his game and not just 80, 80 isn't enough to even pass off as a decent first person shooter.
I'm 17 and I can tell you that from next year onto maybe 2010 or so I'm going to be developing an MMORPG with an independent team ( Not stating the name for obvious reasons ), look at the history of the different developer teams, Bioware didn't suck up to the publishers and look where they are now, they got together an entire association of investors and to this day set some of the highest standards in the games industry, if you've got the time to go whining here about how you can't develop a game then your clearly not spending enough time on it, the games designer that I am going to be working for has a second job and has been designing his game for years, it's only until now he's been able to get the interest of a couple of investors. If I sound harsh, tough, you have to deal with it, this is a brutal industry and people who go in with a half assed attitude will end up like SOE or Blizzard, money grabbing gits or people who try to get money from the Industry by any means possible.
Quoting people doesn't make you clever, in fact, it makes you all the more stupid for not bothering to read the quotes you post in the first place.
I'm trying to hold myself back from saying any age under 30 can be called "almost 30" lol! By your tone I picture you being 15 years old.
But seriously, research! Here, I'll help you out some...
Check out the cheapest made mmorpg, which has been out a solid 4 years: Strive for Power
Here is how it goes:
1. Get a job. Get 2 jobs. Heck, get 3 jobs ...... and start SAVING UP MONEY.....
2. Save your money. Strive for Power SfP cost its maker, who was 1 single guy with a dream, (I think he is British) roughly $5,000.oo (USA) to make. Post on the SfP forums, POLITELY saying you are intrested in starting in the mmorpg field, and making a mmorpg of your own. Ask what hardware was used to run SfP. What company they bought their servers from. What language, or languages, is it written in.
3. Racewar Kingdoms For some reason MMORPG.com has Racewar Kingdoms listed on some parts of this site, but not Strive for Power. Both meet mmorpg.com's definition of a mmorpg. Racewar Kingdoms is the left over from the first major mmorpg to become VAPORWAR. The infamous game called "Dawn". RWK was written by 1 guy. He kept recycling the little money he made, until he was able to keep updating it with. RWK cost him roughly 5k to make. Right now he and his girlfriend run it together. (For some strange reason, in that game he likes to call himself "god".
)
3b. BARP AKA Blood Adventure Role-Playing. The mmorpg called BARP was created and run by 1 guy. It cost him roughly 5k to make it. It had some very unique features. I believe he wrote it in PEARL.
4. TDZK (Acronym for the various races players can pick in game.) Do the same in the TDZK forums. Politely post in their forums, asking the same questions very politely. I believe it's 2-4 women who created that game, doing what I'm telling you to do right now. They run their game on 1 server machine. The even once posted a picture of it. It initially cost them roughly 5k-10k to make it.
5. Astonia 3 The next level of low cost mmorpgs, is Astonia 3, and Runescape. A bunch of German gamers and friends got together and said "we have some ideas for a game. Lets pool our money, and see if it works!". Astonia 1 cost roughly 10K to make, they used their profits to make Astonia 2, and now are up to Astonia 3... which cost very roughly 50k to make. Politely ask the same questions in the Astonia 3 forums.
6. Runescape Runescape cost roughly 100k to make. If memory serves me right, 2 brothers made it. The first version cost roughly between 20k to 50k to make. The current Runescape is "version 3". Too many people post on the RS forums, so it's unlikely you'll get the right answers. BUT, I believe RS is written in Javascript.
7. There's 4 tiny low cost space mmorpgs, none of which I can now remember the names. 2 of them were related to each other. I once commanded an entire squadron in one of them, something like 500 players were under my command. The fun and brutal memories LOL! There was no logging out either LOL!!! After you left the game, your character stayed in it. One of the unique and fun features. Pray your still alive when you wake in the morning and log back into the game heheh. TDZK also has this feature, but with bit more easier safe areas to hide. But all 4 of them were made by as few as 1 person using roughly 5k to 10k of their own saved money to invest in their idea.
The best scenario is make a low cost mmorpg that is free to play. See if "they come". Be very active in your official forums. Constant communication > everything else... Keep it up and running for 1 year to get a core following of fans addicted to it. Then make parts of it pay to play. A-la Runescape's model. (The old parts are free, the new parts are Pay, with a few free new parts.) Astonia 3 allows players to play 1 month free, then they have to pay to continue.
Also look at the pay plan Anarchy Online, RWK, and Astonia 3 have - having as many ways as possible for players to pay: Money Order, Check, yes, even cash heheh (I'd say try allowing cash payments at first to see how it goes....instruct players to send the cash in a potal envelope, or even a small box. That way postal workers can't see what's inside when they hold it up to a light). And of course Credit Cards, Debt Cards, pre-paid CC. And Western Union, MoneyGram.....
All these low cost mmorpgs still exist. They are all currently turning in a true profit. They have all re-couped their initial investment monies. EVERY game, every designer, every developer, started somewhere. And then they all TOOK ACTION. You now have the information on what to DO to TAKE ACTION. Starting off by saving 5 thousand dollars. Easy to do in 1 year.
As for learning the computer languages, you can take night courses at any local college. Or take day courses if you have the time and money. Or attend on scholarship. The computer language information community colleges teach is the same computer launguages that "major Ivy league" colleges teach and will work. Pay a H.S. or even college computer student for their notes, or even go to your local Barnes and Noble bookstore (or whatever major bookstore) and read or buy, their computer books on whatever language.
Did you know Lord British, the most successful game designer in history, started out by making his first game in his garage, then using sandwich bags as packaging, and selling and sometimes giving them away, to his neighbours? He kept saving what little profits he made, and re-invested it into his next game.
Check into Government grants.
The Old Timers Guild
Laid back, not so serious, no drama.
All about the fun!
www.oldtimersguild.com
An opinion should be the result of thought, not a substitute for it. - Jef Mallett
I'd like to disagree. I set my mind to creating my own studio and, low and behold, I have it. I'm learning programming, and have 0 artistic talent... I can't even draw stickmen very well.
Not only do I have my own studio making a SP/MP game, but because I kept at it after I accomplished this task, I also got the funding to make my own engine and tools as well!
IN ADDITION:
I've been approached about making a MMO by said investors. They came to me, not vice versa.
If you truely put your mind to it, you can accomplish it. You obviously haven't put enough of yourself into your goal, otherwise you'd still be at it.
Don't give up, if you give up then your mind was obviously not put towards it... in which case it's good that you didn't start the project to begin with.
- CaesarsGhost
Lead Gameplay and Gameworld Designer for a yet unnamed MMO Title.
"When people tell me designing a game is easy, I try to get them to design a board game. Most people don't last 5 minutes, the rest rarely last more then a day. The final few realize it's neither fun nor easy."
Have you tried getting into a modding project? It can give you experience on how to run a team etc and you'd have lots of fun as well. It can also be used as experience. And how about doing a course!??? There are bloody loads of game-design related courses out there that can help you as well as getting contacts as well. If a 94 year old woman can go to school and finish her studies (I saw it on the news!)...anyone can do anything!