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Why So Much To Make An MMO????
stargate005
Member Posts: 49
Hi guys,
*I would first like to say please read the whole thing before you reply. I know its insanely long seeing as it took me a looong time to write lol, but I really think its important for people to know, and that some of this info will help alot of people. I should have created a guide with this info in it I guess lol, it would be better than just making it a post, eventually I may just do that lol, but I really hope alot of people will read this and understand where I'm coming from.*
For the last week I've been looking heavily into costs of an MMO, and creating my on MMO.On these forums I see ALOT of people saying things like "dont bother the money alone is too much for you", or "not another person, why dont people understand they cant make an MMO unless they have like a billion dollars?" in my opinion these people are full of bs. Probably because they cant figure out how to make one themselves.
After looking through prices on servers, engines, a team, etc... I have begun work on an MMO that will cost me no more than 1500-1000 dollars or possibly less. Of cource I'm not talking about a product that will be distributed to over 50,000 people here but I am talking a good 1000+
Now I'd like to know where ppl are getting these numbers. Alot of people get their numbers from huge buisnesses like those from WoW, I'd like to see an exact chart of their expenses, and a chart of their expenses at the first release of their MMO.
I mean a server that could fit a few thousand players can be rented for between 60-200$ which isn't all that much, expecially if you plan to charge monthly fees. I think that what throws most numbers off is the server costs. I mean to start alot of people and companies are going to have a server that can fit a few thousand unless their a company like microsoft who have billions of dollars that they can spend, I mean if they didn't spend it chances are they'd use it for fire fuel lol, couldnt you picture bill gates infront of a 2 million dollar fireplace throwing 100$ bills in lmao. But anyways one good server like I said isn't all that much for the normal person. What a smart person would do is start with a 99$ server distribute their game then start charging monthly fees of a few dolars I mean you can get some for only 65 bucks a month at http://www.jhservers.com/dedicated.php. This will get them the cash they need to buy another server, and so on until you get enough servers to be able to allow all the customers a well made server. Until then limit the amount of games distributed and cap the amount of people per server. So there ya go, from 99$ you just got yourself a good 5 servers. Also theres other good better servers out there if you have the cash to start with. Next people say "oh the engine itself is worth 15million" lol, I saw that in a post this morning. A good engine that just became public called RealmCrafter (www.realmcrafter.com) costs $55 bucks and I myself have tried it and it's an excellent engine, quite powerful and the graphics aren't bad, and their beeing updated as well. So there you go so far you've spent 150$ and you have yourself a game engine and server. Next add 60$ for a good web hoster like http://www.siteground.com/index.htm for only 5$ a month.
Next alot of people talk about paying people to help make their game. Thats not needed. Alot of the time you'll find people who just want to work on an MMO, I mean without even asking someone came to me and asked to join my team just today, for no pay. For those ho do want to get paid a good opinion is giving them a percent of whatever the game brings in. Or if its made by a group of friends its free lol. But alot of the time unless you do have the cash to hire professionals a newer modeler can be as good as a pro since in an MMO you want a low poly count so its not hard to make a model with a low poly count. Its when its a high poly count you need the pros. Then comes textures which a good photoshop user can make for you, and theres millions of free textures on the net if you don't mind using one instead of making it yourself. Last is the music, which is harder to find, but try searching the forums, and eventually youll find someone. But alot of the time that part can be left until the end. But like I said alot of people if they really are interested they'd take a cut of the profits most wont ask to be paid upfront.
Also don't forget about the programs like modeling programs. Alot of people go for something like milkshape but if your on a super low budget scrub that and o for something like wings 3d (http://www.wings3d.com/) or use a gaming modeler with tons of features like http://www.truevision3d.com/home.php which is great for 3d development. Or another popular modeler is blender 3d (http://blender.org/cms/Home.2.0.html).
Now I'm sure theres also the etra few costs here and there, such as copyrights and legalizing team names and such. SO mabe add a few hundered dollars like 200$ at the most.
So there you have it, an MMO that will cost a group of friends/small team, or even a fairly large team only between 400-500$ to create and to produce for about 1000 people to start off with.
So after seeing this I hope I don't see as many people saying "you can't make an MMO are you kidding me, not unless you have like 50million dollars!". I'm making on and people I know have MADE them. So please don't try to tell people its impossible because of the prices, because if you know what your doing buisnessly then you shouldn't have any trouble.
But I don't mean to sound as if making an MMO is easy, it will cost alot of money once your MMo starts to pick up but you should make alot of that money from monthly fees when you start your game, as long as people subscribe, so in no way am I saying jusy any MMO can make it "big time" but those who do a good job and people see they have done something different will. Even with everything I mentioned it takes ALOT of work and dedication to finnish a good MMO, just belive that you can, and want it enough and you will do it.
~Stargate005~
PS: I hope these links have helped some people. They took me alot of research to find but theres many resources out there to look for, and google can be your best friend 
Comments
Great Post!!!! I'm think of starting my own small mmorpg too, good luck with ur game!!!
well if u think ure up for the job, u think its easy, then go for it, no one's stopping u, but when u fall flat don come whining here. It's not the cost, its the amount of work that needs to be put in, and u think u can just "find" any programmer , artist etc to do the job for u? Even if u manage to find a team, how many will be commited? Well im not saying its impossible to create one mmorpg, but do know your limits to what you can do, if ure doing something that has been infinite times, you should think twice about doing a mmorpg, save your time and effort.
I think you're wasting your breath stargate. If the world was run by most of these folks we'd still be believing that the earth is flat. There are always more people that scream "impossible" than people who say "give it try". No is easy, yes is hard. Most of them are just afraid of trying themselves and even more afraid of someone else achieving this goal when they themselves didn't even try.
Of course, if you really want to get a workforce for free, make a solid codebase and start an open source project. You'd be amazed how many people will jump on. Even the ones that only contribute 10 or less lines of code helped put you closer to where you want to be.
I'm advanced Photoshop and 3DS Max 8 user. I'm intrested to do this, though not as a job, but maybe as a hobby. I would've never started modelling or drawing if I woulnd't love it. I would like to test also to work on some tiny MMO. I got some friends also who can help you in making a web site also, please contact me private if you want to see some of my Art jobs and I'm intrsested to know about the Realmcrafter also.
You can do an MMORPG but you really just have to want it! When you've started doing it, there's no coming back, I'm warning you.
I would give you an realistic state of what you need to start a MMO:
Well, at first you need yourself doing some really hard work.
You need few programmers to do it, usually you have to pay for this work. You can check out some programmer services or forums.
You need 1-2 dedicated animaters.
You can work on the story by yourself, but if you think it's impossible, you can find many people on the net who write love to write stories for free.
Then you need a writer for the game, like what would the fighting be and character creation etc. etc. You can find these people even at the Developers Corner, you can get someone to do this for free also.
Then you need some kind of page to set up your server or you can run the server by yourself, it's up to you. Both cost, you can check the prices from net.
Then you need some idealistic people to do the "something something" touch on the game, you can pay for this service, you can find them for free too, though.
Then you need 1-3 3D drawers for the game.
Then you need still some staff what will do the websites, administrete your forums and stuff like that.
Cost: I can't yet estimate it, haven't never been working on an MMO. The others who havent also shouldn't tell what it's like to be when doing an MMO. Okay, I can tell that it'll surely have some hard times, but it's with all the jobs/hobbies.
I think if you are "committed" in doing this, then go right ahead...but many of the poeple who is going to work for you might not be as committed...because, well, what if it fails...like the many MMORPGs out there who barely make it past beta, or sometimes even development.
Like one said, "...not as a job, but maybe as a hobby."
Just make sure you don't put too much into it and having it come crumbling down, those are the worst feelings.
I'm sorry, but the idea of anything from a 12 to 19 year old making a MMORPG seems too silly to work. Even if it does work, they lose interest. Most posts made by people who want to make MMORPGs on these boards are 14 year olds that can't even spell right. Most of them can't even code. They just want to go ahead and "make a MMORPG", thinking it's that easy.
Of course your costs would be lower then any of the big guys. You using a weaker engine, aiming for (compared to newest) small servers, and not paying for development. They are tradeoffs, but just going low budget, doesn't mean it won't work.
Clerks is a good example. Kevin Smith made the movie on his own, with his own money. He could only afford to make it in black and white. But many people enjoy the movie.
But your not going to be buying (at 6 figures) one of the top of the line engines, or spending the same (or more) to make one that can do everything you want to do with your game. I've never really tried realm crafter, but I hope you are able to mod it as desired, because I doubt off the shelf, its net code is going to be good enough for 1k, from a budget server. Hell most budget servers can't even run 100 players on a multi million dollar FPS, that was made by professionals.
As for development, and art. If you find good people to help you, It won't be top of the line, but it would be ok. But, as these people arn't your employees, what are you going to do, when (for example) your content team decides they are finished, and tell you that you are no longer allowed to use thier content? Or one of the Artists, etc. And if you just grab stuff on the net, as you said, you will be sued.
It sounds like you may be worked towards something like Runescape. Around here it might be laughed at, and degraded, someone is still making a little money off of it, and people do pay to play it.
I don't want my post to discourage you, but to help you reconize a few issues that you will have to deal with.
Good luck
About the FPS servers, it's different, most MMO's transmit a much smaller data packet than online FPS'es, so a server can support more people.
If you don't want to put any effort into making an MMORPG. Try Playerworlds
EDIT: Playerworlds site seems to be offline right now, try later.
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No Userbar here, sorry to disappoint.
The original poster is insane and on crack. Im part of a team developing an MMO and its going to take between 6-10 million to do it correctly.
First of all, lets get something out of the way. No one man can make an MMO - especially not a commercial, 3d, with full content. Aint. Gonna. Happen. Even if you know know to do network code, database code, application design, sound design, concept art, modelling, level design, texture creation, and public relations, there's bound to be something you dont know and are out of your depth on.
Second, lets talk about free/cheap tools. Sure you can pick up an engine for less than $1,000, but theres not one out there (especially not Truevision or Torque or Ogre or Irrlicht) that doesnt need extensive extensive changes to work for an MMO. Network code, database design, animation and modelling import formats...thats just the start of the list. You do realize that the engines you want to work with dont import the modelling file types of the free modelling programs out there?
Third, the amount of content you'll need (and hopefully want) to put in your game isnt creatable by one person in 2 or 3 years time. If you're spending every waking day coding, you wont have time for modelling or quest design. If you focus on quest design you wont have time to make the textures you need...the list goes on. SO...this means that you'll either have to work fulltime on your game (with no RL job) or hire someone to join your team. Programmers, modellers, and musicians dont come cheap.
Let me say that it's great that you want to succeed and great that you want to make an MMO...but start simpler. Make a simple puzzle game first. Make a SP game next. Then progress to harder and harder tasks. Somehow people seem to think "if I want something hard enough I can do it!" That's only for after school specials. Johnny Knoxville isnt going to program the Space Shuttle. Aint gonna happen.
Yes, they are. But it also gets alot of work, from alot of professionals. And as I said, I'm not sure how well realmcrafter does in this. It may manage it very well, but after looking at the site (no source code will be released) if it doesn't, there might not be anything thing he can do, other then to go with small zones. Or have player limits in zones.
superhero13 wrote:
Second, lets talk about free/cheap tools. Sure you can pick up an engine for less than $1,000, but theres not one out there (especially not Truevision or Torque or Ogre or Irrlicht) that doesnt need extensive extensive changes to work for an MMO.
I don't have any experience with Truevision, so I can't really comment on it. Torque would just need some new netcode and quite a number of changes to the scripts controlling game logic and interface. The netcode is a pain, but the scripting is really kid stuff and one hell of a lot more fun than building an entire 3D engine from scratch. Other than that, Torque is perfect for an MMO. It offers large outdoor areas and seamless transition between indoor and outdoor areas. You might have to create some way for it to load scenes while the game is running, as in Dungeon Siege and most console games, but zoning everything works just fine too. As for Ogre, it's a graphics engine. There is no netcode, no game logic, just a simple way of loading meshes and textures and moving them around in real time. Either way, they are both fine for making something of the same visual quality of EQ or even AC2. I'm not quite sure what you think is defferent about the graphics in an MMO and graphics in something like Morrowind or The Dungeondoom mod .
Network code, database design, animation and modelling import formats...thats just the start of the list. You do realize that the engines you want to work with dont import the modelling file types of the free modelling programs out there?
Netcode is a bitch but not nearly the monstert that you make it out to be. I submit all the homemade server emulators as an example of that! Database? For the world and shit? MySQL works just fine for that. As far as 3D file formats go.... Blender3D uses python scripting and I know, for a fact, that there are scripts on the net for importing and exporting bot Torque and Ogre file formats as well as 3D Studio Max, Lightwave, MD2, And just about any other format you could want. If you know Python, you could even set it up to import/export a custom format of your own creation.
Third, the amount of content you'll need (and hopefully want) to put in your game isnt creatable by one person in 2 or 3 years time.
It's certainly doable by 3 or 4 people in about 6 months though. How? Look at the first RPGs that came out on console and PC. Notice how alot of stuff gets repeated? Monsters get a new coat of paint, scaled, and renamed to make whole new monsters. Items have prefix/sufix combinations that exponentially increase the number of items in game. Certain parts of the landscape like walls, trees, tables, chairs, etc, get used over and over again. While I will admit that it is hard to make a model look good in 10,000 polys or less, there's no reason that 5 people, in their garage, couldn't churn out a decent hack 'N slash game in a year or less. I beieve there was an RPG that was put together by a group of 10 college students in 13 weeks a few years back. I think the name was "9th Life" but I'm not sure.
If you're spending every waking day coding, you wont have time for modelling or quest design. If you focus on quest design you wont have time to make the textures you need...the list goes on.
This is why most games do the artwork first. You define that obejects and animations that you want in your design document and then you make up what you think you need so that you have something to work with on the different builds of the game. Yes, you will go back and add too, change, or refine things as you go along. But if you do the artwork first, you can concentrate on the game, which is what you wanted to do in the first place.
SO...this means that you'll either have to work fulltime on your game (with no RL job) or hire someone to join your team. Programmers, modellers, and musicians dont come cheap.
Wasn't Star Chamber made with less than $10,000 on the developer's spare time? And, until recently, Mount & Blade was being made by two people in their spare time. And you'd be amazed at how many artists will work just for the recognition alone. You've heard the term "starving artist"? Well, it's no joke. As for music, There's alot of royalty free riffs, samples, mixes out there. Let's not forget that you can pick up a sound effects CD from Sound Dogs for around $500.
I don't know what company you work for, but I have a feeling that you've been working for the corporate giant for too long. It's not hard to absorb that mentality when you're exposed to it for 12+ hours everyday. They want you to think that you can't make it on your own so that you'll keep putting up with their shit and making them money. Doesn't matter what industry you work for, it's always the same scam. "You can be rich, but wouldn't you rather have the security of making ME rich for 1/2 of 1% of the profit you create?"
My answer is no. And I'm sure you've noticed alot more people in the industry adopting that same answer. We're tired of working 16+ hours a day, 7 days a week, for years on end. And what do we get for that time? A finished product with a strong retail run of 3 to 6 months. That's AFTER two to fiver years of developement. Something has to give. Soon!!!
Hi guys,
I wanted to start off by saying thanks to all those who replied. I'm extremely happy with some of the responses I got, and I'm glad that most people see that you don't need to have millions to make a game. Now I'm not saying your game will be top notch, likethe pros but if you want it to be you can do it. Like someone said in this day in age anything is possible
.
I also wanted to say, I did expect some flames but thankfully only got 1 lol. I posted this near the end of my post but I think some people may have missed it. I know I made the post alot of about money, and ways to create an MMO for relatively cheap. But that's not all there is to an MMO like alot of you stated theres the hard work and dedication needed to finnish the game. In no way was I trying to say it was easy, far from it.
I just wanted to cover superhero13's post quickly although I think that superhero13's post had good reply. I never said that 1 man could make an MMO, I actually made a part about teams in my post (which it doesn't sound like you read throughly lol). Chances are not 1 person will have all the skills required to create an MMO seeing as alot are quite extensive. But like I said theres alot of would be great modelers, designers, etc... around forums even these forums qho have even come to me about working on an MMO so although it may take some time you should be able to get a team together eventually. Also to make a good game you don't need to pay people, the last thing you said is modelers, etc.. dont come cheap. Some of them come free lol, I mean you don't need to make a comercial game where you pay pros to make it for you, alot of new inspiring people just want to test their abilities and alot are actually interested in making a MMO. I never said finding a team was super easy don't get me wrong, but it is possible.
Next I wanted to comment on your modeling tool comment. If you had looked at RealmCrafter, which currently is one of a kinda next to kaneva, you would have noticed that it does practically all the coding for you. All it does is require small amounts of scripting in an easy to use language. It is specifically designed for those wanting to make an MMO but don't have the programming skills to make one. You should really check it out it covers alot of the problems you stated. Also how you said content takes along time, I don't dissagree. Not once in my post did I say making content was easy, but unless your making a game you expect to sell to millions and like Jimmy_Scythe said have it only sell for 3 to 6 months you don't need the best graphics of all time or themost amount of objects in game, I mean alot of people just want to make hobby MMO's and they don't because they think its too expesive. Thats what my post was really about. I said at the end, " Even with everything I mentioned it takes ALOT of work and dedication to finnish a good MMO, just belive that you can, and want it enough and you will do it."
I agree very much with Jimmy_Scythe's post about how something must change when you create an amazing game with 50 talented people thats distributed to millions and then is pulled after a few months. The one thing I can recomened to those making an MMO is to have something different. I've been reading alot of posts lately about people saying all MMo's are becoming the same, and I sort of agree. Alot of MMo's coming out aren't lasting too long because they don't have that feature that makes them special. So before you start you game look at posts to see what people would like to see in a new MMO, and ask yourself one major question:
"What makes my MMO different than the others?"
~Stargate005~
One thing you failed to think about was network cost associated with having your game online. How exactly are people going to play your game? Through a DSL or cable modem? You will need a more than that.
If you really want to know what creating and running a mmo costs, contact the people over at vendetta online. It's a game that was created and is run by 5 people.
It can totally be done for cheaper. The problem is that you forgot upfront capital:
Office space... but lets assume you're doing it out of your Garage. It worked for Steve Taylor (Dungeon Siege)... There's still a good ammount of electricity sucked up by high powered machines for creating your own 3D content. You'll need those machines, but we'll even cut costs there and say you and your team are using your own home computers. Speaking of 3D Content:
Most all games use Max or Maya. And then compliment with Photoshop. But lets skip that for now, lets say you use Blender or Wings3D and GIMP (the Linux PS for Windows). So you can skip out on another $5000 easy per machine to create that content.
Employees: Ok, hard to skip this step. Your buddies are going to want to get paid if they're going to sink major hours into this game. But lets say you're doing it in your offtime (this is plausible), so you skip this step. You're saving about $1k+/person/2weeks easy... and that's being generous.
Tally break: You're paying for Electricity and airconditioning (hey, it's going to be hot in that room!!!) And probably lots of Mt Dew.
Game Engine: Ok, there are lots of good freebe engines out there. We'll use the 1 you mentioned: RealmCrafter. I know, for a fact, that RealmCrafter is a "Per Seat" liscense. SO, you have to buy a copy for everybody working on the project who needs access to the game engine. So at least the major artists, and all the Programmers/Scripters definately. Lets say you buy 4 or 5... that should really cover it... right? $55 isn't it? 55 * 5 = $275
Your Server numbers are accurate as far as I notice. I don't know much about it though... guess it depends how many concurrent users you expect. But that's an ongoing monthly price...
Advertising: Your game is going nowhere without it. Lets say you get on here at MMORPG.com and advertise for $5/month. Reasonable price for RealmCrafter styled games. You might get 100 users total... but that's $500/month... just enough to pay your connection bills.
So. In conclusion I think you should definately do it. I support indy Devs completely... but there will always be upfront capital that will come out of *somebody's* pocket. Money doesn't grow on trees unfortunately *looks out window*... although... *tampers with Genetics*
But like I said. You should definately do it... if nothing else you'll have a) a great experience.
something neat to put on your resume! C) the ability to say "HA HA! I actually made what I dreamed!"... Which of course is more valueable then any monotary value.
Hi,
Actually if you take a closer look you will see I did cover networking and server costs. Check out some of the links I put in there. I also checked out the vendetta online site, and they actually talk quite a bit about costs. They are actually the perfect example of what I'm trying to show people they can do (thanks for the referance
). They were four guys who created their own MMO as a hobby in their spare time. From what I see they did a good job on their MMo just like anyone who really wanted it like they did could. Networking speed depends on your engine. A good example of this is RealmCrafter who takes care of most of the networking for you, and allow customers to play your game on a regular cable modem. Also vendetta online state in their facts section that their biggest cost is bandwidth and servers, which I put links to some great servers, who have t1 connections which is more than enough to support a good playing group, also t1 is what vendetta online uses.
Of cource there were like I said in my original post some costs I did not fully accnoledge but did include in some of the costs such as advertising, which can really be as cheap or expensive as you want depending on how you want to do it. But like the post above stated there are tons of ways to cut back costs, like working on home computers, etc...
~Stargate005~
PS: for those wishing to see the vendatta online site its at: http://www.vendetta-online.com I recomened checking out their faqs section.
Maybe I missed it, but I don't see any bandwidth costs figured in. From my talks with game devs I've been told that the highest recurring cost for an MMORPG is the bandwidth; I want to say that for EQ back when it was $9.99/month roughly $4.00 of that was to pay for bandwidth.
Now these prices are for companys that can buy T1's in bulk. The little guy most likely won't get that good of a deal.
As others have said in other posts, if you really want to make an MMORPG start off by making a MUD. That is a project that's doable with a very small team and will give you a much better idea of the associated efforts and costs that it will take to make your project 3D.
Is it possible to make an MMORPG on the cheap? Sure. Anything can be made cheap. A car can be made out of clay and bamboo. Doesn't mean it will run though.
...Pika
Sorry I guess I should have talked a bit more about bandwidth in my original post. I had expected people to check out my links which they obviously didn't do lol. But the server link I provided includes 1000GB of bandwidth with the 65$ cost which is quite a bit of bandwidth i like I said your just starting off and only have a few players. But once your buisness picks up they have even more options for you. if you wanted you could pay an extra 35$ for an unmetered bandwidth with 10Mbps speeds, which is a relatively nice server. So as you see low bandwidth or high, if you know where to go you can still save quite a bit
Also when you said they should start making a MUD, thats not 100% true expecially if they use an engine like keneva or RealmCrafter. The reason alot of people say start with a MUD is because it helps your prgramming skills and teaches your the basics of programming games. But if you do use an engine such as RealmCrafter the programming is done for you. Really it would be easier for someone using an engine like this to start with an MMORPG because MMO's help with modeling more than a MUD does and using an engine like RealmCrafter puts more enphasis on modeling than it does on programming.
Also in my last post I talked about how it takes work and dedication. I also said of cource just because you make it people wont buy it. I also said ask yourslef what makes you game better than all the other MMO's. I mean look at Runescape. They have bad graphics, alot of "nooby" players and alot of scamming, but what makes people pay, and pay big seeing as there's over 200000+ people doing p2p at 5$ per month, every year andrews making some big bucks all because he made an innovated MMO thats different from most others. I'm not saying that just because you make something that you like and that you think is different people will buy it, but that doesn't mean they wont either. Now adays people spend money on anything lol, look on ebay I mean you see people buying anything you can think of there lol.
But thats besides the point because the point of this topic was to show indy developers who want to make an MMO as a hobby that it is possible. I've seen many small groups deciding not to make MMO's because they think it costs too much. I'm just trying to help those types of people along.
~Stargate005~
...Pika
I'm definetely impressed as you actually took the time to research so much unlike others who just "want to make an MMORPG", if you ever get started with your MMORPG, u can add me on msn at Flaming_Boi@hotmail.com , im a musician..
Irth online would prolly prove the OP is right. I mean, how much do you think Irth Online cost to developp?
Didn't I read that CoH was developped for like 1 million? (prolly many times that $ since release, mainly because they have the revenues to afford this progress)
So you get the picture, 1 million is prolly a "near bottom" for developping a "quality MMO" those days, but nothing says it is impossible for smaller budgets, especially if you re-use stuff that can legally be re-used rather than developp them yourself. Developping your models & animations are expensive. If you cut into them, I see extremely complex MUDS in the past and they aint that expensive if you do the many extras with dedication and find the right folks to program with the right tools.
Good luck.
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
Thank you
~Stargate005~
nexus42 wrote:
As others have said in other posts, if you really want to make an MMORPG start off by making a MUD. That is a project that's doable with a very small team and will give you a much better idea of the associated efforts and costs that it will take to make your project 3D.
This is probably a little bit off topic, but why not make a graphical mud? Or do you automatically cross the line from MUD to MMORPG when you add graphics? It seems to me that since the largest section of the cost is bandwidth, you'd want to make a graphical MUD that supports a smaller number of players. I think WolfPaw has some pretty reasonable server a bandwidth available for such a project. You could charge your players peanuts and save up until you could afford some decent advertising and rackspace. In the meantime, you would probably get a large following of indie gamers that are looking for smaller, cheaper, more inovative games, all the time.
It would really be great if someone made a graphical MUD creation kit. Think NWN with dedicated servers of 500 players. Retail or open source, I would definately be all over that. Realm Crafter is nice, but it's a closed source, work in progress, and that keeps me from fully embracing it. Kaneva is too much like Wild Tangent for my taste.
...Pika
I kind of place sociolotron in the MUD catagory even if it defines itself as an MMORPG. That game WAS made by one guy in his basement.
State of Conflict and other playerworlds games would also fall into this catagory. I personally think that the difference is in the number of players on the server at the same time. MUDs are about 500 players or less, while MMORPGs are 1000+.