Let's Make an MMO

[That One NPC 327]

Anyone also share the dream of making a good, quality 2D MMO that captures the essence of the classic JRPG, in a massively multiplayer setting, with modern features and logic?

 

I am good with creating worlds, lore, plots, characters, Sprites, and icons edits. I am a workhorse looking for a project where multiple people can combine their talents and efforts to produce something truly noteworthy.

 

 

This is an evolving thread and I will be adding ideas and concepts over time in addition to what others bring to it. 

 

 

Edited March 25, 2021 by That One NPC

[Chuck 9]

This would be nice if this came into fruition. I hope you can find people who will support this project. 😊

[That One NPC 327]

UPDATE:

 

No, seriously. I'm making an MMO now.

 

• IT/Server Technician acquired.

[AVGB;KBGaming 1,425]

Cool. May the Divines guide you.

[That One NPC 327]

I'm now grappling with concepts, both world setting and design, and well as play features and game systems to make it stand out and be worth playing.

 

Ideas I have so far include;

• Generic open world Fantasy MMO the that focuses on making the most of every aspect offered by VXO and whatever ese can be squeezed in. PvP minigames and areas, but as largely optional content. Built in E-Sport as well as other distractions heavily integrated into the clan system.
• Open World Dark Fantasy MMO with heavy PvP and survival elements that create an engaging, challenging, competitive world.
• Open world Zombie Survival MMO with heavy PvP elements. Many sub-concepts in here, haven't fully tackled it et because I know RM resources aren't equipped to tackle a full mmo.
• Pirate-themed MMO largely based around naval exploration and battles, as well as land exploration and settlement. Other features would be worked in, but this is a fresh idea.

 

Still working on more.

 

The VXO weapon assets for sprites use Mack sprites, so I have to figure something out for weapon graphics to use for LL sprites. I want a more robust range of weapons.

[roninator2 274]

On 5/1/2021 at 5:33 PM, That One NPC said:

IT/Server Technician acquired.

As an IT desktop support / server administrator / systems admin - You will not get a MMO game running with just basic IT support. I've worked with computers and servers for over 20 years and would not even know where to start. Although my job always has me focusing on productivity for people and not game development.

[That One NPC 327]

On 5/5/2021 at 10:50 PM, roninator2 said:

As an IT desktop support / server administrator / systems admin - You will not get a MMO game running with just basic IT support. I've worked with computers and servers for over 20 years and would not even know where to start. Although my job always has me focusing on productivity for people and not game development.

 

The script package does a good job of making it easy. Luckily I have two tech-heads, one who went to school for stuff along the lines of what we'll need and is positive he can figure it out given enough time and independent research. Then I have my life-long buddy who has been working with code and computer systems with the Canadian Air Force for about 10 years, and can aid him if need be. Worst case, they both have other things that can contribute and we can find someone who can figure out the server side.

[roninator2 274]

5 hours ago, That One NPC said:

with the Canadian Air Force for about 10 years

I may know him. I'm retiring this year.

[techbot 12]

I have built the skeleton of an RPGMaker style MMO.

It has a basic PVE (no PVP).

One can collect rewards from chests

It has 100s of rooms. Players are only updated with the state of the room they are in and only updated room state is sent to players (via Colyseus.js) allowing for more concurrent players.
A very basic crafting system.
A very easy to manage Content design and creation system. Create templates for and instances of  hundreds of elements, components, items, weapons and munitions.
ALL decisions are made on the server using the P2.js physics server (for collisions and combat distances)

I'm currently building the concept of missions. eg how would one represent a mission(including text) or submission  as a json file) and how to store players progression along several missions in json form or Map/Tuples form
More work to do on

• drag n drop inventory
• Trading
• Crafting
• More advance combat system
• Farming and Mining
• PVP (least interested in)
• The main Arc (post apocalytic world with a few cyberpunk cities)
• Open source (so one can create personal world to share with friends)

Uses:

• Colyseus.Js
• P2.js
• Tiled
• Drupal
• Vue.Js
• Phaser.Js

Still very early in dev, about 7 months. But progress is enough to benefit from other specialists, from level designers to story and concept artists. And games design theory especially balancing, combatting and all that stuff.

3 images
1: Game screen
2: List of objects being created that can be instanced on a map (room)
3: A map/room being created with json file for tile sets, exits , instances of objects to be placed in room, instances of mobs to be placed in room

 

[Remi-Chan 68]

Making an MMO in rpgmaker is far from impossible, I have seen it done several times in the past.

Does that make it an idea worth pursuing? No, not even a little bit.

MMO's are expensive, overly-ambitious monstrosities that require constant funding for uptime, surveillance, PR and then if you want to keep it alive, it basically becomes your job to also develop content for it so as to prevent it from becoming stale.

There's a reason even Triple AAA industries are shying away from MMO's these days. They are a nightmare especially if its one designed to be successful. There was a large rush of them for a while in the early 2000's because there weren't many around yet and so even weird ones could get visibility and attention due to just being a new thing everyone was willing to give a try.

But nowadays the formulas and general approach has been nailed down and the mainline ones are basically titans that claim competitor after competitor, usually without even meaning to.

The servers are also getting expensive, and spiked up a lot during the crypto-currency era which thankfully and unsurprisingly died down, but the price has never really made them viable.

I'm not saying not to build one, only to prepare to either not have it last long, or for this to be the work you do for every last minute of your life.

[techbot 12]

I wouldn't get hung up on the MMO bit. I write the code for multiplayer, I'm guessing 20 (maybe up to 100) concurrent players under current situation. But I'm not sure . I have no interest in "Massive" excpept undestanding what technicalities are involved like sharding (which my system allows for) see: https://docs.colyseus.io/scalability/

The game is not an "open world" meaning the server does not have to update every player about every other player. It has rooms or areas, that can be added iteratively without adding extra weight to the servers.

Or the "in RPGmaker" bit because I'm interested in the style but not the codebase. I'm writing my own system using some core open soure code out there and my own stuff to tie it all together.

My online RPG is already 7 months in development. It is 2D and assets cost 20 quid a piece. The style is perfect and consistent and  updated with new sets every month or two. see https://kokororeflections.com/shop I currently own licences for about 30 tile sets.

NPCs and player avatars : https://sanderfrenken.github.io/

I've been running servers for 20 years.  https://www.tilaa.com/en/

(I couldn't care what the triple AAA industry is doing)

I use the Drupal Content design and management system (CMS) to design dialogue, items, weapons, NPCs, Missions, and other content. But I don't use the CMS to present the content to the public which is it's normal function.  This is probably the most unique thing I bring to the table and maybe what makes the project viable. https://www.drupal.org/

I use this system to convert a pretty bad book I wrote that had too much dialogue into the script for the game where having dialogue over narrative is actually a plus.

As for commerciality, one possiblility might be to support the engine (not my game itself) via Patreon since the idea is to make the system available open source.

In short my goal is to exchange knowledge on what makes a great RpgMaker game great and how one might transition that experience online to multiplayer , in return I make what I have learned available for others. 

Edited August 31 by techbot
cool down enough to answer without typos

[Remi-Chan 68]

Okay so I feel like what you're doing is far more sane than I previously presumed, mostly that presumption comes from the fact you necroposted in a thread about building an MMO, so my response was both to the OPs absurdity but also to some extent, though lesser now given context, you're own input on the matter.

I don't care what the triple A industry is doing but its a good frame of reference for the potential success or decline of things when done in the vacuum of indie dev. I often make comparisons to the triple AAA industry in terms of MMOs because indie MMOs are usually incredibly short-lived and therefore don't help much when it comes to empirical data used to determine their overall success.

I'd be curious what about the rpgmaker style you like, my guess would be the ease-of-use comparative to other engines, but to avoid assuming again, i will let you answer that on your own terms as i might simply be projecting there.

Running servers for twenty years on its own isn't as big a flex as it probably is with extra context.

Technically speaking anyone who runs a website or two for that long has technically 'run a server or two' for '20 years.' But I'll humor you and allow they might have been active multiplayer servers that weren't ever in decline and somehow were kept in circulation and remained playable long after their prime. Either way, knowing some stats helps give context on that you might be more qualified than I thought, mostly because all I had to go on before was your word which means diddily-dick in a community this tanked on Dunning-kreuger syndrome.

[techbot 12]

7 hours ago, Remi-Chan said:

Okay so I feel like what you're doing is far more sane than I previously presumed,

Thats 'good enough for me.
I'd rather discuss the concept of an online engine (and my reason for posting) in this necro post and then post my own WIP thread for my own game when I've worked out some of the kinks.
One of the reasons I posted here was testing the waters as to whether a home grown alternative to RPGMaker would be tolerated as [other] . It would have made no sense for me to pour my heart out into a WIP thread only to have it deemed off-topic.

My argument being I'm interested in the spirit of rpgmakers.

I'm interested in disussing the experiences of the creators here, in creating worlds and narratives. The only interest I have in the actual implementation details ie which type of RPGmaker editor is, for finding common ground when discussing technicalities.

For example I would never have thought of having a ladder tile trigger the player avatar to swap direction when moving down until i saw it mentioned in a post somewhere. Now it is my job to reproduce that in multiplayer.

But I'm mostly interested in what a creator would expect of an online 2d tiled rpg multiplayer. How long are the missions, submissions, campaigns, number of npcs, types of missions and how they are implemented. How to create flow and pace. And fun
 

And if there is someone who wants to be an online gamesmaster and actually implement an instance of the engine with any of the above mentioned scenarios

• Generic open world Fantasy
• Open World Dark Fantasy
• Open world Zombie Survival
• Pirate (interesting to have the server physics engine recreate boats instead of people)

then if they scale down their expectations as Remi Chan suggests, they have a chance of implementing something.

________________________________________

As for regular content - this is the crux of what I am working on at the moment. Let's assume there are two main kinds of regular updates. Game mechanics and content.

Game mechanics is new code.

Content is new missions.

At present I am trying to imagine an online mission creator that allows one to swap/import/export missions. EG

Step 1: Gamesmaster will select the mission handler from a drop down of NPCS.

Step 2: Gamesmaster will input mission requiremtents before NPC offers mission to player. This is done into a textbox , with a language that will be parsed by the system eg:

Mission 5.6 {
Requirements: Level:12, Inventory:[SwordOfDestiny, Crown of Justice] Reputation [Cyberians:12, NewRomans:10] Missions [1,2,4,5] Current stage :[1,2,3,4,5]
}

Step 3: Gamesmaster will select new NPCS in game areas (dropdown to select area and number input boxes for x,y cordinates) to be triggered  by player and then removed. This repeatable field includes

NPC ,

NPC dialogue,

item to be added to player inventory (if any),  - Can be used as requirement for next stage.

flag to be triggered(the stage the player is at)

Step 4 repeat

________________________________________

A mission is a collection of sub-missions which are identical in json shape.

This JSON shape  can be expanded on to allow for interaction beyond player and NPC to eventually include interactions between player and switches, buttons, monsters etc.

So how does that sound to an RPGMaker creator? Can one imagine  missions and sub-missions being descibed in a notation form similiar to Json not necessirly for Rpgmaker. Just the concept of describing a mission. Is this how RPGmaker does things in the background?

Drupal has a permissions system that controls access. So certain people can be given access to map making and content creation features without compromising security.

Feel fee to point out anything I've missed or ask me about areas I haven't covered yet.

[Remi-Chan 68]

Ahaha no worries. Generally speaking, this forum doesn't have much of a policy against that anymore, though you might definitely be met with strong reprimands if you attempted similar on rpgmakerwebs forum.

Generally the focus here for specific rm engines is MV. But we accept support for all sorts. The rules have become much more lax over the years and as the delegates of rpgmakerwebs have slowly and surely left this site to rot, allowing the few admins to more or less make it independent of the sister-site status it once had.

To give you context, this is my third account here. My first one was banned back in 2012, the second one was around 2015 and then i came back in the last year or so under a new pen-name and jazz, people saw through it fairly quickly but the admins pardoned my intrusion for reasons i myself am unclear on.

Either way, you are most welcome to make your WIP thread when you're ready to do so. If the admins for whatever bizarre reason do take issue with it, then I will accept full responsibility for providing misinformation in their stead.

 

[kaz 1,349]

Necroposting is ok (any posting is ok “sarcasm “ given how quiet this place is). In this case it has bought some lively discussion

Remi was allowed to stay because after a few years hiatus promised to be a reformed character. So okay play nice Remi 😀
Welcome to the site@techbot

[Remi-Chan 68]

I promise only to try!

[techbot 12]

Here is my MVP* for online RPGmaker style multiplayer missions.
(Given: there are zombies patrolling the various areas to provide basic PVE. )

Creating a mission consists of:
Select a handler NPC to provide the mission stage and give handler dialogue.

Based on having a prereqisite item the  player is immediately given the reward. (This is now the prerequisite for the next mission stage. )

Select another NPC as a mark and place the mark in a game area.

If it is the first mission stage there will be no preqrequiisite only the reward.
If it is the last mission stage there will be no mark only the rward.
Otherwise each stage is identical.
There can be as many or as little stages as the games master wants for this partlicular mission or side mission.
 

Here

*MVP or Minimal Viable Product is part of a design philosophy of providing the very bare bones of a product that can be expanded upon iteratively.

The point being the above would be the least amount of design required to create an online multiplayer mission input system and it points in the direction of improvements that can be added without requiring a rewrite of the code.

With the simple idea of providing the item (that could be unique) as a prerequisite for the next stage removes the need for things like player levels, attributes, keys and locks etc, but keeping the option to add these at a later date. Since the code remains online, players don't have to update anything when patches or new content is released.

 

[techbot 12]

To prototype this MVP, I've created 16 missions. I still have to fill out some of the textboxes and select the NPCs (via dropdowns). But I'll have that done tomorrow.

Next step is to have the server runtime:

Read in this mission data and when the player enters the correct room(gridmap) that has an NPC with missions attached to it , setup the NPC mission handler and the NPC mission mark.

This could take me weeks, (I try to get 2 hours of dev a day- but that often means less than 30 minutes coding etc).

I think 16 missions is enough to test the system at quantity without going overboard. Individual missions can remain unpublished until ready.

Note: to complete a mission the player clicks on the mark npc with the quest item in inventory. There is no option to hand over item or engage in dialogue. Once you click on the mark, the inventory is updated, the mission status is updated and the mark gives its dialogue (A textbox I forgot to add to the mission content item).

I posit that this is the minimum required to build a coherent online world. The PVE, crafting, resource managment  etc are dealt with elsewhere but are used to serve the above main game mechanic.

After that I reckon I'd start expanding the dialogue system and adding more options to the mission building system and allowing for the mission system to avail of the dialogue system.

I'll report back when I've tied the server runtime to this mission content creator.

 

Edited September 11 by techbot
typos and extra image removed

[techbot 12]

Meanwhile I've figured out the ideal PVP for this type of world.

I call it the secondary mechanic and I've seen it in Far Cry 6 and No Mans sky. The secondary mechanic is more like resource managment or crafting and is similar in abstract concept to text adventures or Oregan trail.
As your Player progress, they acrue NPCs that they can send out on "expeditions", similar in theme to the misisons done by the player. You never see the mission in action, only the results the next day.

So as this world is very faction based, a player may or may not be in a faction, they also may or may not, lead their own sub-faction. These sub-factions can be min/maxed and maybe even have different builds for different kinds of missions allowing for strategy (without the PVP being inside the server-realtime-runtime.)

It limits the damage a player can do to another and prevents toxic behaviour.

It limits the damage to strategic and narative based.

It encourages team work to create defences against these attacks

The PVP does not get in the way of the RPG narative

Waddya think?

[techbot 12]

The basis of Domain Driven Design is what's called ubiquitous language and along with MVP is one of the aspects of my old work life that I'm using in current game dev and will be especially usefull if anyone else gets involved. To this end I'd recommend this page as a starting point. It does not mean adopting all of the terminology but it points to what might need to be clarified or redefined with the scope of this domain ie : An Online Narrative based RPG.

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/RolePlayingGame

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/SoYouWantTo/WriteAnRPG

Somewhere amongst these it links (i'll need to find it directly ) it basically breaks RPGs into 3 main categories.

• Dungeon Crawler
• Narrative
• Sandbox

Stating that it is best to focus on one and do it well rather than try and implement all three.

[edit: found it]
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/SoYouWantTo/WriteAWesternRPG

Edited Monday at 12:49 PM by techbot

[techbot 12]

EVENTS!!!

I've been thinking in terms of missions, but it's obvious that I should be thinking in terms of events.

1) I need to make at least one RPGmaker game, so I can upgrade my vocabulary.

2) I need to think of how each player would have their events status saved.

What makes up an event? Dialogue, triggers, exchange of items.