MMO Design Guidelines

From Multiverse

This article was written by Multiverse developer Sysdevja (James Allsopp).

Contents 1 Overview 2 Gameplay flow 2.1 Phase one 2.2 Phase two 2.3 Phase three 2.4 Phase four 2.5 Phase five 2.6 Phase six 2.6.1 The journal 2.7 Phase Seven

Overview

This is just a method. Not a fact or solution or guide. If you choose to use some ideas from here that’s fine but I’m just making it clear this isn't a guide to create a MMO.

If you look at it realistically you can't achieve it. If you look at it from a visionary’s point of view it might just be in your reach.

You really need to think hard though about your small MMO project. Planning is a key to success even if it’s only a few months work.

1. What’s the MMO about? A short description on what your MMO is. Its aim, its genre, its ideas.
2. Gameplay flow. See example gameplay flow diagram.
3. World design
   • Setting: your world setting, what type of terrain, gravity? oxygen? bad weather?
   • Contents: cities, villages, settlements, ruins, battlegrounds
   • Quests: quest Scripts (Set out like Theatre Scripts)
4. Characters (NPC's & Players)
   • Playable characters, appearance
   • Non-playable characters, appearance
5. Static objects (ties in with advanced world design):
   • Buildings
   • Other
6. Scripting
   • Scripting events/triggers: particles, animations
   • Scripting NPCs
     • Dialogue (set as script)
     • Actions
     • Events
   • Scripting quests: technical script side to quests
7. Items
   • Item list
   • Clothing list
   • Weapons list

A bit of a list, and that's just basic study for the simple MMO. However, it can be done within a few months. I used to set myself little challenges like this.

Gameplay flow

Here’s my example of a gameplay flow for a small MMO project.

Phase one

Get the basic terrain down then progress to character development (playable). I then suggest you build a small town and texture it. Once you have that, create some NPC's for that town. Script conversation dialogue for NPC's. Then start to graft up some items/weapons to make it more interesting. Add a small hit point combat system. You should now have a world you can go around exploring different towns (if you wish to build more).Talking to NPC's and able to combat with NPC's.

Phase two

Add some monsters to your world so you can kill. Now comes the skill system part. Start by implementing one skill at a time. Test it out before moving onto the next. I would advise starting with EXP (Experience). Add skill set and scripts to the end of combat with monsters. Give each type of monster different exp point to gain from killing it. Once you have around 3-4 foundation skills you can start to make your quests. Create a simple "Go Fetch Item Quest" then progress to "Kill NPC to Get Item" and so on. Once you have some skills and quests you can advance to rhase three.

Phase three

Economy systems are hard to get your thumbs around, especially MMO's. Create a simple economy system. Create a bazaar market place in one of your towns. Script in a shop conversation, and add a game default item like a barrel to the buy list. Set cost to ten. You may want to look into the start up script and add a "give player money" event upon entering your world for the first time to set the player up. Sufficient 100 would do fine.

Tip: Don’t make your economy too complex. Keep it simple. Keep track of item/clothing/weapon pricing using a Excel spreadsheet.

Phase four

OK so you have a fun little world to run around in. Maybe get some friends to come help you test it and have some PVP. So what’s next? Well many MMO's from here go into there own little advanced design worlds. One thing I want to pick out here is that you must keep it simple, If anything never follow a commercial MMO. Yes use them for ideas but the design just gets to complex. It can stress you out if you get to much of a complicated design module.

Travel would be next on my hit-list. Players can walk yes but why not put in other means of transportation. Spacecraft, Horse & Cart, Falcon Airways? Whenever you look at it, MMO's are big even if you have a small project on your hands you will always be able to see the big picture. Size matters in the MMO world, and it's also a problem. Even if you have a small three town world, players will want to have quicker means of transportation. Depending on your genre, transportation can be a quick warp script or a complex NPC AI + Player interaction script.

The example I'm going use Sci-fi. So we want to join up town A to town B. Simply model a spaceport or maybe just a terminal showing that its the space port. Might want to add some text on the building/sign texture saying Spaceport. I would then simply have a terminal which when opens asks "Would you like to purchase a ticket from town A to town B for X amount" Once you click yes "purchased" It will then warp you to town B's spaceport.

Just keep it simple. No fancy shuttle landing, landing times. Just plain and simple. You can build on fancy elements later on.

Phase five

Look at your project...you should be able to say "I’ve done well." If you createed all the above elements, you have gotten further then most people. Now its time to make your MMO interesting.

You got your basics, you can fight, buy, travel and explore. There’s a big open land out there. What you may know is MMO's are known for wide open spaces with nothing there but terrain. This is a bad element. Try to get a balance between content and open space in your world. World of Warcraft has a great balance. It has some open land and some content for each zone. Its 30/70 if you ask me. 30% space, and 70% content.

Points of interest are a good way to lure the player into your world. Add caves and ruins, get some treasure or sacred items hidden by them. Points of interest are classed as special content as a lot do contain special items. Caves are a perfect example. You fight your way to the end of the cave to gain a Silverblade sword or Lightsaber crystal. Points of interest can also be added into quests, this is a great idea as your quests start to get more in depth without you actually realizing.

Phase six

Rewarding the player. Now your project is taking shape. You’ve got nearly all the foundations to build upon. One design element many people forget or leave out is rewarding the player. This is a key design element. Without this gameplay balance would be all wrong. You can reward the player in many ways, for example:

• Once completed a skill get certain item
• Once killed X amount of X monster get 5 experience points
• Visiting points of interest - logs into journal

The journal

This is advancing the design ahead, but it's something I needed to include as so many developers forget "A MMO Is A Story." It's told or lived out by the player. A simple journal system would make big improvements on role-playing plus can have a good effect on your forums as players can post up stories. The journal system should just be a simple in game text application. Which logs the date and time every time the player writes into it. It should just export as a txt. So players could go to the game dir, find the txt file and post online.

Phase Seven

Now it's time to get into the advanced MMO options. The guild system. This is very important to MMO players. Its a "Create Your Club" tool. Players love to have their own cult, clan, guild with their friends. It's certainly something all MMO's have. You don't need to go over the top with guild options, just simple commands as "Create Guild, Invite Member, Dismiss Member, Delete Guild". Tip: Create a small guild hall building for each town. Here guilds could meet and plan quests or just roleplay.