3D iPhone MMO (+ Mac/PC) in Development

Now that we've established a baseline technology and a semi-optimized framerate with just a terrain and move controller, we carefully optimize each new feature as it goes in. It's a complex ongoing process of tricks and sound practice, balancing quality with speed. You pay attention to things like draw-distances, use Levels of Detail and billboards whenever possible, and design the play experience to avoid long open viewable spaces which would need to carry a lot of objects. There you pay attention to object density, poly counts, unique materials and material complexity, etc.

This also means making judgement calls on art and logic techniques that may suck up the CPU, and making higher-quality art assets for the non-iPhone version.

Our philosophy is to make it run nice on the iPhone first, and also add higher quality visuals for the non-iPhone platforms that are higher powered, and this has to be done with each new feature that gets added in

 

1) The PvP question is going to be a large can of worms when we open it this week to discuss.
A simple solution would be to have both all PvP and optional PvP worlds, like AC did. Some of the areas are being built specifically with PvP in mind though. I remember an awesome double tower area in the swamps near Sawato (where you could get Blunt Arrow Heads way back) which was a perfect place for two-team pvp battles!

2) That is very possible, you never know what someone will try to do. We are going to do our best on being very open-minded towards the play experience, and pay close attention to how things are being used to take advantage of others. It's sort of a new and necessary evil once you go cross-device like this.

 

DangerLands dev update

Last week and this weekend saw a lot of development on the DangerLands MMO project. We have our first zone terrain built, which is being called Danger Forest, sort of an Enchanted Forest.



There are more screenies here, where the terrain designer wrote up an article about the creation of it. We did go back and forth quite a bit to find the right size and settings that would work well on the device. I was after framerates, loading times, and filesize, and Todd (terrain designer) was after something that looked nice The terrain quality can be scaled up or down depending on the needs of the device, so the non-iPhone version can have a nicer looking environment of course.

Framerates are still very high. I'm getting ave 40fps on the iPhone 3GS, and 30fps on the iPod touch. It's much higher in places where visibility is low, sometimes as much as another 10fps.

Now the work can begin on populating the initial zone with vegetation, trees, and other objects. There are multiple spawn locations already.

I also did a lot of work on the account and player creation code, we will be allowing multiple players per account. Lots of little things goes into this process, like unique name checking, bad word filtering, etc.

Also, as a teaser, we have our preliminary list of game skills drawn up. Still subject to change, and not all skills will be available on the initial release (mostly the combat oriented ones will be done).
Here it is:

• Beasting: Use magic that has an effect on the properties, skills, and stats of creatures
• Binding: Cast spells which bind magic to items, or bind people to places. Includes Sending, which is a type of travel magic.
• Bolt: Use mechanical projectile weapons (Cranker, Flinger, Slinger, Bolter)
• Build: Allows you to build structures of increasing complexity that can even persist in the world.
• Burn: Cook food or other things which need heating up
• Choosing: Lets you own and control pets
• Chop: Wield hand-held heavy bladed weapons (Chopper, Dingler, Carver)
• Cobble: Allows one to craft armor
• Cuff: The art of hand-to-hand combat. Good ole' fisticuffs
• Dazzle: Create components, potions, knicknacks. So named for the sparkly ingredients involved
• Dig: Allows you to mine minerals and ore from the very ground, and dig tunnels
• Dodge: Avoid damage in melee combat
• Evade: Avoid getting hit by arrows and the like
• Fangle: Use hand-held slashing/piercing weapons (Fangler, Slasher, Slicer, Hurter, Creaver)
• Fletching: Make and Arrows or Bolts
• Gank: Backstabbing, sneak attacks
• Grok: Helps you figure out information about people, creatures, and items.
• Hoom: Cast spells which directly affect the safety of creatures and people. Affect their vital energies, strengthen or weaken their protections. So named for the sounds these spells typically have.
• Hover: Hover over the ground. The higher the skill, the higher you can hover, and for longer periods of time
• Lead: Gives you greater ability to use leadership skills, and increases the value of your followers
• Lore: Helps you learn how to use things, read ancient texts
• Love: Lets you conquer situations with love and happiness. Includes implements of such art. Ticklers and Lovers are collectively known as Nicers, for their non-violent ways.
• Nick: Use small piercing and slashing weapons (Nicker, Diddler, Diggler)
• Obey: Increases your value as a follower
• Pick: The art of picking locks of all types
• Plink: Fire projectile weapons (Binger, Plinker, Whizzer)
• Poke: Use long pointy weapons (Pokers, Stickers, Jabbers)
• Sizzle: Hurl harmful magical energies at your enemies of various elemental and physical types
• Smash: Use smashing weapons (Dinger, Basher, Masher, Smasher, Crasher)
• Sneak: Stop other players from seeing your information, or for not being spotted
• Source: Increases your mastery of Source, the energy which fuels magic. Affects recharge rate, the amount you use when you cast spells, sometimes used as a prerequisite to use an item
• Tend: Allows you to tend wounds, diseases, and perform other first aid type actions
• Tickle: A non-violent way to defeat creatures in combat. Includes a variety of tickling implements. Ticklers and Lovers are collectively known as Nicers, for their non-violent ways.
• Tink: Create and modify weapons
• Tracking: Track people, things, minerals, etc.
• Void: Increases your ability to resist the affects of harmful spells cast against you
• Whack: Use long, thin, smashing weapons (Banger, Whacker)
• Zip: The skill which you use to travel about the world, like running!

Each of these skills is tied to one or more of your main stats and can go up with use. We're still fiddling with the list, but here it is for now:

• Might: the measure of your strength
• Heart: your primary vitality/health and combat energy
• Cunning: the measure of your hand-eye coordination
• Speed: how fast you move around and perform physical actions
• Brains: the measure of your non-stupidity
• Will: the amount of self-control and awareness you have

Also completed is our spell effect system, which allows the rapid creation of spells based on data files and art assets. We have a lot of cool plans for our spell system. I have done quite a lot with spells in Arcana: Spell Duel, and that work is extremely useful here! We were able to get in and finish the first fire and ice projectile spells.

That's it for now