Think you can do a better job?
by Dan O'Halloran 
Aug 18th 2007 at 1:00PM
Many players insist loudly and long that they could do a better job then the Blizzard devs. If only they had the 3 years and $20 million required to create an MMORPG these days? Now they don't have that excuse any more.
Say hello to Multiverse, a free software development kit (reg required) that gives you all the tools you need to build your own MMORPG. Quests, Inventory, movement, combat and monster AI functionality is already built in plus a free set of starter assets is provided. They not only provide code and content, but customers as well. Any player who has played one Multiverse MMOG can play any Multiverse MMOG with the same program. And Multiverse handles all financial transactions.
What's left? Your creative vision of what an MMORPG should be. It wouldn't hurt if you had art design skills, modeling talent or class balancing experience. What does Multiverse get out of it? 20% of your revenue. Not a bad deal for all the free service they provide upfront. They also provide a movie of their GDC 2007 presentation that showcases early builds by some pioneering developers.
So knowing nothing stands between you and your vision of WoW 2.0, what kind of world would you make?
Filed under: Odds and ends
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Balasan Aug 18th 2007 1:45PM
Wow, next step in game editing? Not only level editing, but also editing the system as well. I'm interested and curious.
Although trying to sell it might be pushing it a bit, I wouldn't count on huge sales. Some might make it for free.
Bob Aug 18th 2007 1:46PM
This is a really interesting project. 10% of the gross income isn't too bad. And they do all of your CC processing for you.
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http://www.TehGamr.com
Paw Aug 18th 2007 1:58PM
Wow! Now we can make that naked pirate ninja transformer MMORPG we were talking about in a previous thread.
Dave Aug 18th 2007 2:01PM
What's stopping me or anyone?
Intellectual Property.
Plain and simple, the masses don't want to involve themselves with something they're completely unfamiliar with. There are better games out there than WoW, but WoW has a large amount of recognition solely based on the fact that the Warcraft games were absurdly popular. Nothing in a long while has even come close to touching WoW, much like no games in quite a while have come close to the sales figures of the Warcraft games in general.
LOTRO has probably done the best out of any game since WoW's launch... because of one single thing and that's their intellectual property. Overall, the game isn't much better than WoW, and in a lot of cases it's worse. Lots of cases it's better too, so it's mostly a wash. However, because they have a name that millions of geeks recognize instantly it's getting subscribers. Star Wars Galaxies had this too, until all the fanboys realized that the game was horrible. LOTRO at least has a solid game behind the name, so I don't predict one year and out failure. We'll see.
So, if anyone has a top-tier intellectual property license that appeals to a broad number of both gamers and non-gamers... my services as a creative executive in charge of game direction and development are up for hire. (it's also worth noting that the dev team for WoW also happens to be gamers, not suits...)
Then again, isn't the argument "if you don't like it, go make your own game" somewhat similar to the idiotic "if you don't like America, get the fuck out and move to Canada" argument? I'd kinda rather the things that are wrong with the best game so far get fixed, rather than go somewhere else or go take my toys and make my own game.
SK Aug 18th 2007 2:04PM
"There are better games out there than WoW"
qft
CVJ Aug 18th 2007 2:07PM
Too many times I see people complaining on the forums about imbalance, loot, raids, etc. When I ask them how they would do it surprisingly they never respond.
Charlie Aug 18th 2007 3:25PM
ever heard of crowdsourcing? its the new buzz-word.
basically its when companies ask teh general population to to the work for them. Instead of outsourcing the job to a nother country, you have the general public do it for free.
aka, you "wiki"-ize it.
Guess i got a new subject for my blog.
Arp Aug 18th 2007 3:30PM
So if you do it right, blizzard will just pick you up to be on the blizz team anyway.
Murdamook Aug 18th 2007 3:36PM
This s all cool but unless u have some pretty original ideas your MMO will flop.
Dan B. Aug 18th 2007 3:42PM
@7 - Umm... no. Actually, this is alot like Epic licensing the Unreal engine or id licensing their next engine, or Valve licensing Source, or...
Why reinvent the wheel, or more accurately, the coding to make a wheel roll on the ground?
Mirandala Aug 18th 2007 6:20PM
"So knowing nothing stands between you and your vision of WoW 2.0"
Except, of course, that pesky PowerPC chip in my computer.
Zechs Aug 18th 2007 6:39PM
Yay for indipendent developers to kick big game developers in the ass sometimes!
Oh, and #3 Dave is a fucking Blizzard shill. Probably a guy being payed to spread loyalty to the company on a hundred forums where people more honest and better than him meet.
rick gregory Aug 18th 2007 7:26PM
@12 - go troll the official forums.
"Then again, isn't the argument "if you don't like it, go make your own game" somewhat similar to the idiotic "if you don't like America, get the fuck out and move to Canada" argument?"
No, it's more like "I think the government should do X" from people who are unwilling to get involved in government. It's one thing to say "hey, there are issues with this." But a lot of people go beyond that and insult the people at blizzard and talk about how they, of course, would do better - but it's cowardly since they know that they'll never have to prove it. Now, they can. Step up and design a great game if you have the skills. If you're right, we all win. But if you're not willing to actually try it, don't post about how you could design a game that's so much better than WoW.
MrBlack Aug 18th 2007 11:33PM
To #4
Thats why as far as I know Multiverse has a FireFly MMORPG, I hope it doesn't suck, allot of FireFly fans out there.
Dave Aug 19th 2007 3:19AM
I've been called a lot of things before, but never a shill!
Dispute what I say, but at least be rational about it. I don't think WoW is perfect by any means (and if there were a way to see a comment history here, i think my record would speak for itself) and a lot about the game I really dislike.
I don't wanna make my own game. I'd be much happier if the game I play just tweaked a few things here and there to make the game more enjoyable.