Splitting the MMO into 'catagories
by Jonathon Stevens · in General Discussion · 06/21/2006 (4:10 pm) · 4 replies
I'm basically trying to get a generic viewpoint and percentage system for how difficult and time consuming each aspect of the game will be. This is basically my way of ranking the systems as to who should get what as far as either money, shares, etc. Just wanted some feedback on what I have so far:
Quote:
This document outlines various parts of the game development process and areas that need to be addressed. The percentage represents two things depending on where it's tied. Each category has it's own percentage and each sub-category has it's own set of percentages. The main categories total 100% and all sub-categories total to 100% within the category as well. Main categories are measured in overall effort and time consumption compared to the total project while sub-categories are how much percent of the total category.
Quality Assurance 5% - Alpha testing 50%, closed beta testing 50%
Sound 10% - Music 45%, Sound Effects 40%, Voice-Over 15%
Art 20% - Concept Art 10%, Modeling 15%, Animation 15%, Textures 5%, Skyboxes 5%, 2D Graphics 5%, Marketing Ads 5%, World Building 10%, character rigging 10%, Special Effects/Particle Effects 10%, Lighting 10%
Writing 10% - Quests 15%, Storyline 30%, Background 20%, Design Document 10%, Help Files 5%, Website Content. 10%, Research 10%
Development 15% - Game Mechanics 65%, Database Layout 15%, Profession Balancing 20%
Management 5% - Producer 50%, Director 50%
Programming 35%- AI 8%, Network Layer 8%, Quest System 3%, Inventory System 3%, Targeting System 3%, Database Programming 3%, LUA/XML/GUI System 3%, Skills/Professions System 8%, Races 3%, Resources 10%, Looting 3%, Chat 3%, Voice Chat 8%, GUIs 3%, Billing System 3%, Character Creation 8%, Helpdesk System 3%, Magic System 3%, Combat System 3%, Environment System 3%, Group/Raid/Guild system 8%.
About the author
With a few casual games under his belt as CEO of Last Straw Productions, Jonathon created the increasingly popular Indie MMO Game Developers Conference.
#2
"you can make a poor model look better with a texture, you can't make a poor texture look better with a good model" or something to that effect. His suggestion was also to combine texturer and skyboxes as they are the same or something.. Thoughts?
06/22/2006 (8:59 am)
Great tips thanks! Anyone else? I have been told off forumn that rigging is rather easy, so should not be as high a percentage and that textures are a lot more time consuming. I think the words were:"you can make a poor model look better with a texture, you can't make a poor texture look better with a good model" or something to that effect. His suggestion was also to combine texturer and skyboxes as they are the same or something.. Thoughts?
#3
1) The skybox is a texture (actually, it's several), so you can indeed combine that.
2) I would swap the background and quests writing rates, because quests are more numerous and have to conform with the game and so on, whereas the background story is easier to write because it affords more freedom.
3) I would also swap the DB and profession balancing rates, because you'll see that the DB is going to be a bear to develop properly.
4) Lighting can be folded into world-building, since it's something the world-builders do.
5) Looting is just viewing another inventory and moving the objects, so you can fold that into the inventory task.
6) Skyboxes and 2d graphics can all fall under textures, or vice versa.
7) what's "races" as a programming task?
8) swap the db programming and skills/professions rates. DB stuff is tough.
The rates aren't so bad, but the breakdown is a little off because some of those things can be combined.
06/22/2006 (9:25 am)
A few thoughts from my own opinion, take with prerequisite salt:1) The skybox is a texture (actually, it's several), so you can indeed combine that.
2) I would swap the background and quests writing rates, because quests are more numerous and have to conform with the game and so on, whereas the background story is easier to write because it affords more freedom.
3) I would also swap the DB and profession balancing rates, because you'll see that the DB is going to be a bear to develop properly.
4) Lighting can be folded into world-building, since it's something the world-builders do.
5) Looting is just viewing another inventory and moving the objects, so you can fold that into the inventory task.
6) Skyboxes and 2d graphics can all fall under textures, or vice versa.
7) what's "races" as a programming task?
8) swap the db programming and skills/professions rates. DB stuff is tough.
The rates aren't so bad, but the breakdown is a little off because some of those things can be combined.
#4
06/22/2006 (9:29 am)
I wanted to keep seperation as much as made sense though. 2D art could mean website graphics, GUI graphics, etc. So I wouldn't want my texturer wasting time on those, I'd want someone else. Now, you can take this master list and combine things IF you have a need, but in my mind it was better to keep what COULD possibly be done by more than one person seperated so if you do end up with a larger team, you have a good basis. (I'm obviously going to publish the list when it's finished) 
Torque Owner John Doppler Schiff
Ditto for QA. Alpha and beta testing will almost certainly shake out more bugs than you're expecting, especially in a game as complex as an MMO, and some bugs will need immediate attention.
Depending on the size of your world, you may want to increase World Building substantially. Populating a large space with consistently interesting and distinctive details is a massive undertaking.