Hello everyone I have decided to write a little "procedural" on how to make your own MMORPG. This is aimed at everyone who wants to make their own MMORPG. In the Game Dev area there are many rumors that go around some of which tell noobs that they can make a game in a week or it takes millions to make a MMORPG and 10 Years to make it. Well this is aimed to get rid of those Rumors. All information in this article are based on my knowledge and are describe to the best of my abitilies. Ok, here goes nothing as an average gamer you play tons of video games and as you play you notice that your Favorite game has flaws or you suddenly become sick of the game and want a different game based on something else. You google all day and find no game to your liking. So you decide to make your own game, a video game that puts Maple Story or World of Warcraft to shame. Now comes your two choices.

Choice number 1) You decide to visit a forum and make a thread on the game you are making. You might be thinking I'am a dumb idiot who knows nothing about having a dream. Not true. Here are some of my old posts where I knew nothing about Programming until I went and started reading,learning, and expierementing.
- http://www.onrpg.com/ftopic27520.html (play 9dragons now..)
- http://www.onrpg.com/ftopic27487.html (can i play cabal withouth using internet explorer)
- http://www.onrpg.com/ftopic32274.html (Anyone Good with Computers?)

Choice number 2) Acknowledge the fact that you need knowledge of programming to make a MMORPG and Learn.

These are your choices as they say "Stop Complaining and Do Something about it." If you choose to keep Complaining this "Manual" for making your own MMORPG is not for you and should stop reading. Now its time for the good stuff.

The first step in making your MMORPG is choosing a language to program in. There are many programming languages to choose from. Here are some. C, C++, C#, Java, DarkBasic, BlitzBasic, Visual Basic, Visual Basic.Net, Python, and many more. Some people just can't handle learning a language or don't have the time for that their GameMaker. GameMaker is a Drag and Drop Program which lets you make games easy. Some people under estimate GameMaker and other GameMaking Programs. GameMaker for example has its own scripting language called Game Maker Lanuage also known as GML which is powerful when used properly. GameMaker with DLLs can make an Online game with Winsockets. Since I covered GameMaker Lets decide which Language is for you by looking at the pro and cons.

C++ C++ is a an excellant programming language which is used often by the game industry today because of its fast speeds, it's Object Oriented Programming, and the fact that it allows you to allocate your own memory , even though this is a good thing its a double sided sword which means if all memory is not deleted when done with it can create memory leaks. Another of its cons is it's a really hard programming language to master.

Java Java is considered a powerful programming language because of the fact its a 100 percent Object Oriented Programming which means you put everything into classes. Java also makes web Applets. One of the Cons of Java is if you do not like Object Oriented Programming ,you won't get along with Java.

C# C# is one of the newer programming languages out their. It was made by Microsoft. C# is a mix of Java and C++ and is an awesome programming language. One unique feature is the fact is it will rarely ever make Memory Leaks. I don't see any cons for this language that i know of because I'am not quite a wiz at this language.

Visual basic Visual Basic is Microsoft's product with an easy user interface. Visual Basic is a great language for beginners to start off with. Heck it was the first language I ever used. It has the possibility of making games with the Direct X library and with the Elysium Engine with some editing you can make a pretty good MMORPG.

Ok now what its time to learn what a game is and how a game works. Think of a 2d game as a grid. Lets let X represent your x and y coordinates and the Os represent the backround. The top left hand corner is the coordinates (0,0) and going down will increase the Y coordinate and going right would increase the X coordinate. So lets say you press the right arrow that would increase your X axis and move you right. See how that moves along.

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Now its time to show how Animation works the animation for a game is nothing more then changing pictures when you move it's not as simple as that ,but thats how the concept works. Next we have Collision Detection, one of the harder features to implent if you want it to work perfectly so you have your sprite and its 32 by 32 pixel big and there is another 32 by 32 image so you decide you are going to bump him because of the fact he is causing a traffic jam because of the fact we live in a world were we do not walk through each other once we get in contact with each other we stop. Something like this Your sprite width is 32 and height is 32 and is blitted(displayed) at coordinate (0,0). So if the other image was to come in comtact with anywhere in the coordinates (0,0) and (32,32) he would be stuck or something would happen to him if your image was a rocket he would be wishing he didn't do that.:cool:

Now that you know how a game works its time to see which Graphic Library you are going to use with your MMORPG. There are many Graphic libraries to use such as OpenGl, Direct X, SDL, ALLEGRO, and Tons more out there. They are out their to make your life easier or else you would have to code your own Graphic Library and that is not a pretty site. Lets leave it at that. So what can you do with a Graphic Library? Well with a graphic library you can render images,sprites,models,backrounds, use alpha blending, make surfaces, collision detection,and more.

Now that your familiar with your graphic library you can make your own MMORPG right? Wrong, The O in MMORPG stands for Online which is call for Networking. So How do I network you might ask? With a Networking Library of course.:eek: Like Graphic Libraries there are many networking libraries as well such as SDL_Net, RakNet, Winsocks, DirectPlay(Useless), HawkGl, and more. So how do networking libaries work? A network library contains two different programs a client and a server. A client sends information to the server through a connection and the server responds and sends the information out to the other clients out there. So how does the actual connection work? The actual connect is not as simple as that the first step is to listen for connections with the server , then the server accepts the connection or maybe due to high ping not accept the connection. Once the connection is made they can now send Packets over the connection. Whats a packet? A packet is just data such as different types of data types integers,characters,pointers, and all those other good stuff. Lets say there was a connection for the a racing game. One client would send his X and Y coordinates to the server and the server would send the X and Y coordinates to the other Client so it could draw the opponent on their screen and so on. Now its time for Databases for an MMORPG your gonna need a database to store all the character's levels and all. So are you still interested in making an MMORPG if you are keep going and never give up and remember the good old saying KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID