Greetings Y'all! I'm currently developing a browser based graphic MORPG. It's loosely based on old turn based RPG games like the Ultima series, but with the addition that many people can play and interact at the same time. It's currently about 30% done in terms of functionality. The movement and map engine is done, some inventory functionality is done (you can buy items and destroy them). There is simple surprise encounter functionality, but all it does is show a surprise encounter notification, you can't fight anything yet. Character creation is done (though there are no character or equipment stats yet) There is no backstory, or name yet (I'll get to content more when I'm farther along with the basic functionality) There is currently a limit of 20 players, for the simple reason that the server also hosts 4 other websites that I run, and I don't want to put too great a load on it. The last time I checked, the game ran fine in IE 5.5+, Firefox 1+, Mozilla 1.7+, Opera 8, Konquerer and Safari (versions unknown for these 2). It ran fine in IE5, but the few transparent png graphics are reverted to gifs, which look rather bad. Anyway, before I continue development, I would like comments, feedback, critiques and suggestions for what I have done so far. http://www.kgreene.com/rpg/ There is a FAQ and a instruction guide at the site, as well as a small messageboard where you can find more info. Thanks for looking.

Very nicely put togethor. [wow]

My only suggestion is that you come up with some sort of cap for movement: I hate it when I'm walking around on the map trying to find someone, and a guy goes from my left hand side, to my right and than disappears before I have a chance to really meet him face to face, simply because he's rapidly clicking the move right button. =/

As I said in-game, I'll be back in a month when your combat system is finished. Best of luck with the project: its looking really really good. [smile]

ps.. I was Tyrael! :D Hihi Propuke!

[Edited by - Thevenin on July 22, 2005 11:21:46 PM]

Thanks for the feedback guys.
Thevenin, I'm not so sure about capping the movement any more than it already is. If I slow it down, people might get frustrated easily. There will be other ways to contact and meet people in the game, such as a link on the who list and private tells, as well as bulletin boards for short semi-permanent messages.

ProPuke, Thanks. The "no page refresh" trick is simply an AJAX backend.
As for load on the server, it's not as bad as you might think. There is a general refresh every 1.5 seconds (which updates other player locations and chat), and a movement refresh, which only updates your position. Only raw data is passed back to the client, and the update and styling is done in &#106avascript. In most cases, each update is under 30 bytes.<br><br>I'm still unsure about music. I'd like to have some midi and some combat sound effects, but I'm really not liking the fact that Firefox uses quicktime for Midi (and the fact that I haven't gotten midi to work in Firefox at all, even after installing quicktime it still says a plugin is required)<br>

Just leave the text area blank. It's not used right now anyway. In fact, I'm going to remove it.
[edit]
Doh, I thought you were talking about the character creation screen. I'll take a look at it. What version of IE are you using?
[/edit]

[Edited by - ScienceofSpock on July 24, 2005 5:02:20 PM]

YOU HAVE ENCOUNTED A TROLL!
The Troll says: "Don't worry, combat doesn't work yet!"

Classic =P