Greetings fellow game-creators. Here comes a time in which I am forced to require your help. I am a Game-designer, and unfortunately, not a game programmer, or even a Network programmer. And all of my previous games were table-top games. Now, a new challenge arises, and I would like to throw myself at it. With your back-up help. I am now going to describe the game and its universe, so please bear with me, since the concept is quite long... My desire (and it seems to be quite a recurent one in these parts)is to make a Multiplayer Online Game. A role playing game. But I'm taking the easy part. In my design, there are no fancy graphics, and no issues about lag. In fact, most of the Roleplaying part can be best described as the misshapen child of a MUD and of a browser-based play-by-click ORPG. But there are still issues with the networking... Let me describe them. I have designed the game to revolve around a LIVED IN world. Most of what happens, happens because of, well, everything else. Let's say it's a sort of "procedurally generated" adventure background. Only that it doesn't describe it at all. The world is in fact the point of congruence (which means, if I am not at fault, point of convergence and meeting) of two, or possibly more games. Hence my problem. The world is merely background. Farmers play a farming game in which they operate, grow crops and sell them, plus diverse other resources, and where they buy tools, lands, seeds, whatever. Things like random events happen in the world. At the other end of the spectrum and of the server, a RolePlaying Game happens, and adventurers live an adventuring life, composed of honing skills, killing stuff, and generally accomplishing quests, which MAY be triggered by the random events in the world, and the desires of the FARMERS, on the other part of the server. SO here come the questions... How can I grow a database which has to be able to update in an almost continual rise of information from both games? How can I get my economy, in both games, to rely on this evergoing flow of information and not crash? WHat are the ways to put those two different gameplay games in Network? Thanks for the part you're taking in this "little project of mine". Thanks for the answers, even for the satyrical, humorous, not so humorous, serious, and interested ones. And mostly, thanks for ont having left before reaching the end of this little paragraph...

Have someone who knows data design make a data store for your system. Then design each game as a separate system that interfaces with the same data store. It's really "not that hard" assuming you can keep the discipline to use a single data model for everything, and evolve that data model as the game systems evolve.

The harder part would be to get enough people interested in playing such that interesting emergent behavior would ensue...

hmmm... yes. obviously. that's the obvious part, really. thank you.

Would you, perchance, know of someone ready for such a difficult task? And I mean for free, obviously, since this is a hobbyist design...

Maybe I should post this in the "help wanted" forum?

It's very doubtful someone would program anything to do with databases for free, unless they were doing it just to learn about them. That would probably end up with a horrible end product though. You could post in help wanted if you want, I just don't think you would get too many volunteers for this type of project.

ah.
Well ...
So long, then.
I'll try to learn about databases, then, maybe, someday. And will hopefully try to experiment about that.

Or not.

"So long and thanks for all the fish", as Adams said...