[attachment=30107:part59_v09_vol1-330.jpg]
Hi there!
There is a thing which I'd like to share, hope it will be useful.
Currently, I'm writing chapters for my upcoming book "Development&Deployment of MMOG (from social games to MMOFPS, with stock exchanges in between)". These chapters are published as they're reaching "beta quality", on my ITHare on Soft.ware blog.
If you make 'useful' comments about these "beta" chapters ("useful" ~= "ones which cause me to change the text", minor typos generally not included) - you'll get a free e-copy when/if the book is published. Full conditions are here.
Alternatively, you may want to comment just to make the book better :-) . All comments are welcome, but I reserve the right to keep my version even if you strongly disagree with it.
Word of caution: please don't expect much in terms of 3D graphics; besides the integration into MMO, 3D graphics is left more or less beyond the scope (it is waaay too complicated to fit, and there are already tons of good books on it out there)
Preliminaries aside, here it goes:
Tentative table of contents
Book chapters so far (BETA QUALITY, DON'T HIT ME TOO HARD!):
Chapter I: “Business Requirements”
Chapter II: “Game Entities and Interactions”
Chapter III. On Cheating, P2P, and [non-]Authoritative Servers
Chapter IV. DIY vs Re-Use: In Search of Balance
Chapter V(a). Modular Architecture: Client-Side. Graphics (Very Basic) DON'T EXPECT MUCH HERE, THIS CHAPTER IS NOT FOR EXPERIENCED 3D DEVELOPERS
Chapter V(b). Modular Architecture: Client-Side. Programming Languages for Games, including Resilience to Reverse Engineering and Portability
Chapter V(c). Modular Architecture: Client-Side. On Debugging Distributed Systems, Deterministic Logic, and Finite State Machines
Chapter V(d). Modular Architecture: Client-Side. Client Architecture Diagram, Threads, and Game Loop
Chapter VI(a). Server-Side MMO Architecture. Naïve, Web-Based, and Classical Deployment Architectures
Chapter VI(b). Server-Side Architecture. Front-End Servers and Client-Side Random Load Balancing
USUALLY, UPDATES ARE PUBLISHED EACH WEEK
Once again: all comments are very welcome, though please don't expect me to agree with each and every comment.
Best regards, and Happy New Year :-),
'No Bugs' Hare