[MUD-Dev2] [BIZ] Project Darkstar - my take on it

[Adam Martin]

On 31/08/2007, Bristle <bristle2008 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> If Darkstar is not the right platform for us low-budget, no-budget
> operators, then what is - i mean something that is not 5 - never years
> away?

Howabout: The freely shared simple-yet-effective techs that come out
of Web 2.0 and adhere to the principle of "basically correct is more
than good enough".

Stop trying to make software that's great, just make something basic
that works. Read up on highscalability.com and marvel at how
incredibly simplistic the architectures are for flickr, amazon,
google, etc - and be inspired to do something as simple yourself.
</easier-said-than-done commentary>

> First, we need to end custom server development, at least at the core

There's nothing available commercially yet that does the job, so why
do you think there's going to be something free?

The people who can do this stuff well are still making very good money
working for the companies who are pouring lots into making the games
that need it.

The rest are being snapped up by said companies to serve
apprenticeships under the experienced others and replace them when
they move on for even more lucrative positions :).

> - and each one was working on their own server. Unless the work is to
> enhance someone's resume its time to reduce the number of server
> variations that end up 75% complete.

That's nothing special about server dev - have a look at gamedev.net
and what happens to almost every game developed by hobbyists.

> The second part is performance. I leave this part as a exercise for
> someone else.

Right. You gloss over the hard part :). It's hard enough that those
who can do it are rewarded very well to do so :).

YMMV, of course...Personally, I'd love to help build a free open
source kick-ass game server system - but I'm kept exceptionally busy
doing it as a day job, there would be major problems about it
preventing me from *keeping* a day-job where the hugely valuable and
IP protectable work I'm doing by day I'm duplicating in the evening at
home, and ... I know how much effort it would take to get a working
version, and my time is too full to make time to do that as well as
everything else. My impression is that most people are in a
superficially similar situation...

And it would probably be easier to get venture capital and do it as a
startup at this point in time, and aim to release a limited version
open-source in parallel. That's the route I'd go.

Adam