Massively Multiplayer Game Development (Game Development Series)

By: Thor Alexander

Book Overview

Massively Multiplayer (MMP) game development is one of the fastest growing areas in the game market. With the first MMP releases, the genre took off with amazing speed, and as its popularity continues... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1584502436
• ISBN13: 9781584502432
• Release Date: February 2004
• Publisher: Charles River Media
• Length: 484 Pages
• Weight: 2.44 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.8" x 1.3" x 7.8"

Customer Reviews

GREAT resource, answers a lot of questions!!

This book is exactly what I've been looking (and wishing) for!! I feel terrible that I found it FIVE years after it's been out! I'm a hobbyist game programmer, a senior in high school, and I've been wanting to make my own MMOG since late middle school. Of course, back then my vision was more... general, unrealistic, overenthusiastic. But over these past few years, as I have matured and gained experience in programming, I've been building up to the time when I had a clear view of what I wanted and exactly how to get there, and especially how much work would be involved. I've taught myself all about general game programming using several other books, but the whole time my goal has been a MMO, and while the books taught general game development, none of them really mentioned how to develop on a 'massive' scale - even the books concerning online games. Finally, I've found one that's not only focused on MMOGs, but has exactly the information I want. I have researched plenty books and websites, but this is a HUGE source of information that I couldn't find anywhere else! Tips on how to organize server farms, complete UML code explaining a full MMORPG framework, tips on server and client development, etc. - just read the table of contents. This book is out of print, but if you are looking to make a Massively Multiplayer game, get your hands on it immediately!! Another great aspect of the book is that at the end of each separate article, there is a list of resources. It's like a bibliography of the articles that the editor used to compile the article, including the original article itself and any additional sources used. This referred me to several other great game design books that I never would have considered. If you have questions, like I had, about how to synchronize objects between client and server, how to handle movement and collision detection, how to design and implement the back-end database, how to protect from 'rogue' players (commonly called 'hackers') and so on, this book will answer all those questions and more. I am writing this review from the perspective of both programmer and designer (well, whole-game-maker, but I've got a couple friends so I consider those my primary roles) - and the programmer will get a whole lot out of this book. A designer will also get some great ideas, and I have not yet read a lot of this book (especially the section meant for designers), so I'm sure I'm underestimating. A single warning though: You should already have a pretty clear vision of what kind of game you want to make, and in the case of a programmer, have a thorough understanding of the programming language, and all the systems of a game - especially graphics and networking. The book describes thoroughly all the processes but does not go into details about how to form and transmit packets, so you'll have to look into that elsewhere (read up on sockets, possibly the library RakNet, for more info). Overall, this is a great book, and I would rate it

Told me what I wanted

PLEASE NOTE THAT THIS IS THE SAME REVIEW AS THE SEQUELS BOOK, THAT IS BECAUSE I CONSIDER THEM TO BE EQUALLY AS GOOD AS EACH OTHER. DON'T BUY ONE BOOK, GET THEM BOTH. As a games programmer I wanted to branch out into a MMG and this book was one of 4 that taught me everything I wanted to know. This book is split into 3 main sections; each section has several chapters about differant aspects of the MMP's. If you have any interest in MMP games you cannot help but to find most chapters helpful. I will admit that some chapters bored me and I skipped them, but the amount of helpful chapters there were more than made up for it. Each chapter has been written by a differant person and quick searches on google makes you realise that these people really do not their particular areas of expertise. James

MMO encyclopedia

Thos book is a collection of wisdom, aimed to provide an overall view of what you need to consider to write your own MMO. There is no code and the articles do not go too deep, which is not a bad thing, because they provide easy to understand contents. So before writing any code, read a related article, avoid pitfalls and only then start writing. I have been reading this book for several months, over and over and I still love it. There is no need to read the articles in any particular order and each reading session can be as short as 30 min. and still provide good knowledge to you. This book is a must have on your bookshelf if you are serious about MMO games and use other people's knowledge to shorten you own development cycle. I like it so much, I just bought the 2nd edition, which looks very promising, too. And dear author(s), if you write a book with a framework, I'll buy that one, too, without any doubt.

A thoughtful compendium of wisdom

A fascinating book that compiles an array of essays by professionals in today's MMO industry. Each chapter brings something new and unique to consider: from the database to the game engine, costumer service to the network protocols, AI factions to interface design. However, some of the topics are so broad and complex the authors really have no chance of leaving you with a sense of satisfaction when their time is up- moving from topic to topic each chapter, you often feel the essays are left open and incomplete. Even so, the issues discussed are very important to consider, and rarely have I seen them covered in other books on the subject. Definitely an interesting read.

Mixed Bag

I have very mixed feelings about this book. While it presents a wonderfully broad discussion of MMOG development and is chalk full of ideas that you can use in development, it is at the same time often incomplete. The problem is not in the desire for the sections of the book to more deeply discuss their subject matter, but more due to the fact that the sections often fail to fully describe even what they are attempting to talk about. Included source code is fairly sparse making it difficult to discern what the authors were reaching at even when he provides UML (minus complete descriptions). At least one python project fails to work at all and there is no information for corrections on the Charles River Media web site.So, do I recommend this book? Yes. Knowing the book as I do now, I would still have purchased it, however this may be one that you want to look through somewhat carefully at a local bookstore prior to purchasing. Expect to have to expend considerable effort when developing code based on portions of the book as you will progress along merrily based on the descriptions only to hit a roadblock in the code based on an incomplete or completely missing description of a critical portion of the topic. This book is definitely for already competent developers/designers, though you should already be prior to attempting to craft a MMOG anyway.This book will likely float between 2 and 5 stars depending on the reader.Best of luck to all!