Development on Designing Virtual Worlds

The Team

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Design might be the most important cog in the machine that creates virtual worlds, but that isn’t to say the other components are unimportant. Some are absolutely critical: If a server crashes, for example, every minute it stays down will be paid for in cancelled accounts. Designers have to know about these things, so they can account for them in their virtual world design.

Designers should have not only a realistic idea of their own place in the system, but also a sound knowledge of the roles of the other people involved in the creation process. Composers don’t have to know how to play every instrument in an orchestra, but it’s essential that they know how all the instruments sound; designers can’t be expected to know how programmers or artists do what they do, but they must be aware of any limitations. If you want every wall of your virtual palace to have a stunning, original fresco on it, you can think again.

The Development Process

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

There are many steps to the development of a virtual world. For smaller worlds with fewer players and different functionality, some steps can be skipped or done in tandem with other steps. To highlight every aspect of the process, however, the description in this chapter is for a large, graphical world. Luckily, designers don’t need to know every detail of this—that’s the job of the producer—but they do need to have an idea of how it breaks down. Therefore, you’ll be relieved to learn that only an overview will be presented here, rather than a how-to guide. If you want to find out more (and to understand why it is that producers are paid twice as much as designers), consult Developing Online Games: An Insider’s Guide ¹ by Bridgette Patrovsky and Jessica Mulligan (for virtual worlds) or Game Architecture and Design ² by Andrew Rollings and Dave Morris (for games in general).

Pre-Production

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Pre-production can last as long as six months. The aim is to do all the concept evaluation and project planning necessary to reduce risk in the later stages of development. It’s undertaken by members of the core team, in close consultation with one another. In many ways, it’s the most exciting part of the project, but it’s usually done under time pressure with inadequate resources available, which rather dulls the edge. In particular, a number of important deliverables will have been prepared by the end, all of which will almost certainly have needed more work on them than they actually received.

Production

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The production phase ¹, which lasts between two and three years ² for a large, commercial virtual world, is when the bulk of the programming and data creation takes place. Code must be produced for the client, the server, and for tools. It all has to be done in order, according to a production schedule ³ set by the producer. Tools are usually written first, because other activities are dependent on them and because some of the code can usually be re-used for the server or client. Tools are required for things such as world generation, artificial intelligence (AI) scripting, and customer service support. It’s also a good idea to build some analysis tools, too, so that once the world is running it will be possible to determine what the players, the software, and the hardware are doing without having to ask.

Roll Out

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Roll out is the most critical phase of development, when all the technologies and assets created are brought together to form a virtual world experience. It formally begins with the open beta (test), but has its roots much earlier in the development process.

Testing takes place all the way through development, of course. Programmers will test individual pieces of code, animators will test animations, even designers will run data through models to ensure that what they think will happen has a good chance of being what will happen after players are let loose in their handsome creation.

Operation

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

The operation phase ¹ begins when people start paying to enter the virtual world. It ends when people stop paying, or when the resources needed to support them would be better employed (that is, make more money) elsewhere.

During the operation phase, the original design and development team (the dev team) typically hands over control to a new set of developers (the live team). The rationale is that the battle-hardened dev team can move on to other projects (say, creating the next expansion), leaving the less experienced live team responsible for the maintenance and long-term improvement of the virtual world. This is not always the case, however; Dark Age of Camelot, for example, retained its dev team for the operation phase, rather than putting the very people who knew the project best to work elsewhere.