The project is a medieval/fantasy mmorpg with the working title of "Aeturna Veritas" which is going to present both 'practical' teaching for christian living and also the doctrinal/philosophical truths of the Christian faith. The ideas behind the project are a mixture of both HanClinto's vision and my own. We have some very good ideas and we are not shying away from forging new territory in the mmorpg world. We're not going to avoid problems by simply re-using the standard mmorpg with a new skin. We're going to try and solve the problems raised by new and innovative ideas and thus keep the new and innovative ideas.

I'm not going to give out too much info until I get the website up, which I'm working on, because we want to avoid over-hyping everything. If you have any specific questions feel free to ask.

If your interested in helping out let me know what your interested in doing and what your skills are. There is alot of work to be done In particular we are looking for skilled 3D artists (modeler/texturer etc).

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-- All that is gold does not glitter,
Deep roots are not touched by the frost,
The old that is strong does not wither,
Not all those who wander are lost.

Maybe if you look at other designs in the design forum it might help give you some more ideas.

You can look for 3D artists at these sites as well (some are game sites)
http://www.turbosquid.com/MessageBoard/index.cfm
http://www.3dcafe.com
http://www.maxforums.org/
http://www.raph.com/3dartists/forums/index.php
http://www.deviantart.com/
http://www.forum3d.kom-net.pl/
http://www.chaoticdimension.com/
http://www.integra.jp
http://forums.free2code.net/
http://www.flipcode.com/
http://gamedev.net/community/forums/
http://gamedev.org/

Good luck

What type of game will it play like... well it is going to be an psudo medieval fantasy mmorpg. That puts it in the genre of games like everquest, daoc, UO and so on. While it is in the same genre as these games and thus has some strong similarities, the game mechanics are going to be alot different. For instance, pretty much all mmorpg's have almost identical combat systems in which the player and his opponent pretty much stand toe to toe and trade blows until one drops. While we will have the same genre of combat (fighting with swords, shields, bow, etc) we are planning on implementing combat in some unique ways, from changing the way that single one on one combat flows, to having large group combats based around actuall units of soldiers and battle field tactics. Another difference between us and most mmorgp's is that most are high magic while we are very low magic. There will be "magical" items in the game, but very little if any "magical" powers wielded directly by the players. We made this decision because the messages we wish to convey are better served this way and the character of the game world itself would simply be inconsistent with mages hurling fireballs all over the place.

in addition to combat, like most mmorpg's, we're planning on having a robust craft skill system so that players would never have to engage in combat if they didn't want to, and could take part fully in the game without ever picking up a sword. Also, one of our main goals, in both crafting and combat aspects of the game is to remove the tedium and drudgery that accompanies "leveling" in most mmorpgs. We want our game to be fun from the start and we want it to be about the actual game play, not about spending endless hours grinding exp to get your next level.

The two guiding principles of our design thus far have been first to serve God and his kingdom with our vision, and secondly to build a world in which the players can have real input and really affect the course of development of the game world. In most big time mmorpg's this simply isn't an option, players are not allowed to have an impact and thus their actions rarely really matter in the game world. That means that players can never be the world changing heros that people should have the opportunity to be when playing a fantasy mmorpg. We want to change that by building a dynamic world in which the player's actions have real effects and real impact.

Just some of the things entailed by our dynamic world concepts include, dynamic spawning, the populations of areas can change based on what the players do meaning that if the players hunt one area alot the evil monsters will begin to disappear and more civilized population will begin moving in, and the reverse as well. Another aspect is players having the ability to run towns and cities and possibly even kingdoms, and the actions of players determining the gaining or loosing territory, and ultimately the rise and fall of Kingdoms.

As for the incorperation of christian themes. There are two primary ways we are going to go about this. One is what we consider to be a more "practical" application. This revolves around the idea of learning things that will be of practical aid in living the day to day christian life. To implement this idea we are planning that in the course of the warfare that goes on in the game world the players will face enemy "strongholds" which are governed or driven by one or more "vices" such as anger, hatred, lust, pride and so on. The vices are the driving force behind the powers of evil in the game and in order to win lasting victories against the advancing tide of evil, the players will be required to defeat the strongholds of vice. This will require strategy and tactics which we will use to teach practical methods of facing those same strongholds in our daily lives.

On the more abstract side we will also be presenting christian doctrine and philosophy through aspects of the games ongoing "story line". There is always the danger of being "preachy" which not only turns off non christians but also many christians who simply want to play a good game. We are aware of this and are going to do our best to avoid it. Yet we also recognize that many popular stories and movies such as harry potter, star wars, and so on, all overtly present the philosophical teachings of their own world views and do so in a manner that is not only not a hinderance but is actually part of the draw for many people. We intend to do the same thing. The ideas of christianity we present aren't going to be a direct alegory of the gospel story but rather will portray the truths behind the christian worldview.

I hope that goes some way to answering your questions. As I said in the first post, I don't want to get too specific or detailed just yet
also thanks for the links to those other sites, I'll deffinetly check them out.

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-- All that is gold does not glitter,
Deep roots are not touched by the frost,
The old that is strong does not wither,
Not all those who wander are lost.

Now for some more questions, from an artists perspective. Will your game feature pre-rendered sprites, or will it be a real time 3D game? Are you planing on having cartoonish graphics, realistic graphics, or something else? How high detailed models would you need, how much animation will you want in the game?

I'm currently involved in my own project http://games.bluegillweb.com that I will be working on for a number of years to come. But I'm graduating from High School this year and I don't plan on going off to study. So if I don't go to study then I will have a lot of time to work on my game project and maybe a few others. So keep me updated and I might be able to help you. Jeff

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Jeff McArthur. Creating Nak'Urij
BlueGill Studios Games

We originaly debated between true 3D and 2d isolinear (diablo style). The decision was eventually made for real time 3D largely because that provided us with what we felt was the best/most versetile engine of the options we looked at.

So we will be using real time 3D. The style of the graphics would be realistic as opposed to cartoonish. The level of detail on models, well I guess in one sense, the more the better. Obviously we'll be limited by concerns of poly count not to kill game performance. So I would guess for characters (people, monsters etc) we'd be looking somewhere around 1000 to 1500 poly's for a base model. Items (like weapons, armor, etc) would have to be less, probably in the low hundreds. For buildings I'm not sure at the moment what the 'polygon budget' would be, I'll have to look into it more.
In all aspects of the game, art and models included as well as story and world design, its the details that really make things come alive, and make them unique. As a result we want to be as detailed as possible within the limits of the technology available to us.

As for animations, characters and mobs need all the basics, run, walk, jump, swim, also there are the basic combat animations, dodge, parry, several variations on the basic attack. In addition to that there will be a fairly long list of special moves/manuevers that would need animations. So the list is pretty long.

Hopefully that isn't too daunting In case your interested, the 3D engine we'll be using is called Axiom, it is a C# port of the OGRE 3D engine.

I went and checked out your website and game project both look very cool. It looks like you've got some cool ideas and a good project underway.

If you have any more questions just let me know.

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-- All that is gold does not glitter,
Deep roots are not touched by the frost,
The old that is strong does not wither,
Not all those who wander are lost.

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proverbs 17:28
Even a fool, when he holdeth his peace, is counted wise: and he that shutteth his lips is esteemed a man of understanding.

www.gfa.org - Gospel for Asia

www.persecution.com - Voice of the Martyrs

P.S. I have some medieval sort of designs I made for fun in the past, such as a sketch of a different kind of warrior and stuff, if you are interested in seeing them just tell me.

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Jeff McArthur. Creating Nak'Urij
BlueGill Studios Games

@outcast

HanClinto is the expert on the programing side and the engine we're using but the engine is written in C# and based on the .Net/Mono frame work so once the engine is complete, as I understand it, it shouldn't be very difficult to port between PC and Mac.

I'd love to see the medieval designs you've done in the past!

P.S. To Benny,
For me RPG's are all about character customization half the time I have as much fun making characters as I do actually playing the games. I hate games where they put you in a character straight jacket. Pool of Radience was about the worst I've seen that way.

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-- All that is gold does not glitter,
Deep roots are not touched by the frost,
The old that is strong does not wither,
Not all those who wander are lost.

[This message has been edited by simon_templar (edited December 15, 2004).]

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Jeff McArthur. Creating Nak'Urij
BlueGill Studios Games

One of the features I would like to include in the game is making some of the model/uv mapping stuff available so that people can design their own coats of arms, clothes, and so on. Everything would have to be approved, of course, before we let it in the game. I was thinking this could especially be something we make available to those who use crafting skills, that way they could actually make unique items by designing their own models or textures.
At least to begin with it would probably be mostly limited to retexturing things as thats pretty simple to add into the game once its already running.

------------------
-- All that is gold does not glitter,
Deep roots are not touched by the frost,
The old that is strong does not wither,
Not all those who wander are lost.

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Jeff McArthur. Creating Nak'Urij
BlueGill Studios Games

Ultimately this project is totaly in God's hands though, both in the direction we pursue, and also our success or failure

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-- All that is gold does not glitter,
Deep roots are not touched by the frost,
The old that is strong does not wither,
Not all those who wander are lost.

You could pay credits or taxes to people successfully hosting kingdom(s). Which they could use to improve their kingdoms (maybe specialize in something) For example, one kingdom might specialize in weapons making, another in horse breeding, another in combat training, whatever.

If they're hosting an 'evil' kingdom, they might not be able to change the evil kingdom they are hosting, but these credits might be usefull in one day building their own kingdom. (they could host both)

Also, since most people aren't using their computer more than a couple hours a day, people could allow their computers to be productive while they're away, continuing to host their kingdom and gaining credits for them. This would allow people who don't want to play 6 hours a day building stats to just focus more on kingdom building and let their computer gain credits by hosting.

On the whole though, creative idea!

--clint

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http://www.includingjudas.com/christiangame.html

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I dont like siggys. They are to hard to think up :(

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-- All that is gold does not glitter,
Deep roots are not touched by the frost,
The old that is strong does not wither,
Not all those who wander are lost.

i can do some concept art for u guys.i value myself as a pretty good artist.a friend of mine would also be glad to help, im sure. when final developement comes around, i can help design some images and what-not for the web-site.
will u be attempting to find a production company, so u can sell a game disk in stores, like everquest? or will u be offering an entirely online setup, like runescape? n.e way i can help in any way involving art, and have almost nothing better to do. i have acess to a scanner, so that will make getting u the art easier. tell me how i can help.

b.t.w if im going to be involved, id like to delve in. the more contact i have with u guys, the better i can work for u.

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It is better to be silent and be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt. - Abe Lincoln

I'd love to see some of your artwork, do you have a web page? if not I'll give you my email address via PM.

As for distribution of the game. I started out planning on primarily promoting and distribution the game online. You never know what doors God might open so I can't say that we won't end up going with a publisher, but I probably wouldn't even bother approaching one until we had a working product.

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-- All that is gold does not glitter,
Deep roots are not touched by the frost,
The old that is strong does not wither,
Not all those who wander are lost.

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It is better to be silent and be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt. - Abe Lincoln

2. Crazyman, I didnt know you played RS...

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I dont like siggys. They are to hard to think up :(

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It is better to be silent and be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt. - Abe Lincoln

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I dont like siggys. They are to hard to think up :(

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It is better to be silent and be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt. - Abe Lincoln

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-- All that is gold does not glitter,
Deep roots are not touched by the frost,
The old that is strong does not wither,
Not all those who wander are lost.

I am running a small software/web development company based in Islamabad, Pakistan. Please visit my website http://ufnasoft.com to know more about the resources. Please let me know if I can help you in programming.

Blessings

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Younas Aamir
Ufnasoft

For the MMORPG project we are working on we're planning on using a GDK (game dev kit) which is still in the early stages of development and its going to be a while before we can really start working with it.
As a result we're going to be shifting the MMORPG to the background until the GDK is closer to completion and we're going to be working on a smaller project. We're discussing right now to pinpoint exactly what we want to do (most likely it will be an RPG of some sort). On this project the engine will likely be written from scratch specificly for this project and it will be 2D rather than 3D.

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-- All that is gold does not glitter,
Deep roots are not touched by the frost,
The old that is strong does not wither,
Not all those who wander are lost.