Looks like there is some sort of DOS attack =(
Strange. Both servers at the system level stopped accepting TCP packets. It might've been my cloud provider trying to mitigate an attack. I guess I shouldn'tve killed the server. Putting it back up now.
Show HN: I built an indie, browser-based MMORPG
61–70 of 165 posts
Re: Show HN: I built an indie, browser-based MMORPG
#62How long did it take you to make this? Looks cool, watched someone fight a chicken before the server update.
Re: Show HN: I built an indie, browser-based MMORPG
#63Surely this was heavily inspired by Runescape? The click to move (including cursor animation on click), camera angles and graphics, chat text colour and position etc. all give me huge Runescape (Old School Runescape) vibes. Congrats on launching though, looks like a fun project.
I think so, one of the other comments OP mentions OSRS having the same tick rate.
Re: Show HN: I built an indie, browser-based MMORPG
#64How long did it take you to make this? Looks cool, watched someone fight a chicken before the server update.
Sorry about that. I think it's back up. I'm wondering if it hit a TCP limit for the cloud provider or something. My first commit was 15 months ago, but I spent some time doing 3d modeling before that, and lots of other failed projects that were somewhat related before that.
Re: Show HN: I built an indie, browser-based MMORPG
#65Huh, this is fun!
I built Genfanad (http://genfanad.com/) as a browser based game with similar inspirations to yours a few years ago. A lot of the technologies you mentioned are very similar. It's surprising how easy getting something up and running is these days!
We ended up shutting down a few months ago as I couldn't figure out how to take it to profitability. Do you have plans for that, or is it just a fun side project?
Re: Show HN: I built an indie, browser-based MMORPG
#66How long did it take you to make this? Looks cool, watched someone fight a chicken before the server update.
Sorry about that. I think it's back up. I'm wondering if it hit a TCP limit for the cloud provider or something. My first commit was 15 months ago, but I spent some time doing 3d modeling before that, and lots of other failed projects that were somewhat related before that.
Getting a 502 here. Welcome to scale, good luck with the fires! Keen to check it out in a couple of days.
Re: Show HN: I built an indie, browser-based MMORPG
#67Huh, this is fun! I built Genfanad ( http://genfanad.com/ ) as a browser based game with similar inspirations to yours a few years ago. A lot of the technologies you mentioned are very similar. It's surprising how easy getting something up and running is these days! We ended up shutting down a few months ago as I couldn't figure out how to take it to profitability. Do you have plans for that, or is it just a fun side…
Nice job with Genfanad! That looked like a really neat game. I don't have a good plan for profitability other than try to keep my expenses as low as possible and see if I can find some way to scrape by in a year or two.
Re: Show HN: I built an indie, browser-based MMORPG
#68Huh, this is fun! I built Genfanad ( http://genfanad.com/ ) as a browser based game with similar inspirations to yours a few years ago. A lot of the technologies you mentioned are very similar. It's surprising how easy getting something up and running is these days! We ended up shutting down a few months ago as I couldn't figure out how to take it to profitability. Do you have plans for that, or is it just a fun side…
Do you have any suggestions? Your game seemed very popular. Anything you wished you had focused more on?
Re: Show HN: I built an indie, browser-based MMORPG
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
The 200 users are on a $5 per month server. I'm guessing a better server could support more, but there are scaling challenges if everyone wants to be in the exact same location. In that case, you're sending 200 updates to 200 people each tick which gets slow since it scales O(n^2). I used 600ms because that's a reasonable rate for walking one square and it's also what is used in the largest similar game Old School Ru…
Do you think gafferongames algorithms would be good enough or need like a scheme for basically every game mechanic that would need to be synchronized?
That's above my paygrade I think. All my logic is rule based at the 600ms tick level. If you pick a berry, each tick take one step closer, then do a pick animation, then add the berry to your inventory and remove it from the bush. The client is responsible for tweening between those ticks. It might be a whole different thing to try physics/fine movements etc.
Re: Show HN: I built an indie, browser-based MMORPG
#70Huh, this is fun! I built Genfanad ( http://genfanad.com/ ) as a browser based game with similar inspirations to yours a few years ago. A lot of the technologies you mentioned are very similar. It's surprising how easy getting something up and running is these days! We ended up shutting down a few months ago as I couldn't figure out how to take it to profitability. Do you have plans for that, or is it just a fun side…
Do you have any suggestions? Your game seemed very popular. Anything you wished you had focused more on?
Set your expectations accordingly.
Coding is the fun part, but it's less than 5% of actually launching and making a successful product. If you don't think you want to spend most of your time not coding, don't try to make it a business!
Marketing is more important than making something. You will get a small boost from things like this (I was always too embarrassed to post here!), but it's an endless pit of time and money! To do it right, I've heard all sorts of numbers, but a good rule of thumb is every dollar/hour you put to making your game, put a dollar/hour to marketing it as well.
From a technical perspective, your stack is fine. You want to make sure you host all your assets behind cloudflare/s3 or similar, the $5 server is fine for gameplay but if you also try to make it send all the stuff, it's gonna die. (As evidenced today!)
Most of my other experience and advice is about how to run a team and set budgets and goals. If you're going about it as a hobby (and that's probably the best way to go!) then just keep doing what you're doing, write some blogs and foster a community instead.