Essence of War: Medieval castle sim [Req. add. teammates]

mPaul · Post by **mPaul** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 9:42 pm

Hereby I introduce to you, our little project: Essence of War.

Essence of War is an Online Medieval castle sim, with various RPG and RTS elements. The idea is to create a game in which you can build a castle together with your kingdom (guild, if you prefer), battle other kingdoms, all in a real time environment.

We, Paulius (modeler/artist) and Michel (me, programmer/designer) have been working on this project for over a year now. However most of it has been preproduction, I have been seriously developing the engine for about 2 months now. Paulius has already produced a considerable amount of graphics for the game (which aren't yet all in the game).
Just to let you know, I have no Irrlicht experience at all.

The state of the game at the moment can be best described by a screenshot:

(this is not actually full-size, i cut the unimportant part)

What you can(t) see in this image is:

- A considerably huge LOD forest (graphics will be worked on when it's needed)
- A server/client networking system using winsock, allowing a virtually unlimited amount of clients (for now it's only walking around (perfect, without lag/glitches), which actually is an important achievement)
- Bone animation with replaceable parts (there aren't any more parts yet than showed in the screenshot)
- Graphics with potential, since i don't know a thing about shaders or fancy effects
- A whole load of fun

But as you've noticed, we're looking for additional team members. What we're looking for are people that have a lot of fun making games, ofcourse. I can guarantee you it will be fun, since it has been for over a year now

But to get back on topic, we lack these skills:

- Additional programmer, preferably with loads of Irrlicht experience
- Music composer (yeah, I'm in the wrong forum)
- (fill in your other skill here)

So if you want to join, let me know, and include a little sample of what you can do, ofcourse.

Also, questions, comment and debate are appreciated

Just a little update. (March 18th)

We're 4 now, me, Paulius, Zack and Martin, programmer, modeler, programmer and designer.
We've just done a little alpha test just for fun, with a chat system i only just made (which means displaying the lines in the console window without any newline or name whatsoever, which led to funny situations).
Anyway, progress is going great, even though we all have very little time (which will soon be different).
Anyway, we're still looking for more people in the team, just let me know who you are and what you can do, and I'll see if you fit in

Michel

Dorth · Post by **Dorth** » Sat Mar 01, 2008 10:04 pm

Good luck with it all. One comment though.

- A server/client networking system using winsock, allowing a virtually unlimited amount of clients (for now it's only walking around (perfect, without lag/glitches), which actually is an important achievement)

How do you KNOW that? Have you stressed tested it for multiple days with over 5000 connections? If not, you do not know. The stress a server handle under 50 is not the same as 200 or 1000 or 5000. Those are all the brackets you should consider. Each one present new challenges and while a network solution that work for 5000 will work for 50, the other way around is not true if you did not specifically build it for that. And tested it. And again. At ALL points of development. My 2 cents.

greenya · Post by **greenya** » Sat Mar 01, 2008 10:30 pm

mPaul,
Nice shot and good lick with the project!

Dorth wrote:Good luck with it all. One comment though.

- A server/client networking system using winsock, allowing a virtually unlimited amount of clients (for now it's only walking around (perfect, without lag/glitches), which actually is an important achievement)
How do you KNOW that? Have you stressed tested it for multiple days with over 5000 connections? If not, you do not know. The stress a server handle under 50 is not the same as 200 or 1000 or 5000. Those are all the brackets you should consider. Each one present new challenges and while a network solution that work for 5000 will work for 50, the other way around is not true if you did not specifically build it for that. And tested it. And again. At ALL points of development. My 2 cents.

A word "virtually" says that there is no limit in the code. Another problem -- is a hardware (cpu/ram) that needed for 5000 connections (players). That is question about a stick with 2 ends:
- better hardware
- OR better software (optimization)

imho

Dorth · Post by **Dorth** » Sat Mar 01, 2008 10:38 pm

Even with better hardware, the software becomes a problem at one point if the data needs to interact with one another. Game Programming Gem (X, can't remember which, I'll post later) had an extremely good article on the subject.

Also, virtually applies to unlimited, which means it is near but not unlimited. Nothing to do with the software hard coded limit, at least, not in the sentence.

rogerborg · Post by **rogerborg** » Sun Mar 02, 2008 12:29 am

Questions:

Is the environment persistent?

Who will be hosting the servers?

If it's you, how are you planning to pay for it?

mPaul · Post by **mPaul** » Sun Mar 02, 2008 11:42 am

Firstly, thanks for all your replies. Yes I know I still need to do stress tests on the server, and I need to do a lot of optimisation, but I have a lot of (hobbyist) experience regarding networking.

rogerborg wrote:Questions:

Is the environment persistent?

Who will be hosting the servers?

If it's you, how are you planning to pay for it?

Yup, the environment is persistent, it's a pretty simple use of a PRNG.
I will be hosting the server at my dad for the alpha tests, where I have a 50 mbps upload limit. I also have a pentium 4 pc which I can use for it.
So I don't need to pay anything yet, since I'll only be hosting alpha tests on, say, weekends or sundays.

lostclimategames · Post by **lostclimategames** » Sun Mar 02, 2008 4:23 pm

wow, aside from myghrotoria, or whatever its called, this seems to be the next shot at a chance of a good online game for irrlicht

good job, just keep up the motivation.

mPaul · Post by **mPaul** » Tue Mar 18, 2008 8:43 pm

Just a little update.

We're 4 now, me, Paulius, Zack and Martin, programmer, modeler, programmer and designer.
We've just done a little alpha test just for fun, with a chat system i only just made (which means displaying the lines in the console window without any newline or name whatsoever, which led to funny situations).
Anyway, progress is going great, even though we all have very little time (which will soon be different).
Anyway, we're still looking for more people in the team, just let me know who you are and what you can do, and I'll see if you fit in

Michel