Behind the Scenes of MMO Design

I've been reading some posts by one of the people behind Ultimate Online and Star Wars Galaxies. Most are about development of the latter.

I've said before and I'll say again that I find looks behind the curtain in such endeavors to be fascinating. Getting insights into the creative ideas behind a major project like that, and seeing how they intersect with practicality, is educational. Sometimes it's also a bit heartbreaking.

SWG has a reputation as being pretty unique among MMOs, love it or hate it. I never played, so I can't render an informed opinion. But there was so much ambition behind the design, that I am impressed by it. Hearing how much of that got scaled back or cut because of things like legalities, development timelines, or simple hardware constraints is something anyone even considering game design should see. And even those of us who only play the games can benefit from it by seeing how complicated things truly can be.

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