[Archived] Alk MMORPG Framework

Plugin System Completed.

 

Please keep us in mind for beta testing.

 

We will certainly

 

We would be interested as well.

 

I've been following your progress here and would be interested in participating in beta.

 

I am taking note of all those interested in beta testing.

 

Agree and who is insane enough to ruin playing a MMO on a mobile instead of a beautiful 24 inches LCD!

But yes i know many people are masochistic these days.

 

Hi there,

We were just about to buy Atavism online when i stumble upon your thread and we would like to know how do you compared your package with them just so that we can make a judicious choice?

We are not asking for the usual our stuff is better than their but a solid comparison features versus features for the price because at 165$ Atavism seem to have a lot more features and they also work on this project for a couple years and their game neo land seem to prove their level of expertize.

You see so far we spent close to 700$ on the asset store and most of these are out of support or they simply are broke with no decent manual so that why we are shy a bit to pay for more of these.

Thank for any clarifications and good luck with your project.

 

Thank you for your question.
I have no previous knowledge of the product from Atavism, so any comparison I make will be based on a quick read of their forum thread and as such will be fairly limited, perhaps other members could be of more help, but I'll try my best.

The first difference I can see is the usual practice of limiting concurrent users based on price. All of our packages include unlimited concurrent users*. For the Atavism product, you would be required to pay $1,000 for unlimited concurrent users.
Also the only difference between their $165, $400 and $1000 packages seem to be the amount of concurrent users.

With our framework, you purchase once and can use on as many projects as you wish, and with as many servers as you wish. Atavism state that "You can have as many different servers done with one license but only one database per server." They don't seem to discuss project limitations.

Only our networking base class library is compiled, everything else comes with full source, thus you can extend the provided framework via our plugin system or source code.
Atavism state "The Core Server Files are compiled. Developers will be able to provide some uniqueness and greater flexibility to their games by means of writing their own plugins.". So in essence your working with a closed system expandable only via plugins.

As for game centric features, we have only listed what we believed to be major features and we have not mentioned minor features. The only features I see that Atavism provides than we currently do not are "Pets" and apparently "Infinite terrain". I cannot see anything else we are not providing.

Also keep in mind that the Alk MMORPG Framework is designed from the base up to be fully flexible with regards to potential game projects, thus we may introduce features which may not be included with the core framework but may be supplied as separate plugins, we aim to do this to keep costs down for customers.

There appears to be a lack of actual technical information from Atavism, such as those regarding protocols, database support etc in both the thread and on their website, so I am unable to make a comparison of system based features other than both solutions offer multi-server support.

As for expertise, I cannot comment for them, however they do appear to have created a good and viable solution.
For myself personally, I have a BSc in computer science, several years experience developing for private MMORPG servers, developing internal social networking solutions for large organisations. I also have experience developing with existing middleware solutions including BigWorld Technology and HeroEngine.

Remember that this framework is not yet a finished product and as such, shall be beta tested, those purchasing during the beta period shall receive a discount and shall be able to work with the developers to produce a better framework.

Once again I do not know the Atavism product so perhaps other members could be of more help. In all honesty I can not comment on the efficiency of other products and I would therefore suggest you purchase which ever product you feel more comfortable with.

I hope this answers your questions. If not let me know


*Packages have not yet been finalised.

**EDIT**
Just found some more information so I can make a better comparison of some features.

Alk MMORPG Framework

• Language: C#.
• Database: MySQL (default), support for MSSQL. Plugins can be created for others.
• Authoritative: Yes.
• Multiple Server Support: Yes.
• Source Code: Yes (except core networking base class library).
• Unlimited Player Cost: ~$250.

Atavism

• Language: Java (server) & Python (Plugins).
• Database: MySQL.
• Authoritative: Yes.
• Multiple Server Support: Yes.
  
• Source Code: No.
  
• Unlimited Player Cost: $1,000.

*Note*
The stats for Atavism were taken from their website.

 

Updated previous post.

 

Well one of the things about the two engines is that Atavism also has a huge head start on you guys.

From the customers point of view we all would love the best engine for the cheapest price. But the task of making such an engine is much more than most take into account.

I would love to see you both complete an amazing base engine and build off it but they really are far along. You will have to also provide the support the way they do witch is very good.

Your features and deal look great but this is far into the pre-release stage. They also stated a much lower price at this stage and had to change it because of a failed kickstarter. Do not get me wrong their engine does give great bang for the buck and I would say is worth it if you are serious about making great games. But to deliver yours with what you are listing I hope you have the staff and skills to come through in less than a year or so.

I really would like my guys to dig into the beta test on your kit then we could write a detailed report on it.

 

We have tried Atavism. It is very difficult to write plugins, although they will tell you otherwise. Our coders tell me that because the server code is not open, they find it difficult to figure out how to tell the server to communicate with the client in order to make their plugins work. Yes, if you want to basically use their system with a few modifications or buy their plugin's or ones made by the community at their yet to be seen store, then Atavism is an easy system, or maybe once it is finished. But at this time, it is very frustrating.

I am not sure how Alk is handing this, but at this time, you must pay per seat for your team members or you could be locked out of getting updates, which is understandable with a finished product but frustrating when still testing to see if the product will work for you. Remember, it is still technically in alpha. They say it is beta but the features are really alpha, not an uncommon label these days for software. Beta sounds better but real beta means all the features are in and they are testing compatibility and load. Atavism does not yet contain server collision or many other really important features necessary for a true MMO. However, when and if Atavism is finished and polished, it might be ideal for a user wanting to make a generic game or someone who has little to no coding experience.

I am really looking forward to seeing what Alk can bring to the table. The open source is going to be fantastic for those of us who want to write our own plugins and make our games unique.

 

Sounds pretty cool, count me in as interested.
Bookmarked!

 

Hi everyone,

Thank to the asset developer for explaining in detail how his package compared with Atavism and we appreciate the way he did it with professionalism.

And also thank to both posters who mention some important weakness in the atavism package that we didn't look at first specially Teila who warn us about the difficulty of writing our own plugin since this was our main interest in the package.

We thought that we just had to write down our code in C# and tap it in via the plugin system and that it will communicate with the server side easily.

Aik system is having a positive point with the C# standard since we prefer C# than other language.

Seem like now our decision will even be more difficult to make but more information is better than less.

We will keep following this thread to see where it goes from here and also to hear from other opinions on server solutions.

Thank to everyone for their contributions on the subject.

 

I am definitely interested in this, as I am a current atavism user, and there are definitely some features lacking, as well as many other bugs and issues that make it nearly un useable at times. Which is a shame for having paid so much money for it.

 

Note me in the beta

 

Personally I'm interested in less of the engine and plugins and more in the actual networking framework. Chances are that I will never use any of the large premade systems like a combat system, and I would opt out for programming my own. What decides which library I choose is whichever one provides the framework to more painlessly implement such systems over a large scale MMO environment.

 

+ 1 for beta testing, sign me up aswell,
i am always looking for beta testing new networking products.

 

Pixel, Atavism uses Python for their server rather than C#. This was a big drawback for us because our coders are much stronger in C# than Python. At the time though, we didn't have any alternatives so thought we would give it a try. Atavism looks great on paper and the salesman talks a good talk, but I would insist on trying it out before you put money into it.

 

Agree with you we would have prefer C# also and unfortunately there is no trial for Atavism so it is a risky guess to jump in.

Like many assets on the store you often realize after buying that the product is unusable for serious production.

I will not continue talking about atavism here since the thread belong to Aik mmokit, thank to everyone.

 

I agree, however I always steer away from using the word "engine" as engines typically tend to be more static and less flexible than a framework

It is always great from a customer's prospective to have alternatives.

whilst we shall support developers regarding issues such as bugs, we also welcome developers to give us insights into their development process and needs, which in-turn can help evolve and expand our product to meet the requirements of our customers.

Pricing is always an issue and unfortunately for the Unity platform, the loose manner in which terms such as MMO are wrongly thrown at assets by their developers does not help. Our approach with regards to the framework is to have a constantly evolving framework, so hopefully we can one day meet the majority of requirements.

We are eager for developers to post reports/feedback, we are also both stressed and excited for the beta release

We have made communication as simple as we can whilst keeping it open to expansion.
An example of a client-server login packet:

Code (CSharp):

1. public class LoginPacket : NetPacket
2.     {
3.         public LoginPacket(string username, string password) : base(Opcodes.LOGIN)
4.         {
5.             Write(username);
6.             Write(password);
7.         }
8.     }

and usage:

Code (CSharp):

1. server.SendAsync(new LoginPacket(username, password));

Server-client would pretty much be the same except you would pass in a client ID argument.

Whilst our purchase packages are yet to be confirmed and we are still evaluating licencing technologies, we aim to provide multiple seats per licence, which should benefit the majority of indie development teams. I shall provide more information as soon as I can.

Source code shall also be provided for our plugin system.

During the beta testing we may introduce a framework only package, however initially our main goal is to ensure the functionality of the entire framework system.

It is my pleasure.

 

As i stated before,
I do too want to be part of beta testing if you would pls.

also wanted to ask,
- will this server framework also support running on linux boxes? I assume it would since the c# .dlls can be run with mono , right? or is it only for windows platform? I am talking about server side


- is beta starting tomorrow? or not yet scheduled?


- regarding price, $250 seems a little stiff for me, well, we know is unlimited users, but I think you should make it indie friendly pricing.
something in the region:
a- free to use with 100 ccu limit,
b- the escalate to paid license , maybe $50 for 500 ccu
c- then $100 for 1000 ccu
d- then the unlimited for $250

or make the core and basic setup all free, then sell extra addons or genre kits based on it.

something in that nature or style.
but i do think you should have a free version so it will gain popularity in the unity plugin networking market.

 

$250 actually IS Indie Friendly licensing for a MMO Framework. You have similar products like Big World and Hero slightly less expensive for their Indie Friendly licenses and then as much as well over a million for a AAA studio. $250 certainly falls with in acceptable pricing for a Indie. MMOs aren't cheap to develop if you don't have the $250 for a license then I think it's safe to assume you don't have even more for suitable Dedicated Servers and everything else that MMOs require,,,

 

The server is mono compatible and the framework shall come with both Windows and Linux executables.

I have given a rough estimate of around two weeks, however this is dependent on feature implementation and rectifying possible bugs. We have not yet begun to implement several requested features such as UMA so I cannot give an exact ETA as of yet.

For the foreseeable future we are not planning on releasing limits for concurrent users. It was one of the primary reasons for us porting our framework to Unity.

Whilst we welcome hobbyists etc, this product is primarily aimed at those dedicated to developing a MMO/MMORPG. Creating a MMO takes a long time and a lot of effort, thus $250 is a minuscule amount in comparison to the other costs involved in developing a online game.

**Personal Note**
We are not charging extortionate prices for a few scripts that you add to Photon or smartfox etc. This framework in an all-in-one basis for your development and all it encompasses was built from the ground up...so that you don't have to.

 

thanks for the quick reply,

altho I do understand that this is not just a bunch of scripts for an already networking plugin, but a framework, you have to remember one thing, if your planning to make a full business out of it offcourseor of you planning to make a living of it.,

this is unity engine, therefore unity developers the vast majority are not even indies as one shall call in the real world or technically speaking,
but individuals using the engine, like an average joe, trying to create a game.
yea, there are actual indie groups and yes there are offcourse a few real funded studios.

but you have to remember 80% if not 90% of actual unity users are the average joe user Hobbyists. who are not a studio not even an indie group but an individual with little to none funding backers.


now, like someone uphere mention Hero engine or bigworld are more expensive but you just do not compare this new framework against the proven technology that already powers up several top played games supporting millions of concurrent users. so at least i wont be that stupid to compare them with this new framework. and think, well BW or HE are worth hundred of thousands of dlls then $250 is just peanuts, that is a very stupid analogy imo.
even them big dogs like Hero engine or Bigworld, have come down to their senses to reach "indie" massive population, why because they realized that their license model to just aim to big funded studios were getting slimmer and slimmer over the years, hence going indie to spread their business model.

so coming down to earth, your framework is new, sounds really interesting in theory, altho has not been proven yet to hold massive players stress testing with live players, at least not yet but hopefully it will and looking forward for its success.

and yes if you consider that your framework is only for a serious indie group or studio that can afford making an mmo and continue developing for years with funding, then your market is very very narrow and with high probabilities to choke due of its narrow market target. since if one would of do an actual survey of how many mmo projects are seriously active and funded in this unity forum,
then you may reconsider. plus a funded studio or indie group will probably look for some other alternatives most of time.

but in the other hand, unity has over 400k users being majority average joe, or like you mentioned Hobbyists I would of rethink my strategy plan more than twice to provide accessibility to the large massive unity audience too.

but hey, that is just me, the little guy Hobbyist, who can not afford to pay monthly fees for a server farm while developing a multiplayer game as stated the indie funded fella because he was funded I assume in his past project, who did the analogy about Hero engine and Bigworld,
and unlike me there are other 400k average joe users outhere who are not funded and probably nor will be any time soon .

look at the unity assetstore and out of all the assets inthere ill bet you most if not all are from a non funded average joe hobbyist individual trying to make a buck or two for living, some of them successfully doing it and some not too successful, and the ones who are successfull sellers, guess who are their target audience

just my .002

 

I fully understand and appreciate your opinion, however you should understand that over 90% of MMORPG project fail before release, primarily due to a lack of financial backing or poor project management. It is due to these factors that MMO development is usually not a viable project for most. Also keep in mind I have been using the unity engine for well over 4 years.

I did not compare this framework to either HE or BWT and as a former developer working with both HE and BWT, I am very well versed in those technologies and have not/would not compare this framework to them. BWT cost over $400,000 before being brought out by Wargaming.net, which is why it was aimed at large studios.

Our product is for anyone willing to develop an MMO. I have only stated that the product is aimed more towards developers wishing to actually produce a MMO rather than spending $250 just to tinker with the framework.

I am not sure how to respond as I do not know to whom your referring as I myself am a indie developer.

Are all of the MMO solutions in the asset store up to your standard?

Once again, developing an MMO in a costly venture with regards to both time and money. This framework is aimed at lowering both of those costs.

 

no worries, actually did not take it as an offense,

I was just trying to state how better off will be a product aimed and affordable to the masses instead of selling 1 license at $250 will be more financial viable to sell 20 at $50 or $75 cost.
after all your production cost is the same if you sell 1 copy or 500 copies

hence stating of the unity userbase amount, and unity assetstore popularity seller most are due of the price range affordable to majority of users,

assets from $100 and up are rare sallers or minimal than items under $100. actually the hot sellers are products priced around $50 to $65 imo and studies.

that was just the comparison or point i was trying to make.

best of luck

 

Whilst that logic may seem valid, from a business perspective it is simply not viable. The issue is not just about hoping to cover the cost of development, but the cost of future development and continued support. The MMO development market of Unity is a lot smaller than markets such as mobile developments etc.

Keep in mind that after taxation, unity store percentages and currency conversion fee, we are only getting around 40% of the cost and as such we believe our pricing to be very fair for what we are offering.

I thank you for sharing your view and whilst we plan to introduce a cheaper "core only" package during the beta phase, initially we are focused on the framework in its entirety.

Thanks and best of luck to you also.

 

your development cost will be the same, your copy sold per production cost is the same whether you sell 1 copy or 500 copies, it is a digital product.(no cost for duplicating for an extra sell)
selling 1 copy for $250 = $250 per every other week,
vs
selling 20 copies every other week at $75 = 1500?

like i said your production cost for selling 1 copy will be the same or if you sell 20 copies.

if you sell in unity store 1 copy =$250 - ($100) 40% unity cut plus taxes + merchant fees = $150 total profit

or if you sell 20 copies outside unity store at $75 = $1500 - $150 (10%) taxes = $1350 total profit

your total taxable items is out of $75 = $7.5 if sold outside unity store compared to $100 in cuts and taxes pr copy sold

what is not viable from a business point of view?
I could be wrong by doing this analogy, but it does sound right in my head. after all we know every head is different so i might be wrong here.

you want unity to earn his cut?, why not, leave a pro license in their assetstore and a license for the rest of the mass to buy directly from you, simple as that.

and all this is without taking in consideration the nightmare that most online digital product seller face nowadays, " Piricy" a product fairly expensive or less reachable to the masses, chances are it will be targeted more often than any other product, therefore reducing sales more than usual. etc....... you may say, well those who are using illegal copies will never legally release a finished product and at the end they will have to buy a license to release, yes that may be very true, but when? 5 years from now when they finish their project? and that is if they release since you said it yourself 95% of mmo projects fail for whatever reason.
woudnt it be nice to just have that money up in front instead?

but I do understand you already have your business perspective already setup, and one can keep on writing examples or benefits or drawback for any business point of view, so no need to go back and fort to see which is the right direction to take, both can be valid in their own way so wish the best on what ever business approach you take.

keep up the good work.

 

While I love seeing people try to argue why a product should be cheaper because they cannot afford it, or are not willing to spend that much, it is tiring. They want to sell it for $250. They seem to know what's up. If you can't afford $250, then you probably shouldn't be trying to make a MMO first thing.

 

I think the price is fair. A developer puts a great deal of time and effort into their projects and this one is quite expansive. Support costs are very important as well and all those people who want to buy a product for little money will add to the support costs. If you aim your product at a group that is more serious about development and you get fewer sales but at a higher cost, you often spend less money and time on support and more on development.

400 hobbyists who all ask questions are going to cost as much or more in time and effort as a smaller number of serious developers who pay full price for the product. It all balances out in the end. Time is money, as they say.

Besides, the fact that the developer is not charging by CC will help many of us out in the end. I am extremely impressed. All I ask is that they are upfront about the costs rather than tell us one thing and then decide to change the price structure later...and charge existing customers for the difference like Atavism did! Fine to change the prices at release but grandfather in those who already paid, please! It really helps to budget costs.

 

This information is not relative to real world business, otherwise laptops & TVs etc would be a lot cheaper... to do the actual maths and add some perspective from our side with regards to cost, we are based in London, UK and the calculation would be similar to this:

• Asset Price = $250 or for us around £140 (GBP).
• £140 - (30% asset store percentage + 20% corporate tax*) = £70.
• £70 - (3.9% + $0.30 + 2.5%)** = £62.04.
• We now have £62.04 or ~(44%).

*All UK companies pay 20% corporate tax.
**Paypal fees including currency conversion fees

This £62.04 has to go towards:

• A licencing solution to avoid piracy (we are investigating different solutions).
• Web-server and dedicated test/demo server cost.
• Ongoing support to licencees.
• Further development costs and time.
• Various business expenses.
• Salary. (also keep in mind the UK has a 33% higher cost of living than the US).

You earlier suggested we sell it for $50 or $75. so using the above calculations:

• Selling at $50 would equate to £12.59 for us.
• Selling at $75 would equate to £18.89 for us.

Those prices are simply not sufficient for our product or costs, especially when you consider that £12.59 is $20. To pay only one person at minimum wage and not including any other costs (as mentioned above), we would have to sell over 962 copies.

I can only hope this helps to illustrate to you why it is simply not viable to sell such a complex system for that low of a price.

We are currently investigating and discussing possible alternatives to using the Unity Store, however leaving the asset store could result in an even smaller potential market.

As mentioned above, we are currently evaluating existing and proprietary software licencing solutions to help combat/minimise the potential for piracy.

Whilst I do understand and respect your opinion, I hope this post has demonstrated our business decision with regards to pricing. Please also take into consideration that this shall not be our only product and that other priced packages may become available during or after beta and this proposed price is based on the entire initial product.

Developers are welcome to try our solution or any solution that meets their requirements. If cost is indeed a issue, I would personally recommend working on developing your own proprietary solution or focusing on generating some form of finance capital, as developing a MMO will cost you time and money in both development and maintenance.

P.s. Please remember, as we have previously stated, that this is a proposed price for the full initial package. As such prices are subject to fluctuate slightly up or down. Beta testers shall receive a discount code to lower their purchase price.

 

I'd like to be considered for beta testing as well, please. I have followed multiple MMO engines and multiplayer assets, both using Unity and outside of it, for a few years now, and this solution looks very promising.

 

You have been added to the list

**EDIT**
Moved beta testing list to first post.

 

Can i be added to the beta testing group too please?

thank you for your consideration

 

Added.
Thanks for your interest.

 

thank you, looking forward to test

good day.

 

I would like to be added to the beta test group as well.

 

You too have been added

 

Hi ,

You can also count me in for beta since i cancel my atavism purchase and i like your clear and concise answers.

Regards

 

Many thanks for considering us.
You have been added to the list

 

Here is a screenshot to demonstrate a server running on Linux (Ubuntu).
We have finished porting the base code to Linux, so you will now be able to host your game servers on either Windows or Linux platforms.

 

looks pretty cool so far. I tried most of RPG ToolKit/Framework on the AssetStore but this one seems to be the most promise. Hopefully, this will be my destination.

 

Looks like I'm late to the party, but better late than never.

Really interesting concept here, and I'd like to be considered for the beta. I have a remote dedicated (windows) server which is currently running my own headless unity servers.

Keep the faith XD

 

You have been added

 

If seats are still available for beta testing I would like to put in my ballot to be considered.

Now in regards to running the platform on Linux, what are the dependencies required and what distrobutions do you plan to officially support? Is the server its own standalone application seperate from Unity, or is it essentially a headless Unity build? I appologize if these questions may have been answered by the picture you shared, but I am currently on my works network, which is heavily filtered.

 

You shall be added to the list

Due to the server components being based on .Net (C#), a Linux host is required to have Mono installed. Mono currently supports a large array of platforms and for Linux, I believe they support primarily Ubuntu and Debian distributions. A full list of supported platforms can be found Here.

For those who are not aware, Mono is also what helps enable Unity to build for various different platforms, hence the MonoDevelop IDE

The serverside is entirely unrelated to the Unity. A better way to envision the system is as a MMORPG server framework with a client API tailored to Unity, thus the server system can (and has) been used without Unity i.e. XNA, OpenGL, DirectX based clients.

 

Thank you very much!

I believe I read earlier in this thread of the system being programmed on top of Mono, and this is perfectly acceptable. I simply was curious if there was a large list of other packages required. While we're on the topic of packages, I see MySQL as the current database engine being used. Do you have plans to support any other database system at an eventual point?

I am glad to hear that you made the decision to go this route instead of building on top of a Unity client.

If you don't mind, a few more questions; firstly how does Alk handle scaling to a large amount of users and data, a bit of a breakdown on how your distributed server system functions would more than suffice - does it store an array of available world and database daemons and select one based on a set of controls, and if so how are all of the database daemons making read/write requests to the same database?

Lastly, how are collisions handled on the server? I see where you have a heightmap export in place for the server, but what of other static and dynamic geometry?

Thank you for your time and I hope to hear back from you soon.

 

Looking really good.

If you have room for beta test i am interested too

 

according the road map and the update speed showed in the first post,I am afraid we should wait at least 2 month for the beta version...