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http://www.ryzom.com/en/ did this. And disregard my reply at shareware I didnt explode your comment (damn abbevation didnt capture the 2cnd line). I rather liked Ryzom for the short time I played it. It didn't get my full support though because I didn't have the money for it and was just checking it out for curiousities sake, but it was very close to WoW as far as MMO's go. There's probably a few other examples out there.

I don't think its a distribution model thats really had serious acedemic thought in the circles of EA and Vivendi and Activision and such. I think it would gain more traction if it was a FOSS client for more then just Linux though, linux users tend to be more frugal people in general. Hence the Obvious trolling of "Freetards".

There are a few that contribute allot in the form of code or other assets though back to the companies they "freeload from".

In some cases the ad-revenue for some sites alone that support linux are worth it.

There's also Ryzom, a fine MMORPG which went free software (including artistic assets) after the company handling it went out of business. Its community picked it up and continues to develop it. They even released OS X and GNU/Linux versions. There's more information on Wikipedia.

If Lego freed the client and server this would not be the first time an MMO was freed. Freeing the complete source code to play the game and build upon the game is the best way to treat the users.

You can get the MFC headers - explained here

Thank you too, in return. I just used that point on fish and water writing to someone else today, coincidentally.

I've been trying to get Richard Stallman and the FSF to consider supporting a campaign (suggesting maybe run by me for pay, so I'm biased, but OK if it was someone else) for fostering the cataloging, creation, and discussion of free software that explores conventional and alternative heterodox economics for a 21st century of abundance for all, based on this appeal:
http://www.responsiblefinance.ch/appeal/
"The authors of this appeal are deeply concerned that more than three years since the outbreak of the financial and macroeconomic crisis that highlighted the pitfalls, limitations, dangers and responsibilities of main-stream thought in economics, finance and management, the quasi-monopolistic position of such thought within the academic world nevertheless remains largely unchallenged. This situation reflects the institutional power that the unconditional proponents of main-stream thought continue to exert on university teaching and research. This domination, propagated by the so-called top universities, dates back at least a quarter of a century and is effectively global. However, the very fact that this paradigm persists despite the current crisis, highlights the extent of its power and the dangerousness of its dogmatic character. Teachers and researchers, the signatories of the appeal, assert that this situation restricts the fecundity of research and teaching in economics, finance and management, diverting them as it does from issues critical to society."

Also related indirectly:
"RSA Animate - 21st century enlightenment "
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AC7ANGMy0yo

So, it is more than a lack of visionaries. The world has no shortage of would-be visionaries, like Paul Hawken documents:
http://www.blessedunrest.com/
"Paul Hawken has spent over a decade researching organizations dedicated to restoring the environment and fostering social justice. From billion-dollar nonprofits to single-person dot.causes, these groups collectively comprise the largest movement on earth, a movement that has no name, leader, or location, and that has gone largely ignored by politicians and the media. Like nature itself, it is organizing from the bottom up, in every city, town, and culture. and is emerging to be an extraordinary and creative expression of people's needs worldwide."

The problem is more like visionaries are filtered out or bought off or changed or isolated or starved or turned into wage slaves doing unrelated stuff to survive. Example:
"The murdering of my years: artists & activists making ends meet"
http://books.google.com/books/about/The_murdering_of_my_years.html?id=iBA7vACOwngC

Related articles on how dissent in academia is systematically suppressed:
http://disciplinedminds.com/
http://www.chomsky.info/articles/199710--.htm
http://www.its.caltech.edu/~dg/crunch_art.html

Yet, things progres anyway, as a tribute to the better side of human nature. Here are examples of GPL'd software that could serve as a base for moving further into exploring alternative economics:
http://p.seppecher.free.fr/jamel/
http://freeciv.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page
http://www.ryzom.com/en/

There is also a lot of other softwar

http://media.ryzom.com/?query=ball&start=320&asset=96ad7f2ea3fb55b77c0e6ba849717ea7

Some things are just begging to be modded into TuxRacer... :-)

CoH is not the first MMORPG with a level editor.
http://www.ryzom.com/en/ryzom_ring.html
Couple of years old, and the game itself is indeed MMO *and* RPG.

Still not the first. http://www.ryzom.com/en/ryzom_ring.html

The MMO Ryzom added user created content with the Ryzom Ring update back in 2006.
 

These guys did, for a different MMO. They did raise 200.000 EUR to buy the remains of the bankrupt company. Their plan was to make the source (for client and server) free. Users would pay for the operations of the servers, development would proceed as any other free software project.

They lost the bid to another company, than run the game in a more traditional way.

I want to give a call out to Saga of Ryzom for this. I loved this MMO - not as high quality, but it had some great personality and elements. In particular, they just released the Ryzom Ring -- player created missions and content. You can either script automatic missions, or play live as a GM and guide the sequence of events. Fantastic!

I want to give a call out to Saga of Ryzom for this. I loved this MMO - not as high quality, but it had some great personality and elements. In particular, they just released the Ryzom Ring -- player created missions and content. You can either script automatic missions, or play live as a GM and guide the sequence of events. Fantastic!

Ryzom already supports player created content.

Here's a plug for the interactive story line concept: Saga of Ryzom(SoR). In particular, check out the Ryzom Ring which allows players to create their own instanced quests off the main servers.

They also run GM-coordinated events, where GMs are actually directly involved (i.e.: spawning creatures, controlling environment, etc.). In this way big events are not just happening, they're happening differently across different servers. I've not reached the levels to confirm this, but from what I understand, landscapes between servers are actually different.

Like all MMOs, Ryzom has its faults, but it's definitely a mature community and I get this feeling that they're working towards the goals in TFA.

Here's a plug for the interactive story line concept: Saga of Ryzom(SoR). In particular, check out the Ryzom Ring which allows players to create their own instanced quests off the main servers.

They also run GM-coordinated events, where GMs are actually directly involved (i.e.: spawning creatures, controlling environment, etc.). In this way big events are not just happening, they're happening differently across different servers. I've not reached the levels to confirm this, but from what I understand, landscapes between servers are actually different.

Like all MMOs, Ryzom has its faults, but it's definitely a mature community and I get this feeling that they're working towards the goals in TFA.

The alternative is haveing everyone doing the same mission.

Now scale that mission up. Turn it into a GM-instigated server-wide event that changes this particular server's world, depending on the way the players act. Take this concept so far that after a while the game world wildly varies between servers. Bing, you've got a world that is more dynamic than a generic MMORPG world by orders of magnitude. To be more specific, you get Atys (or at least what's planned for Atys).

Here is a good example of player created content Ryzom Ring It is an expansion to a current MMORPG Ryzom From the looks of it, the engine looks pretty good and it looks like the contiunity is not going to be messup. It would be pretty cool if blizzard came up with some sort of engine, even one that was a standalone that people could mess around with and post/turn in stories or scenarios

I want a fantasy (or scifi, or spy, or whatever) MMORPG that lets me contribute content and code to a dynamic world.

Take a look at Ryzom Ring, which will be a way for players to add to the game (Saga of Ryzom).

Well, first thing you could do is check out the annual Independent Games Festival, then there are a few game sites devoted to just indy games, like Game Tunnel, or for a good example games you could try something like Gish or Saga of Ryzom. And, if people started taking more notice and buying more, we'd see a lot more indy developers giving it a shot.

You may want to check out Nevrax.org home of Nel, the MMO Engine that powers The Saga of Ryzom. NeL is licensed under the GPL and is a set of C++ libraries and utilities.

The Nebula Device
Its license is as permissive as the MIT license.
Its not an engine per se; its a framework for programming your own engine. But that is what most things billed as "3D Engines" actually are.
There is also Nevrax/Nel technology, which shipped in The Saga of Ryzom MMORPG. The software license is GPL, and it is a competitive cross-platform engine, much like Nebula- however, like Nebula, it is much more of a toolkit, though to a lesser extent.
There are a variety of $100 RAD game tools out there, and it seems like they have always hovered at this price point- you get what you pay for; undocumented, buggy code that is ok for a quick prototype but unviable in the long run.
Excepting Torque. This is an excellent engine for $100 US. The engine shipped in Tribes and Tribes 2, is cross platform, and has a mature toolchain for developing anything that is Tribes-like (predominantly outdoor terrain with buildings and tunnels in it). In fact, if what your developing is basically a Tribes 2 total conversion, the only code you would need to write would be AI and other game-specific code.

Funny that you should mention Nel, the "prototype" game for it is not even remotely close to a real MMORPG. The commercial game doesn't offer the source code to the client under a GPL license at all (they relicense their code under a proprietary license.. that means they have NO third party contributors or they require you to give them the copyright for the CODE). From my perspective (as a coder) Nel is the worse open source project. What perspective are you looking at it from?

Another enjoyable game is Saga of Ryzom which resently launched.

I think the article would be a lot more accurate if it replaced all instances of "open source" with "hobbyist", as they're not totally interchangeable terms. Any project being done in the developers' spare time is going to hit this problem of time constraints on content creation (it was *the* major issue that was discussed at the QuakeCon mod roundtable), and although the vast majority of game projects using the open source model are indeed hobbyist, a commercial developer creating a game full-time isn't going to magically see their content creation timeline get longer if they use open source (such as Saga of Ryzom, whose developers open-sourced the game's engine before the game has even shipped). Moreover, a lot of modern commercial game projects use open source projects such as OpenAL or Ogg Vorbis without seeing their dev cycles balloon (id's Robert Duffy even mentioned Ogg as saving them time on DOOM 3).

The saga of ryzom is probably going to be one of the best MMORPGs available (launched around in sept 20), and the code is GPL (a FSF Europe member is even working in this company)

One of the games I've found interesting recently for this recently is Ryzom. While I haven't had the time to really follow the development of the beta (not much into MMOs currently due to time allotment etc). One thing that caught my eye is their use of an open source engine called NeL, which is primarily a graphics (OpenGL, and Direct3D I think) engine. Along with some other stuff.

There's a few other projects on their page by third parties, and a free tech demo. A co-worker in the beta who's an avid online gamer has said the graphics in Ryzom were definitely above average, if not the gameplay yet. Possibly worth following to see if anyone takes advantage of the source and does anything besides cheat. :-)

Another game that you need to explore in order to harvest natural ressources is The Saga of Ryzom. Very nice scenery and wildlife.

I really don't expect much from WoW. Blizzard is a great game company, and I'm still a big Starcraft lover. They make nifty, well polished games, but WoW sounds just so unoriginal. Yes, the design is quite cool, and so are the races, and the spells ... But does it really sound an RPG ? No. Can you expect to have a really interesting roleplay with orcs and humans and the other races available ? I don't think so, and it does not seem to be the point. Does it bring MMORPG to new grounds ? No. Is it gonna be a hit ? Probably.

Reading the latest big report on the games seems to bring two main conclusions : (1) the gameplay is still open and under discussion, (2) the gameplay is plain unoriginal. They are building a well thought game upon the existing basis, but there is really no risk taken whatsoever, nothing that could really make it the next generation MMORPG.

As an amateur MMORPG game designer myself, I have found that there are an incredibly large amount of possibilities in that genre, but as always most commercial products stay in the same area, ever perfecting one type of game without risking to discover new ones. Too bad Blizzard did not dare to try though, they'd probably have done it the right way.

For my part, I'm waiting for Ryzom, not because it has a much more original gameplay than WoW, not because of its gorgeous graphical design (probably the best out there for an MMORPG), but becauses it dared to leave the traditional fantasy field to explore a new, fresh and tribal universe that is simply fascinating. The objective is more to carry the player into a dream-like original place than put him in front of monsters to fight.

>They're planning to release open API's, anyone can create their own objects and sell/share them, create new parts of There for themselves and other.. once you start doing that, the 'Metaverse' moniker starts to stick.

It remains to be seen how "open" the APIs will be. And most importantly, under what license...

At my new company (Mekensleep) we are working on something quite similar to "There", except that the engine we are using, called NeL, has already been released under the GNU GPL.
In addition to our new -still secret! ;)- project, NeL is being used in my previous company's MMORPG: Ryzom (see here for more screenshots..

>I find it hard to believe so many of them would back it to the tune of $33 million if they didn't see a heckuva lot more potential in this than just another virtual chat room.

On the other hand, I vividly remember how much money was burned on idiotic business plans during the .com era.
So I think I can safely say that the amount of money invested in a company is not necessarily the best way to measure the quality of its project...

Finally a subject where I feel I can safely contribute. :)

I've spent a few years in the MMP (Massively Multi Player) arena so I think I know my way around. As founder and CEO of Nevrax, where I initiated the Ryzom RPG and the NeL technological platform, I've had plenty of time to reflect on the state of this industry.

First let me say that MMPs are an entirely different class of video games. The technology, the gameplay dynamics, almost everything is different. It just happened that the game industry got its hands on them first because it had the closest ties, but it could have been otherwise.

The most important thing to remember is that MMPs have a radically different business model.

In the traditional game industry you create a game, put it a box, then try to move as many boxes you can in the few month the public stays interested. It's a product oriented business.
The typical business plan for a studio is:

1- Convince publisher to finance the production of a game
2- Try to make a small profit in the process
3- Make some royalties (maybe) if the game is hugely successful
4- Start all over again

This is not very different from what goes on in the music business or in the movie business. Basically to make it simple, the author/studio gets a lousy deal from the publisher/distributor who gets to reap all the benefits.

The MMP industry could - it's not there yet, but it will eventually - be very different.
An MMP producer creates a virtual environment, then sells access to this environment. It's a service oriented business.
A simplified business plan for an MMP producer could be:

1- Create a Massively Multi Player Game
2- Make the client software as easily accessible as possible
3- Sell access to the MMP on a recurrent basis
4- Profits! ;)
5- Keep improving your MMP over time > expand user base > more profits!

This would be the equivalent of a musician cutting the middle man and selling his music straight on the Internet. With one enormous advantage: An MMP producer has no fear of having the client software copied since all that does is expand his potential user base. Whatever you do, you *have* to pay if you want to get the experience.
Which is, IMHO, the reason why so many people are whining about the subscription fees. It's not that it's too expensive (12$/month for 20H of entertainment time in average is cheap compared to say, movies), it's just that they can't freeload anymore. :)

My guess is, in the coming years, there will be a real distinction appearing between traditional studios (doing regular PC and console games) and companies building MMPs.

Now back to the current game industry.
The hardest part with the model I just described is making "step 1" happen while still retaining the control of your creation. That, from my painful experience, means avoiding to be financed by either game publishers or vulture capitalists, as they will find a way to wrest control from you. The problem, as it has been said before, is that making a professional MMPs is expensive.

Sure, they are ways to get the numbers down if you know the trade secrets, but it's still going to be expensive.

That's where Free Software can help.

My initial idea for Nevrax was that Free Software and MMPs were a perfect match.
You get all the benefits of Free Software, but keep a strong business model where you can avoid having a competitor piggyback on your work as you stay in control of all the "data" (art assets mostly).
One of the big cost associated to running an MMP is due to maintenance. Also, having a robust tech on launch helps a lot. Those are things that Free Software can help alleviate tremendously. This is why we created NeL. A Free Software engine for MMPs.

As an added benefit, now that I am starting a new company out of the hands of the VCs, I can freely reuse all the tech we did at Nevrax. My software development costs just got divided by a factor of 10. Imagine that...
And the best thing is: you can do it to! :)

One last thing I would like to say to people who think that Everquest & co are boring and ugly: you are right. But real communities formed around these games, and that's what is truly fascinating about MMPs. As time goes, you will see MMPs that are more and more geared towards fostering these online communities, and less and less "games" in the sense that we understand it today. Just because you don't see the point of playing today, doesn't mean that you won't see the point of playing tomorrow...

And I know I'll be working hard to make that happen ! ;)

There's this company called Nevrax founded by Slashdot reader Lejade that makes a MUCH better engine: NeL AND it's released under the GPL, AND they are using it to make a very unique looking MMORPG called Ryzom.
Check out the screenshots in the "download" section! Although beware: the site is not very Mozilla friendly and uses Quicktime and Realmedia. Bleurgh! :(

Another interesting GPL'ed alternative is NeL. NeL is a MMORPG platform developed by Nevrax for a game called Ryzom.