I worked on Ultima Online for five years. If I could get back all the time that I spent fixing exploits, I could have doubled the content/systems that went into the game during that timeframe.
One of the best degree programs that I've seen to date for game and multimedia software engineering is at http://www.fcet.staffs.ac.uk/prospective_students/ comgames.htm Staffordshire University. At one time (started in 1999 or 2000...I forget which), they had a Microsoft sponsored DirectX multimedia degree. I'm not sure if this is still offered. Check out their powerpoint presentation, as it's well worth a read.
The degree program is very close to an apprenticeship where you focus only on courses that are relevant to the market you're interested in. It's counter to how US colleges give you a broad curriculum as an undergraduate. You do not have ancillary courses which have a low impact on your job (such as physical education - while good for your health - doesn't have an impact on how skilled you are as a software engineer).
This is the degree plan I meant to take before I got snapped up by a large game company.:)
These games were published by EA and originally developed by Jon Freeman and Anne Westfall. Although, doesn't Electronic Arts own Archon as intellectual property? I never figured out if it was a separate studio that made Archon or if it was internally developed by Electronic Arts.
This is simple supply and demand. I bet that a large percentage of purchases from this person had fun with that gold. The demand derived from wanting to have fun without churning through hours of creature farming. The harm to the overall game is inflation.
As for harming a game's economy, the basic design of the economy itself will either allow this or not. You have a constant influx of "workers" through new character generation. You'll have inflation whether or not someone is farming objects/money through artificial means. Capping the population to avoid this issue has unforeseen drawbacks (haven't seen a cap yet in an MMO, but it's not hard to reason through).
Of course, you can track gold generation (best used for finding money duplication issues and loopholes) to reduce large sums being introduced to a game. With gold generation tracking, it's best to track gold exiting the economy. With this information, implement systems that are recurring money sinks that do not heavily impair a casual player's fun.
I've been designing and programming on a myriad of projects over the years. Creativity, to me, is something I view on an individual basis and not a generalization (as this article has portrayed).
Games, like many artforms, are extremely diverse. The project cycles can be short or long, but you'll always have an opportunity to move on to something new and different to keep you fresh. Even on the same genre of project, an individual designer's roles can vary in such a way that the work is not tedious or repetitive.
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I worked on Ultima Online for five years. If I could get back all the time that I spent fixing exploits, I could have doubled the content/systems that went into the game during that timeframe.
The degree program is very close to an apprenticeship where you focus only on courses that are relevant to the market you're interested in. It's counter to how US colleges give you a broad curriculum as an undergraduate. You do not have ancillary courses which have a low impact on your job (such as physical education - while good for your health - doesn't have an impact on how skilled you are as a software engineer).
This is the degree plan I meant to take before I got snapped up by a large game company. :)
These games were published by EA and originally developed by Jon Freeman and Anne Westfall. Although, doesn't Electronic Arts own Archon as intellectual property? I never figured out if it was a separate studio that made Archon or if it was internally developed by Electronic Arts.
As for harming a game's economy, the basic design of the economy itself will either allow this or not. You have a constant influx of "workers" through new character generation. You'll have inflation whether or not someone is farming objects/money through artificial means. Capping the population to avoid this issue has unforeseen drawbacks (haven't seen a cap yet in an MMO, but it's not hard to reason through).
Of course, you can track gold generation (best used for finding money duplication issues and loopholes) to reduce large sums being introduced to a game. With gold generation tracking, it's best to track gold exiting the economy. With this information, implement systems that are recurring money sinks that do not heavily impair a casual player's fun.
I've been designing and programming on a myriad of projects over the years. Creativity, to me, is something I view on an individual basis and not a generalization (as this article has portrayed). Games, like many artforms, are extremely diverse. The project cycles can be short or long, but you'll always have an opportunity to move on to something new and different to keep you fresh. Even on the same genre of project, an individual designer's roles can vary in such a way that the work is not tedious or repetitive.