Classic Game Postmortem: Ultima Online

I'm loving this UO talk, I just found this Postmortem by GDC published in Sep 2018 (so I think it's new? I've never seen it) ▶ this video This is a much watch if MMOs fascinate you. They're very transparent. Absolutely great video. edit: Oh my god they bring up FlyGuys prostitution ring..

Classic Game Postmortem: Ultima Online [1], I think that goes into the origin of Shard. ( Sorry I didn't save down the time like but it is an interesting video for those into UO ) And if you do a search on HN you will see plenty of other links about UO and sharding. [1] ▶ this video

In a similar vein to the "War Stories"-clips, (even though I never played Ultima,) their Ultima post-mortem from GDC is a great watch too. ▶ this video

> While not rioting in real life, it feels familiar. The Ultima Online postmortem session from GDC 2018 has some similar stories about in-game protests. The stories in said session are quite entertaining, and there is a lot of other interesting information too in the session. The whole thing is worth a watch. ▶ this video

Fun fact: the word "shard" in this context was coined by the dev team of the first major commercial MMO, Ultima Online, as an in-universe explanation for why the game world was split into multiple servers. If you're looking for an exemplary server architecture for MMOs, look no further than UO. That game came out in 1997 and supported worlds with thousands of players and millions of persistent objects. Players could build their own houses within the game world, decorate (and later design) them to an incredible degree [1], and have other players visit (welcome or not). Players could run their own shops within their homes and sell their own hand-crafted, signed goods (weapons, armour, clothing, furniture) in addition to any found treasure they wanted to offer. What made UO so impressive, technically, was how they accomplished all of this on such modest hardware as was available in 1995 [2]. This second link is to the GDC postmortem of the game. If you're interested, I recommend you check it out. It may not answer all your technical questions but it's extremely interesting nonetheless. The story of how they had to shard the game is part of the talk. I'm pretty sure they did not use any off-the-shelf databases as the performance would have been terrible at the time. Everything would have been custom. The custom networking protocol is extremely reserved (not chatty), since it was designed for dial-up modems. Even when you run the game on modern hardware with broadband, the game us

Related: a GDC 2018 presentation with Richard Garriott and other people from the UO dev team sharing stories from UO's early days: ▶ this video

Interesting :-) Seems like the word 'shard' when used to define splitting up DB's etc. on different servers, actually originates from this game: ▶ this video

Signed binaries use will come into being with trusted computing, they are embedding Denuvo in the operating system, aka future compilers will allow game companies and companies like autodesk to sign their exe's and the exe's if cracked can be added to a list that windows 11 can force update the bios to add these cracked exes to a list that will refuse to run. That's the gist of trusted computing they are building an alternative internet/mainframe computer inside yours that they only have access to. Where have you been the last 23+ years? The videogame industry has been stealing PC games since 1997 with ultima online. Hear it from the dev's themselves. Don't think MMO's killed local PC games? Listen here kids. ▶ this video EA killed ultima 9 when the UO beta got massive interest, that lead to the death of PC games as local applications, the industry from then on there was a massive war to back end all PC games, they couldn't immediately do that to quake and urneal because we'd been treated too good with Warcraft 1-3, Descent 1-3, Quake 1-3, and build engine games like Duke 3d. The entire industry has always wanted to kill piracy and Ultima online gave the entire industry the go ahead once they realized that many of our fellow programmers and gamers were irrationally stupid beyond their wildest dreams. Anyone playing quake and Descent at the time fear the loss of dedicated servers and level editors which used to come with the games, we knew if Ultima online was successful that Publi

>This is a bad example because Steam's DRM is notoriously terrible You don't grasp Valve and the industry has already won any game where the networking code has been pulled out already acts like DRM, any client-server app requiring username and login accounts, or has some piece of code living on some remote server, means you no longer own your own stuff. Valve and the rest of the computing industry is boiling you all slowly. AKA look at this list of games from crackwatch. link You'll notice more and more games are "online only". Diablo 3 is literally diablo 2 /w drm, they wanted to kill piracy. Starcraft remastered, and reforged require internet to play, that means we've lost the battle. The public has eaten up client-server back ended games. You don't get that the whole point was to monopolize their own products and kill the local infinitely copyable binaries PC games used to be coded as, AKA PRe steam 99% of games were complete you got singleplayer+multiplayer inside the same game. MMO's/F2P are literally just PC games with their multiplayer ripped out, don't think so? Listen to the ultima devs here, when Ultima online was successful, publishers and devs went over their entire PC game list to convert their local apps to client-server apps and stuck "MMO" on the front so they could steal PC games from the public. ▶ this video EA killed ultima 9 when the UO beta got massive interest, that lead to the death of PC games as local applications, the industry from then on there was a

Two or more computers in a network become and behave as a single PC, so if you buy any client-server software you are literally stealing programs for yourself. Because all programs are the same to a PC. AKA all programs executables can be divided into two or more exe's and run over a network it's called the client-server or mainframe dumb client model of computing and you don't want that because that's the end of the personal computer you own and control. Client-server apps are the ultimate security risk because you can't audit the code. The last 23 years there's been a war to kill the general computer. link >This language seems unnecessary, It's not, the average gamer and PC buyer has been stealing software from himself for the last 23+ years. Straight, steam/mmo's are just back ended c applications, there's no reason for any piece of software to require a "internet connection" (aka a second computer) half a world away. The 1990's were great because it was before the computer illiterate got internet. Everyone was expecting level editors and free maps, mods and skins Level editors link Free maps mods and skins link ... to continue in all the big budget games but that didn't happen because the computer illiterate masses gave up game ownership giving birth to all the evils of modern gaming (shut down games, mtx, always online drm, which is the same as mmo's, aka client-server back ended c apps). So we're losing game history down the shitter and games just disappear from h

" As longtime poweruser all the dark patterns and user hostile behavior was astonishing." Two or more computers in a network become and behave as a single PC, so if you buy any client-server software you are literally stealing programs for yourself. Because all programs are the same to a PC. AKA all programs executables can be divided into two or more exe's and run over a network it's called the client-server or mainframe dumb client model of computing and you don't want that because that's the end of the personal computer you own and control. Client-server apps are the ultimate security risk because you can't audit the code. The last 23 years there's been a war to kill the general computer. If you've touched steam, xbox live or mmo's, they are all client-server exe's, windows 10 is a client-server operating system. They've been stealing software from 1997 with ultima online, how can you be astonished when valve and everyone were stealing PC games from 1997 onward? See this patent by microsoft here: link On games: It's not, the average gamer and PC buyer has been stealing software from himself for the last 23+ years. Straight, steam/mmo's are just back ended c applications, there's no reason for any piece of software to require a "internet connection" (aka a second computer) half a world away. The 1990's were great because it was before the computer illiterate got internet. Everyone was expecting level editors and free maps, mods and skins Level editors link Free maps mod

Uhh the red flags were there in 1997 when you all started buying client-server software. Intel and the industry know you are idiots at computers. MMO's/steam are signs of idiocracy, aka you are bad at understanding you are getting robbed. That's why we have TPM and client-server crapware in windows 10/11. If you buy any client-server SaaS you are a moron, everyone was expecting local applications forever until 1997. Even EA would have never imagined you'd all be dumb enough to buy incomplete programs where they take files hostage on a 2nd computer half a world away. So no the time to be alarmed was over 20 years ago, since there is no software or game that requires an internet connection, there was no steam, no stupid fucking login screens, nothing. The public has told the tech industry it is chimp factor five levels of stupid over the last 23+ years. So they are locking us out of our PC's, windows 10/11 is building copyright enforcement into the cpu so future applications won't run and your bios can be remote updated like a console to disable any pirated software or cracked exe's that are found on your PC. You all gave them this access to your PC, so why wouldn't intel and the rest just keep going? See here on EA and ultima, and the death of games as local applications: ▶ this video