RE: Anyone with experience with MMOG and databases?

I've never worked on an MMOG, but I played Everquest for three years (and now EQ2 since it Launched last year). I think one of the biggest issues they seem to have (asides from actually getting performance out of whatever hardware they use) is transactional integrity.

By that I'm meaning in-game transactions where a player buys something for money in game, or trades an item with another player. That integrity MUST be 100% all or nothing. Having a server go down may loose people game time. But imagine someone who spend months of real time work playing to gather enough cash for a Flaming Sword of Watzit, hands over the cash and then their session crashes. If they log back in and find neither cash nor Item, then you're going to have one really pissed-off player, who (given the average age of MMOG players) is going to be very loiud about it on every forum they can find.

Even worse, is if someone finds a bug in the transaction system that enables them to duplicate an item through a deliberately failed trade. They then sell that item back to the merchant for cash and start again. This sort of bug can cripple your games economy and eventually drive players away.

Just some thoughts

Dougie McGibbon

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