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Hi guys, I'm hoping that you can help me find a solution to a very frustrating problem. I'm on the development team of a fan-based, nonprofit, game design project that is currently under the working title "Might & Magic 10: Children of the Void." We currently have most of our fan base following us on Facebook here: Might & Magic 10 Facebook Page.

Just about our only development problem remaining is the usability and legalities of the game engine we're using. The engine we're using was designed in the mid to late 1990s to program the games Might & Magic 6, 7 and 8. The names of the graphic engines are Horizon and Labyrinth, and they're pretty old, lacking almost any user-friendliness whatsoever. The game is "developed in a 2.5D format, using 2-dimensional sprites, and most of the artwork in the game is created as pre-rendered 3D images in 3DS Max." Here's a brief article on the M&M games if anyone is interested in reading more about them: Might and Magic Article (GameDev).

With the Horizon engine, we are forced to edit existing maps with a Hex Editor, modding each terrain tile to change the landmass, and it's a very tedious process. Also, we have many assets that we've already completed (we have graphics in the thousands).

We need three main things for this whole venture:

-first and foremost, a new engine (because we don't have the rights to Horizon),
-second, a way to transfer our assets (which are mainly *.BMP files),
-and third, a way to assemble our assets so we can easily program things to do what they need to do.

I would be delighted to provide further information as best as I know, and to possibly work with someone if they are kind enough to offer us help programming-wise. It's really beyond us, for everyone else who is working on the Might and Magic 10 project. If you'd like to contact me, my email is MMXAlamar@gmail.com.

Thank you very much!
-Alamar

Using/modifying the engine without permission is one thing. Using the game's IP material (including trademarks such as "Might & Magic" and original graphics/sounds/etc.) without permission is another (but very similarly illegal) thing. Unless you've cleared the rights with the original publisher, continuing to use such materials opens you up to a rather costly and lengthy legal battle -- and could land you in prison to boot.

So, unless you've been granted express permission (sorry, a "no-reply" situation doesn't equal "green light"), I would suggest you either scrap the project and start from scratch (which would probably be easier than manhandling an ancient, closed engine); pursue permission to use the IPs; or overhaul what you can in order to salvage your project under new IP that you have legal rights to.

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What most people don't understand about "enlightenment" is that it is not an end-goal; but where you find yourself just before taking a new "first step."

We've designed our own graphics, sounds and interfaces, so I don't think this will be a problem. We're not worried about that right now because the game isn't close to being finished. We really need a newer engine that will help us bypass hex editing for the landmass.

Ah, fair enough.

Have you considered learning how to program something like this yourself? It wouldn't be a "fast-track" by any stretch of the imagination, but it might be something to consider until you can find someone else who would be dedicated to coding the engine. Especially since it seems most people who code games are always too busy with their own stuff...

If you do decide to go that route, you can always ask any questions here on the forum. In either case, good luck.

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What most people don't understand about "enlightenment" is that it is not an end-goal; but where you find yourself just before taking a new "first step."

Thanks for your reply! We actually had a programmer who was working on the early stages of a new engine for us...we haven't heard form him in months and we're assuming he's not coming back.

I'd be perfectly willing to try to make an engine myself! I know it will be a lot of work though, and I have no clue where to start. Maybe you could help lead me in the right direction and maybe find someone who I can consult with on the specific needs of this new engine?

-A

Sure. We're here to help!

I guess the first thing to determine is what platform(s) you want your game to run on, including computer operating systems, game consoles, mobile devices... that kind of thing. There are certain languages and frameworks that will port easily to multiple platforms, so if you have anything you'd really like to see your game on, let us know.

Also: Do you have any programming or scripting experience at all? If so, what language(s)?

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What most people don't understand about "enlightenment" is that it is not an end-goal; but where you find yourself just before taking a new "first step."

Alright - first, we'd like to design this engine to support Windows, and possibly Linux (if that isn't too hard to add). It's also going to be in English, and we will possibly have a Russian translator as well since Might and Magic has a large Russian community.

I don't know any programming languages unfortunately, other than a little HTML. :-\

First off, HTML is not a programming language... it's markup.

Joking aside, supporting both Windows and Linux is one of the more difficult schemes. It's not that there aren't many options, it's mainly that it (usually) depends on C or C++, and those are some of the more daunting languages to a beginner (although I personally think C is much more straightforward than C++... YMMV). Of course, you could also go with an interpreted language like Python or Java. Python is a good "starter" language. Java is a little more complicated, but also a bit more robust I think.

Each of those have their pros and cons. C and C++ are natively compiled (so you have to have a version for each platform/architecture), but have oodles of libraries to facilitate creating games. Python and Java are interpreted (they are more likely to run on any platform with an interpreter for the language), but they are less-commonly used for game programming, making it a little more difficult to find game-programming-related goodies (though not by too much). Another caveat is that the interpreters aren't always installed with a stock OS, which means the player is more likely to have to download and install extra packages apart from the game itself.

I don't think you are limited to C, C++, Python, and Java for this, but I think that's a pretty good list to start choosing from.

I'm not really experienced with localization aspects, so making a Russian translation will have to be addressed by someone else here. Basically it involves having each translation used have its own data files for text, and the app can use the one corresponding to the user's language. It doesn't require anything too fancy (it could be done in any language pretty much), but different languages have different libraries to make things easier/nicer.

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What most people don't understand about "enlightenment" is that it is not an end-goal; but where you find yourself just before taking a new "first step."

Well that narrows things down a lot!

As of right now I think I'd better plan on developing M&MX for Windows and in English.

Here's some in-game footage of Might and Magic that might give you an idea of what the basic engine is like. It's mostly just a HUD interface, a bunch of different screens, landmass, and animated/un-animated 3D modeled sprites that give it an overall 2.5D feel.

Here's the video: Retro Revival, Part #20 - Might & Magic VIII: Day of the Destroyer (2011, GOG.COM)

Is now a good time to mention that I'm on dial-up?

If you are certain you want to just focus on Windows, then I would recommend C# instead of Python or Java. C# is (for the most part) tied to Windows, XBox 360, and Windows Phone 7, but it also has a game toolkit known as XNA Game Studio that does a lot of the "grunt work" for you. I'd be inclined to recommend that over all, since it is much more beginner-friendly than C or C++.

See, it's that kind of thing that always makes me ask people what they plan to distribute their game for -- these kinds of things greatly affect your best options.

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What most people don't understand about "enlightenment" is that it is not an end-goal; but where you find yourself just before taking a new "first step."

XNA sounds good to me! Another Might & Magic project called Might & Magic Tribute is using that engine. Here's a little information about MMT, their game looks really good so far: MMT (Wikipedia)

I'd like a little more info on XNA. I can't seem to find the homepage or download link. I only found one for a mobile SDK and I'm not sure if that's the right one. Where can I download the SDK for PC?

Also, what kind of knowledge will I and my fellow developers need to successfully work with XNA?

We will also need a way to import our already designed assets. It will be impossible to convert to fully-fledged 3D graphics, because we're using files in *.BMP format and the resolution can't be changed without a lot of pixelation. I'm not sure if we can create brand new landmass with new tilesets. That might be possible.

XNA isn't an engine, it's a framework and development environment (depending on your definition).

XNA targets all 3 platforms in one package. What you're looking for is XNA Game Studio 4.0. MS is pushing Windows Phone 7 since it's the newest platform and basically ignoring PC and Xbox, which I strongly disagree with.

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Microsoft XNA MVP

Thanks!

Which program do I install?

There's Visual C#, Visual Basic, Visual C++, and Visual Web Developer. I don't know ANY programming languages and I'm working on an advanced game development project. I'm pretty much as newb as can be

Visual C# is the one you want. Visual Basic also works, but there are *far* fewer resources available for learning to use it with XNA.

As far as what you need to know, you'll first need a solid footing in general programming theory (what variables are and how they work; flow control; expressions and conditionals; arrays and objects; and so on). This is stuff that applies to any programming language.

You can learn this along with the language itself (in fact, it would be better to learn how things work by actually doing them... learning from a book without doing it just makes you *think* you know how it works), so I am inclined that you start with a book on C#. Not C# game programming, but just plain old C# programming. I can't recommend any particular book as I haven't any current C# books (I haven't used the language in a couple years), but if you go to Amazon.com and search their books section for C#, you should be able to find plenty of options. READ THE REVIEWS to get an idea of each books strengths and weaknesses (one book might hold your hand, the next might have lots of typos, etc.).

I will go there myself and see if I can find any candidates, and I will post a list of what I find.

Of course, I could go on further about what you need to know -- but this ought to be enough to keep you occupied for the time-being...

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What most people don't understand about "enlightenment" is that it is not an end-goal; but where you find yourself just before taking a new "first step."

Thanks for all of the great information!

I'm going to try and see if I can find some C# resources online instead of buying a book. I'm sure there's a lot out there, maybe even some good information on this site. I'm going to have to get acquainted with C# and the XNA SDK before I fully endorse it to my project leader and we discuss whether or not it's capable of supporting a transfer of all of our assets. I'm sure it will be worth it in the long run, because I foresee that making the game with XNA will be so much easier than using Horzion, an engine designed in the late 1990s, and never updated since.

Cool.

I recommend that you at least consider buying a book somewhere down the line. Good ones have their perks -- you can get a lot more information in one place, and you don't have to worry about links dying or getting buried in a sea of bookmarks.

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What most people don't understand about "enlightenment" is that it is not an end-goal; but where you find yourself just before taking a new "first step."

Well the real difficulty for me is that I'm not really planning on doing anything else programming-wise other than making this one game. I'm actually a Business Administrations student, and I just need to be familiar enough with XNA to let programmers who are much better than me know what I want them to do

Learning some C# couldn't hurt though! I've found this cool website right here that has lots of educational information: http://www.functionx.com/csharp/

I see the CryENGINE got released for free for all non-commercial games

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Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, it can achieve

You could check out something like unity or udk as well. Those are actually engines and not just frameworks. But personally I find making my own engine a bit more fun. And something like M+M probably needs some of that care, as its doesnt really fit a standard game mold that most engines are oriented around.

Also may I suggest changing the name to Strength and Sorcery? It keeps the alliteration, is close enough to the original for fans to notice, but might be far enough away to not have to worry much about the licensing issue.

Thanks for your replies everyone!

So far I only have one programmer who's volunteering to help out with coding M&MX. Is there a section of this forum where I might be able to recruit any other programmers? I could outline some of the story info and show some of our graphics to provide a little background on what we're doing.