MaximumPC 2005 05

34

MMO games are notorious

resource hogs, but you can whip

your machine into shape with just

a few tweaks and inexpensive

hardware upgrades:

➤ Having lots of system memory

is crucial. Make sure your rig

sports at least 1GB of RAM. Some

MMO games will use as much

as 2GB of RAM, if you have it; so

don’t skimp.

➤ Make sure you kill all the

programs that might run in the

background before you start

your game. Defrag programs and

antivirus apps can really hurt

performance.

➤ Defrag your hard drive

regularly. Large zone fi les take a

long time to load, even under the

best of circumstances. Don’t make

it take any longer.

➤ Most of today’s MMO games

are severely CPU limited. Unless

you have a videocard older

than an ATI Radeon 9700, we

recommend upgrading your CPU

before your videocard.

TWEAKING

YOUR SYSTEM

FOR MMO

the workings of supply and demand in

the real world.

Back in the game world, meanwhile,

a clever player can earn tons of in-game

money simply by analyzing the supply

and demand for popular items. Most

modern games include some sort of

in-game auction or brokerage house,

where—for a small fee—players can post

items for sale. These transactions can be

concluded whether the seller is logged

into the game or riding the subway to his

or her real job.

MMO economies can also be plagued

by many of the same problems that

impact real-world economies. Hyper-

infl ation triggered by money-duping

exploits has occurred in almost every

game to date. Unlike the real world,

however, solutions are fairly easy to come

by. The developer of one game absorbed

the excess cash by creating a casino

area in which players could gamble for

rare loot; other developers have offered

unique clothing or exotic hairstyles in

exchange for large sums of money.

THE

FUTURE

OF MMO

Despite the

insane cost of

development—some

current MMO games

are rumored to have

cost $40 million—

there’s a bright future

for MMO games.

Even low-profi le

MMO games can

be very profi table;

most MMO games

cost the same at

retail as traditional

games, but they have the added benefi t

of putting monthly subscription fees

straight into the publisher’s pockets. In

development right now are MMO games

based on the Star Trek , The Matrix , and

Lord of the Rings franchises, as well as

high-profi le projects from the creators of

EverQuest and Ultima Online.

The MMO fun is just beginning! ■

RHODE ISLAND: 1,045 SQ. MILES

EVERQUEST: 350 SQ. MILES

MANHATTAN:

23 SQ. MILES

TRIVIA:

EVERQUEST’S LANDMASS

Vanguard —an MMO in development by the creators of EverQuest —features

realistic landscapes and a totally seamless world. Unfortunately, it’s not due

out for more than a year.

32 MA XIMUMPC MAY 200 5

M M O R P G

MM MM OO RR PP GG

M M O R P G

MASSIVELY MULTIPLAYER ONLINE ROLE PLAYING GAMES

MMO games are big. Really big. To put things in

perspective, we compare the size of EverQuest (plus its

expansions) with two real-world examples.