Understanding Maplestory and how amazing it actually is from a average gamers view.

So before judging this please realize that I'm just an average gamer who doesn't really know anything about scripts or photoshop or adobe flash.
So over the coarse of the last three months I have been trying to figure out how maple story works, heres one of the things I figured out and thought was amazing.When your an average player you play Maplestory and don't really wonder how it's animation works because you just assume its like other games and uses flash animations and other things like that. It all flows and runs just like any other flash game or mmo. You start to hate the creators and employees because you think it should be easy to update the game and fix bugs and that they're professionals and you think Maplestory is like any other video game. You get mad at the amount of glitches you find and start to complain and hate them. This all happens until you go under the hood of Maplestory. So the first thing I realized by looking at other websites about this stuff is that, seems like theres a lot of scripting. Oh Boy was I right! I later realized that it's almost all fucking scripting! Basically though the way it works is they make a huge huge huge fucking script that runs the game. then they make all the images and art work and add scrips to them that tells them where to be and what to do. Over the coarse of thousands of images and probably deadly amounts of scripts you start to get a game. Now they have to make a way for someone to access the game. Even more fucking scripts. Then they decided to pack the files so no one could change them or hack them and of coarse, the magic words, More really Fucking Complex scripts. With all these scripts its no wonder theres glitches! You have miles and miles of scripts that interact with each other and most glitches don't happen from just one script. they happen from different scripts interacting with each other wrongly. Now if you Imagen the situation its a FUCKING miracle they even find whats causing it! Its even another miracle they figure out how to fix it! As for new content, first they got to come up with it, then they got to make the art, then the scripts, and the stories, then they got to unpack the files and some how make another FUCKING script that patches the game for all the players. But heres where the magic of this all is. Maplestory appears to have animations that don't use flash. I know your thinking "Oh HTML5 BIG DEAL! YOUR LATE THIS IS STUPID AnD POINTLESS!" Maplestory came out what 10 years ago? thats before the idea of HTM 5 could have even been dreamed of? And yet somehow Maplestory has been doing it all this time? correct me if i'm wrong about any of this. Also this brings up another point. Games these days have such bigger expectation then games 10 years ago and the fact that they're in my opinion living to it on 10 year old software is amazing.
Come on guys, Give nexon some credit!

In conclusion (aka witty remark before fully reading), average gamers like walls of text.

Remarks as they come:

Flash games are nothing like how the animations in Maple are, and average gamers WOULD know that.

MMO players are not average gamers (pineappleing farmville is NOT an MMO...), they understand that because there is a server, there may be downtime to make sure it runs smoothly (somewhat above average gamers know this). Adding content to that game, as well as other games, isnt a cookie cutter process, especially for an MMO, because there are two programs running that need to work together (server side and client side. Another above average gamer knowledge).

Glitches are in all games, they just happen sometimes. Most dont get fixed because they do not mess with gameplay.

In conclusion (aka witty remark before fully reading), average gamers like walls of text.

Remarks as they come:

Flash games are nothing like how the animations in Maple are, and average gamers WOULD know that.

Would average gamers (I mean Maplers) know that? I Mean you don't need to know that much about games to download one and play it. You don't even need to know what scrips and all that stuff is. You just need to know the basics of how to use a computer. Judging by the chatting in maplestory does it seem to you like most the people smegaing and talking know how games work?

Maplestory the MMORPG came out in 2003; it's 2010.

To actually play, you dont need to know squat about scripts, coding, flash animation (the difference visually is easily spotable though). You basically only need very rudimentary computer skills.

Now, theres an odd effect people have when they are typing stuff, as well as the things that they say and do, regardless of the knowledge they have. That would be your smegaers. Would you like to compare apples to oranges again?

"Thousands and thousands" of lines of scripts and codes is not an excuse. I know military systems can run as high as millions of lines of codes. Maple Story may not be anything as serious as a military software but in the world of programming, tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands of lines of codes is... expected. Even pserver sources are tens of thousands. As a programmer, one should know how to navigate a through a source and the code should be well written enough to identify a bug should one appear. For instance if there's a bug with looting items, the programmer should know to look in inventory handling or looting handling part of the code and not through their thousands of lines of codes.

Maplestory the MMORPG came out in 2003; it's 2010.

oops 7 years XD

To actually play, you dont need to know squat about scripts, coding, flash animation (the difference visually is easily spotable though). You basically only need very rudimentary computer skills.

If your one of those people do you know theres a difference? I'm saying if you did maybe you would appreciate the game more because of how actually complex and hard to make it is.

To give you guys an example, NXPatcher, my maplestory patching program, is about 3000 - 3200 lines of code. I imagine Maplestory is quite a bit more complex than that.

"Thousands and thousands" of lines of scripts and codes is not an excuse. I know military systems can run as high as millions of lines of codes. Maple Story may not be anything as serious as a military software but in the world of programming, tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands of lines of codes is... expected. Even pserver sources are tens of thousands. As a programmer, one should know how to navigate a through a source and the code should be well written enough to identify a bug should one appear. For instance if there's a bug with looting items, the programmer should know to look in inventory handling or looting handling part of the code and not through their thousands of lines of codes.

Finding one bad of code without any identifiers (aka code debugger) is like winning the lottery. The military example is also null, as they employ way more people than Nexon would, AND they are probably way more skilled (and payed more).

To give you guys an example, NXPatcher, my maplestory patching program, is about 3000 - 3200 lines of code. I imagine Maplestory is quite a bit more complex than that.

I had a friend who had written a Gun Turret for Counter Strike 1.6. He said that there was easily 1000 plus lines of code, and finding the problem with it (sprites not appearing when someone upgraded it) would take a bit of time.

One reason I think (thinking aloud really) that Maplestory is broken up into specific .WZ files is to alleviate the trouble of finding issues, but some .WZ files are still pretty large.

Finding one bad of code without any identifiers (aka code debugger) is like winning the lottery.

Knowing compiler errors helps too...

While understandable that maintaining programs are extremely hard (after trying programming, myself.. as well as working with corporate equipments, and programming those..), I realize it's not an easy job. But it's Nexon, and they are a gaming company. It's not a small building dedicated to a single task or job. Sure, benefit of the doubt had it been a small IT-helpdesk staff dedicated on taking incoming phone calls only. But they're running a 'game'. I realize a game is thousands and thousands and thousands of lines of coding, but surely their staff must be huge enough that they can maintain customer service. There are people dedicated to specific tasks, whether it be a person that's in control of a database-server, or another in control of taking phone calls.

I don't think I've even heard of any company in which any person had to multi-task back and forth between maintaining a network, while taking phone calls, ie.

One reason I think (thinking aloud really) that Maplestory is broken up into specific .WZ files is to alleviate the trouble of finding issues, but some .WZ files are still pretty large.

Data.wz was always split up into different sub-files. There was always Skill.wz, Character.wz, and Etc.wz, but they were all contained within the Data.wz file as subdirectories. I'll stop explaining this since now it's kinda getting off-topic.

Not trying to advertise but have you guys checked odin and vana's files ? Odin runs on Java and Vana runs on C++. Both have ten of thousands of codes.

Well, it would be understandable if it were just a college student working on a game in his or her own free time, but as a professional corporation making money off this, figuring out complex things should be expected of Nexon. I think the biggest problem for glitches in Maple is not just the complexity of the code but the fact that almost none of it is written by the Nexon America people themselves, though there are very obvious and easy-to-fix glitches like 1st job pirate sounds that are not glitches in the code but just rather from having the GM skillbook's sounds in the places of pirates' in sound.wz.

1. After 7 odd years of working on the same product I'd expect a professional software company to have worked out most of the bugs. There are plenty of products out there that will assist dev teams with bug tracking, source code revision management, etc.
2. Nexon America is a game publisher not the development company. As such they neither deserve nor praise for any of the glitches unless they're tasked with the quality assurance/acceptance testing.
3. You said "Now if you Imagen the situation its a pineappleING miracle they even find whats causing it! Its even another miracle they figure out how to fix it!"
This is why real software development companies have QA/Test teams. No miracles required.

Well, it would be understandable if it were just a college student working on a game in his or her own free time, but as a professional corporation making money off this, figuring out complex things should be expected of Nexon. I think the biggest problem for glitches in Maple is not just the complexity of the code but the fact that almost none of it is written by the Nexon America people themselves, though there are very obvious and easy-to-fix glitches like 1st job pirate sounds that are not glitches in the code but just rather from having the GM skillbook's sounds in the places of pirates' in sound.wz.

EXACTLY
Nexon america probably codes only 20%-40% of the game. But I do see everyones point in they're a professional company but you still have to give them some slack. I do agree that the pirate skill sounds are one of the many things nexon could easily fix but chose not to. But glitches are part of a games life and if they're fixed then people shouldn't be holding it against the company for the rest of the games life. Its like if I forget a school assignment, I do it any way and turn it in even though it will still be a 0. And I don't hold it against me and neither do any of the teachers yet.

Well, it would be understandable if it were just a college student working on a game in his or her own free time.

It's funny, that's what Odin/Vana were (well, they didn't have to write the client) but from what I can tell they had much quicker responses to bugs. And if what Fiel's said about the BrazilMS source is accurate, Odin was also better structured. Bug in the KPQ? It's all in js so it's easy to diagnose & fix.

It's funny, that's what Odin/Vana were (well, they didn't have to write the client) but from what I can tell they had much quicker responses to bugs. And if what Fiel's said about the BrazilMS source is accurate, Odin was also better structured. Bug in the KPQ? It's all in js so it's easy to diagnose & fix.

What did I say about the BrazilMS source? All of the code for PQs are in Lua scripts on the server which are just as easy to diagnose.

EXACTLY
Nexon america probably codes only 20%-40% of the game. But I do see everyones point in they're a professional company but you still have to give them some slack. I do agree that the pirate skill sounds are one of the many things nexon could easily fix but chose not to. But glitches are part of a games life and if they're fixed then people shouldn't be holding it against the company for the rest of the games life. Its like if I forget a school assignment, I do it any way and turn it in even though it will still be a 0. And I don't hold it against me and neither do any of the teachers yet.

I don't quite understand your arguement. You claim that we need to cut them some slack, but you admit that they barely do any coding. What are we cutting them slack for, just hosting the game? I'm sure everytime they have a problem they have to call KMS Headquarters to ask for advice.

You also claim glitches are part of a games life, such as the BF glitch and the plethora of other glitches that have caused people to be banned? If they were JUST fixed and nothing else I would be happy. Unlike KMS, they don't have some sort of alternative testing server. If I am wrong and they do, they need to put it into good use. Again, BF glitch COME ON, if they had even TRIED to attack it with each skill ONCE they would have know there was a problem. I understand that maintaining a game is not an easy task, but look how little effort they put into it. I think the coupious amounts of glitches/exploits reflects their lack of responsibility and ability to manage their game.

I'm also confused with your analogy.

I don't mind slow content as long as the things they release are INNOVATIVE, or even slightly creative. Like many people here said, they have been doing this for 7 years, none of these things should be new to them, in fact they should be pros at this by now especially since they seem to have so much practice.

I don't quite understand your arguement. You claim that we need to cut them some slack, but you admit that they barely do any coding. What are we cutting them slack for, just hosting the game? I'm sure everytime they have a problem they have to call KMS Headquarters to ask for advice.

You also claim glitches are part of a games life, such as the BF glitch and the plethora of other glitches that have caused people to be banned? If they were JUST fixed and nothing else I would be happy. Unlike KMS, they don't have some sort of alternative testing server. If I am wrong and they do, they need to put it into good use. Again, BF glitch COME ON, if they had even TRIED to attack it with each skill ONCE they would have know there was a problem. I understand that maintaining a game is not an easy task, but look how little effort they put into it. I think the coupious amounts of glitches/exploits reflects their lack of responsibility and ability to manage their game.

I'm also confused with your analogy.

I don't mind slow content as long as the things they release are INNOVATIVE, or even slightly creative. Like many people here said, they have been doing this for 7 years, none of these things should be new to them, in fact they should be pros at this by now especially since they seem to have so much practice.

Give them slack that they're just humans and that yea some of the glitches are really really unreasonable but oh well. They cant make all of their players happy. Thats impossible!