MMO neophyte designs MMO by himself
Gavan H. Woolery isn't letting his inexperience with massively-multiplayer games stop him from designing one. The 24-year old computer programmer from California recently made public Genesis, a game that aims to be the "first truly dynamic massively-multiplayer online game." Woolery spent the last two years designing Genesis on his own, despite his admission that he has "never played a MMOG in my life."
Though the game is still a work in progress, a video demo shows some impressively powerful yet intuitive world-creation tools being used. Creation is the focus of the game, in which characters will have "the power to create or destroy any aspect of your environment." Users will supply all the content in Project Genesis (a la Second Life) and users' actions will supposedly "reshape living conditions, political structures, economies, ecosystems, and all other aspects of the world," (a la Spore).
A bit ambitious for one lone programmer? Perhaps. But since going public, Woolery says he's received support from hundreds of interested parties willing to help with the project. Whether or not it all comes together as planned, it's definitely something to keep an eye on.
[Via Clickable Culture]
