   Small scale multiplayer persistent characters
  I'm just at the idea stage of a game right now but I was wondering, what would it take to make a small scale multiplayer game where a player would keep a character they make and be able to play that character on multiple servers.I guess it would be like what Diablo 2 does, only I don't know what they do really. Do they handle all player actions on a master server?   
  To make that particular network function once you have a networked RPG: not particularly hard.To make an online RPG in general, even if it's small scale: pretty hard.To prevent cheating in any system where users are allowed to run authoritative machines (including user-hosted servers): impossible.;  I don't really want to make anything too complicated, probably something with slightly more depth than a typical flash game. Although I kinda wanted it to have some sort of on going progression on the players part. I'm not aiming for absolutely cheat proof but it would be nice if cheating didn't absolutely destroy the game.I don't necessarily want to make an online rpg, although there might be some rpg elements included. The main goal would just be character progression such as items, and wealth, I havn't decided if there's going to be any kind of leveling/skill progression yet.Something along the lines I'm thinking would be to get a small group of players to crawl a randomly generated dungeon each session.   ;Quote:Original post by etsujaI'm just at the idea stage of a game right now but I was wondering, what would it take to make a small scale multiplayer game where a player would keep a character they make and be able to play that character on multiple servers.I guess it would be like what Diablo 2 does, only I don't know what they do really. Do they handle all player actions on a master server?Diablo 2 has three main multiplayer modes, the normal battle.net one where characters and servers are hosted by blizzard (These can be made fairly secure), a LAN mode (Characters are stored on the local computer and the game server is hosted by one of the players), and an "open" battle.net mode where you're allowed to use your LAN characters to play with others on blizzards battle.net servers.   