Game Concepts – The History Behind the Races and Lore of Alganon

David Allen: I’ve been asked many times what the basis for the races and lore behind Alganon was. While developing for Quest Online, and when I began to refine the history of the game Alganon, creating concepts for the deities and races, the first step I took was to define what I wanted represented. Were we going to have fantasy tech? How about magic specialists? Perhaps those who preferred to build things? What about the love of nature or death? I played around with a number of concepts and brought them together in what I considered to be a solid synergy of fun “cultures” which I then based the Deities and Races on. I also wanted to integrate things which players would already be semi-familiar with by their knowledge of other games, and fantasy media (books, movies, etc). This is why many of the concepts in Alganon are familiar, but different.

I felt it was important to flesh out a “full world” regardless of what features from that world would be a part of the initial design. The reason was to ensure a “full vision” of the world was always available not only to those designing and developing the game, but for those who played it as well. Even today, the original world maps are still available on the Alganon Website as a guide of “what is to come”, giving the team and players something to focus on and be excited about.

I think this sort of approach is critical in developing a MMOG. Always create the core as something which will last a decade and it will serve as a solid foundation.

Also see: http://pcgamestore.blogspot.com/

David Allen, Quest Online QOL, Alganon & History of MMOG

David Allen, Co-Founder of Quest Online (QOL) and Creator of Alganon

David Allen co-founded Quest Online and was the individual who created the MMOG Alganon. David Allen ran Quest Online, hired the team members, and managed the Alganon project from January 2006 to February 2010.

David Allen says “There’s no doubt Quest Online was a unique company. As far as I’m aware it was the first virtual company to produce a commercial MMOG in the industry.

Unless one has been through the process it is hard to understand how difficult it is to start a company, raise capital, hire the talent and get people focused and started on a product the scale of a MMOG; and most importantly, provide a clear vision understood and supported by the team and take it to release.

With such a small percentage of funded games ever making it to release, Quest Online’s Alganon was a great accomplishment for all involved. While many MMOGs of this size can have budgets ranging as high as $50 million dollars or more, our development costs at launch were a fraction of this amount. QOL truly accomplished what most experienced game studios would call “impossible” especially given QOL owned all of its servers and technology including the client, server, support tools, world building tools, online social network system, online library & character repository, micro-transaction (Merchant) and e-commerce transaction system, CSGM tools, and could act as its own distributor.”