Rapture

by Unknown

Back to Mechanic's Corner.

Unknown2005-06-11 16:34:09
Does Rapture use any of the existing MUD's driver/lib as a base or is it all written from scratch? Also, what language is it built from? Both the driver and the lib, that is.
Unknown2005-06-11 18:41:17
QUOTE(CroX @ Jun 11 2005, 12:34 PM)
Does Rapture use any of the existing MUD's driver/lib as a base or is it all written from scratch? Also, what language is it built from? Both the driver and the lib, that is.
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Rapture is the driver... Sort of like LP mud, I think, in that you can customize commands and such. The only mudlibs are the different games. It was build in some obscure language, you can find more info on the IRE website, if you look. Its for sale for a crapload of money.
Unknown2005-06-11 19:57:50
I can code everything in Lusternia in LPC, if I had the motivation to do so. I had a pretty complex mud with the combat system half coded in before I found Lusternia and decided I love it.

Point being, I think rapture is highly over rated. I talk to Hardestat/Anatole now and then, the only person who bought Rapture to make a MUD that isn't part of IRE, and he hasn't finished his yet, which reinforces my opinion that it isn't something miraculous.

It honestly seems like a version of LPC that won't lag as much due to being newer, but costs $10k instead of being free and will make your mud crash any time achaea is down.
Unknown2005-06-11 20:00:12
QUOTE(CroX @ Jun 11 2005, 04:34 PM)
Does Rapture use any of the existing MUD's driver/lib as a base or is it all written from scratch? Also, what language is it built from? Both the driver and the lib, that is.
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I had a friend who looked into it, the base price of $10k (might not be that anymore but it was at one point or another) does not come with a mudlib of any of the existing IRE muds.
Unknown2005-06-11 20:08:40
Its honestly easier to just code your own from scratch or use LPC (never figured out how to use it, whatever I tried never worked).

And of course, much more affordable.
Unknown2005-06-11 20:10:58
LPC can be very buggy, but the $10k more you have after using it makes up for it in my opinion wink.gif
Hajamin2005-06-11 20:49:28
What mublibs from the other IRE games are you talking about? Rapture is an extremely stable and fast environment, built purely for the purpose of coding muds. It has it's own language with many built in abilities specific to muds. The biggest, and most worthwhile, part of Rapture, is the back end things.

I know of Persistant Realms, and from what I have heard from them they are happy with Rapture aswell as the support they have gotten. Ofcourse, they seem a bit disorganized, and creating a new mud from scratch takes years of work.

If you want to know about Rapture, the IRE website has some information, including the manual for it(not that I ever actually look at the thing, but hey it's there). Or if you really want to see it, and understand how things work, get a four year degree and apply for coder. tongue.gif
Unknown2005-06-11 20:52:34
I agree rapture is an impressive piece of work, and there's obviously a reason why achaea wasn't coded in LPC (though, I have a strong suspicion that vortex originally was just a modified LPC =). But unless you want to try and make a living off of it I wouldn't say it's $10k more impressive than the other options out there wink.gif
Unknown2005-06-11 20:59:17
QUOTE(Hajamin @ Jun 11 2005, 04:49 PM)
What mublibs from the other IRE games are you talking about?
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The thing that makes Lusternia different from Achaea, and Aetolia different from Imperian.

QUOTE(Hajamin @ Jun 11 2005, 04:49 PM)
The biggest, and most worthwhile, part of Rapture, is the back end things.
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Whazzit?
Hajamin2005-06-11 21:13:18
QUOTE(Dyr @ Jun 12 2005, 05:59 AM)
The thing that makes Lusternia different from Achaea, and Aetolia different from Imperian.
Whazzit?
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Nope, no mublib's, just code.

Here's a few qoutes from the Raputre manual for those that want to know about such things:

QUOTE
Perhaps a word or two ought to be said about the history and evolution of Rapture.  In the beginning code was written using primitive tools and programming languages.  It was horrible, lacking pretty much all of the features of modern programming languages (every variable was a global one!).  However, code was written, and projects begun and thrived.  Then, the next stage of evolution began, and as a result, a semi-workable language called Vortex came to be.

Vortex was magnitudes more helpful the tools being used previously, and even came with a conversion script that would retro-fit most existing source code to use the new language.  It provided many more features and programmers rejoiced.  Soon though, it was clear that Vortex as it existed could no longer meet the requirements of the ever changing environments created with it.  Vortex V5 was born, and with it came many new features which facilitated progress and user maximums increased.

All this time, the language existed and evolved outside the influence of Iron Realms.  However, Achaea -- the flagship project that used the Vortex engine -- continued to grow and it was soon apparent that Vortex would not meet its needs.  This need sparked the decision to begin work on Rapture, and Iron Realms started it in earnest.  The primary goal was to provide a system which was 100% source compatible with Vortex V5 (as Achaea was now many many lines of code) while providing a robust, scalable, and above all else, FAST replacement for Vortex V5.

Rapture was engineered from scratch, allowing the development team to concentrate on using the most efficient algorithms and data structures while still maintaining source compatibility.  The result is Rapture as you know it today: robust, polished, featureful, and magnitudes faster than any previous environment. 


QUOTE
The entire principle of the Rapture suite is to provide a framework in which a multi-user virtual environment can be easily created while maintaining the utmost in performance.  The Rapture language provides all the normal functionality of a programming language while also including many constructs and abstractions for mechanisms which are normally not (such as a networking server and database access).  By abstracting and providing a clear interface to some of the more complex back-end systems, development time and effort can be concentrated on the actual mechanics and logic of the environment being created.


And from the IRE homepage(www.ironrealms.com):
QUOTE
Rapture is the foundation of virtual worlds. It is a suite of tools designed to create and run multi-user virtual environments. By providing a high performance network server with a robust and fast virtual environment framework, all of the hard work involved with developing the environment (such as a game or MUD) has already been done. This allows you to concentrate development time on the logic and mechanics that make your world unique.

All of our IRE games use this technology to bring you the greatest text gaming experience possible. For those of you familiar with typical MUD development, Rapture is NOT a "codebase"; it is a highly optimized server framework.
Unknown2005-06-11 21:14:40
Well, there is a basic engine running between the four games that makes them go right? And it can be updated changing all the games.

The code that makes Achaea unique is Achaea's 'mudlib.' (IE all the rooms, the skillsets, the players).

And, not to put down rapture, but what is a codebase if its not a specialized mud server? (lpmud is a framework).
Unknown2005-06-11 21:20:23
I'm pretty sure that if you change herb balance time or how the news board works on one mud, it won't change on the others, if that's what you mean.
Hajamin2005-06-11 21:21:23
QUOTE(Dyr @ Jun 12 2005, 06:14 AM)
Well, there is a basic engine running between the four games that makes them go right? And it can be updated changing all the games.

The code that makes Achaea unique is Achaea's 'mudlib.' (IE all the rooms, the skillsets, the players).

And, not to put down rapture, but what is a codebase if its not a specialized mud server? (lpmud is a framework).
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A codebase is just that, code. Rapture is a server, it runs Rapture code. It compiles it, it runs it, it takes in connections, it handles all the server side aspects of the game. The code is what is the game, you're thinking of things like lpmud, circlemud, dikumud, etc where they are one and the same. Rapture is a very different animal.

As Persistant Realms posted on their forums, when they bought Rapture they got something with 1 room, say, who, and that's about it. Rapture handles all the connections, you turn it on, and all that works. For the rest of it, you code in the language that Rapture understands(which is it's own).
Unknown2005-06-11 21:22:34
I thought with bookcases, they were going to implement them into rapture -> all the muds will have them. However, with features, they won't just copy them into other muds, for hte most part.
Hajamin2005-06-11 21:24:50
QUOTE(Dyr @ Jun 12 2005, 06:22 AM)
I thought with bookcases, they were going to implement them into rapture -> all the muds will have them. However, with features, they won't just copy them into other muds, for hte most part.
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We rarely copy code, but some things that are the same are copied and then modified by each mud to fight their own. If that was part of Rapture, then everyone that purchased Rapture would look 100% like IRE. Not to mention, the version number you see when you log in would be changing every time we got new code from IRE(which isn't all that often).
Lisaera2005-06-11 21:25:13
As Hajamin just said, "Rapture" is a server, nothing more.

Do you think a library system in Achaea is going to affect the game being made by Persistent Realms? That's called code.
Unknown2005-06-11 21:33:14
Basically, one of the muds said, hey let's make libraries, and the other muds said, wow we need libraries too, and there's only so many ways to make a library in a mud, so it looked from a player standpoint like they all had the same or similiar code smile.gif
Hajamin2005-06-11 21:35:27
QUOTE(Jello @ Jun 12 2005, 06:33 AM)
Basically, one of the muds said, hey let's make libraries, and the other muds said, wow we need libraries too, and there's only so many ways to make a library in a mud, so it looked from a player standpoint like they all had the same or similiar code  smile.gif
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Actually it was more like, Achaea said hey we need libraries, all the others said oooh me too... Get to work Achaea.
Unknown2005-06-11 21:50:12
There is something constantly running, while the game is variable. How else would they do updates while the game is running? If it was entirely code, wouldn't you have to recompile?

*confused*
Unknown2005-06-12 19:06:40
The Rapture server is a virtual environment with loadable modules. The server continues running and handling all the connections, while the modules for various abilities, sub-systems, areas, etc, can be hot-swapped and start doing something new. If you update the Rapture code itself (say, to handle more connections or to fix a bug with loading modules), you have to take the whole game down for a minute while the system is rebooted and the new code compiled and loaded.