How to create a browser based manager game(part 1)

In my opinion you need at least three different things before you can even start to think about creating your very own manager game.

Experience

You have to have a true interest in playing games. It really doesn’t matter if you play a browser based game or you play the game locally(on your PC). Personally I like the PC game better because of their richness of functionality but on the other hand an browser based game offers interaction among the users so my advice should be to gain experience from both kind of football manager games.

Start playing, you might end up as a game developer! ;)

Skills

Now the fun part has ended(?) and you need to get some kind of education in programming and database development. Don’t worry, you don’t have to be a rocket science to be able to create your own game, just some basic programming and database knowledge.

In my opinion it really doesn’t matter if you learn PHP, ASP, JSP, an object oriented language or not. It is all the same with different approaches for solving the same problem.

I would say that database knowledge is more important than the programming skills when developing a manager game. If you manage to create a very good database for your game you’ll have a much more pleasant journey in your effort to create the game. Stay alert on your database courses and learn your SQL well!

Go to school and learn some basic programming and database development!

Tools

First of all you need is a plain text editor for programming. It is probably easier and the result will probably be more beautiful with a WYSIWYG editor but on the other hand, when making changes, you might drown in all the code those editors generates and not be able to make the necessary changes. Start with a plain text editor and get familiar with coding is my advice.

The second thing you need is a database for storing all the data the game need. If you choose a free downloadable database or buy a it is a choice I leave to you.

The third thing is a tool to make the game reachable for several people at the same time, remember it is a multiplayer game we’re building. Once again there is possibilities to make it free. There are several freeware to download that makes your PC act like a server, buy a server or find a host that take care of this for a monthly rate. I would recommend that you find a cheap and reliable host to start with. Make sure the host you choose fulfils your requirements you have on programming language and type of database.

Now it is time for you to start working on your own manager game!

As you can see, it doesn’t have to cost you anything at all or at least very little to build a manager game and make it public. That is half of the fun isn’t it? ;)


Don't forget to visit Managerglory, for an example of a browser based football manager game

Browser based football manager games

This article is about most of the manager games. So far I've found around 30 football games in different size and condition. Some really large games like Hattrick and some smalller than my own Managerglory.

Below is a list of football manager games I've found so far. The Alexa traffic rank is ground for the rankings.(Alexa traffic rank is a tool for measuring the traffic of each site on the Internet)

1. Hattrick 251
2. Managerzone 1,145
3. Soccerproject 2,343
4. Footstar 4.836
5. Sokker 5,051
6. Trophymanager 4,925
7. Pmanager 8,976
8. Freekick 9,210
9. Dugout-online 11,327
10. Butsa 16,298
11. Managerleague 28,909
12. Sundayleague 38,464
13. Footiemanager 49,358
14. Soccer.managergames 82,587
15. Simsoc 182,473
16. Onlinesoccermanager 187,406
17. Managerglory 188,771
18. 4-3-3 243,031
19. Fussballmanager 254,697
20. Goalunited 279,856
21. Netfooty 289,034
22. Freedompbemsoccer 353,939
23. Rama.frey-united 516,330
24. Footballglory 604,855
25 Smallball 717,810
26. Dreamgoal 866,264
27. Perfect-lineup 1,018,078
28. Purefantasyfootball 1,205,353
29. Amfa-manager 1,596,608
30. Etomanager 1,702,111
31. Footiecup 3,340,916
32. Cyberfootballmanager 7,119,384
33. Tacticalmanager No rank(>10,000,000)

So what can you say about this?

Football manager games are popular and attracts users from all around the world. Most listed games has their own market(An updated version of the list will include which country the game has it's largest impact) . An online game has an great advantage compared to other sites in a list like this since each user generates a lot of pageloads thanks to the nature of this kind of site.

Some football manager games are probably missing but I believe most of the larger one's are there. Anyway, knowing that Managerglory has reach to the 17th largest manager game in the world is a very good receipt(even if the measuring tools are very unreliable) that I am doing something right.

In football terms you could divide this list into three divisions where the sites rank below 1000,000 fight in the top division. Large sites with a large organisation behind the scene.

The second division is the sites between 100,000 - 1,000,000 where both single developers and organisations fight. Gladly to see Managerglory is in the top of this division and fighting for promotion despite the hard compettion. Will the game qualify for the top division or stay and struggle in the lower division? Only time will tell....

The third division is the rest of the games where the inventors probably made something wrong. Game not playable, not found by anyone or anything else that doesn't attract the users.

Purpose of this blog

The purpose of this blog is to share some thoughts and ideas about game development, especially manager games, marketing, administration and other things that concerns browser based gaming from an independent developing point of view.

My experience and inspiration to this blog mainly comes from my very own project, Managerglory, a browser based football manager game.

The referee has blown the whistle and we're on our way, let's see what it will become of this blog. ;