Online Multiplayer Gaming: Exceeding 64 players?

[Acert93]

While MMOs and so forth allow thousands of players, action oriented games tend to hit a limit in the 42-64 player range. e.g. In the Battlefield series, 1942 allowed up to 64 players, and this limit was retained for BF:V, BF2, and BF2142. And in my experience 64 players is only solid, for the BF series, when the server is top notch (bandwidth, processor, memory, great facillity) and your are close to the server yourself. 64 players seems to be a max for that series. Not much progress in 5 years. Obviously this is a game dependant factor (many allow less) that involves map design and game balance in addition to technological factors (downstream and upstream bandwidth, memory limits, computational loads), but I have not noticed little progress in this area in the last couple years. It is like we hit a wall. Sure, a couple games have marketed > 100 players, but in general we are quite stuck in the 24-64 player realm for action oriented games that allow the shooting of weapons with a high rate of fire.

So, my question to developers: What are the hold ups for larger action oriented online games? Is it an issue on the server (memory, processor, nic), server bandwidth, or client side (poor upstream)? A combination of...?

And do you forsee solutions in the next couple years that allow similar levels of action seen in current games (e.g. a BF game with 64 players) but with more people (in this case more than 64)?

Is anyone working on such a title?

Ps- The 64 playes is just an example for a specific series that tends to be technology limited + is one of the largest online games. Basically wondering if/when we may see online action game exceed 100, if not 200, players online at a time in similar action oriented games.

 

[almighty]

Ive been on 100 player Counter Strike : Source servers, playing on CS_Office, THAT was mad so i hope they can get that madness on PS3 and 360.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

So, my question to developers: What are the hold ups for larger action oriented online games? Is it an issue on the server (memory, processor, nic), server bandwidth, or client side (poor upstream)? A combination of...?

I'd guess the hold-up is that it's not really a priority. When you think of all the resources you'd need for fast very-multiplayer action games, you have to question what does 200 players get you over 100 players over 50 players? If the world is really large, they'll be so spread out you'll never encounter many players, in which case you don't need to have all those players on the same server. If you cram them into a tiny space, it'll be so hectic as to be pretty random. For any given game, you would have an ideal balance of players per virtual square kilometre, and a size of map to determine how much time it takes from one end to the other, and you'd calculate a maximum capacity. I doubt there's much need for over 50 in most games.

 

[Skrying]

On the larger BF2 maps 64 players is really need, even more would be nice. The reason for it is the sense of having an actual battle. Sometimes I do not like the fact that I can be a rogue in CS:S and own the entire enemy team, in BF2 you get forced into being a part of it, but alone you're not enough to win. Of course, that means you have to rely on people but that's why I never play a BF2 match expecting to win as a team.

 

[ERP]

So, my question to developers: What are the hold ups for larger action oriented online games? Is it an issue on the server (memory, processor, nic), server bandwidth, or client side (poor upstream)? A combination of...?

Yes.
for a 64 person game the server has to simulate 64 players and everything they can see or interact with. It also has to have enough upstream bandwidth to send that data to the clients. Not to mention if the game streams it has to maintain a much larger streamed area.

There are other possible solutions, dilstributed server architectures etc, but they are extremely hard to get right and they generally have rather severe downsides if you don't.

64 is just an arbitrary number though, but it's probably what the developer feels provides a reasonable experience.

 

[Acert93]

Yeah, 64 is just an example. It, in BF at least, is what they felt fit within their model for a good experience. I know they were aiming for over 100 with BF2 but had to cut it back. One could argue it was a gameplay reason, but the smoothness of 64 player servers indicates it was also a technology influenced decision. I am sure if they cut down on "stuff" (rate of fire, world interaction, detail, etc) that number could be higher (or lower, as many online games are).

Are there any new techniques or technologies that will help us do more in the near future? e.g. Lets say GameABC has LimitX for number of people, are there possibilities to get GameABC with LimitX + 50%? i.e. same general game experience, but just more people? Obviously better upstream bandwidth helps and is outside of devs control and is a slow process (but it is improving in the US... slowly). Anything on the server / software side?

For me, "next gen" is as much about the online experience. And while some may disagree, more players *can be* better depending on the game design. I can think of many designs that would work well.

@ Shifty: It depends on game design. But I do think 50 is pretty arbitrary. While true that "most" games may not need 50 -- most won't need more than 8-12 either (racing games and GOW proves this). There is still room for 4 player MP as well.

But there is no doubt in epic "Battle" type games that more can be better IF designed for. BF proves this. The experience you get on a 64 player map with 64 players is TOTALLY different than what you get on a 16 player map with 16 players. Some of us want to do more of the former -- and to a higher degree.

What I have noticed is we went from 4 player, to 8, then 12-16, then to 24-32, and then capped at about 64. BF1942 came out in 2002, and many of us are hoping to get even larger games... for a better Omaha experience

Not for everyone, nor do I believe every game needs to be this size or scale, but there is a desire for such among some of us. Personally, I look forward to an action oriented WWII style "Battlefield" game. To scale, massive battles with large (128, 256, or more! people in a single battle), living dynamic world, etc.

 

[Razor1]

Its highly dependent on the frame work of the network code. Going with a grid system like Butterfly.net, dont' know if they are still around would allow more many more players in a single world. Perfect for MMO's. Since you will have "zones of influence" where only certain amount of data will be sent to a client. In full scale BF2 game almost all data will have to be transfered from client to server to server to client since thats what the game is about, communication, and the realistic atmosphere of the battle. This isn't the case with MMO's. A character across the world who isn't in any vicinity of your character and will not come in contact with your character in the short term this isn't neccessary.

 

[jpr27]

Well Im hoping that at some point MS might have a way to offer or give dedicated high bandwidth server access to bigger franchises such as say Halo, Rainbow series, etc. I think Shadow Run might be along the lines because there has been speculation (not sure if its true) about Xbox 360 players able to play against PC players. We already know MMO will be coming so I'm sure there has to be someway for MS to make it work. I think issues will probably revolve around cost and bandwidth and the integration to Xbox Live overall.

I agree though there just isnt anything better then getting in a large battle with 64 or more players. I remember the old battlefield 1942 days (Desert Combat Mod PC ) and have some very fond memories of some great largescale battles. With the addition of Xbox Live and EVERYONE having the use of online chat just makes the case for a more engaging experience. Oh and HD next gen graphics doesnt hurt either

 

[Shifty Geezer]

YBut there is no doubt in epic "Battle" type games that more can be better IF designed for. BF proves this. The experience you get on a 64 player map with 64 players is TOTALLY different than what you get on a 16 player map with 16 players. Some of us want to do more of the former -- and to a higher degree.

Oh sure. What I was trying to say is that in those few games where big battles are desired, do the costs warrant it for the developer? From a developers POV, I wouldn't be surprised if the boardroom meeting goes something like...

"How many players should we have in MP?"
"200 would be great."
"200 eh? No-one's done that before. It'd be a good marketting tag too. Is that like 4x the cost of 50 players then?"
"Umm...actually it'll be about 10 to 15x the cost."
"Heck, blow that! 50 is good. We'll have 50. When our players start paying us $10 a month subscription fees we might look at larger battles, but I'm not going to eat into our profit margins that much just to please a few gamers!"

Larger games are possibly not economically sensible ventures - extra costs with no extra gains. But I don't know how the costs would scale in satisfying server requirements. The above 10-15x is obviously a totally arbitary figure from the depths of my...imagination

 

[Rainbow Man]

What's the limit of Quakewars? I read it's supposed to have some really large maps, wiht just 15-30 players it just might feel rather lonely after a while.. I remember some of the rtcw maps were really unsuited to few players too. tram, fpor example.

In any case I think hardware requirements are as much a reason as anythign why we haven't seen higher limits. Rtcw again, once players went above 32 performance really started dipping. Perhaps it was a problem with the wolfenstein engine or such, but it really didnt work that well. A few players got good pings many got pretty bad and not few got terrible when playesr approached 64. Maybe a wolfenstein quirk what do I know but it seems lots of players is very demanding on the infrastructure.

Not many can afford to run such servers.


Peace.

 

[BlackAngus]

Tribes had it.

Tribes had 64 and 128 player multiplayer back in 1999! =)

I would also like to see more fps games that have a 256 play mp limit. So to get a real sense of scale. Like a like battle game with 256 players per side, or sieges!

 

[Skrying]

I've seen at least 150+ people raids in WoW, and I've also experienced flying into major Horde cities (Under City and Org) and it being full of nothing but Alliance (so you can imagine at the high point of that raid how many were there). I just do not think it'd be doable in a game setup such as say Battlefield where the players are the ones renting servers and do not want to pay $8+ per player slot. I could see EA some day offering 100+ player servers but it'll be buggy as hell with multi-server setups.

 

[ban25]

Its highly dependent on the frame work of the network code. Going with a grid system like Butterfly.net, dont' know if they are still around would allow more many more players in a single world. Perfect for MMO's. Since you will have "zones of influence" where only certain amount of data will be sent to a client. In full scale BF2 game almost all data will have to be transfered from client to server to server to client since thats what the game is about, communication, and the realistic atmosphere of the battle.

Wasn't that another one of those VM-based approaches? The efficiency of such solutions is questionable, not to mention you have to convince game studios (who are heavily invested in C/C++) to rewrite their game logic for the VM.

There's another reason to minimize data sent to the client beyond performance: security. You can't trust that the client won't try to cheat should you give him, for instance, information about players he can't see.

 

[rounin]

Isn't Resistance, a 40 player game, hosted on Sony's own servers?

 

[NovemberMike]

Anyone here ever played Planetside? Largest battles in that were probably around 350-450 players over maps that were basically small islands (It could take a minute or two in an airplane going 120kph to get to your destination...).

Quite fun for what it was, but the lag on it was horrible.

 

[Skrying]

I believe Huxley is suppose to go well past the "64 player" barrier. I believe its in the same vein as Planetside and the MMOFPS.

 

[NovemberMike]

From what I understand Huxley exchanges lobbies ala Counterstrike for a big RPG style world, but the combat still takes place in "instanced areas" (think WoW) that are similar to normal FPS's in size. This gives it the community of an MMO in areas where a little bit of lag isn't really an issue and keeps the resource intense things small.

 

[Cheezdoodles]

from what i understand, huxley have been bragging about 100-200 player matches for quite a while now.

 

[Skrying]

from what i understand, huxley have been bragging about 100-200 player matches for quite a while now.

I haven't heard much about it beyond some people being really hyped up about it, other than that the media on it I've never seen besides a video or two that didn't appear to be my style, but maybe that'll change.