Server based game augmentations. The transition to cloud. Really possible?

[Kb-Smoker]

Some very interesting comments from Watch Dogs producer say -among other things- that the city in Watch Dogs is going to react more dynamically in the Xbox One version because of the cloud.

http://www.nowgamer.com/news/198718...f_those_machines_says_watch_dog_producer.html

So, bkilian's aura seldom fails, since he mentioned time ago that one of the advantages of the cloud was this one.

Seeing xbox 360[ie titanfall] have access to the same cloud it does not seem he is talking about that.

Clearing he is talking about current gen version vs next gen version in terms of horse power.

Is watch_dog online only game? I have not heard that at all.

 

[hesido]

I'll not get tired of saying this, but companies paying for continued costs of enhancing single player games is not feasible, not in a model where you pay once. (This is because I'm assuming the processing cycles needed per player would be orders of magnitude higher than running a multiplayer server). If it wasn't so high, you could do it locally anyway.

 

[Rangers]

I'll not get tired of saying this, but companies paying for continued costs of enhancing single player games is not feasible, not in a model where you pay once. (This is because I'm assuming the processing cycles needed per player would be orders of magnitude higher than running a multiplayer server). If it wasn't so high, you could do it locally anyway.

You cant necessarily do it locally when your fixed console specs were locked (possibly too low?) two years ago and are now locked for the next 7 years. Meanwhile in the greater world computing costs could be falling fast over those years.

Also, the whole talk of how azure can scale seamlessly as needed could help alleviate that. Fewer and fewer will play a title as time goes on, obviously needing fewer and fewer resources, which in themselves could be getting cheaper and cheaper.

I kind of agree to an extent though. Maybe 2-5 years after title release the experience will degrade?

 

[hesido]

You cant necessarily do it locally when your fixed console specs were locked (possibly too low?) two years ago and are now locked for the next 7 years. Meanwhile in the greater world computing costs could be falling fast over those years.

Also, the whole talk of how azure can scale seamlessly as needed could help alleviate that. Fewer and fewer will play a title as time goes on, obviously needing fewer and fewer resources, which in themselves could be getting cheaper and cheaper.

I kind of agree to an extent though. Maybe 2-5 years after title release the experience will degrade?

Still, on a business model where you only get paid a single time, cloud won't make sense as your other option is to do everything locally which is more profitable both in the long run and development-wise. Also, like you mention, there either has to be a fall-back, or there's the option that the game won't run at all if no such fallback is in place. Having to have a fall-back mode would increase development costs. And if you have a fallback mode, nothing on the cloud could be critical to gameplay (e.g. eye candy physics stuff that does not affect gameplay like some games that support HW accelerated physics), and if Cloud will be all eye-candy, there's less incentive to incorporate it that way due to continued costs (even though it will scale down like you mention in given time, its cost per player would be several times of a multiplayer game with dedicated servers,)

If Xbox One is Microsoft's final console, the cloud ambitions make more sense, after 10-15 years Xbox One could just act like a passive hub for streaming games, than it will be no different than Onlive where the whole game is processed on the cloud, which is a heck lot easier to achieve as you don't need to sync anything between local and cloud; as time passes by, your local resources will be small enough to be entirely neglected, because of the synchronization issues you would have to tackle with.

 

[itsmydamnation]

Also, the whole talk of how azure can scale seamlessly as needed could help alleviate that. Fewer and fewer will play a title as time goes on, obviously needing fewer and fewer resources, which in themselves could be getting cheaper and cheaper.

this thinking is ignorant of the real costs, compute is sweet FA in terms of datacentre costs. Thats why the "cloud" is so attractive, TCO of data centres is huge, cost of compute in isolation is nothing. I agree with hesido, what you guys are hoping for is a recipe to loose lots of money.

 

[patsu]

Yeah, while it does get cheaper incrementally, the overall upkeep is still high.

If they do stuff on the server, it has to solve a real problem (e.g., global AI in MMO, prevent hacking, ...), or attract more $$$ (e.g., rent server to users, server subscription).

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Still, on a business model where you only get paid a single time, cloud won't make sense as your other option is to do everything locally which is more profitable both in the long run and development-wise. Also, like you mention, there either has to be a fall-back, or there's the option that the game won't run at all if no such fallback is in place. Having to have a fall-back mode would increase development costs. And if you have a fallback mode, nothing on the cloud could be critical to gameplay (e.g. eye candy physics stuff that does not affect gameplay like some games that support HW accelerated physics), and if Cloud will be all eye-candy, there's less incentive to incorporate it that way due to continued costs (even though it will scale down like you mention in given time, its cost per player would be several times of a multiplayer game with dedicated servers,)

If Xbox One is Microsoft's final console, the cloud ambitions make more sense, after 10-15 years Xbox One could just act like a passive hub for streaming games, than it will be no different than Onlive where the whole game is processed on the cloud, which is a heck lot easier to achieve as you don't need to sync anything between local and cloud; as time passes by, your local resources will be small enough to be entirely neglected, because of the synchronization issues you would have to tackle with.

For single player games that's a non-issue. Unless you think that most single player games are like Skyrim and people on average play them for 100+ hours.

But the more likely scenario is that most (not all) single player games taking advantage of the cloud will likely feature anywhere from 6 to 20 hours worth of gameplay beyond which the person that bought it won't be playing it. Hence the cloud compute costs shouldn't be even remotely as high as an MMORPG. It'd likely be a very small fraction of per player MMORPG server hosting costs.

BTW - The original Guild Wars was basically a server based single player game. I used the server/client MMORPG model but without the massive simultaneous player worlds. All game logic and AI was done server side however. And it also relied only on the original game purchase. As well, it was quite easy to play it for 100-500+ hours (some people played it for 8+ years for free without paying anything). They did later introduce microtransactions for costumes, bank space, etc. but as with most of the things like that, only a small fraction of the player base spent any significant amounts of money in it.

And Xbox One's version for the cloud should be cheaper than that. Guild Wars servers had to be provisioned for the maximum projected load at all times, at least originally. I'm not sure if they eventually transitioned to a cloud server type scenario where the server resources reserved for the game could be dynamically ramped up and down.

Diablo 2 also does everything serverside and again mostly relies on a single one time payment for the vast majority of players (who don't use real money in the Auction house).

Path of Exile and Warframe are two other single player games with drop in co-op which have AI and game logic processed entirely server side. Both also happen to be F2P games. PoE relies entirely on cosmetic items to try to make a profit while Warframe introduces new gear regularly (which can also be gotten in game without paying) that can be purchased instead of earned in game.

So, long term "free" (as in no monthly payment) server side compute already exists for some games and for quite some time now.

It's the future of gaming whether people like it or not.

Regards,
SB

 

[Cranky]

I'll not get tired of saying this, but companies paying for continued costs of enhancing single player games is not feasible, not in a model where you pay once. (This is because I'm assuming the processing cycles needed per player would be orders of magnitude higher than running a multiplayer server). If it wasn't so high, you could do it locally anyway.

There is a really simple a straightforward solution to this problem. For cloud based games, MS charges an extra $1 per disc royalty with no ongoing costs. Same game for PS4, MS gets a $2 per disc royalty. Everybody wins!

 

[Rangers]

Yeah, while it does get cheaper incrementally, the overall upkeep is still high.

If they do stuff on the server, it has to solve a real problem (e.g., global AI in MMO, prevent hacking, ...), or attract more $$$ (e.g., rent server to users, server subscription).

possibly not in the context of ms built a bunch of azure servers some of which arent getting used...(supposedly), so they figured Xbox was a place to throw them at.

 

[Cyan]

Seeing xbox 360[ie titanfall] have access to the same cloud it does not seem he is talking about that.

Clearing he is talking about current gen version vs next gen version in terms of horse power.

Is watch_dog online only game? I have not heard that at all.

Yes, neither did I. Watch Dogs is an SP game afaik. The Crew and The Division are online only games, apparently.

On a different note, I agree with Silent_Buddha. Besides that, since the cloud is scalable and only uses more resources when they are actually needed, even for games a la Skyrim new sales will drive the cloud -economically wise- 'cos people could play Skyrim regardless of the fact that they bought a new game.

There has to be a solution to sales driving the cloud though, and I think it's Live Gold.

The response seems so simple that I wonder if I am missing something in the new way of approaching the issue that hesido has set, though

 

[specwarGP2]

Diablo 2 also does everything serverside and again mostly relies on a single one time payment for the vast majority of players (who don't use real money in the Auction house).

Regards,
SB

Diablo 3 does everything serverside because as Patsu said, it solves an actual problem. (In D3's case, it solves multiple problems).

D3 (on PC) isn't a true single player game, in the traditional sense, imo.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

D3 (on PC) isn't a true single player game, in the traditional sense, imo.

I'm curious in what way you think it isn't single player? Just because it has co-op mode available doesn't make it less single player.

Or are you going to argue that Doom back in 1993 wasn't a single player game because you could play co-op in it? It certainly couldn't be considered a multiplayer game considering how rare it was for people to know how to network two or more computers together at the time. Same goes for things like the original Settlers game. Or Command and Conquer. Or any number of single player games that featured a co-op mode.

And yes, obviously the online component addressed a need. As does server side compute.

I just recently got around to playing Mafia 2. Fantastic single player game that attempts to make its city feel more alive with numerous AI agents. Unfortunately due to not being able to dedicated enough compute cycles to the AI, the AI is dumb as shyte. Police cars that will chase you if you speed or run over a pedestrian, but doesn't do jack if you run a red light, stop sign, or drive in the wrong lane. Vehicles that treat intersections with only 2 stop signs as a 4 way stop. Vehicles that take up to 2 seconds to react to the fact that your car is stopped in front of them. Vehicles that stop at green lights and wait while cars with a red light go into their lane. Etc.

That game would have been immensely better had they been able to offload non-combat AI to the "cloud" and thus had more robust AI algorithms. Either that or if they just hadn't bothered with a console version or made it capable of running on low end/midrange PCs and thus dedicated more compute cycles to the non-combat NPCs.

Regards,
SB

 

[specwarGP2]

I'm curious in what way you think it isn't single player? Just because it has co-op mode available doesn't make it less single player.

Or are you going to argue that Doom back in 1993 wasn't a single player game because you could play co-op in it? It certainly couldn't be considered a multiplayer game considering how rare it was for people to know how to network two or more computers together at the time. Same goes for things like the original Settlers game. Or Command and Conquer. Or any number of single player games that featured a co-op mode.

Regards,
SB

But none of those games have a persistent virtual economy, and you can't have an economy by yourself. The fact that D3 has co-op has no bearing on why I don't consider it a single player game.

D3 is like a lite themepark MMO, if that makes any sense.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

But none of those games have a persistent virtual economy, and you can't have an economy by yourself. The fact that D3 has co-op has no bearing on why I don't consider it a single player game.

D3 is like a lite themepark MMO, if that makes any sense.

Not really, the gameplay is pretty much exactly the same as Diablo and Diablo 2. Just character advancement and how you aquire skills has changed. The addition of a marketplace is fairly meaningless, except to reduce the replayability of the game for the very few people that spend money on items. Oh and to protect players from potential scammers on ebay/craigslist/other 3rd party seller site. Because the auction house didn't allow players to do anything that wasn't already being done either in game (trading items for gold, gems, etc.) or out of game (selling and buying items for real world cash) in Diablo 2. So really, it is exactly the same as the those other games. And I'm pretty sure most would consider those single player games with co-op available in some cases.

Hence it is no less single player than Diablo, Diablo 2, Sacred, Sacred 2, Torchlight, Torchlight 2, Champions of Norrath, or any other top down point and click action RPG.

Regards,
SB

 

[specwarGP2]

Not really, the gameplay is pretty much exactly the same as Diablo and Diablo 2. Just character advancement and how you aquire skills has changed. The addition of a marketplace is fairly meaningless, except to reduce the replayability of the game for the very few people that spend money on items. Oh and to protect players from potential scammers on ebay/craigslist/other 3rd party seller site. Because the auction house didn't allow players to do anything that wasn't already being done either in game (trading items for gold, gems, etc.) or out of game (selling and buying items for real world cash) in Diablo 2. So really, it is exactly the same as the those other games. And I'm pretty sure most would consider those single player games with co-op available in some cases.

Hence it is no less single player than Diablo, Diablo 2, Sacred, Sacred 2, Torchlight, Torchlight 2, Champions of Norrath, or any other top down point and click action RPG.

Regards,
SB

By your logic, since the gameplay mechanics in a single player RPG are pretty much the same in an MMO, an MMO is single player as well?

All those games you listed do not have an in game economy. An economy is one of the defining characteristics of an MMO. You cannot have an economy in a single player game.

 

[-tkf-]

Diablo 3 does everything serverside because as Patsu said, it solves an actual problem. (In D3's case, it solves multiple problems).

D3 (on PC) isn't a true single player game, in the traditional sense, imo.

On that note about Diablo 3:

http://www.diablofans.com/news/1873-exclusive-fansite-console-info-from-blizzard-hq/

Initially the Console version was also supposed to be online-only, but Blizzard's research showed a huge part of the Console population didn't have an Internet connection
There are anti-dupe mechanisms in place, but Blizzard knows they'll eventually be overcome
There are some concerns about Trading in the Console version, because of the lack of Auction House

 

[hesido]

@Silent_Buddha: While you bring up valid points, so far the cloud use you mention for single player games with a pay-one-time approach (free 2 play does not apply as it relies on continued income, and players who pay also pay for non-paying players) cannot be compared to the compute use for the discussion at hand. In your example, basic AI decisions and in game economy controlled over the servers is not a compute intensive task, I'm guessing the loads would not be so great compared to a web server that can serve several hundreds of clients at a time, and if all those several hundreds of players have paid their 50 dollars, that's going to pay for a lot of months of servers. While I don't know the details, I'm sure a single server for Guild wars could handle thousands of players per day, while continued purchases of games could fund the server costs (and maybe when that money flow lessened, they had to get that microtransaction system going, demolishing the pay-once model)

Here I was talking about cloud computing for higher fidelity graphics, pathfinding in a dynamic world, stuff that's going to eat a heck lot of computing cycles, so I still believe for these uses the cost per player would be orders of magnitude higher and wouldn't work with a pay once model (@cyan: continued subscription for Xbox Live could pay for it but Microsoft is still asking money from publishers (although at heavily subsidized rates by Xbox Live members) to do cloud work, something which the publishers wouldn't be so keen on.

 

[liolio]

Diablo III... I still can't play since I'm back from the US. ALl my characters are on the US servers and even with the leatrix latency fix... it is not good enough, EU servers are better though not perfect (that is with Leatrix fix) but I've no characters, no gears, nothing... Blizzard doesn't allow one to move its characters from one region to another, even once... I could provide them docs that prove that I moved, it is not a scheme or anything...
I'm wary about the cloud and the lag it induces even in SP games, either way Blizzard did things wrong and too many things are done on the servers side.
I lost south of 400 of gameplay, Diablo 3 is not a good example of a proper use of the cloud. Level are tiny on top of it, they could send info about the monsters, etc once, when you enter a new area and have only the drops to be send realtime from the servers, it is laggy.
It was laggy when I first started the game (in the US), moved to another place in the US it was way better (not yet perfect not as reactive as a game that runs 60FPS on my computer should be), back in France I no longer play it and I would want to...

 

[Silent_Buddha]

By your logic, since the gameplay mechanics in a single player RPG are pretty much the same in an MMO, an MMO is single player as well?

All those games you listed do not have an in game economy. An economy is one of the defining characteristics of an MMO. You cannot have an economy in a single player game.

What incredibly twisted logic. An MMO is an MMO because it's a "massively multiplayer online" game. In that at any given time you can not only run into other people, but that you can potentially run into 10's or 100's of people at a time.

Unlike say, something like Demon Souls where you can run into another person online but you aren't going to be running into more than a single person at a time. Or something like Diablo 3 where you have to explicitly join or host a co-op session and that session can't contain anything even remotely resembling "massively multiplayer." Hell it doesn't even have a persistent world. Another cornerstone of an MMO. At least something like Borderlands 2 allows people on your friends list to drop into your game, which makes it far more MMO-like than Diablo 3, but still nothing even close to resembling an MMO.

BTW - Diablo 2 also had an in game economy as does Borderlands 2. It just happens to be player driven.

BTW - there are also single player games that do not have any co-op or online portions that also feature in game economies that react that to the sale and purchase of goods.

Oh, and Planetside has no in game economy. By your logic that makes it a single player game?

Regards,
SB

 

[specwarGP2]

BTW - there are also single player games that do not have any co-op or online portions that also feature in game economies that react that to the sale and purchase of goods.

Except D3's economy actually requires other players to participate. Items in the auction house don't just populate themselves out of nowhere.

Oh, and Planetside has no in game economy. By your logic that makes it a single player game?

No, by my logic a game which has an economy (with human players, since that wasn't ovious to you) is not a single player game.

Furthermore, I never said D3 is an MMO, but rather, a lite MMO - meaning that it has elements of an MMO. Did you know D3 was originally developed to be an MMO?

P.S. D3 lets your friend drop into your game, just like borderlands.