multiplayer (and LNet)

[pitfiend]

I'm aware that p2p multiplayer games are something hard to code. My idea takes in account that you have nodes/supernodes for each client/server. So, when you came into some specific area where a supernode is already working, game client switchs to it as main server, later all supernodes syncs between them to keep data integrity, or as soon as you move to another supernode or became one. Anyone in that network scenario could became a supernode, as any client could upscale as needed.

On the pros side, you could play solo or with your friends (multiplayer is an option).

On the cons side, you may need humongous disk space for user data validation, once you became a supernode. A house keeping mechanic must be implemented to make this viable. A tracker server may be needed to be able to sync nodes/supernodes.

This is just a project on planning stage. I know there are lots of things/condition to foresee/consider.

[phibermon]

A distributed model will work but you'll hit limits pretty quickly and it'd be an absolute nightmare to debug/optimize. You might want to make a virtual network with artificial delays, either using VM software or by mechanism in your code, it'll be a bit of work to get it set up but well worth it if you plan on making something robust enough for real-world use. Would love to hear about progress so please keep us updated!

[pitfiend]

As far my schedule permits it, I will, unfortunately this is a project I work on spare time.

[laggyluk]

btw, probably I could use p2p to share world data between users in bit torrent manner and limit server bandwidth usage. Anyone done pascal torrenting?

[pitfiend]

Torrenting in pascal is the tricky part of my project, as there are not any component ready to use. Some of the available are just wrappers for external libraries with really dark interfaces. There's a torrent library in Ares Galaxy, but still trying to understand how it works, as I'm looking for a way to separate it from the main core. To be honest I found it a complicated task to achieve, working on spare time.

[SilverWarior]

I remember a Pascal Torrent project a few years ago. It was quite stable but unfortunately it didn't support all the features of latest torrent protocol. It had no DHT support, it had no Peer to Peer seds exchange, no encripted transfers.
As far as I know Pascal Torrent didn't depend on external libraries but it was trying to reimplement whole torrent protocol using Sockets.
In the end I belive that orignal authors abandoned this project.

[pitfiend]

I remember a Pascal Torrent project a few years ago. It was quite stable but unfortunately it didn't support all the features of latest torrent protocol. It had no DHT support, it had no Peer to Peer seds exchange, no encripted transfers.
As far as I know Pascal Torrent didn't depend on external libraries but it was trying to reimplement whole torrent protocol using Sockets.
In the end I belive that orignal authors abandoned this project.

The one I found inside Ares Galaxy, seems to have all the torrent protocol features. It's available on sourceforge here, as you can see it is announced as a free open source bittorrent and chat program. My trouble, I can't found any documentation (or maybe I'm looking in the wrong place).