SkyNet - Co-Op Gameplay (Theory and potential structure)

[Emmarae]

Mhm, but the CK is a mixed blessing. We don't know its' limitations, so I'm trying to refrain from speculating on end-functionality of SkyNet :confused: Eventually we'll be able to do everything, sure, but it'll be very limited at the start due to a lack of familiarity with the CK and a lack of hooks for SKSE.

 

Well I gladly offer my services to the exploration and usage of the CK. As I said before I have some side ideas of my own that I want to see come to fruition. In doing that I'll hopefully learn some things to contribute to the cause :D

 

"Sadly" you're not a coder? You don't need to be a coder to contribute fascinating ideas and concepts (Like you've already done) :happy:

 

I did run with a few game coders back in the day. Met them at an Emagination Game camp thing. But even then I was put into level and character design and story board editing because I'm better at lore and story driving. Making levels that foreshadow, maintaining balance between player progression and difficulty, when and where to introduce new concepts/weaponry/skills, and the good old Voice acting. :D Even met Bruce Shelley, the designer of Age of Empires. Too bad I joined the military and realized that all the money in making games was going to Japan and soon China and decided to stop pursuing game development. :x

[hipolipolopigus]

Also, instead of using UDP broadcast locally, one could use a connectionless, multicasted but reliably delivered socket type such as RDM (System.Net.SocketType.Rdm), which retains message borders and order and ensures that no messages get lost or duplicated. This may actually be the best course of action even for LAN usage.

Hm... Well nothing is final (Ever). We may end up moving to another networking infrastructure later on, but needing a VPN to do distance MP isn't exactly desirable. I was hoping for a simple console command along the lines of "connect [server] [port]" but I'm not sure that'd work too well if we switch to a non- or even semi-TCP infrastructure :confused:

 

I'm trying to set up some tests for UDP networks, but you peeps keep distracting me! :happy: :rolleyes: Well I suppose I have until at least January... Unless Bethesda wanna give us a sneaky Christmas present :P

 

It's not my keyboard, I just do better when I visualize (Which comes a lot easier through listening, for me :P)

I see, that makes sense. I'm also a visual person, though I can visualize better when reading than when hearing.

My early education was heavily focused on the "mind's eye" way of learning, so heh :happy:

[nandchan]

Personally, I've been programming for about a decade with mild experience in game development and 3D rendering/engines and am currently studying computer science, but I've unfortunately never really worked with bethesda games or the CS. That's why I intend to take a healthy distance, I don't really want to get involved with the mod creation/scripting process too much because I know I'll get sucked in quickly, and I have a schedule of my own to follow.

 

I can share ideas, but I don't want to concern myself with the implementation. If you have questions about C# in particular though I can gladly answer them, been using the language almost exclusively since 1.0.

 

Hm... Well nothing is final (Ever). We may end up moving to another networking infrastructure later on, but needing a VPN to do distance MP isn't exactly desirable. I was hoping for a simple console command along the lines of "connect [server] [port]" but I'm not sure that'd work too well if we switch to a non- or even semi-TCP infrastructure :confused:

 

At no point was needing a VPN implied - one could simply run the lightweight server on any single player's machine and have users connect to that, assuming the user has his firewall set up appropriately.

 

Either way, since we'd probably need an extensive loader with all of the internal logic, we can simply have the loader differentiate between “Play (multiplayer)” and “Play (single player)”, where the latter would simply launch the game, and the former would set up the connections, synch a save file, and create a special saves folder so that pressing “continue” in the title screen would run the multi-player instance, and take over from there.

Edited December 3, 2011 by nandchan

[hipolipolopigus]

Well I gladly offer my services to the exploration and usage of the CK. As I said before I have some side ideas of my own that I want to see come to fruition. In doing that I'll hopefully learn some things to contribute to the cause :D

Yay :happy:

I did run with a few game coders back in the day. Met them at an Emagination Game camp thing. But even then I was put into level and character design and story board editing because I'm better at lore and story driving. Making levels that foreshadow, maintaining balance between player progression and difficulty, when and where to introduce new concepts/weaponry/skills, and the good old Voice acting. :D Even met Bruce Shelley, the designer of Age of Empires. Too bad I joined the military and realized that all the money in making games was going to Japan and soon China and decided to stop pursuing game development. :x

:o Neat! Well... Welcome to the deep end! :D Well not yet :P When/if you feel comfortable with it :happy: Edited December 3, 2011 by hipolipolopigus

[hipolipolopigus]

Personally, I've been programming for about a decade with mild experience in game development and 3D rendering/engines and am currently studying computer science, but I've unfortunately never really worked with bethesda games or the CS. That's why I intend to take a healthy distance, I don't really want to get involved with the mod creation/scripting process too much because I know I'll get sucked in quickly, and I have a schedule of my own to follow.

 

I can share ideas, but I don't want to concern myself with the implementation. If you have questions about C# in particular though I can gladly answer them, been using the language almost exclusively since 1.0.

That's alright :happy: I've been solidly messing around in C# for around 8 (Almost 9, I think xD) years so I'm comfortable with it. Just not non-TCP networking protocols :P If you do decide to join us at some stage, you're more than welcome.

Edited December 3, 2011 by hipolipolopigus

[hipolipolopigus]

Just doing some thinking about how we could hypothesize about the level of traffic and the ratio of reliable:unreliable data...

 

We can't use a strictly MMORPG model; there are action elements which are more complex than clicking a target and mashing a series of buttons. I doubt using a strictly FPS model would be a good idea either (Although I can't think of any reasons why not... Not my area). We need something in-between. I hate to reference an outside source (And a Java one at that ;)), but I feel that we may find part of a solution in Minecraft.

 

For any given frame on a Minecraft server, there are these updating;

• Up to and well over over 20 players at once
• NPCs
• Chat

 

Now, obviously, Minecraft isn't Skyrim. But let's compare our needs and what we have to what Minecraft has... Both use a cell system for controlling updated data flow (Although Minecraft calls them "Chunks"), both have players with equipment that can change at any given moment, both have AI running in the background controlling "Active" NPCs (NPCs inside the active cell area), both have continuously changing entities and environments.

 

I'd like your thoughts on this, Nandchan. Minecraft uses a mixed TCP/UDP architecture (UDP for chat, I imagine).

 

http://caia.swin.edu.au/genius/genius-papers.html Got me on this train of thought :happy:

Edited December 3, 2011 by hipolipolopigus

[Emmarae]

Just doing some thinking about how we could hypothesize about the level of traffic and the ratio of reliable:unreliable data...

 

We can't use a strictly MMORPG model; there are action elements which are more complex than clicking a target and mashing a series of buttons. I doubt using a strictly FPS model would be a good idea either (Although I can't think of any reasons why not... Not my area). We need something in-between. I hate to reference an outside source (And a Java one at that ;)), but I feel that we may find part of a solution in Minecraft.

 

For any given frame on a Minecraft server, there are these updating;

• Up to and well over over 20 players at once
• NPCs
• Chat

 

Now, obviously, Minecraft isn't Skyrim. But let's compare our needs and what we have to what Minecraft has... Both use a cell system for controlling updated data flow (Although Minecraft calls them "Chunks"), both have players with equipment that can change at any given moment, both have AI running in the background controlling "Active" NPCs (NPCs inside the active cell area), both have continuously changing entities and environments.

 

I'd like your thoughts on this, Nandchan. Minecraft uses a mixed TCP/UDP architecture (UDP for chat, I imagine).

 

http://caia.swin.edu.au/genius/genius-papers.html Got me on this train of thought :happy:

 

Hehe: Link

[hipolipolopigus]

Hehe: Link

I know. I have to call "noobs" on this one. Several things (Me being mean :P);

 

 

• You have a version number already? Wow! You must be so awesome to actually have a functional system already without any known hooks!
  
• You're waiting for the leak of the "Construction Set"? I didn't realize that Skyrim was Oblivion! :o
  
• Amazing grammar! So many capitalized "I"s! Amazing English! Correct spelling of everything!
  
• Your first goal is a >250ms latency? What are you programming in? That amazing language called Python?
  
• A Wordpress-hosted page? You're so elite!
  
• You're promising end-product mechanics already? Wow! You must know that everything is going to go exactly as you plan it to!
  
• "Coop mode"? OMFG PIGEONS! :D :D :D
  

 

 

/Mass Sarcasm :pirate:

 

Seriously, though. This is why people usually don't take projects like this seriously and it's bloody annoying that they'll most likely "borrow" several ideas and methods that we're using for Skynet. :wallbash: I hate to be mean, but... Yeah... :confused:

Edited December 3, 2011 by hipolipolopigus

[nandchan]

I didn't know “hight” was a word until I read https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/hight - well, now we know what a “hight quality” multi-player mod is. Edited December 3, 2011 by nandchan

[hipolipolopigus]

I didn't know “hight” was a word until I read Wiktionary. Well, now we know what a “hight quality” multi-player mod is.

Fixed the URL in mah quote :3 Archaic words don't count :P They're neat and all, but silly in terms of our totally non-ambiguous and succinct modern English :rolleyes: :wink:

 

Left a post just up there for you to gawk at (Quick link :P) :happy:

Edited December 3, 2011 by hipolipolopigus