Toward a Future of Serverless Multiplayer Gaming with Cachai
In the evolving world of multiplayer gaming, the architecture behind game servers plays a pivotal role in delivering a seamless and enjoyable experience. More importantly, it can impact the fairness of the game and trustworthiness in an Esports industry that’s worth $2 Billion dollars and growing fast.
“Architecture” can be daunting, so let’s make it easy to understand. Imagine you’re playing a multiplayer game. The smoothness of the gameplay, the fairness in competition, and the overall experience heavily depend on how the game's server is set up. We’ll start by looking at the traditional models—Peer-to-Peer (P2P) and cloud servers, each with their unique advantages and challenges. Then, we’ll dive into an exciting new approach using consensus models, which hold the promise of combining the best of both worlds.
Let's take a closer look at the different server models that power your favorite games and explore how emerging technologies like Cachai are paving the way for even better gaming experiences.
Peer-to-Peer Model: One Player's Computer Hosting the Game
In the peer-to-peer model, one player's computer acts as the server, hosting the game for all other players. This setup is popular in many multiplayer games because it’s simple and cost-effective, as long as the players are geographically near each other and there aren’t too many players. And perhaps most importantly, once the hardware is purchased this model is basically free to run - free for the developer and costing only the electricity for the host player.
The trick here is latency - when the host player makes a move, the game knows it immediately and can account for the action (say, kill the target, or move out of the way.) When someone other than the host makes a move, the game doesn’t know immediately and that move might have been overtaken by events in the meantime. We all know the experience of accidentally talking over each other while trying to have a conversation over a slow connection - imagine negotiating those interruptions in a high-stakes shootout for a cash prize. Do you stop and let the computers figure out whose action was technically “first”? As you can see, Esports platforms are really challenged to balance fairness with gameplay experience.
Pros:
Cost Efficiency: No need for dedicated servers, reducing operational costs.
Quick Match Setup: Players can quickly set up and join lobbies.
Local Performance Optimization: If players are geographically close, latency can be reduced.
Cons:
Host Advantage: The host player typically has lower latency, giving them an unfair edge.
Variable Performance: Game stability depends on the host’s hardware and internet connection.
Security Risks: More vulnerable to cheating and DDoS attacks.
Limited Scalability: Typically supports fewer players due to hardware limitations.
Cloud Server Model: Centralized Authority
Let’s look at the other model commonly used today, in which a cloud server hosts the game, and all players connect as clients. This setup is common in many modern games, from MMOs to competitive shooters.
Here, there’s no particular advantage for a “host” player (though there certainly can be an advantage for whichever player happens to be located closest to the server hosting the game!) This model can scale up and down with elastic resources and offers better protection against cheating and attacks. But, cloud infrastructure requires some expertise to maintain. Most importantly, this model is not free to run. Running a game on cloud servers requires some form of ongoing monetization, like micro-transactions or paid downloadable content.
Pros:
Consistency and Fairness: No host advantage; most players have similar latency.
High Performance and Reliability: Cloud servers offer robust performance and uptime.
Enhanced Security: Better protection against cheating and attacks.
Scalability: Easily handles large numbers of players with elastic resources.
Cons:
Cost: Maintaining cloud servers can be expensive.
Latency: Latency may not be consistent among the players
Complexity: Managing cloud infrastructure requires expertise.
As you might have noticed, both of these models depend on one server with authority over what’s happening in the game. In a Peer-to-Peer model, the server belongs to one of the players, and in the Cloud Server model the server belongs to the Cloud. So, in important ways this is a centralized system and suffers from some of the downsides of centralization like uneven access and inconsistency among nodes. What if the game were hosted on multiple servers simultaneously?
Consensus Models: Distributing Authority Among Players
A distributed model would enable multiple computers to run the same game. The architecture would leverage consensus algorithms like Raft or Paxos to distribute the authority and server role among players. That would mean all of the players’ games have to collectively agree on what happened each move, rather than leaving that decision to a single point of authority. It makes for an extremely trustworthy game with an even playing field.
But, of course, this approach comes with its own set of challenges. You’ve got more computers doing more work - which means it’s a more redundant and resilient game, but it’s also more resource-intensive. And, just like humans, computers take time to reach consensus. If that process gets overwhelmed, it can introduce serious performance issues that disrupt the experience of the game. Unfortunately, consensus is the kind of process that’s very difficult to implement properly, and it often does become overwhelmed.
Pros:
Fault Tolerance: Resilient to console/computer failures; no single host that can crash a lobby.
Fairness: Equal authority among players, promoting fair play.
Scalability: Players can join and leave as desired, less need for server caps on players.
Consistency: Strong consistency guarantees across all player’s perspectives.
Cons:
Complexity: Implementing and maintaining consensus algorithms is technically challenging.
Latency: Consensus processes can introduce latency, impacting real-time performance.
Resource Consumption: Higher computational and bandwidth demands.
Cachai: Simplifying Consensus and Enhancing Performance
This is where Cachai comes in. Cachai was designed to make developing and managing consensus-based architectures easier and more efficient. Someday, along with advances in the gaming world, that will enable a distributed serverless gaming architecture. Here’s how:
Reduced Complexity: Cachai simplifies the development of netcode and game logic for consensus based systems, making it accessible even for developers without deep expertise in distributed systems.
Improved Performance: By optimizing the overall consensus process, Cachai reduces latency, ensuring a smoother and more responsive gaming experience.
Reliable Quorum Maintenance: Cachai enhances the reliability of maintaining quorum, preventing disruptions in gameplay.
Cachai is moving the consensus-based model one step closer to being a practical, high-performance option for multiplayer games, bridging the gap between the peer-to-peer and cloud server paradigms.
Stay tuned, gamers and enthusiasts—exciting times are ahead!
