View Full Version : Interview With Erik Johansen Up At Warcry
Malevolent
10-07-2003, 08:30 PM
I just posted an exclusive interview with Darkfall's Network Programmer, Erik Johansen up at Darkfall Warcry.
Some of it is very technical in nature, but for those of you wondering how they are going to pull off having over 10,000 players online in one game-world simultaneously, Erik has graciously provided some answers.
You can check it out here Darkfall Warcry (http://df.warcry.com/scripts/news/view_news.phtml?site=7&id=10260)
Thanks to Erik Johansen and Tasos Flambouras for making this possible.
jittles
10-07-2003, 08:46 PM
"At least 10,000 and I hope for double that"
My hopes are very high for this number of players online, would be something pretty damn cool.
I have to admit that your interview was a lot more interesting than I thought it was going to be back when you had announced your intention to do it. :)
DoS attacks are a problem. Damn script kiddies.
Cert has a nice little write up on them: http://www.cert.org/tech_tips/denial_of_service.html
And GRC makes DDoS easy to understand: http://grc.com/dos/grcdos.htm
LoD_BlackJack
10-07-2003, 09:04 PM
good stuff Mav.
PheniX DragoN
10-07-2003, 09:12 PM
Originally posted by jittles@Oct 7 2003, 12:46 PM
"At least 10,000 and I hope for double that"
My hopes are very high for this number of players online, would be something pretty damn cool.
If you think that is a lot check out Citizen Zero and the Big World technology. You looking at 60,000 is a joke compared to what they are claiming. If I remember right, they claimed it was 100,000+ per server and they actually only plan on using one server, maybe one per region depending on how many users.
Still though, 10,000 would be very very nice.
Phooey
10-07-2003, 09:13 PM
Wow, good stuff!
PheniX DragoN
10-07-2003, 09:14 PM
I do like the patching w/o bringing it down. This will come into play a lot with seiging. SB had issues with it since you could set a bane to go active at the server drop; then you log back on when the serevr it up and no one is there attacking the city. Now they placed a time between the server coming up and when it will go active again. But that still sucks since you can be controlling the city, have the server drop and may not get control again.
Very interesting stuff,
I have to admit Im a bit concerned about servers stability and how many people they will support, but it looks like the devs have it covered nicely :)
nice job.
Airius Droc
10-07-2003, 09:42 PM
I liked this quote:
There's nothing magical about it, it's simply a matter of thorough design with distribution as one of the main design goals.
Ah, the mantra of Darkfall Online. :)
Great questions, thanks. :)
The 400MBit bandwidth statement raises a question for me. Where will the server cluster(s) be located?
Shadowbane has gimpy movement controls, so everyone's mobility is equally pathetic, but in UO Ping Was Master.. I'm not saying it was or should be the only thing, but it sure didn't hurt any. :P
When the servers moved from Austin, TX to the northeastern US, I had to get a static route added to address some awful latency upstream. I feel bad for those in my area who may not have known how to diagnose it, much less contact those who could address the congestion. Europeans trying to play N. American shards pretty much had no way around bad lag...
Just curious, anyone know?
Airius Droc
10-07-2003, 10:37 PM
Originally posted by Minx@Oct 7 2003, 04:34 PM
but in UO Ping Was Master..
Ping WAS master in UO.
I had poor ping.
I hated UO.
Just putting a vote in for a base maximum on ping.
Originally posted by PheniX DragoN@Oct 7 2003, 03:14 PM
SB had issues with it since you could set a bane to go active at the server drop; then you log back on when the serevr it up and no one is there attacking the city. Now they placed a time between the server coming up and when it will go active again. But that still sucks since you can be controlling the city, have the server drop and may not get control again.
SB has daily maintenance. I'm not sure why this is absolutely necessary since other modern games seem to get by with much less frequent outages. For example Lineage2 beta had a weekly 1-2 hour maintenance period.
Alienyouth4jc
10-08-2003, 12:49 AM
Originally posted by Ren@Oct 7 2003, 03:09 PM
SB has daily maintenance. I'm not sure why this is absolutely necessary since other modern games seem to get by with much less frequent outages. For example Lineage2 beta had a weekly 1-2 hour maintenance period.
HA, you never played SWG during beta, with its sometimes twice daily quick fixes and then its 2 hours weekly scheduled updates.
But we are not talking beta. Personally I feel that any game that has to update everyday after the game goes live either has a faulty game, or overly cautious developers. In any case, its unwarranted and can severely hurt the game. I doubt Darkfall will make that kind of error call. I am still all for having the servers go offline to update, becuase there IS an increased risk of errors while updating with thousands of people online, you risk the serious chance of causing a problem that results in more downtime then a scheduled update.
Now with that in mind, I hope they just keep the updates to about once a week or so, and of course some monthly content updates are useful too.
Charlie
10-08-2003, 02:52 PM
with Erik Johansen (http://df.warcry.com/scripts/news/view_news.phtml?site=7&id=10260)
Satan
10-08-2003, 03:53 PM
yeah, 10k people per server is really good.
they will need alot of people per server if the game world is gonna be as big as they say, otherwise people would get spread out and it wouldn't seem as populated.
ReconLT
10-08-2003, 04:39 PM
Not too technical, really, only takes a basic understanding. I understood the interview and thought it was quite interesting, and I am definitely only at the basic understanding level.
Sounds awesome.
druez
10-08-2003, 05:56 PM
Hehe, that answers one of my concerns.
I really hope they host a server cluster here in the US and then one for Europe.
Th
Luella_Lokidottir
10-08-2003, 06:37 PM
I'm surprised DoS attacks might affect a MMORPG, i'm not sure that's true. Do you not have to pass through a login server to gain access to the game server, and there is then a SSL that prevents unauthorised connections? Perhaps Erik is talking about DoS attacks on the ISPs that service the server farm connections.
I freely admit I am a mainframe technical support person, using the IBM or plug-compatible platform, I am not very familiar with client-server hardware. I am very aware that the IBM mainframe supports up to 4096 Linux images and virtual Unix (USS) servers on a single CPC. It surprises me more organizations do not use the scalability and reliability of a single IBM mainframe rather than support/maintain/capacity plan a truckload of individual hardware servers. The DASD sub-systems are more expensive, because they have lots of clevers to support the block-based I/O, and are more sensitive to the size of the cache (need much larger ones).
Malevolent
10-08-2003, 06:45 PM
Luella - one word - cost. For what one would pay for an IBM mainframe you could probably buy 400+ clustered x86 based servers. Not only that, how many people know how to develop games on IBM? (try like, none) =p
Sachem
10-09-2003, 03:29 AM
MalevolentA small preface regarding the technology - Darkfall is expected to use 40-50 load balanced servers inter-connected to form one massive server cluster. This cluster will work in unison to form one huge "server" that will be presented to the players as a single game-world.
That is 40-50 servers in a cluster where they expect to top out, with 10k to 20k players online.
Starting with 6 server-clusters (240 boxes), how much investment in hardware and assembly do they need? Support to maintain that? Sounds like the bandwidth is the least costly item...
Malevolent
10-09-2003, 04:49 AM
No idea to be honest, I have never price specced a 400Mbit Connection before =p
T1's run $800-$1200 for 1.5mb. This probably isnt accurate because the pricing probably changes when you scale that large, but if you based it on T1 pricing that could be as much as $300,000 a month.
At $13/mo per player thats a MINIMUM playerbase of 23,076. Makes ya wonder =p
Andonis
10-09-2003, 09:50 AM
Nice to see more and more info coming from the devs as beta progresses keep up the good work I hope theres lots more interveiws and Q&A's to come shortly :D
jittles
10-09-2003, 10:18 AM
Originally posted by Malevolent@Oct 8 2003, 07:49 PM
No idea to be honest, I have never price specced a 400Mbit Connection before =p
T1's run $800-$1200 for 1.5mb. This probably isnt accurate because the pricing probably changes when you scale that large, but if you based it on T1 pricing that could be as much as $300,000 a month.
At $13/mo per player thats a MINIMUM playerbase of 23,076. Makes ya wonder =p
I would be willing to place a bet that the price based on having a dedicated T1 line to your house is off by quite a bit, considering the servers will most likely be located at the ISP to have as direct a connection as possible, plus any business contract they sign will be less cost than an end user.
Expensive, yes. THAT expensive, not a chance.
Gaintlord
10-09-2003, 02:33 PM
A nice read even though I'm not a very tech person.
Some stuff went over the head but understood most of it. I do hope for a world with 10,000 or more people in it B)
KniteFlux
10-10-2003, 09:29 PM
Thanks for the info chummers. It would have been cool to get a bit more detail, but I understand why such information wasn't released. I have been very impressed overall at RW's sharing of game info. Keep it comin.
Til' Next Chummers,
KniteFlux
Dozier
10-10-2003, 10:16 PM
interesting read, i'd like to see soem pics of the server cluster sometime
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