Rooms - Limiting users

reset

Hi

I am really going to love Photon - really what I have wanted. I have coded a little with Unity's networking but am new to Photon.

When a user contacts the Photon Cloud now they are asked to create a room. I don't want to do this - I want the user to hit the server and be present in the game/room without having to create one. I will to do this by having the client-side see if a room called "Blah" exists and if not then create one called "Blah" - is that right?

Also I only want about 30-40 people be in ONE level of the game - is this possible? So that if a client tries to join and and the game/room is full then they get a message back saying that "The room is full - try again later". The avatars are super simple - the level is simple too - the avatars can basically and chat - that is it. Would this be possible?

thanks for your help
S

dreamora

1. Right you would listen to the RoomList / RoomListUpdate calls and check if the room is there and if not create it

2. Thats easy, you can set the limit or alternatively you just use the 'open' and 'visible' properties of the room which will remove it from the room list / make the room unjoinable

reset

Thanks for your reply!!

So am I right in thinking that 30-40 simple avatars could exist in one room/game/level - depending on the users system of course - but the server can handle the load?

I wouldn't need to worry about the MMO app - which seems a little complex.

Sorry I dont really play MMOs so I am a little naff trying to comprehend the magnitude of servers, scale, load balancing etc :oops:

s

dreamora

The server can handle it normally, not much of a problem. bandwidth wise it depends on what you do in the room though as it could end pretty heavy for the users and there is no 'scope limitation' that reduces that for clients

Tobias

If 30-40 avatars in a room are ok, depends on what they do and send (in reaction to what they do). If you try to send 100bytes, 10x/sec and per avatar, this could amount to a lot of updates.
It's certainly possible (and not necessarily ultra-complex) but you should keep sent-data-per-avatar in mind while you develop and test.

reset

Thanks for your replies.

The avatars can simply move - there are not even any bone animations - just a simple mesh. And there is chat.

But there is an elevator that needs to be synced across players too - need to figure that out.

I am going to pull apart the Viking demo this weekend and see what I can find Looking fwd to this.

Will I be able to rent a Photon Cloud connect by the end of Feb 2012? For a few months?

thanks for your help

s

Tobias

Photon Cloud: sure you will be able to rent it for a few month. If we offer longer subscriptions, those will be optional.
I hope you make good progress on the weekend.