Is this type of server possible?

[12padams]

Here's a quote from my caveman2cosmos lets play thread about a possible lets play idea:

"Imagine 10 players all against eachother and all making lets plays from their own perspective of this game. People could choose who they want to go for then watch the lets play from that persons side. If that person dies then the viewers can watch and root for the person that killed them...

Who could we have?
12padams
Hydromancerx
Koshing
Wolfensoul9
quill18
Dancing Hoskuld
AIAndy
ls612
Thunderbrd
Vokarya
strategyonly

All on the same map with synchronized lets plays uploaded to their own lets play channels. Wow... now that I would like to watch! pity about the timezone difference though because the more players the more difficult it is to find a time all can get together to record their episodes..."

Now a lets play like that as interesting and fun to watch as it would be just would be impossible to coordinate unless the following was possible.

The game/save-file/access point or whatever you want to call it would need to be hosted/accessible with read and write access at any time so it would need to be hosted on a server with 24/7 uptime. Basically players from the lets play could log in whenever they wanted to check the turn status. So when its their turn they take it then it updates the server file and when the next person logs in whenever that may be so they can have their turn... So turns could literally take a whole 24 hours due to all the logging in and out but each play should just log in at least once a day to take their turn...

The way this would be recorded is you connect to the server then press record. Record your turn then when your done stop recording and disconnect. Repeat this every time you log in. Every 25 turns you will be left with 25 small videos (each consisting of a turn) on your computer. Simply put them into windows movie maker then click make movie to join them into an episode. Each player could upload an episode to their channel after 25 turns. There would be no ai turn time since the player only records their turn then logs out.

Is this type of server possible however? If so could it be coded? If so who would be interested in watching this lets play or joining it as a player?

 

[Hydromancerx]

@12padams

Actually I was thinking more of the people who did YouTube Let's Plays ...

- AstralPhaser/12padams
- Cotronia/Acularius
- Darrinus
- IdioticUlt1mara
- Quill18
- rcd1293
- shenryyr2
- tegual

I apologize if I forgot anyone who makes C2C Let's Plays on YouTube.

Re-posting here since the best chance to getting people to do an ALL STAR C2C Lets Play would be to have people who have already done a C2C Let's Play.

I am not sure if the team is comfortable talking on camera. I know I would much rather make the game than do a video of the game. But I am just camera shy I guess.

 

[Thunderbrd]

We shouldn't HAVE to upload any audio... the record could only be of the turn itself without necessary narration.

This sort of server access multi-play would be AWESOME! I'd SO be willing to be a part of that!!!

No idea how it could be done though. If it worked like a constantly ongoing simultaneous turn game that allows you to log out without disrupting the game so you just check in whenever you can throughout the day and give a maximum wait time between turns of 24 hrs, that would be optimal.

 

[wolfensoul9]

This sort of server access multi-play would be AWESOME! I'd SO be willing to be a part of that!!!

No idea how it could be done though.

Hahaha! This made me laugh.

 

[Hydromancerx]

You know what I might be open to doing this if I could just post my progress in a forum thread with pictures instead of a video. In fact there are other that do that such as ...

- Blue Boy
- Boksi
- Vokarya

It would be interesting if we could get them to join as well.

EDIT: The down side I think would be is that as everyone posts their stuff the other players could cheat by watching each others videos or posts. We would know what each other was doing.

 

[12padams]

Just a note... if this type of lets play was started my current single player vs ai lets play would be unaffected since this multiplayer one would literally only take away 5-20 minutes (depending on the amount and length of turns) of each day.

However I started this thread to find out if this is possible... I'm not sure how c2c servers work and am under the impression that they require all players to be logged in at once...

Is it possible to get a log in and out type server to work if hosted on a web server or some other type of 24 hour server? Also... each person could choose whether or not they have commentary in their episode. I for one would have commentary just so the other viewers know what I am thinking and planning. Episodes would be uploaded every 25 turns so if you plan to attack... do it within 25 turns or hope that the others in the lets play are not watching the episode in which you plan to kill them lol

 

[Hydromancerx]

So what would happen with updates? Would we be stuck in a specific version of C2C for the entire multi-player game?

EDIT: If we did have forum people I would very much like to play against JosEPh_II.

 

[Thunderbrd]

Well... we could do something like this with a play by email game, no?

But perhaps for the sake of the 'cheat' note that Hydro brought up (I was considering that element as well...) we should only deliver our side of the 'lets play', be it via video or posting screen shots or just textually, however we wish, with like a 25 turn delay. So at 50 turns we start with a summary of the first 25 and so on.

I probably wouldn't even want to look at the other players presentations so much as just do it to enjoy the game.

And I'd say we should keep the game consistent within the scope of one version. We could start this just after the next release, which SHOULD be about as debugged as possible for a version release considering the way we're going about it this time around.

Edit: In fact, I would suggest we all make a copy of the mod into a folder labeled 'C2C v27 Multiplay' so we keep it separate from the main C2C folder that's constantly updating for the mod team at least.

 

[12padams]

You know what I might be open to doing this if I could just post my progress in a forum thread with picture instead of a video.

Players could do whatever... even if that involves just playing without logging or uploading anything. However it would be better if some type of log was made. Even if its in the form of a novel lol
Hell, It would be interesting to see how creative some people could get with how to log this...

The down side I think would be is that as everyone posts their stuff the other players could cheat by watching each others videos or posts. We would know what each other was doing.

Yes, but only every 25 turns... So you could be on turn 75 (last turn of episode 3) and pretend to be good but then on turn 76-100 set up an army and take over another players city.

 

[Hydromancerx]

@Thunderbrd

From a modder's standpoint I would be very interested in their game play since its the only method we really have to "watch" testers. That's one reason I love to watch all the C2C Let's Plays.

 

[12padams]

In fact, I would suggest we all make a copy of the mod into a folder labeled 'C2C v27 Multiplay' so we keep it separate from the main C2C folder that's constantly updating for the mod team at least.

Wow, your thinking of starting it that soon (a week) and we haven't even confirmed that its possible? Yikes... you must be as eager as I am

But perhaps for the sake of the 'cheat' note that Hydro brought up (I was considering that element as well...) we should only deliver our side of the 'lets play', be it via video or posting screen shots or just textually, however we wish, with like a 25 turn delay. So at 50 turns we start with a summary of the first 25 and so on.

Oh course we could agree to not watch any of the other persons content but you know some people may not be able to resist...

 

[Hydromancerx]

So if this was a once a day thing what happens if everyone on their turn has like nothing to do? Is that day just wasted? I suspect this is going to be the slowest game ever! What's more is that if a bug gets fixed after the game is started that we cannot fix it.

 

[Thunderbrd]

So if this was a once a day thing what happens if everyone on their turn has like nothing to do? Is that day just wasted? I suspect this is going to be the slowest game ever! What's more is that if a bug gets fixed after the game is started that we cannot fix it.

Play by email wouldn't have the restriction of even one turn a day required. So it would probably go even slower at times as it could get hung up by the next player. But some days, like weekends, we could see more than one turn too.

So sure it'd be the slowest game of all time but so what? It'd be fun to play against HUMAN minds for once!

I'd suggest the next speed up from Normal (I think it just doesn't play well at that speed...) All on Noble level. Perhaps a Large Perfect Mongoose map? (depending on how many players we collect here...)

If a bug gets fixed during the middle of it, we'd all have to be capable of updating to the SVN but should only do so if it becomes absolutely necessary, and we'd all have to make sure we were at the same revision!

 

[12padams]

I don't get playing by email... how is this process possible?

Also I would suggest a small game with 5 players on a normal sized map to start off with. Otherwise people may give up out of bordum... If people like it however then we should do a big one... maybe 15 people on a large map? Still we might fight over game settings...

P.S. I'm still waiting for Koshing to say something like this is actually possible. I would be willing to do this even If I was the only one logging/recording the game for everyone else. Still that would be problematic if I died, someone else would need to take over. Still I think multiple loggers would be ideal!

Also for those who don't know how to record the game I am more than willing to provide a tutorial... (only if this multiplayer game ever happens though).

P.P.S I was being sarcastic about this in the beginning when I first spoke of it in my thread but boy its gained a lot of attention and excitement. I wonder if this will actually be a reality!

 

[Koshling]

It wouldn't be massively hard to modify multi-player so that if player X was not connected then it just waits for some (LONG - like days) timeout before handling that player over to the AI. However, we'd still need somewhere to host it. IMO just using play by email would be easier for now, but instead of ACTUALLY using email we just use a file sharing site to pass the game file around (in fact we could use SVN!). Just grab the file (or update the SVN) and load up - if it's your turn take it, save and post the file back. If i's someone else's turn too bad - you have to wait.

Timezones would almost certainly limit us to a MAX of 1 turn per day though, if we took players from all around the world (in fact US + Australia pretty much would, and US + Australia + Europe certainly would). No reason we couldn't upgrade as we wen along so long as we did it by mutual agreement and made sure to do it at the start of the FIRST player's turn each time (for fairness).

IMO the main issue is that we would have circa 100 days of nothing much at the start.

 

[Il Principe]

IMO the main issue is that we would have circa 100 days of nothing much at the start.

Yeah the start could be a bit drawn out

But if , like suggested, you set it on noble, you can expand, and thereby make something happen, pretty fast.

I would realy love to have basicly the whole forum regulars(devs and lurkers like me) on one giant map. But options to agree on might be hard ( I think I remember that Joseph II does not like revolutions turned on.. while I harly paly without it).

Oh and why not use the play by email system? It´s there, so why not use it?

 

[GiuseppeIII]

If this actually could work that would be awsome but why does C2C have to keep getting better. Right when I think I might be able to play a different game. C2C adds an awsome feature which I have to try out

 

[Koshling]

Yeah the start could be a bit drawn out

But if , like suggested, you set it on noble, you can expand, and thereby make something happen, pretty fast.

I would realy love to have basicly the whole forum regulars(devs and lurkers like me) on one giant map. But options to agree on might be hard ( I think I remember that Joseph II does not like revolutions turned on.. while I harly paly without it).

Oh and why not use the play by email system? It´s there, so why not use it?

PBEM with SVN as the 'email' system my recommendation

 

[AIAndy]

That is what Pitboss is about. You have one server in which actual players can log in to play their turns and there is a very long turn timer after which it automatically advances to the next turn if someone hasn't played their turn yet.

There are some issues though that would need to be fixed to get Pitboss working with C2C.

 

[wolfensoul9]

Well, 12padams, looks like your dream can become a reality. Congratulations.

A concern that was brought up a couple times does indeed worry me.

...how on earth are we going to agree on game settings? Seems like a nightmare...