Sat, Oct 29, 2011 | 21:43 BST
DUST 514 to have “very scalable” battles hosted on a dedicated multi-core server machine
EVE’s server architect, Lin Luo has said the team is working hard to make sure the servers being “hosted around the globe” for DUST 514 are fully optimized and ready for anything players can throw at them.
In a post over the PS Blog, Luo explained the tech behind the servers and how various scenarios, as far as load and utilizing the game’s speedy, FPS dynamics would be handled.
“Unlike normal FPS multiplayer games, DUST 514 has heavy MMO elements,” he said. “And unlike normal MMO FPS games, DUST has heavy interaction with EVE Online. This imposes challenges on what technologies we should use in order to have this level of interaction with EVE, while keeping FPS gameplay as smooth as possible.
“While continuing to rely on the Unreal 3 engine for the FPS multiplayer gameplay for DUST, the interaction with the rest of the EVE universe should naturally take advantage of utilizing some existing EVE online technologies.”
Luo explained that the technology will make use of clusters when the number of each team battling it out has reached a pre-determined minimum. The EVE server logic will “instruct an appropriate DUST battle cluster to spawn a battle in it,” providing the server with “all the necessary information regarding the prospective battle upon launching.”
After a battle is over, the server process will be terminated by the EVE universe.
“So the EVE universe needs to manage the lifetime of DUST battle servers as well as communicating with them when needed, while we also need to make sure that the latency sensitive FPS multiplayer gameplay goes fairly for the participating DUST players,” said Luo. “I won’t go into a deep technical discussion about how we solve the challenges involved here, as we are still exploring all the possibilities to find out the best balance point to map physical DUST battles nicely into the EVE universe.”
Since the centralized server hardware resources will be limited in number, the team will utilize existing server resources as much as possible, so instead of having a “dedicated server machine to host one battle, we aim to have a dedicated multi-core server machine to host as many DUST battle servers as possible,” he said.
CCP has been conducting numerous performance optimizations on both the server and client sides in order to make sure the battles will be “very scalable.”
DUST 514 is slated for a summer release with a beta confirmed, but a release still to be determined.
10 comments
#1
Erthazus
29/10/11, 9:47 pm
I’m very dissapointed that this is Ps3 only. I love EVE, but i like my FPS’s more with my favourite little mouse and keyboard.
I like CCP games really much.
Still, i will absolutely play it at least on the PS3…
#2
blackdreamhunk
29/10/11, 11:11 pm
they said dust is coming the year ps3 version after however I think the game will bomb in general. Even if it was on the pc. Why because the game was made with consoles in mind.
#3
IL DUCE
29/10/11, 11:15 pm
@1 Can’t you use a keyboard and mouse on the PS3…or do only some games offer support for it? I believe I heard CS:GO will allow support to use keyboard & mouse for PS3…
#4
Phoenixblight
29/10/11, 11:43 pm
@3
Yeah the PS3 allows KB and Mouse but then you have to expect the developer to support not only the controller but also the KB and Mouse which they typically don’t.
#5
BULArmy
30/10/11, 8:15 am
I am absolutely sure that he game will land at some point on the PC, because it will not be the so successful as thay think.
#6
Gekidami
30/10/11, 8:40 am
When are we going to get some actual new footage of this? And have they actually said how many players it supports?
#7
Erthazus
30/10/11, 10:18 am
I think it will be successfull on PS3 more or less.
It’s going to end up free to play with item shop. If HOME is successfull with that model than probably this can be also successfull.
@6, E3 footage and 64 players. 32 vs 32. Thats why they are going to end up with multi-core server support. It is obvious. You don’t need to be a genious to figure that out.
It’s made on Unreal Engine 3 and by the latest EVE Alliance Tournament, gameplay will be similar to Halo (which i hope thats NOT TRUE, or at least it’s faster god damn it. They are doing this because making fast paced FPS is really hard for current gen with it’s limits) and MAG at some point.
#8
deathgaze
30/10/11, 3:53 pm
Not that I really care, but I wonder how this game is going to be marketed? I mean, they’ll be selling a F2P format game on the shelves with regular games that don’t have any real cost to play online (for the most part). I’m seriously wondering how consumers will react when they find out that when they run out of their starter fund of in-game funny-money that they’ll have to shell out real-world dollars to keep playing the game they paid 60 USD for.
Should be real interesting.
#9
Gekidami
30/10/11, 3:56 pm
^ You clearly know nothing about this game.
#10
Erthazus
30/10/11, 5:36 pm
Btw, also, this game can have battles bigger than just your 64 players. CCP said at EVE AT that this can be done, but current limit on UE3 is 64 players for now.