i was reading about your thing.....
It appears your doing a "relay" thing thus re-broadcasting
data to all users connected to your server. Is that correct?
There are pros and cons to such an idea, and they should be mentioned on your website.
pros -
most all users could easily connect to a game
regardless of firewall settings.
easy to locate other player because all users must use the same server
easy to debug client-server networking code because most would be handled by your server
cons -
slower gaming (double the network lag time or more) do to data must travel much farther... to the server, then to the client.
smaller bandwidth. FPS and RTS like larger bandwidths to work properly.
Having stated my concerns about methodology,
This could be a great product if you could offer a third network gaming method of payment; server listing support only.
This method, an indi developer could use your server to list other remote servers for games. Example:
Lets use my Duel game as an example:
I wish to host a game session, So when I click the host button,
my game connects to your server, your server obtains my address and lists that address with a my game session name. When someoneelse wishes to join the game, They click the "join" button. Then, the game connects to your server, obtains a list of remote servers that match the target game version and presents that list to the joining player. Then, when that player selects a game, they disconnect from your server and connect to the hosting player.
Using this method, there would be almost no bandwidth requirement from your server. As an indi dev, I would pay $10 per month to NN to support your server and you could support unlimited number of my gamers, as no game data is passed through your server.
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all three methods are usefull. My method would be the most complicated to use, but would be the fastest.
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side note:
I think your service can be used in this manner already;
by properly coding the connections, and then disconnecting at game start. But that would be overly complex and support limited users, You quote 4 players per session as a max. A simple server list has almost no bandwidth requirements and would greatly expand options.
maybe charge $10 per month per game name to support....
So if I wanted to support my Duel,Chess,Bumper Pool that would be $30 per month to you ..... just an example. DUEL and Chess are not that good to pay for, and Pool will just use IRC.
Maybe offer a forth option?
Subscribers pay $10 per month to play any supported game that uses the remote server listing? Just a thought, and would save me the hassle of converting my proxy server to linux for hosting myself.