Working Multiplayer Proof of Concept with video proof [No Longer In Production]

[iPirmin]

This said, and consider this for a second... if instead of focusing on making an asynchronous multiplayer (traditional Server-Client, everyone playing at the same time) instead you looked at perhaps something that simply allowed players to Collaborate... i.e. Aerospace Manufacturer(s) [sPH] ... Launch Vehicle Manufacturer(s) [VAB] ... Mission Control (Provides Missions / Objectives / Budgets) and Pilot(s) (who actually Fly the Missions)

Then that might be a far more interesting form of Multiplayer that doesn't require any real alteration of how KSP works at all.

Instead you could then have a group of friends who are basically playing together doing each of the individual components, then sharing what they come up with.

For example someone working on an Space Plane, would be considered to be in a 'Simulated Environment' once they're done they would then hit the "Ship to Space Agency Button" that then makes it available to Mission Control for actual Missions they want to set the Pilots. Best part would be that it could all be backed up to an SQL/WebServer so they don't even have to be playing at the same time to be playing and 'sharing' the experience.

When there are launched then have it so any of the /other/ players outside of the Pilots could then get a "Live Feed", for what is going on.

It also kinda keeps well to the /spirit/ of KSP being the whole peaceful, yet often disaster ridden exploration of Space.

I totally agree, even if you can't fly together/it comes later, It would be super for aerospace company employees to work together with set departments, expertise and can help each other with building. Also combining with Kessler live feed, Telemachus, a huston mission control room and a dedicated company server will allow for hired pilots, launch agendas and different missions with info from Telemachus displayed on consoles in the mission control. So multiple people can fly at the same time with their own Houston mission control support group. This would be awsome and should be developed before fly together multiplayer mission. With some many aerospace companies, this would be so popular and more useful. Keep up the great work!

[John FX]

All I want is to be able to have the VAB open designing ships and launching them on my laptop whilst on my main PC I am flying the craft once they are in LKO.

The timewarp thing and all the rest of the issues would not affect this type of play, I would want the time to be `set` by the master system. If there is an early alpha that would allow even just this then it would be of great value if released.

/Surely each running process would keep it`s own reference frame and always be at the centre of the universe when calculating physics to avoid kraken issues?

[CaptainBullet]

All I want is to be able to have the VAB open designing ships and launching them on my laptop whilst on my main PC I am flying the craft once they are in LKO.

What keeps you from copying your safefile to a dropbox and insert it into your gamefolder on the pc? What you are asking for is not a multiplayer, it's something much simpler than that and can be done without any mods, or am I missing something here? Actually that would be a nice Steam feature to add... allways syncing the safegames on all your computers as soon as you login. But thats not the subject of this thread.

[team.leit]

I totally agree, even if you can't fly together/it comes later, It would be super for aerospace company employees to work together with set departments, expertise and can help each other with building. Also combining with Kessler live feed, Telemachus, a huston mission control room and a dedicated company server will allow for hired pilots, launch agendas and different missions with info from Telemachus displayed on consoles in the mission control. So multiple people can fly at the same time with their own Houston mission control support group. This would be awsome and should be developed before fly together multiplayer mission. With some many aerospace companies, this would be so popular and more useful. Keep up the great work!

This is coming from someone with barely any knowledge of programming, but I agree with the above quote. Except for the fact that I think fly-together MP should be limited to 2-5 players to avoid the time-warp issue. Not trying to start that argument again though, I just want to some space battles maybe? but most certainly being able to fly around the atmosphere with friends. Having said that, I will be keeping an eye on this thread like a hawk

[CaptainBullet]

I think fly-together MP should be limited to 2-5 players to avoid the time-warp issue. (...) Having said that, I will be keeping an eye on this thread like a hawk

You might be interested in that thread. If thats not enough to let you forget the "timewarp-issue" I don't know what would be enough.

I'm not a Programmer either, but it seems there are very smart people out there solving all the problems, so I just keep their threads active to encourage them to go on. I love this community

[Pwolf]

So, uh... I've been completely burned out coding wise. Between work and this, I don't want to look at a line of code for a while. Since I've started this project I've had very little time to just enjoy the game. I haven't even played .22 yet ;_; I also have a lot of other things going on so I can't devote any time or energy to this project. I think I've completed my goal of a "proof of concept" so I think it's time to put this to an end and give the community my ideas and thoughts (as well as source code).

So, that said, I think what I'm going to end up doing, sometime in the near future, is make a write up about KSP Multiplayer... Which means going through what I've done, as well as other projects, to explain why and how it's possible to bring MP to life. For the most part, it's already been done. Between my initial work and what the L.O.G. project has been able to do recently, it's already happened. We've played multiplayer KSP... Now it's just the long haul to make it playable and practical for you all. Along with this write up I'll explain what I've been able to do as well as talk about various other concepts... for example: what about the kraken? I'll also release my source code for everyone to look at. I still need to clean up a few things before then though (cleaning up some debug code and adding comments mostly).

I'm sorry if I've dissapointed anyone by shutting this down but, again, it was never my intention to make a full-on multiplayer mod. Hopefully down the road I might be able to contribute some more time to either the L.O.G. project or some other MP project. I wish them and anyone else who's crazy enough to make this happen the best of luck

[DannySwish]

Thanks for all the work you've done! Wish I knew about this thread sooner.

[Meatsauce]

So, uh... I've been completely burned out coding wise. Between work and this, I don't want to look at a line of code for a while. Since I've started this project I've had very little time to just enjoy the game. I haven't even played .22 yet ;_; I also have a lot of other things going on so I can't devote any time or energy to this project. I think I've completed my goal of a "proof of concept" so I think it's time to put this to an end and give the community my ideas and thoughts (as well as source code).

So, that said, I think what I'm going to end up doing, sometime in the near future, is make a write up about KSP Multiplayer... Which means going through what I've done, as well as other projects, to explain why and how it's possible to bring MP to life. For the most part, it's already been done. Between my initial work and what the L.O.G. project has been able to do recently, it's already happened. We've played multiplayer KSP... Now it's just the long haul to make it playable and practical for you all. Along with this write up I'll explain what I've been able to do as well as talk about various other concepts... for example: what about the kraken? I'll also release my source code for everyone to look at. I still need to clean up a few things before then though (cleaning up some debug code and adding comments mostly).

I'm sorry if I've dissapointed anyone by shutting this down but, again, it was never my intention to make a full-on multiplayer mod. Hopefully down the road I might be able to contribute some more time to either the L.O.G. project or some other MP project. I wish them and anyone else who's crazy enough to make this happen the best of luck

Pwolf, you blazed trails that many said where impassable.

You did well, sir. Thank you.

[zex420]

thanks and this might be best i mean getting your code out could be just what we need ty for your hard work.

[oggylt]

Sorry to hear this but you made a sparkle for IT:)

[John FX]

What keeps you from copying your safefile to a dropbox and insert it into your gamefolder on the pc? What you are asking for is not a multiplayer, it's something much simpler than that and can be done without any mods, or am I missing something here? Actually that would be a nice Steam feature to add... allways syncing the safegames on all your computers as soon as you login. But thats not the subject of this thread.

I want to launch from one PC into a shared system and fly the craft I just launched from the other PC, whilst all the time flying a mission. Currently I cannot launch and play at the same time. Launches take 10 minutes that I would rather not have my computer taken up by. using your solution does not help my problem. I currently run around four copies of KSP on a single machine for making variations on designs whilst flying but I still cannot fly a mission and launch a craft at the same time into the same system as I am currently flying in.

[John FX]

PWolf, when you release your source, could you release any compiled executables you have made please? I would really like to try whatever is functioning but I`m not too hot on compiling my own code.

[MedievalNerd]

Launches take 10 minutes that I would rather not have my computer taken up by.

Launching takes 10 minutes? Using the mod? That's a pretty long time for launching something.

[John FX]

Launching takes 10 minutes? Using the mod? That's a pretty long time for launching something.

Launching is not just all about the bit where you thrust. It takes a few minutes of preparation. And anyway i do not have to validate my need for the patch.

[Pwolf]

PWolf, when you release your source, could you release any compiled executables you have made please? I would really like to try whatever is functioning but I`m not too hot on compiling my own code.

Unfortunately the code is in a very early stage, to put in nicely. Since I wasn't planning on making anything completely usable from the start, the server and port addresses are hard-coded and the environment needs to be setup before you can even connect. There's no vessel spawning and the client/server update code is unstable due to the way I'm indexing vessels and updating their data. The source will only really benefit anyone who's curious about it or those who want to reference it for their own projects. Sorry :\

I really do wish I had more motivate and time (more knowledge as well) to make it more robust and useable for those like yourself to at least play with. Maybe someone who has a bit more time and experience can add on to what I have to make it a little more playable.

That said, I've added all the comments to the code I feel like I needed to add and cleaned up some test code as well. I am currently working on a write-up to explain the code and my methods in more detail so someone who knows better can probably take what I did and make it more usable

[John FX]

Unfortunately the code is in a very early stage, to put in nicely. Since I wasn't planning on making anything completely usable from the start, the server and port addresses are hard-coded and the environment needs to be setup before you can even connect. There's no vessel spawning and the client/server update code is unstable due to the way I'm indexing vessels and updating their data. The source will only really benefit anyone who's curious about it or those who want to reference it for their own projects. Sorry :\

I really do wish I had more motivate and time (more knowledge as well) to make it more robust and useable for those like yourself to at least play with. Maybe someone who has a bit more time and experience can add on to what I have to make it a little more playable.

That said, I've added all the comments to the code I feel like I needed to add and cleaned up some test code as well. I am currently working on a write-up to explain the code and my methods in more detail so someone who knows better can probably take what I did and make it more usable

That makes a lot of sense. Myself I think you have done an awesome job with what you have done. I can only hope someone takes up the baton.

[TimMartland]

Dude, this is the closest anone has ever get to the KSP holy modding grail of multiplayer. Someone needs to keep this going!!!!

[coolcat007]

For a warp to work without much annoyance, I think that atmospheric warps have to be eliminated for multiplayer games. Also, I think that the MechJeb auto-warp tool could be improved for warping until a certain position (like when you click on a certain part of an orbital line, you can click on "place warp node", which places a node where you can warp to automatically and (if the orbit isn't on a collision course or planet escape trajectory) the number of rotations until the warp ends. The system would keep track of what would be the highest warp speed.

If a spacecraft is stationary, the player doesn't have an orbit, but sometimes it needs to do time related tasks (like mining in the Kethane mod), so blocking warp should always be available (also in space)

[Pwolf]

Added a link to a new thread where I released the source code. Thank you all for being so interested in my work. Sorry I couldn't deliver... That said, please be sure to check out this plugin that just got released yesterday: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/55835-Kmp-0-22-wip-alpha/

The new thread is located here: http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/56056-KSP-Multiplayer-Proof-of-Concept-Source-Code-Very-Alpha