I’m studying about making a game server for my online Poker game. Since I’m completely new in server side programming, I’ve asked my friend, who has been successfully built a server for his chinese chess game. He suggests using Node.js because it’s easy to learn, and fast to program. I’m not sure about that because I usually think about Photon, Smartfox, or someother framework that sold on asset store, but rarely heard about Node.js combines with Unity.
Anyone please help me decide if Node.js is good for making a game server for Unity. Is there any options other than Node.js.
Node.js is a server side Javascript engine. If you want to write your server code in Javascript then it could be a good choice. For a poker game the server side code will be fairly simple, I would expect most of your effort would go into setting up sessions, matchmaking, etc. Maybe you can get a plugin for Node.js that handles some of this.
I don’t think there is anything technically unique about it other than that it is an efficient JS engine outside of a browser.
You could look at more managed solutions like Yahoo Games Network. They can take care of a lot of the pain of user management, and they host your servers for you, so all you need to write is a small game code plugin to run on their servers.
Thanks for the reply. I’m completely new in this section so any recommendations are appreciated.
I just wonder if the is other as good as it framework. My game is not really big, so I do not really new a solution that supports a large amount of CCU. I’m looking for a framework that is easy to learn, and fast to programming.
Can we create a poker game server with Unity built in features ?
Hi @kactus223 , i dont know about node.js+unity implementation, but…
uMMO(Unity Network)
uMMO use the current-old Unity Network Legacy, and have the max 32 CCU Limit per Server(Dedicate Server, machine, etc).
Unity Network it can be used in 2 ways:
putting on a dedicated server (and you will have 32 CCU limit).
allowing Client/Users to create their own servers and machines by running the game (I do not think it’s good idea if you want to create a business online poker because you will not have control of cheating) with a user record in a database(php/mysql maybe). You can see something like this here Unity Asset Store - The Best Assets for Game Making
uMMO say they will try to support the new Unity Network when it is released(It is only a possibility for now), maybe you can buy now the uMMO (Madness Sale discount event) and wait for that.
Photon PUN: this is easy to learn but is expensive when you start to fight with the “MAU” and the “max Msg/s per Room” you will understand that it can be expensive if you can not handle it. https://www.exitgames.com
TNet: I only read some articles in the official forum, youtube and anothers Web. Everyone says is the best when it comes to max CCU Client(this depends on your server), easy to learn and easy to switch between Unity Network and Tnet. Unity Asset Store - The Best Assets for Game Making
Regarding Unity networking (and uMMO too), my idea is to create multiple server on a dedicated server, each one has a different port, so that I can make each server for a table. And using Unity I can handle the poker logic on that server too. Do you think it is possible.
I also did some google and Bolt seems fine too, especially when I can host the server on my own VPS. Does anyone has experience about it ?
With the actual Unity Network you have the limit of the 32 CCU but if it does not matter you can try.
Bolt is like uMMO, but I think it is more advanced right now. Bolt use the the Unity Network too(32 CCU Limit), as far I know is that bolt can be run on Linux but i dont know if uMMO can do that
The Unity Network can run in a VPS with linux, in Unity you need to export/build your project for linux, then you can upload your files to the VPS and run the game as masterserver. I did this in linux for testing purposes of the Unity Network but running the game in Konsole mode (./myUnityApplication -batchmode -nographics).
Your poker game have In-App Purchase? or is it just a game to pass the time and retribution with ADS?
If you want unlimited CCU you could try DarkRift. For something as light on the server as a poker game you may very well be able to host everyone on the same server instance and you can manage the rooms and matchmaking on the server quite easily. Plus you also get persistent storage (via a database) and no 32 limit per instance :)
You can try it free here to see if it’ll suit your game. I’ve not seen anyone make a game like this because people generally use DarkRift for faster paced games but I’d be really interested to see how it goes
I have just tested. My server is running in Unity Editor, and I created >50 clients that connects to it. And it still works fine. I’m trying to make server with Unity built-in networking. I’ll feedback when I finished coding.
