I stumbled upon this over the weekend: http://www.frost.io/
It looks very new and potentially promising. Looks like there’s the option to run the server within a Unity instance (similar to uLink) for physics, but it can be run as a standalone as well.
I’m a horrid programmer, so I’d love to hear the more experienced’s perspectives.
I have not seen this before… interesting find you have here! I will play with it and see what is has to offer.
That looks so good. I’ve never heard of it and I browse Unity forums for hours a day, and as far as I’ve seen, no one has ever posted about it. I may give it a try myself.
I’m really interested in how easily this framework can be used for an authoritative, load-balancing MMO with Unity as a client. The features page says all those items are either in place or upcoming. Server-side collision is supposedly already inherent. I’m not sure how it works and how easily it can be integrated with reading in Unity terrain (maybe via RecastUnity for exporting navmeshes).
Looks good,
but if i am not mistaken, this seems pretty much similar if not maybe the same as SlimNet just with another name.
maybe fholm the author of Slimnet using lidgren library can corroborate, because this looks very much like his work, maybe is him redoing SlimNet now in a more commercial venue?
http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/123983-Released-SlimNet-0-2-Beta
http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/111299-Release-SlimNet-Public-Alpha-(Free)
i may be wrong, but if you look at fholm’s SlimNet server and demos and if you look at FrostNet both are pretty much identical principle.
looks good tho
Looks interesting. Lets see what the price is 
Haha, good point. Hopefully it’s reasonable. I’m especially interested in the cloud hosted solution. Looks like even that solution is supposed to be fully authoritative, unlike Photon Cloud.
That would be great
Yeah, I submitted an inquiry via their website last night. Looks like the version of the code and Unity project are pretty dated (August 2013). The promo video is only a couple weeks old, and it has footage of load balancing, server side collision, and their cloud performance reporting. I’d like to see more about that.
you dont need to buy it, this is SlimNet, you can get the source code from the links i posted
go an download both SlimNet and FrostNet and you will see exactly the same project but with different names.
I wonder if fhold from SlimNet sold the rights to FrostNet or maybe he got it from them? and that is why he release source code with such restrictive measures and stopped selling it?
i am intrigued.
Yeah, I was able to download it for free as well, although I’m wondering if there may be some sort of paid license model in the future? Also, I would assume the cloud-hosted solution will have a cost.
And yes, I’m intrigued as well. I like the idea of coding once in the Unity editor and having that work shared between client and server. I’m still trying to wrap my head around how that’s possible with an authoritative server.
I was checking out FrostNet when I was deciding on a networking package, and I had some serious issues with:
So, while in the future when this all gets sorted out and whatnot, it could be the sweetest thing since caramel was invented; however, for now, I had to pass on it. Very interested in seeing where it goes.
the way how slimnet/frostnet works:
the server console .exe application looks for the unity project server folder files(server side game logic), this is how you can add your authoritative game logic.
that is why you can code from within unity editor, you can even use monodevelop to compile the server side code, then you can run the server .exe console app manually or choose unity to run it every time you click play button in unity. that feature is configurable on the unity editor window from slimnet/frostnet.
in both cases the server console should read the server folder game logic code compiled from within unity editor.
the current beta release that FrostNet did is exactly the same as the last published in github SlimNet 0.2.1.6 beta idential , but with different name.
– https://github.com/fholm/SlimNet but with a very restrictive license but you get all source code plus the server core code.
which was last release about 2 years ago.
in FrostNet you only get compiled server core .dlls (no source for server core) but you can still code server side game logic for your game same as slimnet.
now frostnet future releases supposely are load balancer, lobby server to intercommunicate all single servers , but not as of yet, right now the current beta is just a server lke slimnet does, no load balancers nor lobby etc…
now the current license pdf file for frostnet does not really say anything about pricing nor the website, you just get a license pdf which i did not see anything about ccu limit, if could be used commercially or price.
at least i did not see it, or maybe i missed it, so you may want to read it and let me know incase i missed it.
Well unfortunately, this is the response I got to my inquiry on the website:
Unfortunately, we’ve ceased active development on FrostNet for the time being, as we’ve been putting all our efforts behind our Unity2HTML5 Toolkit. We may certainly resume development in the future, but as of now we do not have the resources.
Cheers,
–
Kenney Wong
that is too bad,
ask them about the current beta license for frostnet standalone server, is it free? is it unlimited ccu?
can we use it for commercial games?
see what they say about it.
I’m not particularly interested in the product anymore, if it’s not being developed. I scanned the license agreement, and it looks like you can use it for commercial games and there doesn’t appear to be any CCU limitation.