I’m working on a project right now and I’m wondering what the interest of releasing it to the public would be.
If I were to release it the project would be very simple to work with, all the end user(the developer) would need to do is handle the inputs received at the end as the cell-controller itself, the networking, the connecting to the game, the sending/receiving and parsing of inputs would be done for you.
The route I am currently going for looks like this(Here cellphone is used to represent cellphones, tablets, and as many other mobile devices I would be able to implement):
V1: The cellphone would act as a controller, sending input to your game using my servers as a matchmaking service to route it to the right instance of your program.
V2: Authentication added when connecting to a game, to allow better security with new features; the game itself will now be able to send media to the cellphone to customize the look and layout of the controller(For example using sliders, switches, changing the background look to have a more personalized look for your game). Although it should be noted that the user will be allowed to opt out of receiving the media, if they wish to keep the default look, with your game, or even if they wish to save bandwidth.
V3(Possibility, depending on interest and needs): A more complex controller can be used, where tokens can be slid around and such, to represent card games RTSs and the such. The extent of this leg of the project is undetermined, nor is it assured without interest in this project.
If anyone would be interested in the release of such a project publicly or has any ideas for improvements to the project, please let me know below as I will concentrate my efforts on making the code releasable rather than simply workable for private projects.
As well, if you are interested I would like to know what you would deem a suitable payment model, as this will require some server upkeep; the project will begin completely free for sure, but as the upkeep rises then a small fee may be required to keep the servers running, although if possible I would love to keep a free option open for smaller projects.
No, I wouldn’t be interested. This si something I can jury-rig myself, besides controller needs buttons I can FEEL with my fingers. Cellphone buttons are painted on screen. So, unless you’re trying to utilize phone’s gyroscope/accelerometer, a phone would not make a good controller.
I’ve heard of similar things, but from what I can tell they don’t offer a free solution past two players which I feel is much too restrictive. If you find it do let me know though !
Thank you for the feedback, excellent idea about the gyroscope !
The way I’m planning on it working it could work on top of existing controllers, for example you have a whacky idea involving 12 people on a PS4? There aren’t enough controllers so this could supplement the lack of numbers
This is a pretty niche idea that works best with things that don’t need to worry about latency much, like You Don’t Know Jack and those kinds of games. Anything that could strongly benefit from visual representation on the controller (card games, etc) would also work really well.
Having to use your servers to connect to the game is going to be a major drawback, though, so if you can find some way for people to host their own servers (on Amazon, or their own hardware, etc) I think people would find it a lot more attractive. You could also offer free development hosting on your hardware and reasonably priced production hosting for those who opt for that, so long as they know they could always fall back to hosting their own if they had to.
Im aiming for minimal lag of course, to that end I was hypothesising using my server to point to the game instance itself, which could then handle the input itself, possibly even through the local wifi directly. What would you think of this alternative?
Local wifi or even better a Bluetooth connection would work better than server through an isp in my opinion. I use the fallout companion app on my tablet and like it alot. I think this should be something more widely used. I like being able to look at a realtime map and select items from inventory without using an onscreen menu. I often have thought of a sniper game similar to silent scope with a place to hold your phone in a gun controller that used your phone screen as the scope. It could even aid the tracking of the gun the same way wii controllers use accelerometers.
I believe one of the games that used external displays was zombii U or something, where one person was fighting and the other one was placing enemies on the map.
Fallout companion APP was also sorta decent. And then there was a app that could stream the game for using smartphone as a google cardboard VR viewer.
However, I definitely wouldn’t want this to have through developer’s servers. When an application needs me to open one more account, it is at very least annoying.
think this would mostly be cool, if it was used for more then a controller. Thinking a always open and intractable inventory screen or map. Or say your in a game like Elite Dangerous it be your navigation or contacts screen.
still dont see any need for a server at all, it is pretty easy to discover the device on a certain port on the lan. also this feature would work best if you are simply just streaming video to the device. Thinking something like Moonlight, but it is for streaming offscreen stuff
The moment where developers need to open account is the moment where they start losing the interest. At least that’s how it would work for me.
When you start talking about “accounts”, it becomes obvious that you’re very interested in building a community around your product, and then monetizing it, gathering statistics, and turning the participants into product. This is something I’d have no interest in supporting, and at one point you may decide to route all things through developers account, and that for a developer would be an inconvenience.
Your idea could work as a small asset store package. However, if you attempt to build a mini-empire around it, chance are someone will simply clone your tech.
Essentially it would pas through the server in case the game instance is not the right place for the traffic to go, if the game instance tells the server to redirect directly to the local game then so be it it will pas through wifi, if however the développer wishes to get the input somewhere else then so be it as well.
For example a cooperative online game where people share a screen. Computer a has a controller and a keyboard for example for two players then another computer has only a keyboard. A friend wants to use the screen from computer two, but instead of rerouting and slowing down the controls even more the developers wish for the phone controller to send it’s inputs directly to the server rather than to computer 2 who would then pass it on it would be possible to do so.
You want one computer to support 3 players in splitscreen, only display 2 players, and use external computer to display the third player’s screen. There will be extra lag on the external screen regardless of where control commands go - because even if the server performs all the calculations for movement (which it definitely shouldn’t be doing), the data for the other computer is still going to go through the network API and will be subject to the lag introduced by the overhead. In addition to that there will be a bigger lag between input and picture being displayed.
Also, if you have a GLOBAL server decide who connects to whom, then you’re gonna have a lot of fun if your players are behind the router. Or several.
A much better idea would be to let players decide locally which phone acts like which controller.
Yeah, I can’t see any reason to have external stuff in the mix.
Even though I’ve little experience in network programming, I can’t see myself using a 3rd party tool that requires connecting to the internet when the devices are in the same room and potentially even on the same network already.
… but… it MUST be usable without an internet connection at all
games without LAN = trash, not even worth $0.01
iam VERY interested in it though,
cause i want to have TONS of options for the players to play multiplayer, and couch coop on PC too
thats one of the biggest things ive seen that ive been ULTRA ULTRA mad about…
these games nowadays dont have multiplayer, dont have splitscreen, and make you buy 2 copies, 2 xboxs to play multiplayer = TOTAL TRASH
… i grew up rural, even now i only have like 10mb/s internet… but for the LONGEST TIME
i had 56k … and then 128k until like 2005? and then 1mb … then 3mb/s until 4 months ago i finally got 10mb/s
LAN without internet connection is a MUST!!!
i remember i HATED STEAM WITH VENGEANCE until like 2 years ago, cause i had a bad experience when Half Life 2 came out… had to be on the phone (dialup) for like 2 whole days to update (force update) and then it had to update again … another whole day, and then it wanted to update AGAIN before ever even being able to play the game… i just cancelled the install, never played it… and said SCREW YOU STEAM I BOYCOTT YOU!!! until like 2 years ago… lol … buddy bought me a game on steam, i wouldnt have bought it from them… lol then i started using steam… i think steam was really trash for the longest time wasnt it? they made it a bit better i guess… …steam is still pretty lame for modding and forced updates… alot of games need internet connected for steam too dont they?? … its super lame…
While I can understand the utility of such a proposal, I would never use such a plug-in personally.
For smartphone-application interfaces, it is much better to be relying on LAN-connectivity as opposed to a 3rd-party on-line service. Even for slower-paced or turn-based games, performance and speed are going to be desirable for interfaces. And frankly, Unity already provides all of the tools you would need for this king of functionality. I actually built a basic prototype for this kind of thing. It wasn’t very difficult, and since the 5.0 upgrade, it would be even less difficult. Everything an enterprising user might need is already built into the engine.
A more effective approach for such a proposal would be to come up with a customizable solution that focuses on standardizing and streamlining the process for LAN. An Asset like that with respectable pricing would probably do well.