Original Post
I'm working on a large-scale game project (MMOG) and I'm at a cross-roads in terms of where to go in terms of planning out the internal server-to-server communication. The two options I'm playing with are to either: a.) Build a distributed object API (similar to RakNet's Distributed Network Object) or b.) Build upon a purely packet messaging API I'll describe what I mean by each in some more detail. First, what I mean by a Distributed Object API, is something similar to how Quazal, RakNet, and in a minor way .NET Remoting, work for distributing an object across server boundaries. As a distributed object's properties change, their accompanying "ghost" objects on other servers would be transparently updated as well. Secondly, is the Packet Messaging API. This would basically involve creating packets or forwarding packet information between servers in a more manual way. This would be similar to how most Client/Server network apps work. I'm sure you get the idea :) The Pros and Cons for each method, that I forsee, are: Distributed Object API Pros: Elegant, easier to work with once it's setup, quite a bit more powerful in terms of usage, allows transparency. Cons: Takes longer to develop, is likely slower than the packet approach. Packet Messaging API Pros: Fast, simple to design and implement. Cons: Not nearly as elegant, requires manual encoding and decoding of commands/messages, can get messy when there are 100's of possible commands, requires distinct programming paradigms that tailor specifically to messaging. So, I would like some input, comments, suggestions on what you guys think of both of these approaches, and what you think would be best used in a MMOG. FYI... I care much more about learning how to do things the "right" way than taking the easy way out in order to finish the game. Thanks, synth0id
