The Server Meshing Wars Have Begun

Any discussion about large-scale player-versus-player fights in an MMO eventually includes EVE Online. The title from CCP Games not only holds world records for largest fight in a video game (8825 players), but most concurrent participants in a multiplayer video game PvP battle (6557) as well. Any game offering EVE-sized battles will attract players just out of curiosity.  Currently two companies, Cloud Imperium Games and Intrepid Studios, are working on a technology they believe will put them in the conversation of games capable of hosting large-scale battles.

The technology is called dynamic server meshing. Both Cloud Imperium Games and Intrepid Studios published videos last week proclaiming their progress on the technology. But before diving into the videos, I perhaps should explain what server meshing and dynamic server meshing mean in the real world.

I turned to Copilot to summarize the technology as my backend server infrastructure knowledge is from ten years ago. First I asked: What is server meshing?

Server meshing is a technology that allows multiple servers to connect together and work seamlessly as if they were a single large server. This technology is used to overcome the limitations of a single server’s capacity.

Here’s how it works:

• The system divides the workload among multiple servers, each handling a different part of the game world or application.
• These servers are interconnected in a “mesh” network, where each server is connected to every other server.
• This allows for efficient communication and data exchange between servers.
• When a user moves from one part of the game world (or application) to another, the responsibility for that user is transferred from one server to another.
• This transfer is done seamlessly, without the user noticing any interruption or delay.

I then wanted to know about dynamic server meshing and what the dynamic part of the term meant.

Dynamic server meshing is an advanced form of server meshing technology used in video games and other large-scale online applications.

Here’s how it works:

• Unlike static server meshing where servers are pre-allocated and cannot be changed, dynamic server meshing allows servers to be dynamically moved as needed.
• It allows for dynamic scaling of servers based on player movements, optimizing server resources in high-population areas and reducing costs in less populated regions.
• The technology also enables servers to stream in and out as needed, potentially shutting down unused servers to save resources.
• In the context of video games, this means that different parts of a game world can be hosted by different servers, and these servers can be dynamically adjusted based on the number of players in each part of the world.

All links, at least according to Copilot, lead to CIG and its MMO under development, Star Citizen. What led to this article was the company posting a documentary-style video about server meshing and CIG's pursuit of the technology. The video concludes with a statement about how the developers will deploy static server meshing to the Persistent Universe in Alpha 4.0 and the conditions in which the company will proceed with the development of dynamic server meshing. I liked the video for the history, but for a 13 minute explanation of CIG's version of the technology, I turned to a well-respected YouTube creator, Space Tomato.

If Alpha 4.0 does indeed launch during the current quarter, it likely will conflict with Intrepid Studio's release of its Alpha 2 test for Ashes of Creation. During a 3 July broadcast, the company revealed plans to introduce dynamic server meshing in the upcoming test. Following the link leads to the video embed on the Ashes of Creation website. Tech nerds should definitely watch the video. But for those who don't have 75 minutes, I found the below 13 minute video by Narc, a long time Ashes of Creation YouTube creator, an excellent watch.

What I found most interesting in the video was the comparison of the tech in Ashes of Creation with that in Star Citizen and World of Warcraft.

I've addressed the topic of server meshing from this post's title, but where does the concept of war come into play? While the games exist in different genre (science fiction vs fantasy) they have three things in common. First, both games are PvP titles. The second is both are crowd funded, with the Star Citizen Kickstarter raising $2.1 million in 2012 and the Ashes of Creation Kickstarter bringing in $3.2 million in 2016. The final similarity is both are much delayed from the estimated dates of delivery given on their respective Kickstarter campaign pages.

How delayed? Star Citizen famously gave an estimated deliver date of November 2014. Missing a delivery date by 10 years and counting is quite a feat. But Intrepid Studio, with an estimated deliver date for Ashes of Creation of December 2018 isn't that far behind.

And now we get to the matter of content drops. Both Star Citizen's Alpha 4.0 and Ashes of Creation's Alpha 2 were both expected to launch sometime in the third quarter of 2024. With the announcement of Alpha 3.24 last month, I no longer expect Alpha 4.0 and server meshing to launch in 2024. I expect CIG to launch Alpha 3.24 in the weeks leading up to CitizenCon on 19-20 October.

Intrepid Studio, on the other hand, has an incentive to launch its Alpha 2 in October instead of during the third quarter. The next World of Warcraft expansion, The War Within, is scheduled to launch on 26 August. Perhaps more importantly, Throne and Liberty, a game more comparable to Ashes, should launch on 17 September. The Intrepid Studio leadership might want to delay the launch of Alpha 2 to mid-October not only avoid completing with either title, but take advantage of the extra development time.

In the end, does all the fuss and commotion over server meshing really mean anything? For Intrepid Studio, I think so. The company's story will change from a company making a vaporware game to one that took the time to not only upgrade Ashes' engine from Unreal Engine 4 to Unreal Engine 5, but also develop a solution allowing for massive fights where a much bigger company with even more financial resources failed. As for Cloud Imperium Games, they still have Squadron 42 to launch next year. The launch should make up for any decrease in Star Citizen related sales. And for the rest of us, lots of Star Citizen white knights telling us how we should think about the entire situation.