Bandwidth requirement and state consistency in three multiplayer game architectures

Abstract— Multiplayer games become increasingly popular, mostly because they involve interaction among humans. Typically, multiplayer games are organized based on a Client-Server (CS) or a Peer-to-Peer (PP) architecture. In CS, players exchange periodic updates through a central server that is also responsible for resolving any state inconsistencies. In PP, each player communicates with every other player while state inconsistencies are resolved through a distributed agreement protocol. In this paper, we first examine these architectures from two perspectives: bandwidth requirement at the server and players, and latency to resolve any player state inconsistencies. Our results are based on both analysis and experimentation with an open-source game called “BZFlag”. The CS architecture is not scalable with the number of players due to a large bandwidth requirement at the server. The PP architecture, on the other hand, introduces significant overhead for the players, as each player...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2003
• Where: NETGAMES
• Authors: Joseph D. Pellegrino, Constantinos Dovrolis
• Keywords: Bandwidth Requirement, Multiplayer Games, NETGAMES 2003, State Inconsistencies