Column #134; By Kent Wang

[DanQ]

Kent Wang re-investigates the model used for multi-player gamers, and offers an alternative in his latest article entitled "A Model For A Cheat-Free Game".

Comments/questions welcomed.

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Dan; Apolyton CS

[UltraSonix]

The column mentioned a "slight" lag - but with so many transactions: imagine a large civ with heaps of units being moved, improvements being built, etc. Even a slight lag per transction will lead to a longer game, wouldn't it?

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[DarthVeda]

Yeah the problem arises in the fact that Civ uses OLD networking technology and that a main server would cause ultra lag for players (Imagine waiting for a packet from a server supporting about 40 - 50 consecutive games).

[Kwang]

Lag would only occur when a game requests new information. Most commands don't require new gamestate info, like reassigning build orders, changing governments, etc. All those commands could be executed immediately on the client end and the command is sent to the server concurrently. In most cases, the client would not have to wait at all.

[MacHatter]

Please excuse this shameless plug for freeciv . The article includes the folowing line

A better solution would be to create an independent server that would mediate all transactions.

This is exactly how freeciv works. The only major difference is individuals can host the server on their own computer. If you don't trust users to be honest with their servers, you can use one of the public civservers. For a list of curent games, you can look at the metaserver. To download freeciv, click here. Freeciv is curently available for all Linux users. There is a windows version avalable, and I've been doing work on a mac version, but it isn't ready yet (and may not be any time soon). On a side note, there was an article in the june 2000 issue of Game Developer that you might find interesting. This article talks about designing a program to reduces the ease of cheeting. And security through obscurity isn't an answer.

Andy Black
Mac Freeciv Port Manager

(edited to add content)
[This message has been edited by MacHatter (edited October 01, 2000).]

[DaveV]

It's been proven, time after time, that hackers will find a way around any security system. If someone really wants to cheat, he will; anti-cheating measures are like the lock on my front door - there to keep the honest people honest.

In the end, you have to trust the people you're playing with. I think the vast majority of people are looking for a fun, challenging, and fair game.

[Kwang]

MacHatter: Great. I guess I'm sane after all. Now, we'll just have to wait for the game companies to follow suit.

I read the same article, but all it advocates is encryption, which can still be hacked away.

DaveV: There is absolutely no way this system can be hacked. One might be able to hack or takedown the server that is hosting the system, but it's downright impossible to steal information or send invalid commands to the server.