I see many different questions about Colyseus and Defold in various chats/places. And looks like very little lands on the forum. So I’ll try to collect that scattered experience and I inspire others to copy/paste useful bits to the forums, so it is searchable to others.
Here’s a nice chat from Defold’s slack:
totebo [11:00 AM]
Has anyone here had experience with the Colyseus multiplayer server?
sven [11:01 AM]
Not yet, I want to try it but haven’t had the time
Looks promising though!
evangelist [11:03 AM]
guess @SelimAnac is an expert: Colyseus - Tic Tac Toe Multiplayer Example
also @cytherabbit poked around it, to my knowledge
Selim Anac [11:14 AM]
@evangelist @totebo not an expertJust made some tryouts with it. Feel free to ask anything, I’ll be glad if I can help.
totebo [11:16 AM]
Thanks guys! I’m researching the possibility of creating a four-player turn based game. Is Colyseus the closest to a plug-and-play option for Defold currently? (edited)
totebo [11:19 AM]
@Selim Anac How well does Colyseus handle multiple servers and scalability?
Selim Anac
[11:21 AM]
Yes Colyseus is very very closest to a plug-and-play. It is easy to use. It is a practical solution for a small size games. (edited)
totebo [11:22 AM]
Nice! I’m looking for a solution that can SCALE if needed, though.
Selim Anac [11:23 AM]
It can scale but honestly I don’t recomended it for large projects.
http://colyseus.io/docs/api-server/#optionspresence
colyseus.io
Server - Colyseus v0.9.x
Documentation for Colyseus Multiplayer Game Server for Node.js
http://colyseus.io/docs/api-presence/
colyseus.io
Presence - Colyseus v0.9.x
Documentation for Colyseus Multiplayer Game Server for Node.js
totebo [11:24 AM]
That looks good, similar to a solution I used for No Brakes io. Is the reason you can’t recommend it the single point of failure? Or something else?
britzl [11:31 AM]
@Selim Anac Why don’t you recommend it for large projects?
Selim Anac [11:33 AM]
First of all it is a Node.js app(edited)
It is expensive to use on server side.
Defold version of Colyseus is using a msgpack-lua algorithm cause frame drops: Colyseus - Multiplayer Game Client & Server - #23 by nik.dreml
Which is why I’m working on C++ NE with threads for handling websocket connection and binary serialiation.
(expensive because of the cpu and mem usage)
I didn’t test it’s scaling features.
So I can’t say anything about it, sorry.
totebo [11:38 AM]
The frame drops is mainly because it’s a synchronous game? The one I’m planning to make is asynchronous.
Selim Anac [11:44 AM]
I think so. Heavy realtime calculations may cause this issue. It may suit well for asynchronous game.
Your game’s logic is very important there. If it is a puzzle game… like a word game, you can do whatever you want. Colyseus with Defold is more than enough for it. (edited)
But if you are planning something like this: Family Age
You can’t handle it with Colyseus. Actually you can, but your server costs go higher and higher.
Selim Anac [11:58 AM]
One more thing; there isn’t build in matchmaking solution in Colyseus. It has matchmaking cycle but you should implement your logic. Matchmaking is a totally other and complex subject
totebo [11:58 AM]
Ok great info.
The game I’m making is for Facebook Instant. So I think I can let Facebook deal with that.
Selim Anac [12:01 PM]
Ah this is great. But highly recommend to test it is performance first. Html build in FB Canvas may cause other problems.
A specially on mobile