[Question] The Multiplayer Mod -- Is it Possible?

[redjoker5]

Hello, everyone! Right off the bat I want to say that this thread is not meant to whine and cry about the devs adding multiplayer to the game. I am already well aware that they don't intend to do so in the near future if at all. I just want to look at this from a mod perspective.

This is my first post in this forum, but I have been playing Don't Starve for a while now, and I must say this game quickly became one of my favorites of all time. The true, hardcore survival element is something that was missing from games like minecraft or terraria, where you could just make a cave in a mountain or a small house and live forever. But the more I play the game, the more I feel like it could use some type of multiplayer. Me and my cousin had a couple of side by side playthroughs and we could not help but crave the idea of being able to survive together in this wonderful world within Don't Starve. A 2-4 player Co-op would be amazing in my opinion. So I have the following questions for the Don't Starve modding community:

1. Would Klei support the creation of a multiplayer mod? The developers have already stated that they dont plan on adding multiplayer to the game. They have said that making the game work over a network would mean that the game would need to be heavily modified. So my question is would they allow modders to make this a possibility? Would they be ok with the community taking this task in their own hands while leaving them to keep focusing on the single player aspect of the game, which is amazing in my opinion. The game is so good it doesn't really need multiplayer, but I think it would certainly appeal to a lot of people.

2. How hard would it be to make a multiplayer mod? I am not much of a coder, but I assume that multiplayer support would need to be coded on a way deeper level than adding a backpack slot for example. Is the current modding system even capable of these type of modifications? And if not, would Klei grant modders the neccesary access to the game code to even try to make this type of mod?

3. Is there anyone interested in making such a mod? As a graphic designer, I have had to learn about both the graphical side of things as well as the coding side. I am a much bigger fan of the graphic side, but I love this game so much, I would honestly learn this coding language just to help someone make this a reality. I cannot die before I can go hunt spider queens with my buddies!

Thank you for your time.

New viewers, please read WrathOf's response and Kevin's response before posting to this thread. Thank you.

Edited March 24, 2013 by WrathOf

[Heavenfall]

As far as I can tell, the parts of the engine currently exposed do not include such possibilities.Even if it were possible to get some kind of server->client structure going, we must also keep in mind that the game is built from the ground up to be one player only. And I'm not talking about balance here. I'm talking about how the world interacts with the UI and the many objects in the world.For example take Chester. When you hover over chester you get the option to open him up and store items in him. So, let's look at it from a multiplayer perspective. Instead of following a single item, he has multiple items to follow. Instead of being opened by anyone, he should only be opened by his owner. Instead of prompting a UI to appear when opened, the UI should only open for the player that opened him. And so on. Now, that's just one tiny bit of the game that would need significant re-coding just to work with multiplayer.

Edited March 23, 2013 by Heavenfall

[redjoker5]

Yeah, I get what youre saying. There is no question that making this mod possible would be a lot of hard work, but just knowing if its possible could spur a group of modders to give it a shot. As for Chester, I have noticed that you can still make use of him without having the eyebone in your inventory. I have my eyebone on the floor next to my fireplace and Chester just stays in place but I can still use him as an extra chest. I keep my tools on him so when I need the tools, I just pick up the eyebone and he follows me. Maybe in multiplayer, you could make him usable by anyone, but he only follows the holder of the eyebone.

[Mark_Twain]

but just knowing if its possible could spur a group of modders to give it a shot.

It may even be easier to write a completely new game that is meant to be played online instead of modding a single player game into a multilayer game....I believe that anyone who could manage modding this game to add multiplayer could just as easily create his own game in the style of don't starve....

[Omnicast]

Easier? Ehh maybe. Impossible? Nope! I'd like to point out two games that I can think of off the top of my head that was released as single player then had co-op modded into it.Just Cause 2 and Doom 3. Although I'm not sure if both of them being FPS affects how easy it was to mod or not.We could just hope that Klei patches in a multiplayer mode after release like what System Shock 2 did, but since they did say that their main focus is on the single player aspect we should just assume they won't bother with co-op at all.

[Alpaca's, Starving]

Omni the Devs have been over this countless timesThat theres gonna be

[redjoker5]

Another game that was made to be single player and got a multiplayer mod was GTA: San Andreas. And it wasnt no 4-man co-op either. Those were 100+ people servers, and it was the most epic **** ever. But a game like this almost begs for co-op. Sure, some people like the alone in the world aspect of Don't Starve, but have you never wished you and your buddy could corner a koelefant so you could get meat for the winter?

[redjoker5]

Omni the Devs have been over this countless timesThat theres gonna be [ATTACH=CONFIG]5113[/ATTACH]

In case you forgot the read the OP, this thread is not to beg the devs to do it. Its to explore the possibilities of this being done through modding.

[BarovSoap]

1. Would Klei support the creation of a multiplayer mod?

The Devs would most likely allow it, however, who would be hosting it?

2. How hard would it be to make a multiplayer mod?

It would require to change most of the game's coding, that's a big part of why they don't want to include it.

[Alpaca's, Starving]

[MENTION=17682]redjoker5[/MENTION] THERE ENGINES CAN HANDLE ITDon't starve's can't for ***** sake it's just not built like thatGTA:MP was a project done by about 4-5 people because the engine was easy to bypass with code to do with MP same with Just cause 2 and all the others

[redjoker5]

It may even be easier to write a completely new game that is meant to be played online instead of modding a single player game into a multilayer game....I believe that anyone who could manage modding this game to add multiplayer could just as easily create his own game in the style of don't starve....

GTA San andreas was a single player game and massive multiplayer was added quite easily. Not just that but a whole server structure a la minecraft. And minecraft was actually meant to be multiplayer. So no, I dont think this is correct.

[redjoker5]

[MENTION=17682]redjoker5[/MENTION] THERE ENGINES CAN HANDLE ITDon't starve's can't for ***** sake it's just not built like thatGTA:MP was a project done by about 4-5 people because the engine was easy to bypass with code to do with MP same with Just cause 2 and all the others

I think if the multiplayer problem was due to engine limitations, the devs would have just said so. They clearly said the game would need to be recoded to implement a multiplayer feature, which was a time consuming task they were not willing to do at this point, not that it was impossible because of limitations of the engine. So unless someone can verify this, I will assume it is false.

[Alpaca's, Starving]

It's both.Now close this useless thread.It's been here many times before and it'll never happen so please stop trying to make it happen

[WrathOf]

I was debating on whether to even bother saying anything but to be clear....

I consider this a legitimate mod request albeit one that requires experienced modders with skills in developing a client/server architecture, handling netcode and coordinating event streams among the instances of the game across the lan and/or net.

Those that do not want this feature do not need to post negative comments here on why it cannot be or should not be done. If you are not interested in this feature then don't concern yourself with it. This is not the general discussion or game suggestion/feedback area. thx

There is no debate here as much as a question of whether it is possible or not with what is available to the modders so far.

To be even clearer....the devs have decided for several reasons to *not* provide a multiplayer/co-op version of the game. It is therefore up to the modding community to produce it if they want it bad enough to go through all the hassle of making it work.

Kevin has already stated that they are ok with the modding community attempting to make a multiplayer mod and in fact would be very impressed if they could accomplish it.

--------

To me the biggest question is how to manage the simulator at the server and client levels and coordinating the entities and events across them. Seems as though you would need a 'server" version of the simulator so you can run it alongside a "client" version on the same machine. The "client" version of the simulator would run in "passive mode" and just receive the changes provided by the "server" version via the lan/net.

I would not expect Klei to provide source code for the game's executable (which contains the simulator) but they *might* be agreeable to at least provide an alternate "server" build that you could control with Lua and method(s) on the simulator to feed it entity info for the "client" version that the modders make.

At the moment, I would envision in broad strokes that the server would generate the map, save it and pass it down to the clients for them to load, the server would manage all entities except the character which each client would manage. This may have to be adjusted to deal with the issue of entity sleep/wake states in the vicinity of the characters though. Much beyond this I would no idea since I have no experience in such things or interest in pursuing it.

[shoseta]

The Devs would most likely allow it, however, who would be hosting it?

How about the players themselves, I can't imagine that a multi player mod for don't starve would support more than just a handful of players ,heck even 2 players. So you wouldn't need a super computer to host a server for you and a friend. Off Topic: Why the bashing and the hate on the original poster? He was asking a polite question, not instigating a flame war or whining. He is just curious. I'm kind of disappointed to see most of you are just straight up "BAAW close this pointless thread". Why? If you don't like it no one's making you read what people are talking about in here. I thought this community could do better than that. Ontopic:I'm thinking that the devs would have to give permision for more than just a part of the code to mod. Meaning that the whole thing would have to be available in order to make such a mod possible. I'm not a hardcore modder or anything but I did try my hand at some things. Basically it depends on how much of the code is made available to modders. Though a mod for multi does sound like an interesting idea

[Alpaca's, Starving]

Sorry [MENTION=10271]WrathOf[/MENTION] I didn't want to offend anybody I just am starting to hate these Threads poping up here and there and everywhereI'm guessing that second bit would take more time than anyone has on there hands

[shoseta]

Sorry [MENTION=10271]WrathOf[/MENTION] I didn't want to offend anybody I just am starting to hate these Threads poping up here and there and everywhereI'm guessing that second bit would take more time than anyone has on there hands

True but time and time again I saw dedicated modders do incredible feats disregarding the fact that they embarked on a battle with the windmills sort of speak.

[WrathOf]

So far, I have not seen any modders for this game who are experienced enough to take on this mod, myself included.It may take the release of the game before enough modders show up and a few of them want to take this on together.EDIT:Oh and I am not sure at the moment that you must have the executable's source code to accomplish this mod as long as they provide a non-gui server version (that does not require a steam/chrome key or uses the same as the client) and callback hooks into the simulator to run it in "passive" mode as I am calling it.Creation of new entities would need to be processed by the server to ensure unique guids and then "loaded" into the client simulator so it can take it from there to manage the interactions locally.Most of the events generated on the client side would need to be pushed up to the server, processed and then pushed down to the other client(s).All of this of course does not address the player interface in setting up a new game or connecting to a server running a game.I do not envision a server handling multiple games at once other than setting up a game server machine running multiple virtual machines/terminal services, one for each game.

Edited March 23, 2013 by WrathOf

[redjoker5]

How about the players themselves, I can't imagine that a multi player mod for don't starve would support more than just a handful of players ,heck even 2 players. So you wouldn't need a super computer to host a server for you and a friend.

Off Topic: Why the bashing and the hate on the original poster? He was asking a polite question, not instigating a flame war or whining. He is just curious. I'm kind of disappointed to see most of you are just straight up "BAAW close this pointless thread". Why? If you don't like it no one's making you read what people are talking about in here. I thought this community could do better than that.

Ontopic:

I'm thinking that the devs would have to give permision for more than just a part of the code to mod. Meaning that the whole thing would have to be available in order to make such a mod possible. I'm not a hardcore modder or anything but I did try my hand at some things. Basically it depends on how much of the code is made available to modders.

Though a mod for multi does sound like an interesting idea

So far, I have not seen any modders for this game who are experienced enough to take on this mod, myself included.

It may take the release of the game before enough modders show up and a few of them want to take this on together.

What I was thinking would be a 2-4 player coop with 4 being the maximum. The point is to survive with 2-3 friends, not to make an entire world of 150 people, to preserve the survivalist element of the game.

THANK YOU! The point of this thread was never to just beg for multiplayer like most threads I have seen on the subject. I just wanted to discuss the possibilities of this being accomplished through a mod instead of through the developers. People who are just crying for the thread to be closed and the possibility of multiplayer to be dismissed are not welcome here.

Hopefully this happens one day

Edited March 23, 2013 by redjoker5

[Heavenfall]

There's just one person asking for the thread to be closed, the other replies are on-topic as far as I can see. So enough with the melodrama.

[redjoker5]

Yeah but he's done it like 4 times already. It's annoying. If he wants to make a "kill all multiplayer requests" thread, he can go ahead and do that. But not in my thread.

[WrathOf]

Sure, 2-4 makes the most sense given the genre and size of the maps currently.To me the fundamental work is the same though regardless of number other than scalability of the code. Seems like Lua should be adequate to handle 2-4 players without having to go to C++/C# or whatever. This would be preferred in keeping it open source and accessible to more modders to maintain it over a longer period of time.Plus this mod should keep in mind support for upcoming Mac and *nix versions of the game and possibly the Chrome version (doubtful on that one )

[Xemgoa]

Perhaps in the future. If Bethesda had Creation kits for games like Skyrim and Fallout: New vegas + Fallout 3, Whats to stop the dev's to allow a sort of creation kit, and advanced scripting and engine modifying?I would really look forward to something like this. to be able to cooperate together. In itself as the game is, that would be a much of a challenge as trying to live off a world generated to sustain one guy. Two player's present means they would have to think smart, make tough choices and be conservative. If your buddy dies, and no means of reviving him/her means hes gone till you get something up to do so.But yeah...Hopefully in the future there will tools, or files in the game itself getting polished over to allow almost complete modification of the entire game will make this, and much more to come, possible.OFF TOPIC:

Like... Being able to have more breed's of Small/Tallbird's in Don't Starve... Instead of having your greatest pal grow up and fight with ya... Till you have to make the hard decision to end its life due to the fact its adult stage will kick your ass, let alone if you soon have food only to support yourself. Instead, depending on their diet and environment their raised in will effect what breed of TeenBird or Tall bird they grow into. Like being exposed near the Coast makes it a CoastBird when it hits the Teen or Adult stage, or Adult stage if late, where it fishes with its long legs to fetch fish for itself or the player. Or a SavanhaBird, where its taken on a shorter, burly and wooly like appearance of the Beefalo, Where its shorter but slightly strong, only slightly higher health pool then its kind. But its protective of the player. In the Heat season for Beefalo, it mimic's this as a draw back by killing anything that approaches the player. Or a FrostBird, Thats raised and more akin to the Frozen environment. ITs capable of actually going out and getting its out food when hungry rather then turning hostile, which means its stronger and most likely a hunter type. Otherwise it follows the player away and doesn't like really heated sources like fire sinces its new fur keeps it warm enough.Stuff like that. Which means it doesn't have to eventually grow into the adult stage, and you have to make that hardest decision to fight it head on, since it somehow doesn't remember you anymore and want's to kick your tookus because its instincts cause it to be VERY territorial to a point of blind fury and no self-preservation. Where a good majority of Tallbird can either remain a follower to the player, some will just be aggressive to all or somethings. Some will become more relaxed and passive to some or all things. It'll be up to what the player wants.

But this? This won't be easy. But it'll be a gem. I know Klei never considered of adding in Multiplayer... But was so very kind to let us take part in creating somethings we know that can be made as a modification for the game we like and Love....But this got me thinking, see? If by then Don't Starve finally reaches its official, stable version. And there is a official, stable, bug free Multiplayer mod fully developed and checked over twice for any further problems, designed for Don't Starve, would you think they would appreciate it and integrate the mod into the Client itself so its a normal feature?

[Mark_Twain]

What a liverish alpaca...

So far, I have not seen any modders for this game who are experienced enough to take on this mod, myself included.

Right now i haven't even seen people successfully adding new animations or images into the game...

GTA San andreas was a single player game and massive multiplayer was added quite easily. Not just that but a whole server structure a la minecraft. And minecraft was actually meant to be multiplayer. So no, I dont think this is correct.

That is truly amazing, i tried to code multiplayer (no mod) once and haven't even managed to do some lag compensation system...

[WrathOf]

Luckily this mod would not require creating new assets, just managing them as needed. Support for mods on a multiplayer setup is another question altogether. :DSo far we can make and load new textures for inventory items, crafting menu ui and such....but no, changing or adding anim files which control the bulk of the game's graphics is not properly supported yet.