[vcf-midatlantic] SpaceCommand test, Multi-Screen, Multi-Player network game[video]

[Dan Roganti]

SpaceCommand test [video]
I promised some of you that I would let you know this
This is the first test of Multi-Screen feature on this Multi-Player network
game
After a few months of glitches and brain-farts, this is working
This is basically one step above Multi-Player
This allows you to interact with any player in this virtual world
The virtual world is 8x screen wide on the C64 = 2560 pixels

One of the biggest glitches I came across was using Broadcast packets.
The problem slowed me down for a couple months.
that's why it was only 90% done
All of the network communication is done with UDP.
I found out eventually, that you can't use a consumer grade network switch
Because they don't let you provision the server to prevent loopbacks
So the server was getting inundated with it's own broadcast packets.
Almost as if there was a DDoS on the server.
So much so, the network lag in the game from the Server to the Players,
was as long as 2min - we had to time to believe it :)

I still have another glitch with Players 6,7,8
The missile can only fly on 5 screens at the moment
There's an issue with receiving packets on those players
And there's some anomaly on the Y axis when the missile flies in each screen
There's some jitter as if it's dropping the LSB bit somewhere.

The player screens are small cause the screenshot extend over 2 monitors
I'll have to make another video later with my tablet so I can zoom in closer
I turned off the soundfx for now
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mr1F8PMQd9I
Dan