@larGe:
Massivizing Online Games
using Cloud Computing
Alexandru Iosup
Parallel and Distributed Systems Group,
Delft University of Technology,
The Netherlands
VENI – @larGe: Massivizing Online Games using Cloud Computing
1
Cloud Computing
VENI – @larGe: Massivizing Online Games using Cloud Computing
Joe’s Small Online Gaming Studio
# of Users
Predictor + IT Source ($)
My research:
Dynamic
Cloud
+
@minutes
(1$-1M$)
Exponential
growth
Year
Dynamic
Own
@90 days + (10M$/iter)
Static
+
Own
(100M$)
Variability is Joe’s unsolved problem
VENI – @larGe: Massivizing Online Games using Cloud Computing
The Scientific Challenge
Variability is one of the few unsolved
problems in Computer Science
Devise a software and hardware architecture that can
tolerate high variability without service degradation,
just by adding more resources.
•
•
•
•
•
Grow and shrink infrastructure automatically
Replace faulty parts automatically
Automation is efficient
One support engineer regardless of scale
I’ve tackled similar problems for grids and P2P systems
VENI – @larGe: Massivizing Online Games using Cloud Computing
Research Challenge
Variability =
Player + Non-Player Interaction
?
?
?
VENI – @larGe: Massivizing Online Games using Cloud Computing
Research Challenge
New IT Fabric = Cloud + New
Variability-Aware Methods
?
VENI – @larGe: Massivizing Online Games using Cloud Computing
What if Joe is not into Gaming?
e-Science
e-Collaboration
e-Architecture
VENI – @larGe: Massivizing Online Games using Cloud Computing
Extra Slides
VENI – @larGe: Massivizing Online Games using Cloud Computing
8
Why Am I the Person to Work on This?
Why Should the Netherlands Fund This?
• Gaming is entertainment branch with highest revenue
Human Capital:
• NL is 27th +
“A longer-term
challenge for some
European countries
is encouraging
more graduates to
choose sciencerelated subjects.”
but
Source: The Economist, Benchmarking IT industry
competitiveness 2009 http://portal.bsa.org/2009eiu/study/2009_eiu_global.pdf
Gaming, the New World
Exponential
growth
Sources: MMOGChart, own research.
•
•
•
•
•
Market: 7BN$/year
250,000,000+ players
10,000+ online games
Success kills small companies
Only big companies can
join market (1BN+)
Sources: ESA, MPAA, RIAA.
Stop innovating and
the growth stops tomorrow!
VENI – @larGe: Massivizing Online Games using Cloud Computing
11
MSG, MMOG, MMO, …
up to 40% operation costs
Massivized Online Games =
online games with massive
numbers of players (100K+), for
which the social interaction
improves the experience
1. Virtual world
Old variability source
+
up to 40% revenue
2. Game data
Player activity, stats,
and (social)
relationships
Romeo and Juliet
“Data deluge” = New variability source
VENI – @larGe: Massivizing Online Games using Cloud Computing
12
Is Lack of Data a Risk? (Reviewer #2)
Situation world-wide
• “Unfortunately, I am not able to release any of the data. Sony still
considers it proprietary, and we can't control that.” –
Sony “releases” EverQuest data
• “Unfortunately, CCP won't allow me to make their data publicly
available for EVE Online.” – CCP “releases” EVE Online data
My situation: NO Risk
• Spent three years collecting data for gaming and clouds
• KGS, OpenTTD, RuneScape, WoW, AmazonWS, GoogleAE, RightScale
• Prior to this, spent five years collecting data for grids, P2P, general
The Grid Workloads Archive
• 6 traces online, over 20 in total
• Toolset for analysis/statistical modeling
Why Near-Real-Time Gaming Analytics?
(Reviewer #2)
Situation world-wide
• More detailed/faster analysis is constant concern
• “Data deluge” in E-Science etc.
• TNO thinks it’s big
Online Gaming
• Three years ago gaming analytics was not a market
• Last year Zynga made ~700M$, mainly from it
• Playtomic, Kontangent, Mochibot: using own infrastructure,
reduced refresh time from weeks to hours (minutes, early 2011)
• Zillians thinks it’s big