External Server Match making confusion
I am looking to use external game servers with Playfab and I have read through
https://api.playfab.com/docs/tutorials/external-game-servers
It goes on it say that I use
https://api.playfab.com/documentation/Client/method/Matchmake to match maker players however what is the difference between that and the match making calls found here
https://api.playfab.com/documentation/Multiplayer#Matchmaking
The 2nd set of match making calls seem more complex and better to use. Are these supported with external servers?
Best Answer
There are three, technically:
Client/Matchmake: This is the legacy matchmaker, which you can use with hosted servers or externally hosted servers. Basically, the doc you listed first references that because that's the most common use case in the legacy model.
Multiplayer/Matchmaking: This is the newer, Entity-based matchmaker, which was recently rolled out. It is usable with our Server Hosting 2.0. This is unrelated to the first doc you referenced.
Matchmaker API: This third option is also part of the legacy service. It's an API you can use to drive calls to PlayFab from your own custom matchmaker server, if you want to use one.
Ok that clears things up. Are there any plans to support external servers with the entity based matchmaker sometime soon? Looking at the docs it seems like that is the only way to support multiple players on one match making ticket (i.e parties). This isn't really a key feature for me right now but will become one very soon.
If there currently no plans will Server Hosting 2.0 ever support light weight containers? The only reason I have external servers is due to being super light weight, i.e 200 millicores (in kubernetes terms) and less than 512mb ram. Running this in my own kubernetes cluster is way more cost efficient then paying for managed VMs. However doing that it seems like I am loosing features which is disappointing.
Yes, the plan is to have external servers supported in the new matchmaker once it reaches General Availability (tbd, depending on the feedback we get from folks in the preview - we're aiming for the end of the quarter, but I wouldn't take a hard dependency on June, as it could go a bit later). But since the answer to your second question is that we already support Containers (https://api.playfab.com/docs/tutorials/landing-tournaments/multiplayer-servers-2.0/debugging-playfab-multiplayer-platform-integration-locally), you may not need to wait on that.
Ok great and thanks for the link however I noticed that those docs are very windows based and then I scrolled down to Known Limitations and found this:
Linux is not currently supported, but will be added soon.
I only develop on Linux and don't have a Windows based computer that can do game development. My game's backend is also based in Golang and runs in Linux containers. I do realize though that this is somewhat of a unique situation.
