Rpcs3: Multiplayer service collaboration (Aixen)

[haneefmubarak]

Someone mentioned over in haneefmubarak/aixen#10 that it would be nice for Aixen to support RPCS3.

Aixen aims to provide a networking service similar to LIVE/Steam, for Xenia and also new games developed in the future. Integration into future games and projects like Xenia will be done via the use of a C library.

However, to support projects such as Xenia, and in this case, RPCS3, certain changes must be made on the Aixen side of things, since both emulate specific functionalities and are also able to play a variety of games.

So I wanted to ask if you guys would be interested in working with us to have Aixen support RPCS3. All that you would need to do is provide someone who is somewhat familiar with PSN who is available to do related work on Aixen and give a username for whomever is most familiar with this project; the former would actively work on Aixen while the latter would only need to answer the occasional question about RPCS3.

So would you guys be interested in working with us so RPCS3 could have something similar to PSN, just like Xenia will have something similar to XBL?

[haneefmubarak]

After a bit of research, for the occasional contact person, I'd like to suggest one of:

• @AlexAltea
• @DHrpcs3
• @Hykem

[AlexAltea]

Well, afaik the original developers of RPCS3 are @DHrpcs3 and @Hykem so it's their opinion what really counts. I'm just another developer that joined later. Anyway here is my point of view:

Aixen seems to be more designed to Xbox360 than PS3. Since XBL and PSN probably work very different it might be confusing to handle both servers inside the same project. Anyway, that's not very important.

What really worries me is this: I think its too early for such a project for the PS3 (I don't know how the situation in Xenia is). I think the top priority here should be just the emulator. How can we even test the servers when 99,9% of the games just crash at some point during the loading stage?. Working on Cell and RSX should be our priorities. Even if we work on some HLE modules too, emulating PSN is far away from being relevant for RPCS3.

Of course, anyone is free to spend their time however they want. :smile: Once RPCS3 achieves a better status for more and more PS3 games, this may become interesting.

[lioncash]

Unrelated to the project largely, but as an infrequent contributor, I fully agree with what @AlexAltea has stated here:

I think its too early for such a project for the PS3 (I don't know how the situation in Xenia is). I think the top priority here should be just the emulator

[haneefmubarak]

@AlexAltea It's one coherent server that deals in a rather curious way: it doesn't emulate XBL, it provides a platform independent solution - the library and abstractions using the library will deal with specifics. The situation in Xenia is actually earlier than what you all have here (and I commend all of you for it).

That being said, no additional work is necessary on this end until you are ready - to be honest, all we really need is someone who can answer questions on specifics about RPCS3 and PSN.

If you read through Aixen's discussions and code, you'll see there isn't anything at all platform specific - the people who work on it just happen to be more familiar with X360, but everything is still kept quite agnostic.

As for testing, we do testing in our own ways, and your end will only need to be tested when you are ready. We can easily write test rigs on our side and even small applications that utilize our service.

The main reason I want some basic input from you guys now rather than later is that it is much easier to add things in as we go along rather than having to alter much later. However, as I said, the effort on your side should be negligible because all you guys will be doing is answering Q's.

[ghost]

Hi!
Like AlexAltea already pointed out, RPCS3 is still at a very early stage, so this kind of features aren't in our mid-term task list.

I regularly follow Xenia's progress and I saw the issue where you began discussing this project. I must say that this is a very interesting concept and I'm definitely interested in it.
The platform independent approach is complex, but, if successful, it's clearly a great addition to the emulation world.
Since you're developing Aixen in such an abstract level I think it would be nice to add RPCS3 in the mix.

There's not much to do right now with the emulator's themselves, but it would be interesting to have Aixen as an ongoing research project for a future PSN/XBL clone server implementation.

Please feel free to contact me and I'll try to help as much as I can.

[haneefmubarak]

@Hykem - added you as a collab to the Aixen project - so feel free to look around and comment on anything over there, anytime. :smile:

[tambry]

@haneefmubarak As the emulator has advanced quite far in the past months and some games need/want the PSN emulation to start up, it might be a good time to start developing Aixen into something that actually works.

[haneefmubarak]

Fair enough. I'm currently occupied, and likely will stay so for the next month or two, as I resume school and get back into that flow. I will be able to start working on Aixen and asking people back to it then. Anyways, you do realize that we aren't going to provide exactly what PSN provides, right?

Aixen will just provide a way to make matches and connect players. It will then provide a set of connections between a set number of players. What RPCS3 chooses to transmit over that will be entirely at the decisions of the RPCS3 project.

---

Also, the Roadmap and FAQ suggest that RPCS3 is nowhere near the stage where online networking becomes relevant.

Naturally, as I have not been following the project, I am not fully aware of how far the project has come. However, as RPCS3-Aixen liaison, I feel like @Hykem would have a much better idea than I, especially given his work here.

So @Hykem, is RPCS3 really fully ready to start working on networking yet, or is that still a future goal?

[ghost]

It's still more of a future goal, but we can already provide some early network testing in certain PS3 modules.
While it should only be useful for debugging purposes for now, it may later on develop into something more complete.

[tambry]

I guess using Aixen can be left out for some time, since I didn't realize it didn't provide some of the other features that PSN does.

[twdarkeh]

@AniLeo Since you appear to be cleaning issues, this hasn't been updated in nearly a year and a half, and the project has been dead since April 2014. Could it be closed?