NL2002558C2

NL2002558C2 - METHOD AND SERVER FOR MULTI-PLAYER GAMING.

Info

Publication number: NL2002558C2
Application number: NL2002558A
Authority: NL
Inventors: Laurens Hendricus Jan Bushoff; Wouter Arnold Brackel; Jasper Petrus Hermanus Wanrooy
Original assignee: Chatventure B V
Priority date: 2009-02-24
Filing date: 2009-02-24
Publication date: 2010-08-25
Also published as: WO2010098660A1

Description

Method and server for multi-player gaming Field of the invention

The present invention relates to a method for providing a gaming web 5 application, the gaming web application comprising an execution of a game play, the method comprising executing a gaming web application using a gaming server, and accepting subscription by the gaming server of at least two clients for playing the game play. In a further aspect, the present invention relates to a server in communication with an IP network and at least two clients connected to the IP network, and in an even 10 lurther aspect, the present invention relates to a computer program product.

Prior art

Such a method is known from various Internet web sites, where a service provider allows visitors to play a game on its web site.

15

Summary' of the invention

The present invention seeks to provide an improved and different version of such a method, allowing attractive and exciting game play.

According to the present invention, a method according to the preamble defined 20 above is provided, in which the game play comprises a plurality of player input types, the plurality of player input types being divided in two or more parts which in combination form an entire player input set for the game play, each of the two or more parts being obtained by the gaming server from a different one of the at least two clients via a network. This allows to provide a multi-player game, and having split 25 controls of the game actors for multiple players. In order to be able to play the game correctly, the multiple players will have to co-operate to reach the game goals, which add an attractive and exciting aspect to this game play.

In a further embodiment, the gaming server is in simultaneous communication with all of the at least two clients. This may be accomplished using a jabber type of 30 platform, where a gaming server accepts subscription from multiple clients, monitors all clients, sends messages to clients and checks replies from clients. The replies from the clients can be combined again to use as input for the game play.

2

The latency between gaming server and each of the at least two clients is less than 100 msec in a further embodiment, e.g. less than 50 msec. This allows correctly processing all the player input data to allow the behavior of the game play to precisely implement the mutual dependency for the players using the combination of different 5 player input types. The latency is a timing determined by the hardware and software involved. The reaction time of a player is not included in this timing parameter. The user inputs can be viewed as a continuous reaction to the subsequent game states presented to each user of the at least two clients.

In an embodiment the gaming server is a server using an extensible Messaging 10 and Presence Protocol (XMPP) to communicate with the at least two clients. The clients, which are acting as e.g. Jabber clients, can then provide the player inputs correctly and timely to the gaming server.

The method comprises in a further embodiment receiving inputs from all the subscribed clients by the gaming server within a maximum time interval (dtmax) from 15 sending out a new game state to the at least two clients. This maximum time interval is e.g less than 50 msec to allow a very smooth game play progression. When the maximum time interval is limited to less than 100 msec it is still possible to provide a sufficiently smooth game play experience to the at least two clients. Also, the maximum lime interval may be dependent on the game play situation, where in game 20 phases comprising more actions, a lower maximum time interval is used. The inputs received by the gaming server comprise player inputs, but may also be mere indication that a connection with that client still exists. The actual time interval between sending out a new game state and receiving an input from any of the at least two clients may be different for each client. The definition of a maximum time interval allows to receive 25 inputs at different points in time from each of the at east two clients, and still remain consistent in calculating new game states.

The gaming web application is implemented as a Java or Flash client in a web page in a further embodiment. This allows players to access the game play using cobrowsing to a specific web page or Internet site.

30 In a further embodiment, the gaming server is also executing a messaging client allowing the at least two clients to communicate with each other. This may enhance the game play perception and add to the excitement of the game play. Furthermore, the 3 messaging may also be used for other purposes, e.g. for registering a client by the gaming server.

The plurality of player input types may comprise a control of an x-axis rotation and control of a y-axis rotation, and the plurality of player input types is divided in two 5 parts. This subdivision of the player input types might be applied in the game known as Balance Ball, which mimics a board on which a ball is to follow a route using gravity forces.

The plurality of player input types may also comprise a control of movement of a displayed item and control of rotation of a displayed item, and the plurality of player 10 input types is divided in two parts. This type of subdivision may be applied in Tetris type of games.

The plurality of player input types comprises in a further embodiment a first control set and a second control set, the first control set comprising control of a magnet on/off switch and control of movement of a board in x-direction, the second control set 15 comprising control of a magnet movement direction and control of a board in y-direction. This type of subdivision may e.g. be used in the game called Junkyard Huzzle, where a crane must be operated and moved.

The plurality of player input types may also comprise a first control set and a second control set, the first control set comprising movement control of an object, the 20 second control set comprising speed control of the object. As will be clear, also other subdivisions may be applied, even using more than two subsets of player input types to allow three or more players to co-operate from remote locations to play a single game play.

Tn a further aspect, the present invention relates to a server in communication 25 with an IP network and at least two clients (e.g. connected to the IP network), the server being arranged to provide a gaming web application in an IP network and to accept subscription of the at least two clients, the gaming web application page being accessible through a browser application being executed in each of the at least two clients, in which the server is further arranged to implement the method according to 30 any one of the method embodiments described above. The method may also be implemented in a peer-to-peer computer environment in which multiple computers or computer systems are in communication with each other. A client sends all input 4 signals to the other clients. Each client calculates the new game state itself based on the inputs of other clients.

The server is in communication with at least one client of a first type and at least one client of a second type in a further embodiment, e.g. one client being formed by a 5 laptop computer and a second client being formed by a mobile phone (PDA).

In an even further aspect the present invention relates to a computer program product comprising computer executable code, which when loaded on a computer system in communication with two or more clients via a network, provides the computer system with the functionality of the method according to any one of the 10 method embodiments described above.

Short description of drawings

The present invention will be discussed in more detail below, using a number of exemplary embodiments, with reference to the attached drawings, in which 15 Fig. 1 depicts an embodiment of a communication environment in which the present invention embodiments are implemented;

Fig. 2 depicts a graphical view of an embodiment of the present invention;

Fig. 3 depicts an exemplary embodiment of a game play web page according to an embodiment of the present invention; 20 Fig. 4 depicts a further exemplary embodiment of a game play web page according to an embodiment of the present invention; and

Fig. 5 depicts a timing diagram of an exemplary game play indicating data flows according to an embodiment of the present invention.

25 Detailed description of exemplary embodiments

The present invention finds its application in computer networks such as the Internet, graphically depicted in the exemplary diagram of Fig. 1. In the embodiment shown, multiple clients 1,2 are connected to an Internet Protocol (IP) network 4, to which also a gaming server 3 is connected. The present application relates to the 30 provision of a multi-player game, which is available in a co-browsing environment, i.e.

in a web application which is accessible at the same time for more than one, i.e. two or more clients 1, 2 in the network 4.

5

The clients 1,2 can be implemented in various alternatives, ranging from regular PC’s or laptops connected to the Internet 4 via a service provider, to mobile terminals such as smart phones, or even dedicated playing terminals. The clients 1,2 may also be of a different type, e.g. one player is participating in a game using a laptop computer 5 while another player is participating using a mobile phone. Each of these clients 1,2 has the ability to output audiovisual data, e.g. relating to the play of a game, and to relay player input data to the network 4. The player input data may relate to regular key input (using a general keyboard or a dedicated game keyboard), mouse input, joystick input, or player input data originating from processed audiovisual data (images, video, 10 sound, speech, etc.).

The gaming server 3 is depicted in Fig. 1 as a stand-alone server connected to the network 4. However, the gaming server may also be part of or implemented as part of a computer system connected to the network 4. The gaming server 3 is provided with processing and memory resources and a way to process input and apply logic to it, 15 which allow it to provide a web based application, including a gaming web application.

In Fig. 2, a more detailed view is given of an exemplary embodiment of the present invention. Schematically it is shown that the gaming server 3 (indicated in dashed lines) provides a web page 5, accessible for clients 1,2 via the network 4. The provisioning of a web page using a server such as the gaming server 3 with content in 20 various forms is known to the skilled person and not elaborated herein in detail.

The web page 5 comprises a game play window 6 and an instant messaging window 7, in which respectively a gaming web application and a messaging application arc being executed. In the embodiment shown, two players arc simultaneously viewing the web page 5 using client 1 (1) and client 2 (2), and are interacting simultaneously 25 with the game play in game play window 6. Furthermore, the two clients 1, 2 may be also involved in the messaging application (e.g. an IM application) in order to be able to communicate with each other. As indicated in Fig. 2, the communication between clients 1, 2 and the game play window 6 may be different from the communication between clients 1, 2 and the messaging application window 7, although both use the 30 network 4. In an embodiment, the communication between clients 1,2 and the gaming server 3 for the game play window 6 is implemented using an extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP), known as such. The communication between clients 1, 6 2 and the gaming server 3 for the messaging application window 7 is e.g. implemented using a hyper text transfer protocol (http).

The gaming web application being executed in the game play window requires a set of player input types, e.g. to control a rotational movement of a board in two 5 orthogonal directions. An example of such a game play is the well known game

Balance Ball, in which a board has to be moved over two rotational axes to have a ball follow a preset labyrinth course to a hole. This game simulates a virtual gravity force, the ball ‘rolling’ over the board due to inclination of the board. In Fig. 3 an implementation of the web page 5 is shown schematically. According to the present 10 invention embodiments, this plurality of player input types is divided in two parts, i.e. one to control rotational movement around an x-axis (indicated by (1)) and one to control movement around an y-axis (indicated by (2)). In combination the two parts (1) and (2) form an entire player input set for the game play.

Each of the two or more parts of player input types are obtained by the gaming 15 server 3 from a different one of the at least two clients 1, 2. Effectively this splits the control inputs of a game, and allows to play a single game with multiple players. The players thus have to co-operate and are dependent on each other to effectively play the game, enhancing the game experience offered.

To enable the multi-player co-browsing game having split controls, the gaming 20 server 3 needs to take special provisions. When providing a web application using a gaming server 3, the gaming server 3 executes a gaming web application, e.g. using a Flash or Java software program. Furthermore, the gaming server 3 receives input from two or more clients 1, 2 simultaneously. For this the gaming server 3 is arranged to accept subscriptions of the at least two clients 1,2 for playing the game play. The game 25 server 3 can then be in simultaneous communication with all of the at least two clients 1, 2. The gaming sever 3 monitors all clients 1, 2, e.g. by sending messages to the clients 1, 2, and checking replies from the clients 1, 2.

Furthermore, the communication with each of the clients 1, 2 is set up such that a maximum amount of latency is present in each of the communication channels between 30 the gaming server 3 and the clients 1, 2. The latency is in a specific embodiment less than 50 msec, but in an improved embodiment even less than 10 msec. Latency control can be implemented in various manners, including but not limited to influencing 7 timing, manipulating timing, predicting user inputs, work around such as queuing, buffering, dead reckoning, etc..

For game play an important parameter which influences the game play experience by each of the game players is the timing interval between two game states.

5 In general, a game play processor 3b uses received input, a previous game state, and the game play logic to establish a new, updated game state. When the update interval (at the game players) between two game states (i.e. the interval between sending of the game state and the receipt of all clients) is smaller than a maximum allowed time interval dtmax (e.g between 50 and 100 msec) the gaming experience is satisfactory as 10 it experienced by the user of the clients 1,2 like a normal online game. However, in order to experience a smooth game play in which the discrete steps are not noticeable to a game player, an update timing interval of less than 50 msec is applied. However, this can be overruled by the game play processor 3b to ease or weight the game.

In Fig. 5 a timing diagram is shown of a game play, indicating the data flows 15 between a game control manager 3a, a game play processor 3b and three clients 1,2,2’ (or client A, B and X). A client 1,2,2’ can be a computer system or e.g. a dedicated game console, and more or less clients can be present. The game control manager 3a and game play processor 3b are part of the gaming server 3 as depicted in Fig. 1 and 2, but in this embodiment separated by functionality. The game control manager 3a 20 provides the interface between the clients 1, 2 and 2’ on one side, and the game play processor 3b on the other side. The game play processor 3b is the platform actually executing the game play and progression.

The game control manager 3a receives from all clients A, B, and X an input message (indicated by 1,2, 3 in Fig. 5) for e.g. indicating that the clients are ready to 25 play. As already indicated the time needed for a message to reach the game control manager 3a is different for each client A, B, X, as indicated by the different slopes. The game control manager 3a receives this input, processes it and provides it to the game play processor 3b (message 4: process input).

Subsequently, a loop is started in which the game play processor 3b provides a 30 new game state at time tl to the game control manager 3a (message 5: game state). After some processing time, the game control manager 3a provides the updated game state to each of the clients A, B, X (messages 6, 7 and 8: game state).

8

At each client A, B, X, processing is performed to render the new game state, and subsequently, each client provides a new player input towards the game control manager (inputs 9,10,11). Both the reaction time of the player, as the transfer time between client A, B, X and game control manager 3a (latency), result in that the 5 messages 9,10,11 : Input arrive at the game control manager at different times.

At time t2, the game control manager 3 a has verified that an input message of all participating clients A, B, X have been received, and provides process input to the game play processor 3b. Only at that time, the game play processor 3b can calculate a new game state.

10 In this schedule, the time interval between time t2 and tl (dtmax = t2-tl) is a parameter corresponding to the maximum time delay allowed to enable a smooth game play. As discussed above, this time interval dtmax is less than 50msec, although game play would also be possible with a higher value of dtmax. In a further embodiment, the maximum time delay allowed (dtmax) is variable and depends on the game play status. 15 E.g. when during a game play, the intensity of action increases, there may be a need to increase the frequency of the game state updates, resulting in a lower maximum time delay allowed.

The value of dtmax is actively checked by the game control manager 3 a. If not all necessary inputs have been received before the end of the lime interval dtmax, the 20 game control manager can report this to the game play processor 3b. Depending on the type of play, and the type of missing input, this can result in a halting of the game play.

The input message 9,10,11 from client A, B, X can be a void message, but needs to be sent to allow the game control manager 3a to verify that the communication link with that client A, B, X is still active. Depending on the specific game play and the 25 distribution of game control inputs, in some cases no active control input is expected from one or more of the clients A, B, X. This can be communicated in the game state messages 6,7, 8, resulting in that the respective client A, B, X replies with a null or void message as input message 9,10,11.

Note that as the game control manager 3 a and game play processor 3b are part of 30 the gaming server 3, which is usually implemented in a single computer system, the messages between these two units are transferred very rapidly, virtually without delay.

This can be effectively accomplished when the gaming server 3 implements a Jabber platform, using xmpp messages to communicate with the clients 1, 2 via the 9 network 4. Jabber is a designation of a software developing community, in which the extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (xmpp) is used for presence and real-time communication applications. Reference is made to the website vvwvv.xmnp.org. which provides information on implementing a real-time server application.

5 As mentioned above, a possible game play to be used in one of the present invention embodiments is Balance Ball. A generalized screen shot of a play situation is depicted in Fig. 3. In this embodiment, the plurality of player input types comprises a control of an x-axis rotation and control of an y-axis rotation, and the plurality of player input types is divided in two parts. Another possible implementation using two players 10 could be a tetris like game play. Here, the plurality of player input types comprises a control of movement of a displayed item and control of rotation of a displayed item, and the plurality of player input types is divided in two parts.

In further embodiments the player input types are more complex. For example in a game play called Junkyard Huzzle, a crane with a magnet is to be operated and a 15 playing board of the game can be moved. In this embodiment, the plurality of player input types comprises a first control set and a second control set, the first control set comprising control of a magnet on/off switch and control of movement of a board in x-direction, the second control set comprising control of a magnet movement direction and control of a board in y-direction. In a further embodiment, the plurality of player 20 input types comprises a first control set and a second control set, the first control set comprising movement control of an object, and the second control set comprising speed control of the object.

The plurality of player input types may also be divided over three or more clients 1,2 whenever possible. Furthermore, the plurality of player input types may also be 25 divided over two or more groups of players, and the subsets of player input type for a single group may in its turn be divided over two or more players within that group. This allows to organize game tournaments using the gaming server 3, where duo’s or teams of players compete against each other. The division of player input types may be registered by the gaming server 3 after interactive communication with all of the clients 30 1,2 subscribed to a specific game server at a moment in time. The gaming server 3 may further be arranged to keep score, i.e. in time or points, of all the groups or players in order to enable a real tournament behavior.

10

In the embodiments described above, specific divisions of player input types are mentioned. To the skilled person it will be clear that other divisions are possible, using more or less players or groups of players interfacing with the gaming server 3 using the clients 1,2. Even role playing games are possible, where teams controlling one avatar 5 play together or compete each other. The avatar behavior is then controlled using the subdivided plurality of player input types, each team player controlling a specific part of the player input types.

In one of the embodiments described above, the clients 1,2 are also able to communicate with each other using an IM application. The same IM application may 10 also be used by the gaming server 3 in order to register participants in a game play, e.g. by sending a code to the gaming server 3. Also other types of communication which are possibly available to the clients 1, 2 and the gaming server 3 may be used to set up the gaming scenario (i.e. register participation and divide the player input types), e.g. email of SMS types of communication.

15

Claims

1, Method for providing a game web application, wherein the game web application comprises an execution of a game, wherein the method comprises performing a game web application using a game server, and accepting registration by the game server of ten at least two client computers for playing the game, characterized in that the game comprises a plurality of player input types, wherein the plurality of player input types is divided into two or more parts, which in combination form an entire player input set for the game, and each of the two or more parts are obtained by the game server from a different one of the at least two client computers via a network.

The method of claim 1, wherein the game server is in simultaneous communication connection with all of the at least two client computers.

Method according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the time delay between game server and each of the at least two client computers is less than 100 msec, for example less than 50 msec.

The method of claim 1,2 or 3, wherein the game server is a server that uses an extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP) to communicate with the at least two client computers. 25

The method of any one of claims 1-4, wherein the method comprises receiving input from all registered client computers within a maximum time interval (dtmax) from the sending of a new game status to the at least two client computers. 30

The method of any one of claims 1-5, wherein the game server also implements a message client that allows the at least two client computers to communicate with each other.

The method of any one of claims 1-6, wherein the plurality of game input types comprises a control of an x-axis rotation and control of a y-axis rotation, and the plurality of game input types is divided into two parts.

The method of any one of claims 1 to 6, wherein the plurality of game input types comprises a control of a movement of a displayed object and control of a rotation of the displayed object, and the plurality of game input types is divided into two parts.

A method according to any of claims 1-6, wherein the plurality of game input types 10 comprises a first control set and a second control set, wherein the first control set comprises a control of an on / off switch of a magnet and control of a board in a x-direction, and the second control set comprises a control of a direction of movement of the magnet and control of the board in a y-direction.

The method of any one of claims 1-6, wherein the plurality of game input types comprises a first control set and a second control set, wherein the first control set comprises motion control of an object, and the second control set comprises a speed control of the object.

A server in communication with an IP network and at least two client computers, the server being adapted to provide a game web application in an IP network and to receive registration from the at least two client computers, the game web application is accessible via a browser application that is executed on each of the at least two client computers, characterized in that the server is further adapted to implement the method according to one of claims 1-10.

12. Server according to claim 11, wherein the server is in communication connection with at least one client computer of a first type and at least one client computer of a second type.

A computer program product comprising computer executable code which when loaded on a computer system in communication with two or more client computers via a network provides the computer system with the functionality of the method according to any of claims 1-10.