Game developers, operators and cloud computing encounters

Cloud computing has been involved in various industries, including the nature of business and Web sites also began to implement the application, then, at this time, cloud computing is no longer just a commercial technology and even become a measure of the national information industry technology level of one factor. The topic today is about the demand relationship between the gaming industry and cloud computing. Before this, the author has visited several game developers and operators, to understand the domestic online gaming industry in general.

The server for the online games manufacturers is a necessary foundation, it accounted for a game from research and development to the listing operation of a small part of the total expenditure, or even this part of the cost for the game vendors is insignificant, but the server is really the whole operation of the heart, master the whole game environment lifeline. Now many game manufacturers in the market will take the form of transport with the platform, in particular, the developer will play the game data through the port to the operator's hand, and the operator platform for the game vendors to provide server hardware support.

Therefore, in this mode of cooperation, the performance of platform server and stability, become a developer in the choice of platform for one of the important reference conditions. But the operation has specialized, some more well-known platform although the propaganda effort is good, but the server may not be able to completely flexibly adapt to the game manufacturer's demand, but the current market most platform uses the traditional host leasing method, for example vps,http://www.aliyun.com/zixun/ Aggregation/14840.html "> Virtual host. But some well-informed game makers have long started using cloud infrastructure, which is what we usually call cloud computing. But most still operate through host hosting.

This part of the Research and Development Chamber of Commerce to find their own service providers to operate alone, the process will also experience the internal operators according to the game data to predict the server configuration, and then buy the host to choose the room for hosting, and later to send the appropriate technical personnel for maintenance. The content is cumbersome, and it costs more to the server than any other rental way. But the game owner insists that "penny by Penny" is still keen to spend a lot of money on server hosting. But in fact, this idea is too conservative, as the game industry itself on the market elasticity of demand is very large, and the traditional host-managed mode can not adapt to this flexible changes, operators can only consider the worst-case scenario for the host to assess, but the actual operation process, most of the server configuration resources will be idle.

As a result, some game owners are beginning to try to find new ways to operate the server. Some cloud computing service providers give advice the functions of the cloud server can meet the flexibility of the game industry, specifically in the game during the operation of the game can be at any time according to the number of players online and the required configuration to change, for example, for a white-collar game, often after work to around 11 o'clock to reach the peak of the player online, In the daytime because the number of players will be greatly reduced, then for this change cloud host can automatically adjust the physical configuration of a single host, according to the resources to charge the corresponding costs. Some large game manufacturers do not care about the cloud host compared to the traditional host of the remaining costs, on the other hand, they believe that the direct purchase of high configuration of the host will be more worry, more insurance. But Xu Shixiao, general manager of the Sino-Cloud, has analyzed how game vendors Choose the server, server hosting, the need for the entire purchase of the server, if the purchase found that the configuration can not meet the requirements of the server upgrade process will be more cumbersome, while the game has extended the time to go public, and now the market is very competitive, Product cycle is also shortened, so too long time is undoubtedly a bad news for game manufacturers.

In addition, for small and medium game business or individual entrepreneurs, the cost of buying host hosting is not like a "drizzle", while the server requirements of people who are not aware of the procurement of the host is a headache. But the cloud host uses the form which rents, and the regular cloud computing service provider also will send the specialized operation maintenance personnel to help the game quotient to evaluate, then carries on the demand the corresponding configuration, helps the game side's operation maintenance personnel to save the very big trouble. And these characteristics not only the game can learn from the adoption, the platform is also more suitable for the implementation of applications.

Platform business to assume responsibility for the game operation, the choice of service providers is also required high quality. But it cannot predict the exact configuration and number of units required for the server as the game maker does, so still use the form of host rental, the same traditional lease configuration also does not have the flexibility to change the characteristics, so still use the "worst-intended" strategy for the game to provide services, of course, a platform can not only a game, If each game can save a part of the cost of flexible spending, then the sum of this part of the cost is not only "drizzle", with this, many platform operators have also started to provide the game side cloud server, and some even made the "must" requirements.

So, it is also such a variety of factors, game developers and platform developers worth a try on cloud computing technology, and the cloud computing technology itself has more features to be superior to other server hardware, in addition to flexibility, but also to the security of data and processing performance are also better.

(Responsible editor: The good of the Legacy)