Server support?

[The Cool Uncle]

It would be great if there was a way for player-made servers to run Ecosystem 24/7, and allow other users to spectate or even intervene in the game as it unravels. Imagine the scale of biodiversity that could come from a beefy server that a standard desktop couldn’t even scratch the surface of. This could be a boon, not only for the lifespan of the game, but for large-scale environmental studies. It may even serve as another source of revenue. CPU usage is definitely a large hurdle in the game, and this may be one way to alleviate it.

 

[Tom Johnson]

It would be great if there was a way for player-made servers to run Ecosystem 24/7, and allow other users to spectate or even intervene in the game as it unravels. Imagine the scale of biodiversity that could come from a beefy server that a standard desktop couldn’t even scratch the surface of. This could be a boon, not only for the lifespan of the game, but for large-scale environmental studies. It may even serve as another source of revenue. CPU usage is definitely a large hurdle in the game, and this may be one way to alleviate it.

That is a great idea, especially because, as you mentioned, the CPU is always a limiting factor and it would be very nice to support truly large-scale populations or the amount of diversity of something like a coral reef. I usually find the game more fun the more creatures and species exist at a time. Some people have run the game over night and I would really enjoy seeing a genuinely long term ecosystem. I will probably focus on getting the single-player desktop mode first, because a server version could be fairly involved, but I will definitely keep the idea in mind once I'm further along. Thanks for the suggestion.