Guild Wars
From AboveTheGarage
Contents |
Intro
The last four+ years I've been a server and parallel programming dude on Guild Wars.
Working at ArenaNet has expanded my mind as to what is humanly and computingly possible.
The following information is from a short talk I gave at Digipen:
- The first server I worked on is called the stream server. It supports observer mode. I didn't write it from scratch - there was an almost working version when I arrived. Unfortunately, when it comes to parallel programming, almost working is about the same as not working. But Pat Wyatt, who gave me the task, had incredibly high standards for how a Guild Wars server should perform, and so I had to concentrate harder than I have ever done before to iron it all out.
- The current version has been running for over a year solid! On four different hardware boxes! That cooperate! Across all builds of Guild Wars and across internet connectivity problems and ... most amazingly ... on Windows! I didn't even know Windows could run for a year straight. (The uptime would be almost two years since I last made a code change but even though we strive for 24/7 uptime, we do occasionally have to defer to some maintenance needs.)
- I've worked on several other servers and some other parallel programming and the scope of what ArenaNet does just boggles my mind.
I'll try to come up with more stories that don't give away any of the secret sauce.
In the mean time, ArenaNet has started to roll out some awesome taste treat teasers for Guild Wars 2:
Videos
Elementalist
