Hello UE4 community. I have been working on a multiplayer game for the last 9 months. So far I have been testing inside the editor with 2 players in a new editor window. Players are able to use different forms of combat to kill each other (PVP) or to fight AI mobs (PVE) there are also non-combat NPC’s like shop keepers. My replication system is 100% working. Animations, statistics, health, stamina, cooldowns for abilities all work both server and client. I am now ready to start testing this game with my friends spread across the country.
I have scoured the forums and youtube for a system that would work for me to begin testing this but I have not gotten anything to work as of yet.
My goal: Give my packaged game to a friend. Friend boots game, signs into account with user or email and password. Then, the player is moved to the main menu. The main menu has an “open worlds” button. Upon pressing this, a list of my dedicated servers would populate (1 to start with). This server would be up 24/7 or at the least when I’m ready to test with friends. My friends and I would join this world and it loads up an instance of my main map in which we could all test the PVP and PVE systems and level up our characters together. Upon exiting game or logging out the stats, items, and location of the player would be saved to an sql database.
To achieve this goal, I am willing to spend money. I am willing to spend time learning and implementing it. Whatever it takes. I have tried out a few systems already, and it works on LAN. When I give my packaged game to a friend however, they are never able to log in or connect.
Any resources or ideas that would help me are appreciated. Yes I know about port forwarding. Yes I already am using the VaRest and Rama Save system plugins.
I am no pro when it comes to networking but since you stated they can’t connect to your server, did you instruct them to ping the server via the console to see if they can contact it at all, regardless of any game specific stuff?
I have never been able to get LAN to work. But I’ve gotten multiple computers to connect to each other. Thing is, I don’t really know what does it. We’ll have a working setup one day, then the next day none of the computers will communicate to each other. Then after the usual 2 hours of troubleshooting (including re-migrating the master project folder (more than once, usually)) it starts working again.
On more than one occasion, I have seen instances of computers with servers open that did not belong to my computers, meaning that anybody running the default coded steam subsystem can see anybody else running the default steam subsystem; they don’t have to be the same project.
Anyways, get another computer in your home and try some in-house troubleshooting (not using LAN).
I have not tried pinging but its a good idea to at least see if we can communicate between routers back and fourth. I think its propbably an issue with firewalls or my port 7777 not being forwarded properly. When I run the command prompt and type “netstat -a” I do not see my ips 192.168.1.XXX : 7777. I think I should see that as “listening” if it is working properly.
Just incase anyone finds this thread and is after a similar goal, I have figured out a way to get my friends in the game!!! I live in MN and I was able to get my friends from FL and UT in the same game as me. I used this series for a server hosting and joining system: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weNj…qlp-zU5cizkvK6
However, that system wasn’t working over WAN as stated (only worked for LAN). All I had to change at the end to bypass this issue is how players connect. Instead of pressing the “Refresh Servers” button to try to find an open server, I made a new button that said “Join World 1”. On the backend, upon pressing this button you do “Execute Console Command” with the command “open <your public ip address>” with my ports being forwarded it finds the hosted server and immediately loads the level that is being hosted!!! After ten months of work seeing my friend drop into the map and us able to fight against or alongside each other in game was a great achievement!
If you need help or have questions private message me so I get a notification. I’d be glad to help as I know how difficult this stuff is. Cheers!