In The Division, Massive discusses their server structure and the current cheating issues.
Cheats and hacks. Especially the PC version of The Division is plagued by these annoyances. A few days ago, the statement of a network expert caused a stir: He suspected that due to Massive’s server structure, the cheats could never be completely fixed – unless the development team rewrote most of the net codes and game codes entirely.
Now, regarding these speculations about the server infrastructure, Anders Holmquist, the Technical Director of Massive, made a statement in a podcast.
This is what Massive says about the server infrastructure of The Division
In a conversation with the Community Developer Hamish Bode, Holmquist talks about the server infrastructure of the MMO shooter. We summarize the key points:
- The Division has a comprehensive online infrastructure. Massive has dedicated servers distributed around the world, such as in Sydney, Hong Kong, on the west and east coast of the USA, and at several locations in Europe. This helps mitigate lags and poor pings.
- The matchmaking depends on several factors: Where you are, where your friends are, and your ping. It can happen that players from Europe, for example, end up on Chinese servers if the European servers are full. The matchmaking does not strictly follow regional divisions, you can meet agents from all over the world.
- When you log into the game, matchmaking starts right away. Gear score and other factors are considered, which according to Massive will enhance the individual player experience. This all happens during the loading screen when logging in. Another matchmaking occurs when you enter safe houses or are near the Dark Zone.
- The matchmaking for the Dark Zone does not start when you step through the door, but “much earlier”. The roadblocks marking the entrances to the DZ serve merely gameplay purposes. The matchmaking is already complete when you approach them. The shots and explosions you hear outside the Dark Zone occur in real-time in the DZ.
- On one hand, the dedicated servers of Massive can guarantee a seamless player experience, and on the other hand, they set the rules for everything that happens in the game. The server controls everything, from the events to the battles to the loot. What the server says goes. However, there are two exceptions:
- The local movement of the player: When you move, the server does not correct you in any way. However, the server ensures that you do not enter areas that you should not be able to access. It only checks your movements. If this were different, the movements would not feel smooth. It could happen that you suddenly get reset or feel like you are stuck on a rubber band.
- Also, aiming with weapons is not directly controlled by the server. It checks whether it was a valid shot but does not intervene in your aiming movements.
- During the beta phases, there were numerous issues as the server did not properly verify the events. Many of these issues have now been fixed, however, according to Holmquist, there are still bugs that are more difficult to resolve. For these, better cheating detection systems are continuously being added, for instance, to address the fire rate issues on PC.
- When cheaters are reported, the team reviews all the reports. For reported players, Massive can see many details.
- The Division is both an MMO and a shooter, so the servers need to meet multiple demands: While other shooters have, for example, 32 players on a server, The Division has thousands of players plus tens of thousands of NPCs.
- Furthermore, they do not want to kick players with bad pings, as The Division can also be played solo. In other multiplayer shooters, players with a ping over 200ms would not be allowed on servers. The Division has a “hybrid solution.”
- In PvP, The Division is currently very tolerant and generous with bad ping values. But this will be further investigated how tolerant they want to be here. In dubious situations, the server has to decide whether in combat with “laggers” some shots should count as hits or not. However, this can lead to agents occasionally taking damage when they “shouldn’t” and vice versa.
- The biggest challenge for the servers is to control not only the agents but also the numerous NPCs (up to 15k on a server) so that all players have the same gaming experience.
- Since most of the action takes place on the servers, many problems can be fixed server-side. Bigger problems arise when a server-side fix causes the client to display something different than it should. Therefore, client-side patches are also necessary.
- Basically, the online infrastructure is about who decides the game events. And as players, we want the servers to decide as much as possible. The servers of The Division fundamentally control everything, with a few exceptions: running, aiming, and minor features while shooting. But even here, the server should check everything.
- Massive continues to combat cheating, exploits, and bugs; they will make stabilizations, and the new raid and future content should function as Massive envisions it.
- Massive is aware of all the issues. They will fix them. The quality of the player experience in The Division is to be significantly improved. The developers want to continue working passionately on The Division.
