Forum ‹ Multiplayer ‹ Multiplayer in Unity WebGL

[LorenzGames]

When is support for Multiplayer in Unity WebGL slated for?

[Henrik]

When there's first-class support for TCP sockets in it.

[LorenzGames]

Do you know if Unity has any plan for that in the future?

[Henrik]

I have no idea, sorry.

We are working on a sort of workaround solution though, we'll announce it when it is ready.

[tripknotix]

If you need a beta tester let me know, i can test my mobile game zombie ops online.

[markloika]

I'm interested in this functionality as well.

[Evgeniy_Eliseev]

When there's first-class support for TCP sockets in it.

I don't understand about what TCP sockets you talking.

WebGL builds works only on browsers. Browsers works only with WebSocket. And there nothing on Unity side to make something else.

[Henrik]

And there nothing on Unity side to make something else.

Currently, using WebSockets in your Unity code depends on pretty horrible hacks and workarounds. It's possible for Unity to add proper support for it, so that you can use regular Sockets inside your Unity code, and have it actually use WebSockets transparently.

[LorenzGames]

I have no idea, sorry.

We are working on a sort of workaround solution though, we'll announce it when it is ready.

Hi Henrik, I understand this might be difficult to answer, but what is a possible ETA for the workaround?
1 month, 3 months, 6 months...
Just a ballpark would be really appreciated if you can.

Thanks.

[LorenzGames]

Any news on this?

[Henrik]

Real soon now!

[Astrovolts]

Interesting that the last post in the announcement forums was exactly one year ago.

[Henrik]

The workaround is simply this: Instead of using the multiplayer functionality in the Unity client library, which would need some sort of awkward bridge between Unity and the browser to simulate sockets over websockets and external calls, embed the PlayerIO JavaScript client library on the webpage, and use it for all your multiplayer needs. The external call interface should fit pretty nicely with the message listener interface of the client library:

https://docs.unity3d.com/Manual/webgl-i ... pting.html

[Evgeniy_Eliseev]

It is strange that I need write wrapper to wrap unity version of playerio and javascript version of playerio in unity

Also, I found that JavaScript SDK uses only insecure protocols (http/ws instead of https/wss). So it impossible to publish game to any social network. Try for example publish test project from package on the facebook.

[Henrik]

Well, there is no regular socket support in Unity WebGL, so there has to be something somewhere that bridges this. It would be great if Unity added this bridge themselves so that it would be completely automatic, but they haven't. The remaining choices is then either to marshal socket data across the external call interface, or to marshal PlayerIO messages, and the latter just fits the external call interface so much better, that it is the current best choice.

Thanks for pointing out the secure websocket requirement. Annoying, but there's support for secure multiplayer connections in the other client libraries, we just need to get it working in the JS one as well.

We'll be working on polishing the JS client library in the immediate future, your feedback is much appreciated! We'll try to make a proof of concept or recipe for Unity WebGL message marshalling as well that others can use.

[LorenzGames]

Hi Henrik, any ETA regarding the support for secure connection in the JS library?

[Henrik]

Hi Henrik, any ETA regarding the support for secure connection in the JS library?

That was fixed and released two days ago.

[LorenzGames]

Thanks Henrik,
do you guys have an example of marshaling Unity to PlayerIO JS?

And more specifically regarding the connection.OnMessage and PlayerIOClient.Message, how do you send that from JS to Unity?

[LorenzGames]

Has anybody been able to successfully interface this with Unity?

[Henrik]

Hey Lorenz,

Sorry, no, we haven't created any examples yet, we'll try to get it done soon.

In the meantime, have you tried following the steps in the Unity docs I linked above?

[LorenzGames]

Hi Henrik, yes.
The problem is not implementing the JS part, I am having issues with figuring out a way to deal with the callbacks.

My whole logic to handle the Messages is in C#, so I would like to figure out a way to send the whole "Message" back to C# from JS to be parsed. Maybe if there was a way in JS to say Message.toBase64 and the in C# Message.fromBase64 I could pass it as a string in the SendMessage function?

The best way would be to be able to use the DLLImport but looks like the JS version of PlayerIO is incompatible to be used that way in Unity, unless I am missing something.

[LorenzGames]

Hi Henrik, any progress regarding a demo project to show best practices for Unity->JS->Unity?

[Henrik]

This is now fixed, and the PlayerIO Unity SDK has built-in support for multiplayer in WebGL builds.

[tripknotix]

Thats fantastic news ! , does that mean it also works with facebook gameroom as well?

[Henrik]

does that mean it also works with facebook gameroom as well?

Yes, it should.