SE-Radio Episode 339: Jafar Soltani on Continuous Delivery for Multiplayer Games.mp3

Trunk-Based Dev

Trunk-based development is a strategy where all developers work on a single shared branch, often referred to as the main or trunk, to avoid complex merges and support continuous integration. Jafar Soltani explains that this approach minimizes painful merge conflicts and provides faster feedback by integrating changes frequently, sometimes even daily 1. He contrasts this with feature branch development, where separate branches can lead to long feedback loops and difficult merges, especially with binary assets 2. Soltani shares a past experience where integrating changes from multiple branches took days, highlighting the efficiency of trunk-based development 3.

The longer it takes and the bigger the change is, the more painful it is to merge that back.

--- Jafar Soltani

This strategy ensures that the main branch remains releasable, stopping all changes if a problem arises until it's resolved.

   

Feature Toggles

Feature toggles are crucial in game development, allowing new features to be tested and enabled or disabled without requiring new builds. Jafar Soltani describes two types of toggles: compile-time, which removes code before shipping, and dynamic, which allows features to be toggled on or off at runtime 4. This flexibility helps manage features still in progress, ensuring they don't disrupt the player experience. Soltani emphasizes the importance of small, frequent changes to reduce risk and simplify troubleshooting 5.

By choosing to switch off certain code paths through feature toggles, we prevent players from seeing it.

--- Jafar Soltani

This approach supports continuous integration by allowing developers to work on the same branch without releasing incomplete features.

   

Prototyping

Prototyping in game development involves testing concepts and features without impacting production code. Jafar Soltani explains that a separate prototype team uses a different engine, like Unity, to experiment quickly and answer questions about the game 6. This separation ensures that prototype code doesn't accidentally enter production, allowing for rapid iteration and learning. Soltani notes that as the team matures, they increasingly prototype within the main engine, Unreal, while maintaining clear boundaries between prototype and production code 7.

We could be almost like fast and loose on the prototype code base.

--- Jafar Soltani

This strategy helps avoid the risks of releasing untested features to millions of players.