Hey guys,

There really seems to be a lack of information around for DirectPlay 9 (or 7 and 8 for that matter) programming in C# and VB.NET....

I'm currently trying to complete a little side project for a game community... basically, I want to recreate Gamespy Arcade for one or 2 games... I've got the socket server part all sorted out, now i just need some help with the DirectPlay part... here's the layout...:


1) Client Connects to server
2) Client joins one of a few game areas
3) Each game area has it's own chat conversation between all users in that current game area...

(Note, all this so far is done with sockets... no directplay)

4) Next, a user can Host a new Lobby session for the game of which they are in the game area of... (Since most if not all games these days are DirectPlay Lobbyable, this system will work well with many games)
5) Now, the host waits for other people from the game area to join their existing game lobby session...
6) Again, in the game lobby session, there is yet another chat, which is just between members of the game lobby session...
When all players have signaled they are ready to hte host, the host clicks a button to Launch the game.
7) At this point, the actual game which i have nothing to do with in creating is launched into multiplayer mode, and everyone is matched up in a multiplayer game from the game lobby session...

Again, if yo uare familiar with gamespy arcade, or MSN Gaming Zone, i want to do something very similar to this...

I contemplated making the game lobby sessions on sockets, however, i know directplay is quite capable of handling this, and is even intended for this purpose. This would also take a substantial load off of the servers, since it puts a client in charge of hosting the chat and it's details...

Again, i have found almost no documentation on this subject.. I'm working with c#, but vb.net is also fine... could someone please point me in the right direction? surely someone has done this before?

For now, i'm trying to use the DX9 SDK as an example, but i find these examples extremely overlycomplicated and confusing...
If anyone could help me, i would be extremely grateful...

I can also be contacted via icq or msn or aol:
msn: [email protected]
icq: 22921863
aol: RedthMotoX2

Thanks again!