EC2 Gaming Script

This Node.js script automates a number of steps in Larry Gadea's guide on how to set up a streaming gaming service on EC2.

I've only tested this on OS X but it should work on other operating systems with some minor tweaks.

What does it do?

With this script you can get in-game with minimal effort.

There's three phases to starting a gaming instance:

1. Set up AWS with the right security group and start the EC2 instance.
2. Print out details for accessing the instance using a remote desktop client to login into Steam.
3. Output configurations files to connect to the VPN via TunnelBlink

Setup

Install node.js if it's not already on your machine.

We'll also need Remote Desktop software. I recommend CoRD as this script can automate the configuration for CoRD if you turn on the useRDPLink option in config.json.

For our VPN client, download TunnelBlink.

Finally, download this script to your computer and run

npm install

Run

To start a new gaming session run

node index.js

The first time you run this it will complain about not having any AWS credentials. Log in to AWS and go to Security Credentials then Access Keys. Create a new Access Key and click Show Access Key. Copy these details to config.json. You also need to enter a region to start the image in. To find your closest AWS region check out cloudping. You'll need to enter the code name for the region, you can look that up here.

Now when you run the script, it will start up a Windows instance and print out the instance-id and IP address.

On to step two, it will print out details for logging in via RDP. Enter these into your Remote Desktop Software. Once you've logged in it will ask you to change your password, enter a new password and it'll open up the desktop with Steam. Login to Steam, go to Preferences -> In-Home Sharing Streaming and ensure the enable streaming checkbox is enabled. Then click the logout shortcut on the desktop.

Step three, in this scripts directory, there's a openVNP directory. Open this and there'll be two files. Open client.ovpn with TunnelBlink. You'll have to enter a username and password. The username is Administrator, the password is what you set in the previous step.

Now we're ready to go! Open up Steam on your local computer. Once again, go to Settings -> In-Home Sharing Streaming and ensure the enable streaming checkbox is enabled. Now you should see the remote computer appear.

When you're finished gaming you can press 1 to stop the instance and exit or 2 to keep the instance running and quit.

Configuration

• useRDPLink If true, instead of displaying instructions for an RDP it will open a fully configured RDP link. Works with CoRD
• useSpotImage: Whether to use a spot image or normal instance
• securityGroupName: The name of the AWS security group
• spotPrice: The maximum spot pricing to pay
• spotDuration: The maximum duration an instance is active (safeguard incase you forget to turn it off)
• instanceType: The type of EC2 instance
• imageId: The base image for the instance
• username: Username for accessing the server
• password: Password for accessing the server
• accessKeyId: AWS Access key
• secretAccessKey: AWS Secret key
• region: AWS Region

Common Errors

• price-to-low - Your bid price for the spot price is too low. Try bumping the spotPrice up in config.json
• capacity-not-available - There's no servers available for spot requests. Try changing useSpotImage to false.
• When opening In-Home sharing the remote computer is visible but has a status of Not connected - Force Steam to check for updates on your locally and remotely.

Optimizations

• Install RDP software that can open RDP links on the command line. If you switch useRDPLink to true the script will do run open rdp://username:password@xx.xxx.xxx. CoRD does this, Microsoft Remote Desktop does not.
• Once you change the Windows password and log into Steam (click Remember my password), go into the AWS Console and create an image of the instance. Set imageId to the image you've just created and password to your new password and it will automatically log you in and start up Steam next time you run the script.