macOS EC2 Gaming

Ready-made configuration for macOS EC2 gaming, based on Larry Gadea's excellent work.

First-time configuration

The goal is to create a solid baseline that can be snapshotted to an AMI for future use, that requires zero intervention on startup and takes the minimum amount of time to install games.

From a terminal:

• Clone this repository to a convenient location and put it on the PATH

• Install required components using Homebrew:

  brew install awscli jq
  brew cask install steam tunnelblick
  

• Install Microsoft Remote Desktop from the App Store

• Run aws configure to configure your AWS credentials and region

• Run ec2gaming start

Windows configuration

Once the instance is running, a RDP session will be opened automatically:

• Login using the administrator account with the password rRmbgYum8g and change the password.
• Run Windows Update

Note that EBS is super-slow at startup as blocks come off the snapshot, so expect the instance to be sluggish as it warms up. It only affects file operations on C:\ and won't affect gaming performance later.

Steam configuration

• Steam will run and update automatically
• Login and save your password
• Go to Settings -> In-Home Streaming -> Advanced Host Options and enable 'Hardware Encoding' and 'Prioritize network traffic'
• Install and run several of the games you intend to play to Z:\. This performs first-time installation, avoiding the redistributable installation overhead. Delete local files once you're done

Steam remote install to ephemeral storage

The Steam remote install feature assumes the default Stream library, even if a second library is available and set to default. So, to install games to the emphemeral storage on Z:\ remotely, we create a junction on instance startup:

• Copy bootstrap/steamapps-junction.bat to C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup

Unfortunately, you can't install games larger than the freespace on C: with this approach, but in that case you can use RDP and this avoids having to RDP for every installation.

Windows automatic login

Use Autologin to set the instance to automatically login, so Steam starts automatically and it's not necessary to RDP into the instance to start gaming:

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/autologon.aspx

Cloud sync My Documents

Use Dropbox, OneDrive or similar to sync My Documents. Steam Cloud will do a decent job, but it's good to have coverage for games that don't cloud save, or if your instance terminates and Steam doesn't have a chance to perform the cloud sync.

Final steps

• Run ec2gaming snapshot to snapshot the EBS volume and create your AMI

• Run ec2gaming terminate to terminate the instance

• Create a ec2gaming.auth file in the ec2gaming location (it's .gitignored) with two lines, it'll be used to authenticate the VPN for gaming:

  administrator
  <new password>
  

Gaming!

• Run ec2gaming start. The instance, VPN and Steam will automatically start
• Wait for the notification that the remote gaming host is available for home streaming
• Enjoy!
• When you're done, run ec2gaming stop

Periodic maintenance

This configuration differs from the original blog post, in that the goal is to keep the AMI immutable from session to session (call it an instituional bias ;) ). You'll want to periodically update Steam, run Windows Update etc. and re-snapshot and replace your AMI using the ec2gaming snapshot command.

Help

The original blog posts and the cloudygamer subreddit are great resources:

• http://lg.io/2015/07/05/revised-and-much-faster-run-your-own-highend-cloud-gaming-service-on-ec2.html
• https://www.reddit.com/r/cloudygamer/