Gaming Software | Database Performance Consulting Services
From data overload to optimized database performance: Ruby Play Network's PostgreSQL success story with Pythian
Ruby Play Network experienced rapid growth, increasing data volumes in their AWS Aurora PostgreSQL databases. They needed a proactive approach to database performance optimization and management to protect platform performance, developer productivity, and player engagement. AWS recommended Pythian due to their PostgreSQL expertise.
With Pythian's guidance, Ruby Play identified database optimizations to boost performance, enhance security, and ensure continuous availability.
Ruby Play employees benefit from improved database performance
With a robust database performance optimization strategy, Ruby Play Network developers and engineers can focus on innovation, improving customer and developer experiences while reducing overall system performance and AWS expenses.
Gaming products that can be scaled faster with an optimized database
Ruby Play’s existing gaming products, as well as any new products they introduce in the future, will benefit from the ability to scale up much quicker and simpler now that they’ve improved their database’s performance.
Platform users enjoy a more stable and reliable gaming experience
Ruby Play Network’s gaming platform has grown rapidly and continues to do so. With Pythian’s robust database performance tuning and optimization support at their disposal, they no longer need to worry about a strain on their platform that impacts customer experience.
Customer
Industry
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Overview
Ruby Play Network is a rapidly growing crypto and gaming development studio with offices in Christchurch and Westport, New Zealand. Its blockchain-powered gaming platform, Ruby Rewards, is a mutually beneficial environment for mobile gamers and operators: Gamers can acquire digital play-to-earn assets on the blockchain while developers can drive more engagement and revenue. Gamers are rewarded by playing games on the Ruby Play Network, earning or buying digital assets, and discovering new developers—unlocking value throughout the gaming ecosystem. With the swift expansion of Ruby Play Network, the data volumes in its production databases surged. To tackle issues related to performance, availability, and security, the network temporarily archived older database table rows.
The challenge
Securing scalability for Ruby Play Network's gaming databases
The company faced critical challenges with their PostgreSQL databases on AWS Aurora Serverless V2. Mounting data volumes—over 10 million new rows monthly—threatened performance, availability, and security, risking player engagement and developer revenue.
Their initial temporary solution of manual data archiving couldn't keep pace with rapid growth, creating development bottlenecks. Recognizing the need for a permanent, proactive strategy, Ruby Play's CTO, Gwyn Edwards, sought a database partner with expertise in PostgreSQL and AWS Aurora V2 to ensure sustainable scalability.
Rapid data volume growth
Over 10 million new rows added monthly, with projections for even faster growth, overwhelming the existing database infrastructure.
Ineffective temporary solutions
Their manual data archiving, a reactive measure, could not keep pace with rapid growth, creating ongoing operational burdens.
Development bottlenecks
The focus on managing database scalability diverted technical teams from core development, necessitating a proactive, permanent solution to prevent further bottlenecks.
A lack of specialized internal expertise
Identifying internal limitations in managing the escalating data volumes, Ruby Play's CTO recognized the need for support from an external partner.
The solution
Pythian implemented a comprehensive database optimization and management service for Ruby Play
Pythian began by performing a comprehensive database security assessment and health check for Ruby Play Network's PostgreSQL environment on AWS Aurora. Utilizing specialized tools, we identified key areas for improvement, providing strategic guidance to enhance scalability, performance, and security. Our recommendations included vital database and cloud performance optimizations like auto-vacuuming, partitioning, and reindexing, alongside implementing security best practices for updates and configurations.
Our team of experts also advised on 24/7 monitoring via CloudWatch alarms and proposed measures for robust configuration and availability, covering backup, recoverability, and high availability. These targeted optimizations not only empowered Ruby Play Network to manage escalating data volumes, maintain peak performance, and strengthen security, but also significantly reduced their AWS Aurora cloud expenses, allowing their teams to focus on innovation.
Database and cloud performance optimizations
We implemented auto-vacuum, partitioning, reindexing guidelines, and configuration tweaks to handle growing data volumes and maintain peak performance.
Security best practices
Pythian advised on regular updates, configuration settings, and security toolsets to strengthen Ruby Play's overall posture.
24/7 database monitoring
Our team recommended CloudWatch alarms for continuous oversight of their environment.
Configuration and availability
We suggested measures for robust database backup, recoverability, high availability, and fault tolerance, including adjusting performance insights retention to a month for trend analysis.
Key outcomes
Partnering with Pythian provided Ruby Play with sustainable, high-performance, and cost-efficient database scalability
Through comprehensive PostgreSQL security assessments and health checks, Pythian provided Ruby Play with deep insights into their database vulnerabilities and performance. Key recommendations—including CPU thresholds, CloudWatch alarms, and performance insights adjustments—significantly improved performance, reduced computing costs, and enhanced monitoring.
This robust scalability strategy allowed Ruby Play to proactively prioritize optimizations, integrating them into their development cycles. The result is top-notch customer and developer experiences, sustained system performance, and reduced AWS expenses, even as the platform continues its rapid growth.
Enhanced database performance and stability
Database performance improved significantly with enhanced monitoring and alerting, ensuring sustained system performance even amidst rapid growth.
Strengthened security and reduced vulnerabilities
Pythian established deep insights into database vulnerabilities allowing for the identification and addressing of security concerns.
Optimized scalability and cost efficiency
A robust database scalability strategy was developed, leading to reduced AWS computing expenses and the ability to proactively prioritize future optimizations.
Superior customer and developer experiences
As a result of integrating database optimizations into development cycles, Ruby Play can now facilitate excellent customer and developer experiences.
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