From the first release of Inn Keeper, multiplayer will be available to everyone. To make this possible, we're using Epic Online Services to make multiplayer cross-play, allowing you to join the world of anyone who owns Inn Keeper on any platform and has made their game public or invited you.
To connect, you won't need an account. However, you will be able to connect with Epic Games and Steam to save your progress on a common cloud between platforms (so you can find your progress on any platform).
An in-game server browser will make it quick and easy to find someone to play with. You'll be able to communicate with players in the game via text chat and emotes.
Tools will be available for administrators to adjust multiplayer settings and player privileges, and to ban or kick players.
Multiplayer will be peer-to-peer only, meaning that the host player will be the server. This means that if he quits, the game will end and everyone will be returned to the main menu. There are no plans to add support for dedicated servers.
To keep things balanced, you'll have one character per game. You won't be able to carry equipment or other content between games. However, you may decide to save your character from one game and duplicate it in another game hosted by you (please note that the saved character will be a duplicate, and will not be synchronized between games).
Here's a work in progress of the multiplayer system: