Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Specialty Hosting and Markets : Game Servers : Running a gameserver?

[citricsquid]

Running a gameserver?

Hi,
Let's say I have:
A high end server with the capability to stream a lot of data (3TB bandwidth?) and I want to run a gameserver, how would I go about it?
Do I simply download a set of server files for the specific game and run them on the server and then use some sort of control panel that controls it? How do I go about it. I'm not looking to rent a gameserver, I want to look into running my own (personal not commercial) from a dedicated.
Do I have to pay for the games? Any help is much appreciated. I can't find much information... anywhere.

[RichardPerez]

I would really recommend going with TCAdmin for your game server control panel, it is one of the best game server control panels out there for Windows.
You can gain allot of information from the TCAdmin forums on how to get the game server files for your dedicated server.www.tcadmin.com






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[Bryce|C]

I would also recommend using TCAdmin for your server, there forums can provide a lot of information on how to go about hosting game servers, etc.
As for actually hosting the game servers and getting the files, it really depends on the game, some games have dedicated servers files to download for free and some you have to own a copy of the game itself.
To really help you out we are going to need a few more details about what you would like to accomplish, such as what game and some more specifications about your server such as what operating system you run.





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[citricsquid]

I don't have a server as of yet, I'm looking into developing a gaming community and that will require gameservers, so I'm looking into it all first. I would probably be going with a linux server, as I have some experience with managing linux, but if required, windows would be an option.
Right now the games I'm looking at are; Left 4 Dead and Call of duty 1. I own a retail version of Call of duty and I own the retail version of Left 4 dead. Do I need brand new copies to run a dedicated server with? I would expect not, otherwise companies wouldn't be able to provide gameservers so cheap?

[Bryce|C]

Well as for the Linux versus Windows server, that is probably going to be a topic of heavy debate, but I myself will always recommend using Windows because of the ability to use TCAdmin and I have found over the years a lot of game servers runner better on Windows versus linux.
As for the games, for Call of Duty you would not need to buy a new copy of the game, you can just use the copy you already have, and Left 4 Dead is a steam game if I remember correctly, so you would just use the HLDS updater tool to download the files for free.
Let us know if you have any other questions, once you are ready to do the setup there are many guides available for this.





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AIM: Shortywakeman E-Mail/MSN: shortywakeman @ hotmail.com

[NitOxYs]

Technically you need to own a copy of the game to host it. You will need to download the installation from Steam (Using their tool) and upload the contents of CoD to your server to host them.
If you want to run a server, like others said get TC admin for windows.
Linux is a beast to get yourself into if you don't know what you're doing.
Preferably you don't want a GUI with linux as it eats up memory and processor. So you'll be using the command line, as it is the best way.
Windows Server (2003

[citricsquid]

Quote:



Originally Posted by NitOxYs


My recommendation will probably be have a hosting company do it for you, unless you want to go through it all.


I won't ever learn if I don't do it myself
I want to give it a go, if it does become apparent that it is far beyond the scope of my ability I'll just rent gameservers, but it seems like a good option atm.

[zomgmike]

Back in college, I ran a CS 1.6 server on Ubuntu for about a year. It's not really much different than doing anything else in Linux. My suggestion is just to dig in and use Google for whatever issues come up or possibly ask on each game's message boards for tips on where to start.
If you want to do it on Linux and think you have the know-how, by all means, do! Windows licensing and TCAdmin licensing add up (you could save hundreds per year) so it's quite the savings if you can figure out how to do it without them.





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