Should Online Console Games Have Dedicated Servers?

Thanks to GameSpot for its 'GameSpotting' editorial discussing the problems of online console gaming without dedicated servers. The author points out: "Let's consider the top upcoming shooters on both the PS2 and the Xbox: Killzone and Halo 2... the cold, hard fact is that these games will only offer a maximum of 12- and 16-player online multiplayer, respectively. In other words, if you can find a good nearby server, you'll be playing a game that isn't fundamentally different than what we've been playing for about eight years on the PC in Quake 1." He continues by contrasting this to the PC experience: "EA has promised that the upcoming Battlefield 2, currently scheduled to ship in the first part of 2005, will have more than 100 simultaneous players", before suggesting: "The bottom line is that console games need dedicated servers. As it stands today, only individual Xboxes are serving matches while simultaneously allowing the host to play. You simply cannot run a 24- or 32-player game with just a 733MHz processor and 64MB of system RAM available, hooked up to a potentially flaky cable or DSL line."

Comments

should they? yes.

[gl4ss]

of course they should have, especially in cases where the whole game essentially is just for online play.

They should give the server software for people as well to run dedicated servers.. it's the normal way anyways.

Soooo

[Apreche]

The makers of those console games should distribute PC software for linux and windows so that college kids with high bandwidth connections can run servers on the spare pcs they have lying around. That's where all the counterstrike servers come from. If they don't then they are going to have to run their own servers, which might be higher quality but it will cost them more money.

In America, More = Better!

[Anonymous Coward]

With Battlefield 2, I almost feel as if EA is running some kind of brainwashing campaign to convince me that 'more players in a server' means 'more fun.'

Am I the only one who thinks that smaller servers are the most fun? First off, in my experience with games like Day of Defeat and the Battlefield series, larger servers usually equate to laggier servers, no matter what hardware you're running. Second, in team based games, one or two non-cooperative miscreants can ruin the fun for everbody. Let more people in a server, increase the chance that it sucks. Third, why turn a great, teamwork-oriented, strategic experience like you can get in Battlefield into an out-and-out Frag-a-thon by adding 32 players? I have really never, not once, ever, had as much fun in a 32+ person server in Battlefield as I have in an intimate 16-player game with even the most basic kindergarten-level teamwork going on.

I think the console powers-that-be should avoid larger servers at all cost. Don't give in to peer pressure!

Re:In America, More = Better!

[KDR_11k]

I agree, even though for different reasons. See, when I get together with friends to play games over LAN, we're maybe 4 or 5 people, sometimes only 2 or 3 meet. That means we cannot play most team games. UT2004 Onslaught would have been impossible without bots and most teamplay based games/mods don't have that good of a bot support.
With the attempt of having more players on a server, the gameplay gets adjusted to require more players (ever tried to play a duel in RTCW?). This usually results in larger maps and vehicles that require more people to control. In UT2004 you have vehicles that can be controlled by a single person, but most games attempt to differentiate between driver and gunner(s) to "encourage team play".
Sometimes I wish for the days of Doom with four players max to return. Doom 3 seems to do that, but I expect people to prefer modding HL2 instead so they can continue making "truly teamplay dependant" mods.

Re:In America, More = Better!

[Anonymous Coward]

you forget what the #2 requirement of an army is, right after 'soldiers.'

Discipline.

Why do I want to run around with 100 12-year-olds who still think killing teammates is hilarious?

This is why...

[hookedup]

I've taken to playing FP shooters on PC like Battlefield Vietnam. Last night I played on an official EA games server with 52 people.

Let me tell you, there's no better way to play an online shooter than with 26 teammates..

Re:This is why...

[Anonymous Coward]

Teammates? so that's what you call them... I was calling them 'non-targets.'

Seriously, in big 32+ public servers, do you ever see any real, cohesive teamwork? They're chaos, and basically the only thing that having 'teams' does is cut the number of opponents in half.

Except of course if you have TKers.

50 player games may be more STIMULATING, but I ask you to think critically whether they are FUN.

Microsoft reneging

[GeorgeH]

Part of the deal with XBox live was that you were paying for a superior online experience. Why would I spend $70/yr to play a game on someone's laggy cable modem? I can get that for free with the PS2 online or a PC.

Basically it's paying for developers who are too lazy to impliment Jabber as a standard presence protocol for online gaming.

More players does not equal better

[superultra]

I played Planetside with at least 60 people in the same area and I was not impressed. Factor in that at least 25% of (and I'm being very conservative) are morons, another 25% are jerks, and really you've got 30 players who hampered by poor CPU performance and the presence of morons and jerks. Realistically, there's probably only about 10-25% that are really wanting to play well and on a team. Besides, how many games can perform effectively with 60+ enemies on the screen at one time?

I think we'd all agree that the constraints of previous systems actually meant that companies had to be more creative. The same is true here. I've had far more fun with the four player Splinter Cell Pandora Tomorrow than nearly any other online game. I'm not saying I don't run across my share of stupid people, but it's far easier to find 4 good people than it is 60-100. When you do find people that play fair, that don't camp, that play as a team, SCPT is an amazing multiplayer game - and usually lagless. I'm all up for more creative gameplay with what we have, not just adding more players.

Re:The author seems to be jumping to conclusions

[Anonymous Coward]

he didn't say it was the same game, he was making point although games have come along way since quake, halo 2 still is constricted to only 16 players like quake was. Except Quake was released in 1996 and multiplay wasn't as widespread back then so it made sense. Today we have Battlefield, UT2004, CS, etc...and oh yes all of which have superior graphics, ability to yield two weapons at once(ut) grenades vehicles and voice support(socom2). And these are the games halo 2 should be on par with inch for inch, but yet it's still limited to 16 players. That's the point he was driving.

and oh in terms of ingenuity,whether you like it or not, when Quake came out it was innovative and highly regarded,(half life borrowed from Q1 and Q2).
Halo as popular as it was, was just another fps. As Halo 2 will be.

Re:The problem with dedicated servers.

[Anonymous Coward]

Easy solution to that. The game makers can distrubute dedicated server software for the game for windows and linux. You can now set up or rent your very own dedicated server. On top of that they can still allow clients to double as servers.

If I want to 1 on 1 with a buddy in UT2K4 either of us can use our systems as the client and server. If we want to go head first into a battlefield with two dozen people I can join one of the many dedicated servers up already. Most PC FPS have acted like this since forever and it works out great.

Re:What are you talking about?

[*weasel]

Neither of these things require a centralized service and both can be run by publishers.

And yet no PS2 game offers anything of the sort.
It can be done - but it hasn't. They haven't even tried.

In the meantime, the service means alot to me, the gamer - and I'm willing to pay for it. I don't particularly care who's delivering cheat-free gaming. All that matters is that it only exists on one platform today, that platform has games I want to play, and the price for the service is extremely reasonable.

If they implemented an open standandard (or even a closed standard like Oscar) to provide between-game communication they could provide decentralized presence and allow out-of-game invites.

Once again, sure, it's something publishers could do - but they don't. Hell, how many PC games have shipped with native voicecomm support? Someone could do it - but they don't. In the meantime, I'm playing with voicecomm in every title by default. I'm not firing up firetalk or teamspeak or whatever 3rd party product fills that gaping hole in the PC multiplayer experience today.

Again, I don't care who is providing the service. There's a platform that delivers it as a default feature for a reasonable price. The PS2 provides voicecomm as a default and should be commended (over PC internet gaming) for it. With some effort by Sony it could easily be just about as good. But it isn't.

I attacked the quality factor, but none of those need to be exclusive to XBox.

Of course they needn't be exclusive. But MS is the only one who has sacked-up and provided gamers with internet play the way it should be. For that, I gladly pay them $50 per year. They have their online shit together more than any other platform - period; and they deserve to be rewarded and acknowledged for that.

The one aspect of XBL that you can reasonably gripe about - is those high performance servers. MS did promise it, and at least one of the early titles did deliver MS-hosted servers with higher player-counts. (Unreal championship notably had dedicated servers allowing 32 player matches).

Thing is: this is the one promised feature of XBL that MS left up to the individual publishers to follow through on. And none of them have opted to implement it.

So when a first-party game doesn't have MS-hosted dedicated servers, there isn't really much of an excuse -- MS did say one thing and fail to deliver on it consistantly across its titles.

But that becomes a fairly minor quibble when the rest of the service is weighed against the cost. The rest of the system is still worth $50 to me - because it exists, and it works, the right way, right now.