The Struggle For Private Game Servers

A story at the BBC takes a look at the use of private game servers for games that tend not to allow them. While most gamers are happy to let companies like Blizzard and NCSoft administer the servers that host their MMORPGs, others want different rules, a cheaper way to play, or the technical challenge of setting up their own. A South African player called Hendrick put up his own WoW server because the game "wasn't available in the country at the time." A 21-year-old Swede created a server called Epilogue, which "had strict codes of conduct and rules, as well as a high degree of customized content (such as new currency, methods of earning experience, the ability to construct buildings and hire non-player characters, plus 'permanent' player death) unavailable in the retail version of the game." The game companies make an effort to quash these servers when they can, though it's frequently more trouble that it's worth. An NCSoft representative referenced the "growing menace" of IP theft, and a Blizzard spokesperson said,"We also have a responsibility to our players to ensure the integrity and reliability of their World of Warcraft gaming experience and that responsibility compels us to protect our rights."

Comments

Re:WoW

[sopssa]

there will likely be class action suits against companies like Blizzard in the longer run and they will likely loose them. Having that in mind it might be smarter if they open up their servers and focus on getting paid for content they create

That is just completely absurd. Or are we going to sue every company now that doesn't publish their server infrastructure or for-internal-use made software? Or companies that object to industrial spying?

Not that there's anything bad with subscription model either. People pay it for cable TV, for Internet, for mobile, for rent. Or are you not using those either? $15 per month is actually pretty cheap for the amount of game play those games create, considering most people play them quite a lot.

Re:Why don't we see more OSS MMO contributors?

[AntiDragon]

Time and Effort and Expectations.

The thing is, reverse engineering an existing game and duplicating whatever scripts or behaviours are needed on the server side to allow the commercial client to connect is far less work than doing it from scratch.

To put it another way, for most OSS projects, you are your own master. You write the code when you feel you have the time and (unless you have some sort of mutually agreed deadline) there's no particular pressure to fix a bug other than the pressure you put upon yourself. For an MMO, there are players, live, playing on your server all the time. There's constant pressure - technical improvements and bugs to squash, desire for new content, need administration and various disputes to solve. MMOs are 24-7 and likewise so are the demands from your player base.

When you create a server for an existing MMO, you only have to match what already exists. No one will be hounding you to add new content - the original developers will be doing that. You also have the momentum of an existing game with an existing fan base and it's own momentum and quite often a world that's been fleshed out with history, lore and so on. Create your own and you have to do that from scratch, you have to let people know you exist and you have to create both server *and* client.

Projects like Planescape show that it can be done but ultimately it's the harder path. MMO players tend to have a reputation for whining too, so I doubt it's the most thankful development hobby you could have!

(I have no first hand experience either way but this seems a likely explanation to my mind)