Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Halo 2 Online Preservation Effort Ends

Posted by Soulskill on from the good-show dept.

A couple weeks ago, we discussed news that some dedicated Halo 2 fans were keeping the game's multiplayer alive after support for online play was dropped. Now, a few days shy of a month after support ended, the last users have been knocked off the server. "[A user named] Apache N4SIR outlasted everyone. 'May 11th @ 0158hrs I was FORCEFULLY REMOVED!!' he wrote on the forums at Bungie.net. 'I thought I'd be the one turning off the lights but that was done for me. Good night everyone, my Elite needs a rest.' His last comrade in arms, Agent Windex, was still signed on, as spotted by Kotaku at 4 p.m. US Pacific Time on May 10, but their adventure, which began on April 15, ended after Windex announced 21 minutes later that he had been removed from play and Apache N4SIR suffered a similar fate hours later, as he described in his post."

21 of 201 comments (clear)

  1. and... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    And nothing of value was lost.

    1. Re:and... by Kitkoan · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Halo 2 was released in 2004, its now 2010. Thats almost 6 years. Don't know of many (if any) console games that have had that much online support made for them. I don't feel thats really screwing over your loyal customers as have some of the longest online multiplayer support. And there is a time for a business to have to cut legacy support.

      --
      Attention... all grammer nazi"s! Is they're anything; wrong with: my post,
    2. Re:and... by billsayswow · · Score: 3, Funny

      Oh, I know you from somewhere... You were the guy who said he'd move to Canada after every election that didn't go your way. You're the guy who said you were switching to satellite after your cable provider raised the prices again. You were going to switch to Verizon after AT&T charged you a lousy service fee, take the City to court after they didn't plow your street well, never use UPS again because your package was damaged, never eat at McDonalds again since your burger had pickles on it, never go into a Walmart because you couldn't return your opened copy of Madden '96, switch to ATI because you got a DOA NVidia card, and always buy Durex because you had a trojan rip on you once, and now you have a kid that you're inflicting your empty-threated wisdom upon. Nice to see you again. Though you said you'd never speak to me for as long as you'd live.

    3. Re:and... by trawg · · Score: 4, Informative

      They don't need to provide legacy support for old games though - if their games are created in such a way that users can run their own game servers, someone else can do it as long as there's someone that still wants to play the game.

      As others have pointed out in this discussion, PC games from as far back as Quake (1996) are still perfectly playable because it uses an 'open', dedicated server based framework for its multiplayer services.

      Sadly, the PC world is catching up to the console world in this respect - because developers are less interested in having you play their game for more than ten years. They don't see the advantages in having a game that lives that long and instead want you to continue buying the next version every year or so. Unfortunately for people that care about having good games that will last for a really long time (like me), this model is proving super-successful.

    4. Re:and... by MBGMorden · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Anyone else feel it sad when people reference a whole six years as an eternity, after which a product should surely be dropped?

      Stuff used to be made to last a lifetime. I have an old double-barreled shotgun my granddad passed down to me. My mother has dresses, dolls, and other heirlooms passed down to her by her mother. Most of this stuff is 50-75 years old, and I envision it to be around a lot longer. Even in content - I've got movies and such that are as old as I am (original release Star Wars VHS for example). Yet with this type of thing, well, it's SIX years old. It's obvious that you shouldn't expect to keep using it.

      --
      "People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
    5. Re:and... by DirtyCanuck · · Score: 4, Interesting

      XBConnect is pretty sweet.

      Allowed playing of the Original Halo online before Xboxlive existed.

      Also allowed for playing of Halo 2 online well before the official release date

      Not to mention all the modded Halo versions that can only be played online via a VPN

      VPN allowed for much more freedom with regards to game choices and banning of cheating players.

      Once again the community compiled something more useful than the locked down mainstream service.

    6. Re:and... by Mashiki · · Score: 4, Insightful

      What makes consoles so special?

      It's easier to screw owners over.

      --
      Om, nomnomnom...
    7. Re:and... by iamhassi · · Score: 4, Insightful

      First they take multiplayer away after 6 yrs, next it will be DRM disabling of single player after 6 yrs... then 5... 4.... 3.... or whenever the sequal comes out. Slippery slope, and I'm sure some kid will say "Come on that game is 2 yrs old and they have a sequal they have to stop support someday!". No, they didn't, they designed the game so multiplayer support could be shut-off and use that as an excuse.

      --
      my karma will be here long after I'm gone
    8. Re:and... by Maxo-Texas · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Monopoly, Risk, Axis & Allies, Diplomacy (50 years old).

      Yea-- hard to believe ANYONE would want to play a game 7 years after it was published.

      Games Workshop is getting bad about this (as is Magic the Gathering).

      Sure- you can play on your own, but convention play requires the current figures and rules. Which are arbitrarily changed about every 24-36 months.

      Business wants you to RENT everything- no ownership.

      --
      She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
    9. Re:and... by sjames · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It's all part of the rentification. At one time when you bought something you owned it. You could expect to pass it on to your children one day. Your wealth would tend to increase over time.

      Now, it's all essentially a multi-year rental. Even major appliances may be expected to conk out in a decade or so and become landfill (yeah, that's really green!). You may rest assured that replacement parts will not be available should you decide to try to fix it or they will only be available to the brand X authorized repair shop that will (because of the costs to become authorized) charge you nearly as much as the cost of a new unit to replace the $20 part (that cost $2 to make and $8 to ship from China). Yeah, perhaps you were thinking one of those fancy new ones would be nice anyway, but it might have been nice to sell the old one to someone who needed a good deal on a basic appliance.

    10. Re:and... by hairyfeet · · Score: 5, Informative

      And let us say, just for the sake of argument, that all the major game companies decided to be pricks and got together and quit making new PC games tomorrow. How many of you actually have ALL the good PC games, hmmm? Hell I'm still finding great new mods for Freelancer and that game came out 7 years ago!

      If the game company acts like a prick, don't buy from them. Instead vote with your dollars and buy from somebody that treats you decent like good old games that don't fill your PC with DRM or make you phone home just to play. This is one of the reasons I refuse to give up PC gaming and mess with consoles. If MSFT, or Ubisoft, or any other game company acts like a total douche I can take my business elsewhere, and there is plenty of products to choose from, but if for example I'd have went with PS3 and wanted to keep my OtherOS and still game? Tough shit, buy another console.

      With consoles ONE company owns the keys to the kingdom, and it is their way or nothing. With the PC I can buy big games or indy, new or classics, and have a wealth of places to shop at. EA killing online multiplayer on the consoles when the sequel comes out is just a glimpse of the console's future. It will be pay and pay and pay some more if you actually want to get the full on and off line gameplay. Finally with DLC I'm predicting the PHBs at the major game companies will pretty much destroy new games on both consoles and PC, by chopping them into pieces and nickel and diming the player to death to "maximize profit potential" so a new game will end up costing you $100+ just to get to play the whole thing.

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
    11. Re:and... by DarkOx · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You are operating under the assumption that you did not put more energy and resources into the manufacture of the new equipment or that it was going to be done anyway. Now if you really needed a new computer to do something you could not do before that holds up. You should always use the newer more energy efficent model. On the otherhand if that P4 was doing everything you needed it to do the truely green thing would probably have been to never create a market for that new computer and therefore avoid its constuction in the first place.

      There is more to greeness than just carbon emmissions; people seem to have forgotten this! Losts of really awful chemicals get used to manufacture chips; computers are full plastics that don't biodegrade and are made from limited petrol resources. Oh and on the carbon front manufacture of the thing probably consumed quite a lot of engergy all told; possibly years worth of the delta between the efficencies of the two units; and released lots of carbon.

      People whine and cry about efficent this but really most of it is feel good nonsense so people can create an excuse to make and have new toys. The disposability of our society is doing more harm to our enviornment than anything else. Which is not to say that when we do make new things we should not make them as efficent as can be. Its also true that old things which can be retrofited to improve them possibly should not be. Adding more insulation to an existing house probably makes all kinds of sense. Replacing something like an old boiler where almost everything can be recycled might be good too. Retering a perfectly servicable computer or automobile probably not so much.

      --
      Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
    12. Re:and... by d3ac0n · · Score: 4, Insightful

      And what if 3,500,000 people take their $50 elsewhere? What then?

      This is why I don't own a console, and probably never will. A console doesn't give me enough control, and is nothing but a money pit. Far more so than a PC.

      Control is what it comes down to. I insist on controlling the equipment I own. Excepting my Cable box (which I'm basically renting) I have ultimate authority over all electronics in my house. Nobody else can tell me how to use it., and nobody can remotely disable any of it's capabilities.

      Think about it: What good are those old X-boxes now? You can't play online with them, and Single player was NEVER very impressive on them. They don't have HD capabilities, so even XBMC isn't useful anymore. They are junk. Not even useful for nostalgia's sake like an old Atari, NES, or SNES. And the old games? Money down the drain. Hundreds, possibly thousands of dollars per person just gone.

      With PC games, even if my PC dies and I have to build a new one, I can still play my old games. Even if I change OSes I can still play most of them because community groups are porting them over. So even though I've changed PC's multiple times since MW4 came out, I can still bust it out and play it, any time I want. (and I do. MW4 was and is a great game.)

      Long live PC gaming.

      --
      Official Heretic from the "Church of Global Warming". Proven right thanks to whistle blowers. AGW = Flat Earth Theory
  2. Meanwhile on the PC by Shadow+of+Eternity · · Score: 5, Informative

    People are still playing everything from Quake's Team Fortress to Tribes 2, with their own dedicated servers and authentication systems.

    --
    A bullet may have your name on it but splash damage is addressed "To whom it may concern."
    1. Re:Meanwhile on the PC by ani23 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Counterstrike. I seriously doubt it will decommision in my lifetime

    2. Re:Meanwhile on the PC by OrwellianLurker · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Counterstrike. I seriously doubt it will decommision in my lifetime

      It's the Pacman of FPS.

      --
      'Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.' - Mao Tse-tung
    3. Re:Meanwhile on the PC by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

      This is because of the way Valve thinks about CS. It started out as a third-party mod, and Valve was all "wow, the fans are having way more fun with this mod than they are with the main game - we should find a way to get in on this action!" So they adopted it, and the rest is history. At one point it actually accounted for more internet traffic than the nation of Italy (admittedly, before broadband penetration was quite so high, and in no small part because of sloppy network algorithms). Given the thinking behind why Valve picked up Counterstrike as an official product, I would be absolutely dumbstruck if they don't keep milking it for as long as the fans are interested in it.

      In related news: the lack of LAN play in Starcraft II means that it is going to horizon eventually, while Starcraft will always be around. Go figure.

      But seriously, game producers - an established fan base is extremely valuable even if they've already paid for the game. If you can't figure out how to sell them something else on the basis of their existing fandom, you need a new job. If you can't figure out that it's good marketing to find a way to continue supporting a game that still has fans and would rather spend the money on another television commercial, you need a new job.

  3. Re:hmmmm by Amarantine · · Score: 3, Informative

    Actually, i know that EA's games carry such a warning on the back (altough in very small print). Especially on their sports games. It reads something along the lines of "EA may retire online features after 30 days notice posted on www.ea.com or 30 days after the last day of the 2008-2009 NFL season."

  4. What I really expected to read by masterwit · · Score: 4, Funny

    What I really expected was:

    "Halo 2 preservation ends", six die in a fire believed to be caused by their game consoles.

    --
    We should start a new Slashdot and return control to the geeks. It actually wouldn't be that hard to get some users to
  5. Re:And I thought... by SheeEttin · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The difference here is that you can still use FORTRAN if you want to.
    One of the main selling points of games like these is their multiplayer. You'd want it to go on forever--and well you should, you certainly paid for it!
    You can still compile and run FORTRAN programs--in fact, if you run Linux, you might have a FORTRAN compiler installed and not know it (I'm in Windows, so I can't see if I do right now). Hell, when you install mingw, the compilers offered are C, C++, and FORTRAN. (Probably Java too, but I don't remember. Wikipedia says there is also Pascal and Ada support.)
    The problem with Microsoft's treatment of their fanbase is "This product has reached end-of-life, we're killing it. Tough. What, you want more? No. And don't think about setting up your own master servers, etc., or we'll sue you." (Or something to that effect.)

  6. Re:And I thought... by Jedi+Alec · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ...the Windows XP hangers-on were annoying. Sheesh...let it go guys. Like that one wizened old-timer in the back warehouse blathering on how FORTRAN is still relevant...

    Ehmm, it works. It supports all the hardware in my gaming machine. It has been rock stable for the past few years.

    Why *would* I change to a different OS? I already paid for this one...

    --

    People replying to my sig annoy me. That's why I change it all the time.