Game Server Update

[[Team] Kilemal]

It became apparent to me yesterday that the game server required an operating system reload, so we were looking at another day or two of downtime anyway, therefore I have a new plan and this is it:



The datacenter will be reloading the server with Windoze Server 2003 instead of CentOS. There are many reasons for this decision, some of them are as follows:
I'll actually be able to get some support again from Art of War since it's been a couple years now that they haven't officially supported Linux operating systems on their game servers, they just did their best to continue supporting us because we've been with them a long time now. Unfortunately "their best" hasn't been very good lately. I would have gone this route a long time ago, however they originally could not get the private ranking system to work on windoze, so after three days of no games while they tried to make it work, I told them to just go back to Linux because I already knew how to make that work. We did some testing with a Windoze game last night and have verified that the stats will work.
Windoze will give us a lot more options for games. Don't get me wrong here - we still play Battlefield 2, but we'll now have the ability to play any game in their inventory, which is substantial and I'll list the games they have available below. Also - I'll be able to install any of the games in MY inventory - which is also substantial. So my plan is to have the usual three or four BF2 games with an optional "extra" game of our choosing.
Here's the list of games AoW has available for install at anytime:


Age of Chivalry
Aliens vs Predator II: Includes Primal Hunt
America's Army (Non-Honor)
America's Army 3 (Honor)
America's Army 3 (Non-Honor)
America's Army Honor
Arma : Armed Assault
ArmA 2
BattleField 2
BattleField 2142
Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (Soon)
BattleField: Desert Combat
Battlefield: Vietnam
Black Hawk Down
Call of Duty
Call of Duty 2
Call of Duty 4
Call of Duty, World at War
Call of Duty: United Offensive
Counter-Strike: Source
Counter-Strike: Source - Boosted
Crysis
Crysis Warhead
D.I.P.R.I.P.
DOD Source
Doom 3
F.E.A.R.
FarCry
FarCry 2
Frontlines: Fuel of War
Garry's Mod
Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter
Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2
Gore: Ultimate Soldier
GT: Legends
GTR 2
Half-Life 2 - Fortress Forever Mod
Half-Life 2: Source
Half-Life: Condition Zero
Half-Life: Counter-Strike 1.6
Half-Life: Counter-Strike 1.6 Boosted
Half-Life: Day of Defeat
Half-Life: Death Match
Half-Life: Digital Paintball
Halo 2 (PC Only)
Halo: Combat Evolved
Hidden & Dangerous 2
IL-2 STURMOVIK
INSURGENCY: Modern Infantry Combat
James Bond: Nightfire
Killing Floor
Kuma Games
Left4Dead
Left4Dead
Legends
Live For Speed
Medal of Honor Airborne
Medal of Honor: Allied Assault
Medal of Honor: Allied Assault Breakthrough
Microsoft Flight Simulator
Multi Theft Auto
NASCAR SimRacing
NeoTokyo Source
Neverwinter Nights 2
No One Lives Forever I
No One Lives Forever II
PainKiller
Postal 2
Quake
Quake 4
Quake II
Quake III
Quake Wars - Unranked
RACE 07 - The official WTCC Game
Rainbow Six 3: Ravenshield
RAINBOW SIX VEGAS 2
Red Faction
Red Orchestra
Return to Castle Wolfenstein
Return to Castle Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory
rFactor
Rune 1.01
Rune: Halls of Valhalla
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl
San Andreas Multiplayer
Savage
Section 8
Serious Sam II
Serious Sam: The Second Encounter
Shattered Horizons
Soldier Of Fortune I
Soldier of Fortune II: Double Helix
Star Trek: Elite Force I
Star Trek: Elite Force II
Star Wars Battlefront
Star Wars Battlefront II (PC)
Star Wars Battlefront II (PS2)
Star Wars Jedi Knight II: Outcast
Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy
Star Wars: Republic Commando
Stargate Legacy mod for HL2
Synergy
Tactical Ops: Assault on Terror
Team Fortess Classic
Team Fortress 2
Team Fortress 2 - Boosted
Trackmania Racing
Tribes 1
Tribes 2
Tribes: Vengeance
Unreal Tournament
Unreal Tournament 2003
Unreal Tournament 2004
Unreal Tournament 3
Warsow
Wheel Of Time
Wolfenstein
World in Conflict
Zombie Panic: Source
And . . . as I stated earlier, my collection of Win games is also substantial, going back as far as Jane's Fighters Anthology.

Make no mistake about this though, my objective here has not changed:

We run the best Battlefield 2 co-op games in the world and will continue to do so. The other games are strictly an additional bonus, you may never see any of them played here, but they're there if we decide to try them out.

[[Team] Traz]

Glad to hear things are moving forward and hope you do not have any heart burn from this fun experience. Thanks for working so hard on it Kil. An additional bonus game sound interesting. Look forward to hearing more about it later.

[Zwerghirsch]

We all know, that you're doing the best to keep the number one's at it's place ;)

I appreciate your work, Kil :)

[=UCO=Mudgutz]

IS IT ALL REALLY WORTH IT?

or just a bandaid until the next nightmare rears its ugly head?


Mud

[[Team] Kilemal]

Nightmare is my middle name . . . . :eek:

[[Team] Jenifearia]

thanks for the update and the hard work :)

[JoeSWO]

Just as a bit of feedback, I rented a slot server from AoW for the Nations at War mod. We had continual problems with it, and it required constant maintenance. We just pulled the plug on it. As a test, one of our N@W developers assembled his own server at his residence, and the software works just fine with minimal hiccups and crashes. Plus, AoW won't allow remote desktop access, making it more difficult to maintain the server.

AoW prices were quite reasonable, but when coupled with the problems, it wasn't worth it.

Cheers,
Joe

[=UCO=Mudgutz]

Well Joe, sometimes you need to weigh the cost versus the problems, in the end, I think anybody would agree its not nearly worth it, not even close! ... It probably would be different if BF2 were a brand new cutting edge game, then it probably would be worth the effort, as far as the new BF2 bad company release, I played it, and I can tell you that you are going to need a real fast computer to play it (quad core at least with a smokin video card), and as of its release on March 2, theres are no signs of any kind of private dedicated servers being available and no coop play. So it will be quite different from the current and tried n tired BF2 senerio.

[[Team] Kilemal]

Most people are of the same opinion about Art of War, however we've had a good 2 years of pretty much hassle free gaming with them. Granted - the problems in the last 6 months have kinda made up for that, but they know me and I know them (very well) so I get even better prices than their advertised price and since the server is our own dedicated box I have no issues with what we can or can't do with it. I can install/run anything I want, and if they don't want to do it for me I simply do it myself. With a windoze server that will be even easier than ever.

[=UCO=Mudgutz]

Well at least you are steeping up to a windows server , F_____K that Linux Shit! LINUX SUCKS!... carry on ...

[JoeSWO]

Yep, I agree with you Mudgutz. That's why we pulled the plug. We're in the process of either acquiring a new server, building our own, or finding a better deal. Cheap prices are irrelevant if it doesn't do what you want it to do.

[Ghotimeal]

Thank you

[black_rook_1981]

I for one, would like to see EA make an updated BF2 with better graphics. A BF3 would be awesome. Until that day though, BF2 is still the best 1st person squad warfare game i have ever played. Thanks Kilemal for working so hard on the servers. Cant wait to play with everyone again.

[loadedNlocked]

Thank You for your dedication and long hours on this project; it is appreciated!

[Phantom]

Yea Boss. we appreciate your time and effort to give us a nice safe place to frag the bastages.:D

[ElCazadorDiablo]

Thanks for the hard work!

One more reason I like this place ;)


Very interested in Bad Company 2... anyone already own it and play it?


Would it make a good server selection?


-T1

ElCazadorDiablo

[PJGARD]

Thanks for taking your time to fix the server problems.
A good deed is never over l:D:confused:k, great job.
Hope to see you on the field soon.

Kill U Later
PJ

[[Team] Kilemal]

Hopefully this recent o/s downgrade (:D) will be complete today. I know that playing without your rank and awards can become tiresome very quickly. Especially since you cannot earn new awards, in case you didn't know. Although the server is sending in your stats (scores, etc) at the end of each round and they are being recorded, if the game doesn't know when you log in what awards you have already earned, it can't award you the next level if you earn it during that round. But - on the bright side - you get to earn the same basic badges again, and again, and again. How much fun is that ! Sorry again for all the bs this turned into, I should have tested the 64 bit thing days ago. I can't expect the server admins to know this was a problem since it effected only the stats and not the games. All they knew was that they gave me an operating system and the games ran on it, the rest was up to me.

[[Team] Traz]

Thanks for the effort Kil. And on the bright side we get to go into battle in our squads to waste some bots, rewards or not.

[ISirius]

Another thanks! Your hard work is much appreciated.

[Pudolski]

Thanks for your efforts Kil. It feels great going back in and killing some bots. :D

[CFFS BIONIX54]

Traz;4463']Thanks for the effort Kil. And on the bright side we get to go into battle in our squads to waste some bots, rewards or not.

I totally agreed with Traz. i think many of the players that had been in Team or in BF2 Long enough will also agree with Traz. And we really appreciate the hard work from You and the rest of the Team Nitro Members, so that we have a good server to play in. THANKS :):)

[**72C*Ben*R77**]

hmm...must have missed alot since I've been gone. Nice work overcoming server troubles once again Kil. Thanks!

[[Team] Kilemal]

As of today - 03.03.10 - I'm not overly impressed with the new Windoze operating system on the game server. The games certainly crash a lot more on windoze than they do on linux, but I guess I should have expected that. Once everything is settled on the box I suspect it may settle down a bit. I know one thing for sure - running a windoze game server is like "Game Servers For Dummies." My dog could run it now, for treats of course.

Anyhoo - I'm still a little busy getting everything on the box, and as I mentioned before, other games we can run are practically limitless. In response to all the shows of gratitude and support I received during these emotionally trying times, there could be a few extra games running for the next week or so at least. I just finished getting Eve of Destruction running, next I'll work on Project Reality.

[[Team] Jenifearia]

Dan will be your new best friend if your able to put PR on he's been waiting months to play with the team.

[[Team] Kilemal]

Just a little more info here about the server for any who are interested:

The BF2CC was not working very well because the wrong version of Microsoft .NET Framework was installed on the server. I fixed that yesterday. This morning I discovered that the wrong version of the Mod Manager was also installed, so I fixed that this morning. The games are running much better but I still don't think they're at 100% yet. After I reinstalled the correct version of the Mod Manager scripts, I cleared the maplist in every game profile on every game, because the maplists seem to always be the biggest problem. However upon forther contemplation, I realized I should have deleted all the profiles in all the games and remade them from scratch, since the BF2CC writes the profiles, and it obviously wasn't working correctly.

This will mean that each game will be down about a half hour while I rewrite its profiles. Using any of the backup profiles I have would be foolish in this case I believe. Was hoping to get a few games done this evening but work went a lot later than I had planned and I have a very pressing appointment with my pillow and blankey. I'll get going on it first thing in the AM.

[Ghotimeal]

Thanks again Kilemal

[[Team] Jenifearia]

ditto:)

[schildmann]

Anyway, I hope you make backups of the stats now. A Great Crash of '10 and I will jump out of the window :D

[Tea&Medals]

Thanks again for all the time Kilemal,you do have the patience of a saint,i think i would have taken my sledgehammer to it by now

[[Team] Kilemal]

Anyway, I hope you make backups of the stats now. A Great Crash of '10 and I will jump out of the windows :D


The stats aren't kept on the game server, they're on another server entirely, but since the Great Crash of '09 I've backed up the stats database and the forum database every Sunday night like clockwork. The worst that can happen from here on out is we go back to where we were Sunday. The website itself would have to be remade because its just too big a folder to backup the whole thing, that's why it stopped getting done in the first place, but once the site was back loading the forum back into it will be a snap.

More about the games also . . . . .

I just realized that the ModManager scripts ver 2.0 were probably already installed in the game file that Art of War uploaded to the server for me. That being said, there's no telling what else they (or EA) have done to the installation. I learned a long time ago that the game files that EA distributes to the big game farms are somehow different from the version available to the general public. I'm not really sure how they are different but I've had problems before with the BF2 installations they've provided for me. So . . . I'm downloading my own, clean BF2 Ver 1.5 to my pc as I write and I'll start uploading it and replacing the games on the server with this copy soon.