There’s a lot of gamers in this thread too young to remember how overloaded and miserable the free console game servers were.
Microsoft was like “chuck us like ~$5 per month and we will put up enough servers so the games are actually playable”. At the time, it was the best deal available for console gaming.
Honestly an argument could be made it was the most economical way to play online, in general, at the time. The console cost was subsidized, and the online servers were arguably at-cost, and you really only needed to buy one copy of Halo to join the fun.
There are more costs than just servers. I’m just saying, that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be part of the upfront price of the game, though, and I agree with you.
Idk. I was always a PC gamer, and think the old, often modded, independently run servers were much more fun than the soul-less matchmaking I see on most modern games. It was fun to play UT2004, and join a server where the arena was someone’s bedroom and all the sound effects were ripped from The Simpsons; or to jump into a clan’s open server and shit-talk them while they dominate me, or to join a server run by Beyond Unreal’s community, where the mods used were voted on by the community beforehand, IIRC. Good times.
I was always a PC gamer, and think the old, often modded, independently run servers were much more fun than the soul-less matchmaking I see on most modern games.
Absolutely. If one was lucky enough to have a buddy with a server setup, that was by far the coolest option.
Very true. These things do still exist for a lot of games. It lost popularity a lot on CS due to the incessant need for “competitive” matchmaking, but they are still out there. Rust is a good game for heavily modded servers (if you like the game concept in the first place) and I think Arma (which a bit more niche) is basically all community servers, ranging from in depth military reality to role playing much more mundane stuff.
It’s not a matter of age. You can play for free on PC now and it’s a better experience in many regards. There are also older games (even on console) where you could connect directly to a user through IP address or phone number and those will work to this day. Consoles are the domain of companies that want to have their little walled garden so they can overcharge for things like this.
It’s totally a matter of age. Kids these days have no idea how good they have it, and don’t realize they need to get off my lawn. Shakes cain in the air /s
There’s a lot of gamers in this thread too young to remember how overloaded and miserable the free console game servers were.
Microsoft was like “chuck us like ~$5 per month and we will put up enough servers so the games are actually playable”. At the time, it was the best deal available for console gaming.
Honestly an argument could be made it was the most economical way to play online, in general, at the time. The console cost was subsidized, and the online servers were arguably at-cost, and you really only needed to buy one copy of Halo to join the fun.
Yeah but they don’t run the servers anymore. So I don’t know what I’m paying for really.
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There are more costs than just servers. I’m just saying, that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be part of the upfront price of the game, though, and I agree with you.
Access to a router somewhere, apparently.
Idk. I was always a PC gamer, and think the old, often modded, independently run servers were much more fun than the soul-less matchmaking I see on most modern games. It was fun to play UT2004, and join a server where the arena was someone’s bedroom and all the sound effects were ripped from The Simpsons; or to jump into a clan’s open server and shit-talk them while they dominate me, or to join a server run by Beyond Unreal’s community, where the mods used were voted on by the community beforehand, IIRC. Good times.
Absolutely. If one was lucky enough to have a buddy with a server setup, that was by far the coolest option.
Very true. These things do still exist for a lot of games. It lost popularity a lot on CS due to the incessant need for “competitive” matchmaking, but they are still out there. Rust is a good game for heavily modded servers (if you like the game concept in the first place) and I think Arma (which a bit more niche) is basically all community servers, ranging from in depth military reality to role playing much more mundane stuff.
And this is why it was successful and still exists to this day.
excuse the fist shaking at the cloud
Kids these days literally want everything for free and don’t care that microtransactions and other monetization has pervaded every aspect of games.
Horse armour, man. Never forget the horse armour. Kids these days love horse armour.
It’s not a matter of age. You can play for free on PC now and it’s a better experience in many regards. There are also older games (even on console) where you could connect directly to a user through IP address or phone number and those will work to this day. Consoles are the domain of companies that want to have their little walled garden so they can overcharge for things like this.
It’s totally a matter of age. Kids these days have no idea how good they have it, and don’t realize they need to get off my lawn. Shakes cain in the air /s