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Online Future of Some Command & Conquer Games in Doubt

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It was announced last month that hundreds of video games, including those made by Electronic Arts, Ubisoft, Gearbox, Nintendo, Konami, Capcom and more, may be taken off-line as GameSpy's multiplayer servers shut down on the 31st of May. What this means is the multiplayer services for the games listed below will no longer function.

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Games Effected

  • Command & Conquer Generals
  • Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars
  • Command & Conquer 3: Kane's Wrath
  • Red Alert 3

From what we understand, Electronic Arts says it is working to transition old multiplayer games away from the soon-to-be-defunct GameSpy network backend, but some hurdles remain. And that's basically all we know at this stage, there have been no further announcements from EA. It may be a case of the community seeking alternatives such as Hamachi, Tunngle, GameRanger and Evolve in order to continue to play these games online.

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Definitely*

 

Also, this is no major loss. Where one service dies, ten more alternatives will arise (provided the service was useful enough, of course :P).

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RA3 is definitely affected. Add ZH to the list, too.

I believe TibTwilight is a totally different story. Between 2003 and 2008, C&C devs only coded enough multiplayer code to merge with GameSpy, the latter did all the "dirty" work. TibTwilight does not seem to be in the same wavelength with other GameSpy-powered games, so it's likely in the safe zone. Unfortunately.

 

All of this means that ranking systems that were previously in place, and which held much of the multiplayer community this long, will be gone. There are several alternatives that emulate LAN play, but the feeling that there's a big server with ranking and friend system will be just a memory :( This isn't much of a problem for me personally, but the remaining "pros" seem to refuse the migration...

Edited by Plokite_Wolf

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Generals and Zero Hour might get Revora's support soon in the same way we do with Battle for Middle Earth 1 and 2. We just need to collect some data on Gamespy. Any help to make data collection quicker (by playing and simulating some situations such as win/lossses/quickmatch, etc with me) is appreciated.

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I can put you into contact with GameReplays staff knowledgeable on the matter.

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Generals and Zero Hour might get Revora's support soon in the same way we do with Battle for Middle Earth 1 and 2. We just need to collect some data on Gamespy. Any help to make data collection quicker (by playing and simulating some situations such as win/lossses/quickmatch, etc with me) is appreciated.

 

 

I have a lot of research (packet captures, decrypted IRC traffic, working IRC decryption and information on how the staging rooms are provided to the game client, which I am able to decode to an extent). Could you message me at gamereplays and let me know the state of affairs. I cannot commit too much time unless I am certain that there is a viable project, as I have another solution in the course of development. My profile on Gamereplays profile is http://www.gamereplays.org/community/index.php?showuser=148533

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TT is not affected as it doesn't run on GS at all.

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TT is not affected as it doesn't run on GS at all.

 

That's what I thought. I couldn't remember at the time of posting the news.

 

This whole situation has been a long time coming. The team at EALA during the Red Alert 3 development in 2008 were aware of this. I recall them saying they hated that they had to count on GameSpy for MP. Back then even the official C&C site was hosted on GameSpy servers, using stuff they had developed. It was shortly before the release (or during development) of C&C 4 that everything got relocated to EA managed servers. All but the games mentioned above of course,

 

People have asked if XWIS can support these games http://xwis.net/forums/index.php/topic/177066-with-gamespy-servers-shutting-down-do-you-plan-to-extend-your-service/

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Guest Stevie_K

That would be technically impossible.

 

Technically? Would you mind elaborating a bit since you have technical insight? :)

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All of the games on GameSpy's servers are placed on mutual hardware and software. Ripping individual games off the existing platform would be quite a task, even for EA.

Edited by Plokite_Wolf

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That would be technically impossible.

 

I guess it would be. Just sharing the link here that's all.

 

Someone has posted this guide explaining how to use Gameranger.

 

http://playgeneralsonline.mygamesonline.org/

 

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Part of their guide says to use a crack for Generals and Zero though.

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Part of their guide says to use a crack for Generals and Zero though.

Yeah, may be misleading for newcomers to GameRanger. Nothing of this sort is required in any of the major alternatives. It will work, though.

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Hi

 

I just registered an account here. I created that site & guide today... I've also created a quick spam-bot in 2vs2 chat room of generals online to inform everyone. I set it loose every few hours :P The way I see it is I don't want Generals to just... die...... I've been playing it since 2003. I now play it on Gameranger and have been doing so for a couple of years. When I saw the news, I thought others might want to know about it, and that with programs like Gameranger they could continue playing. My only intentions are to keep the game and its community alive.

 

Someone wrote to me (in generals online chat) that the creators of GenTool are working on something to keep online play working. Is this true? Or was he just speculating?

 

Also, when it comes to the 'crack', it's just what I use to play the game. I'm a bit busy now, so I don't have time to write a detailed guide and test for the optimal possibilities. I wrote this quickly in a matter of minutes in order to get the information out there. I'm not sure if the crack causes connection errors or version mismatches in LAN (using Gameranger), but my guess would be that it does.

 


Part of their guide says to use a crack for Generals and Zero though.

 

Anyway if anyone has a better alternative to Gameranger, I can put it up on the site. My plan is to let my spam-bot continue over the month, just to make sure as many people are informed as possible.

 

If this cancellation does not affect Generals, please let me know so I can update my information accordingly.

 

Thanks guys, love the site & forums :)

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Someone wrote to me (in generals online chat) that the creators of GenTool are working on something to keep online play working. Is this true? Or was he just speculating?

Probably speculation.

 

I'm not sure if the crack causes connection errors or version mismatches in LAN (using Gameranger), but my guess would be that it does.

I used to have one, but not the one you're linking to, and I was able to connect to a non-cracked guy, also via GameRanger. However, you'd be better off not putting it in the setup guide as a necessary step.

 

Anyway if anyone has a better alternative to Gameranger, I can put it up on the site.

Well, you could mention Tunngle, which is also quite respectable, and the lesser-known Evolve, which seems to have the best options for creating a LAN party, IMHO.

Edited by Plokite_Wolf

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Probably speculation.

 

I used to have one, but not the one you're linking to, and I was able to connect to a non-cracked guy, also via GameRanger. However, you'd be better off not putting it in the setup guide as a necessary step.

 

Well, you could mention Tunngle, which is also quite respectable, and the lesser-known Evolve, which seems to have the best options for creating a LAN party, IMHO.

 

I mentioned Tunngle in the top part of the page with Gameranger. I'll add Evolve there as well. I only have experience with Gameranger. If anyone has a good guide for Tunngle or Evolve I'll link it. :)

 

Also, I'll remove the crack from the page.

 

Thanks for the feedback! :)

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Of all the recent C&C games the ****tiest one is the only one that has its online working, so sad..

  • Upvote 1

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IMPORTANT UPDATE: EA games powered by GameSpy will shut down on the END OF JUNE

What's more, they seem to actually be looking for a solution for C&C?!?!?!

 

 

http://www.ea.com/news/update-on-ea-titles-hosted-on-gamespy

http://www.ea.com/1/service-updates

 

 

GameSpy announced earlier this month that they would be ending all hosted services for games, which impacts the online capabilities of a number of older titles, including some from EA.

 

Since GameSpy’s announcement, our teams have been working to evaluate options to keep services up and running. Unfortunately, due to technical challenges and concerns about the player experience, we do not have a solution at this time. Online services for EA games on the GameSpy platform will be closed down at the end of June.

 

We know some of these games are still fan favorites, including Battlefield 2, Battlefield 1942, Medal of Honor: Allied Assault and Command & Conquer games. We are still investigating community-supported options to preserve online functionality for these titles, such as multiplayer. Significant technical hurdles remain, and at this time we don’t have anything to announce.

 

For the full list of titles impacted by the change, visit the EA Online Services Updates page here.

 

Greetz to onch-onch from the GameReplays forums for this awesome find.

Edited by Plokite_Wolf

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The replacement community run GSA master server for C&C Renegade will be the clone up at renmaster.cncnet.org from the looks of it. The main application used by players joining via GSA already updated their server list a few days ago.

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I get the feeling there will be community created alternatives in place well before EA provide anything.

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I get the feeling there will be community created alternatives in place well before EA provide anything.

That wouldn't surprise me, seems to be how it often goes in this community. Not because EA is inefficient (which they are), but because we have some very dedicated fans.

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Thank you whichever admin authenticated me, I have an account here but I can't get logged in and my efforts to fix it failed dismally so I gave up. Sidebar: If someone will help me recover it that would be sweet!

 

This is methuselah from gamereplays.org. Could someone shoot me a pm in terms of whomever is running this for you all so I can give you my email?

 

Thanks!

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