this post was submitted on 03 Jan 2024
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Back in the 90s, no one could afford a good computer that could run a game and serve it's users.
It's 30 years later and today, most people have a phone that's hundreds of times more powerful. Not only that, many people now have dedicated Internet that is, again, hundreds of times faster than what most people who had computers in the 90s.
It's even easier than ever to stand up a server with docker containers, which was not even possible back then. Virtual systems was still a niche development and was at least a few years away from regular use.
You are right that back then, it sucked ass. But today, it's more possible than ever.
Right but this means that it was not, in fact, random acts of greed but rather offering services people want that made the switch happen, which is the topic of discussion here
No, that isn't what happened. User run servers, particularly dedicated servers hosted by proper hosting companies, got good before they were taken away. Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Counterstrike 1.6, then all the Source games, hell even early EA's Battlefield and Call of Duty had user servers. Communities formed on these servers along with innovative gameplay modes - I know this first hand running Counterstrike surf servers in the 00's.
They also had mods. Valve hired the developers of the Counterstrike mod to help make source, and EA hired the developers of the BF1942 mod Desert Combat to make Battlefield 2. Then Activision stole the zombie mod from COD modders and then locked away modding so they could sell maps (which modders had been making for free, with better quality). EA followed suit not long after.
It was around this time that user servers started to be prohibited in new games. It was part of the same greed, with servers it gives the publisher more control - you'll have to buy the new game to keep playing if they switch the servers off.
User servers being taken away was a business decision, it did not happen because the concept was flawed.
I love how you talk about all these games with private servers, but not user numbers, because it cuts to the heart of this discussion immediately.
The reason the gaming community grew exponentially is that gaming was made significantly easier, especially PC gaming.
I understand you don't like the change and pine for the old days, but we aren't discussing things we like, were discussing events that happened
But finding servers, official or community, was never hard in any of the games I listed. Like I say, the game runs a simple server that catalogues them - when you run a server it tells the game server its details, then a player polls the game server for IPs and the player's client then fetches the details and pings from each server. User servers are exactly the same as official servers in this regard.
The reason gaming grew is simply because more and more people had internet and computers/games consoles, and because young gamers got older such that it became more acceptable for adults to play.
Everything you've said hasn't been true for more than 20 years.
You're not the mainstream person who wants to play FIFA, Madden, and COD and just pick the fucking thing up and hit "play game"
We are literally talking about the past.
But that's exactly what you did with COD and user servers.
Honestly, at this point it just sounds like you're shilling for the publishers. You cannot accept the fact that user owned servers were not taken away for the benefit of the players, but for the benefit of the business.
"everyone who disagrees with me is shilling" is not a reasonable thing to say.
I get that you're frustrated by reading things you don't like, but that argument above is the mentality of a child, which you presumably are not, given our discussion.
Minecraft is making shitloads of money. It's not a purely business decision. That's absurd.
Way to build a scarecrow argument.
I'm not saying you're a shill because you disagree with me, I'm saying you're a shill because you're repeating the same excuses game publishers make when they take away features in a profiteering manner. It's like Capcom claiming that mods will confuse players and cause "reputational damage" and offence to "public order and morals". It's pure bullshit.
Why are you bringing up Minecraft? That game has always had user servers.
I challenge you to explain, with recent examples, how user servers are objectively worse than official ones.
Because it is the most popular game using user servers, and also makes a lot of money, punching holes in your claim that centralized server hosting is entirely profit-driven.
Consider the possibility that I agree with them.
This has never been a thing I've said. Again, we are discussing history.
Minecraft doesn't only have centralised servers, it also has user servers. It's a poor example.
We're not talking about history, we're talking about user servers. You said user servers were taken away because they were crap in the 90s, I pointed out they were incredibly popular in the 00s - before they were taken away.
Your statement is wrong. Your telling of history is wrong, you've mixed up your dates.
Edit: Apologues for all the double posts, I keep getting timeout errors. I thought it was just my poor signal, but apparently it isn't that as ym signal is fine now. Yay v0.19 lemmy!
This is why I brought Minecraft up lol
I don't think you're following this discussion so let's just let it go.
No worries on the double posts. Happens to me all the time too.