The Game Studio

One of the hardest (and most exciting) things about the initial startup of game design and creating an online game for me has always been locating resources which you will build your game on. Where does the art come from? What engine will we use? What is our budget? Where will we host this game? It seems that my luck has always been in everything but the last question and challenge - locating a good game host.

For most people the biggest concern when finding game hosting for an indie game development project is finding a game server on a reliable network that is cost effective. There are a wealth of game server companies on the market that offer insanely cheap hosting for clan servers (some as low as $5 a month), but if you’re developing your own indie game you most likely won’t ever fit into that bracket. What most game developers end up needing is their own dedicated server.

What is a dedicated server?

A dedicated server is essentially a computer, housed in a secure location with constant network access, that is intended to run programs and operations that are accessed by people all over the world. Long story short? It’s like your home personal computer (on steroids) that you have access to over the internet. Typically you’re allowed to put anything you’d like on these computers, and ultimately you manage the software that exists on the computer.

In many ways a dedicated server is going to be the option that anyone hosting an online game should go with, unless you’re running a flash based application which could potentially run sufficiently on generic web host. Unfortunately, I am not familiar with flash based game development, or it’s requirements so I cannot efficiently comment on that at this time. However, if you are developing a 2D or 3D game in which users interact with one another (chat, battle, etc), or if you have server controlled elements in your game, you will need a dedicated server. As a general rule, I stay clear of shared hosting options on those servers because you never really have a guarantee as to what resources you are entitled to.

Things To Consider

When you set out to purchase a game server, there are a few things you should consider before buying from a specific site:

- What is their contract term? Do they allow you to pay month by month, or do you have to pay a certain number of months in advanced? This is important because if you are in development, you may only be interested in month to month pay, to say money in the event that your development ceases. This is also important in making sure you can back out of your contract if necessary.

- Are there setup fees? Sometimes setup fees can really rocket the price you’re intending to pay. Pay attention to these.

- What type of Operating System is on the machine? What are your options? Do they cost more depending on your selection? For many engines, they require specific server operating systems, and in some cases your price can increase if you require windows over linux.

The Options

In order to prep for this article, I dug in and tried to find some decent, non-shady looking services which seemed to be reasonable for what they provide. I was not able to find very many, as there seems to be a small market of dedicated server hosts who specialize specifically in hosting. You can use sites like GoDaddy, but you need to read their ToS and EULA to make sure they allow game type applications - many of them do not, because they pose additional security risks to their network. We ran into this in the past specifically with Serverbeach, who ended up canceling our contract due to us running game style servers… A newbie mistake, for sure!

Gameservers.com offers a very nice, reliable package, and does not include any kind of setup fee. One very nice thing about this provider is that they offer a short term money back guarantee, and their only server option is quite the power house, with dual quad core xeon processors, and 4GB of memory. There are definitely cheaper alternatives out there, but Gameservers.com is definitely one of the leaders in providing a secure, reliable, gaming network.

Darkstar Communications is a site that has a nice variety of servers and pricing, although the price for a Xeon server is close to that on Gameservers.com. Some nice things about Darkstar Communications: They offer a 45 day trial of their services, you get to choose from various locations in their network that your server will be hosted from (some price adjustments included). You can read a little more about their bragging rights here.

As I find more dedicated server hosts that specialize in game hosting, I will share them with you here. Let me know what else you find!