The History of CSS Servers

Just about any gamer knows what Half Life and CS is both the original game and the “new” source engine version CSS servers. Its become almost a house hold name like Quake and Doom were in the 90’s.

CSS Servers in the beginning

Counter Strike rolled off the development line way back in June 1999 as a mod to half life. But was not until November 2000 that Valve retailed the game, the game had 19 beta releases until version 1 was made available and even then there were 7 major updates to the game, one of the biggest and most talked about with the update from 1.5 to 1.6 but the current CSS servers is still a little way off.

Introducing STEAM servers

Many people believed that this update ruined the game as 1.6 was only released on Steam, after the WON platform was shutdown in 2004, there is still a group of hard-core players still playing 1.5 but these mainly consist of people who are too cheap to buy a genuine copy of the game. Like all good games this carried the ability to add custom content like: new maps, mods, sounds and graphics to it to change the game play, there is still a large active community of developers supporting this game after 10 years! This proves just how big this game still is.

Valve also released Counter Strike Condition dubbed as CS:CZ in 2004 which was a slightly facelift version of the game but still ran on the now 6 year old Goldsource engine which is a modified version of the Quake II engine, this did not have the success that was expected with only 2.9 million retail sales of the game as of December 2008 compared to the 4.2 million by the end of the same period.

Source server engine is introduced with CSS servers

When Valve released Half Life 2 in November 2004, they also released a new up to date version of the game called Counter Strike Source, or CSS servers for short, this version now had the same level of graphics of other games for its age and so was making older PCs struggle to run the game, even in beta testing we saw an influx in CSS servers influx. When Half Life Episode One was released they also released an update to the Source engine in June 2006 which improved CSS servers. With the original engine needing a reasonable powerful pc for the time did mean that it took a while for people to start getting into CSS servers, and when they did many did not really look back, some people still prefer 1.6 to this day after playing CSS for many years. Like 1.6, CSS servers maintained the ability to change the game content with mods and maps etc.

CSS servers and cheaters

All three versions of the game have been plagued with issues of cheaters and hackers, the Valve anti cheat system (VAC) works well but is not the best thing and so there are groups like Steam Bans that work better as this is ban submissions by real people. But still there is no substitute to good old fashioned human admin but for many servers this is just unrealistic to haveadmins on their servers 24/7, and to help this many mod developers have coding kick and ban scripts in to allow people to start votes to get rid of people from CSS servers.

CSS Servers the Future

As of the time of writing there is still little word on the future of Half Life and CSS servers, and the market is becoming increasingly competitive with the likes of EA’s Battlefield seriers of Games and Activision with the Call of Duty games. We will have to wait and see what Valve do with new CSS servers.

A required update for Counter-Strike: Source is now available. Please run hldsupdatetool to receive the update. The specific changes include:

- Fixed new weapon firing integration causing some guns to over-fire on single taps
- Fixed a couple of cases where machine guns could skip slightly with enough lag
- Fixed c4 explosion pre-caching
- Added precise audio timing fixes for client-side prediction
- Increased the tolerance for skip detection in client side audio to prevent sound dropping out due to client clock drift
- Completed work on clan tag strings validation

Jason

Want a CSS Server?

As we know that Alien Swarm was released on Monday and myself and Olly were quite excited on Tuesday morning to get this up and running and everything was going really well until this:

[gssimon@INX-236-135 srcds_l]$ ./start.alienswarm: ./srcds_run: /bin/sh^M: bad interpreter: No such file or directory

So had a Google around the error and found that it was todo with a Linux textfile being corrupted by being opened in notepad so used a Linux command to fix it and its still broken.

So I looked through the HLDS Linux mailing list and found this in it:

Upon further investigation, the Alien Swarm dedicated server has not been released for Linux. We shipped some of the Linux files by accident.

M.

Then:

That doesn’t sound good, “by accident”? Will we be getting Linux files tonight?

Jim

Just to confirm:

Sorry if I wasn’t clear. Alien Swarm is not currently supported on Linux.

M.

So we can chalk another mark on the wall for another botched Steam release!

Stay tuned when we hope to have good news soon….(well this is Valve time we are referring to)

An update for TF2 servers was released late last night.

A required update for Team Fortress 2, and an optional update for Day of Defeat: Source and the Counter-Strike: Source Beta is now available.  Please run hldsupdatetool to receive the update.  The specific changes include:

Linux Dedicated Server:

- Fixed srcds_run to work properly with the Counter-Strike: Source beta dedicated server when autoupdating.

Engine:

- Fixed the startmovie command not using the codec dialog.

Team Fortress 2:

- Fixed dropped weapons and ammo kits not being affected by explosions.

- Adding missing “+lookup” and “+lookdown” keybind options.

- Added SetCTFCaptureBonusTime tf_gamerules input to allow map authors to set the length of crit bonus time (in seconds) for CTF captures.

Jason

We get a lot of questions asking us, ‘Why are you best?’, ‘What makes the best game server?’. Well here’s my unofficial take on it. If you don’t agree with me, tough. No, seriously- leave a comment below please and tell me where I’m wrong

There are so many factors that make a great game server. If we look at the technical specifics- anything from the hardware, to the connection. The configs- rates, tweaks etc. To the aesthetics- if you are going to have a good game server, the better the tools, the easier the job.

With a struggle, here’s the top five factors (in no particular order) that make a good game server:

The tools

To configure a game server, you need the full access. And to do it properly, you don’t want to be faffing around. This is where a good control panel comes in. As well as the control panel, full FTP is a must. The control panel should do everything the FTP does, but my making 101 clicks, one click! The ability to save config, install mods, change the start line on the fly, are all a must

The hardware

Game servers will run on:

• Desktop PC’s
• Crappy specs

However, don’t expect performance. Desktop PC’s aren’t made for stress, and can overheat (I’m talking about those that host them in a datacentre for some weird reason- must be cost cutting). Quad Cores are a must these days- Dual Cpu’s will do for running a few servers. Anything less and you are going to see horrible performance degradation.

Hosts should skimp on their hardware.

The best connectivity

Connectivity is perhaps the most important part of a game server. One bad route, and your pings will sky rocket. An ip transit provider should be incredibly stable. If you are finding the network going offline every few days, that’s a sure way to scare off players. So look for a good network. Goscomb connectivity is highly rated in the UK for example.

The configs

A CS Source game server needs rates set correctly according to those using the server. If you don’t set your rates correctly, expect horrible packet loss, choke, and lots of ‘OMFG’.

The provider

Of course, it goes without saying. A good control panel, good connectivity and the rest. But you are stuck without a good provider. There are a number throughout the world. Things to check for

- Are they a real company, or after school operation?
- Does their pricing scream desperation?
- How long have they been around
- How quickly do they respond to sales emails?

For now, that is just about enough to get you started. Be careful….it’s a warzone out there

We all tell a little white lie every so often.

No… your bum, doesn’t look big in that extra extra large swim suit.…..
I’ve only had three pints…
Moi, eat the rest of your pizza? How very dare you.

There’s the odd white lie, and there’s blatant lies. Unfortunately when it comes to stretching the truth, some internet businesses are no different, and neither are some server hosts. Whether it’s a Call of Duty 4, Team Fortress 2, or Counterstrike server host you are looking for, here’s three common porkies to beware of when choosing the next host for your clan’s gameserver:

• Do they really offer the 24/7 support advertised?
• Are they really hosting gameservers from their own datacentre?
• When they talk about we is it we, or me?

The great 24/7 support server host lie

Sometimes I feel like a stuck record going on about this one. I probably am.  But it does erk me those one-man server hosts (see below) claiming 24/7 support. If your bank claimed to be open 24/7, and it wasn’t, you’d call your local outsourced call centre and give them a jolly good piece of your mind.

So it shocks me, frequently those server hosts that use the whole 24/7 support thing as the main selling point. Telephone numbers that always go through to answer machine. Emails and support tickets unanswered for days. If only gameservers weren’t so important, and out lifeline! In fact, I had a shock the other day. My own public Call of Duty 4 server went down. I was shaking with fear. I nearly had to go out. Can you believe it? Luckily I was able to phone myself, and got the server rebooted.

But what if you’ve already bought a gameserver from a server host that claims 24/7 support when they don’t? Would it be acceptable for the server to go down at 6pm on a Friday night, and your server host doesn’t respond until Tuesday?

Some server hosts think the fact a website is potentially online 24/7, and that you can fill out an online contact form at 4am, means they offer 24/7. Don’t fall for it. They might think it means support 24/7 . It doesn’t.

My gameserver host has their own datacentre

This comes a close second on the lie scoreboard to the 24/7 myth.

There’s nothing wrong with not owning a datacentre. Let’s face it, if you are in the know you’ll understand already a minimum datacentre budget is going to cost you upwards of half a million to kit out. So it’s not really practical budget wise, for gameserver hosting.

But what is a concern is those hosts, that copy and paste data centre specs from their dedicated server host, and conveniently pass it off as their own.

Beware. Not knowing you do get found out for this, says a lot about this kind of server host.

Server hosting, to we or not to we

That is the question. There’s nothing wrong with a one man company. I’m sure you wouldn’t tip your window cleaner off his ladder, because the window washing waster doesn’t have 30 employees. Well you might if you are a tad sadistic, or he’s not cleaning the windows very well (my window cleaner, beware). The same logic applies to a game server. There’s lots of single man (or girl) server hosts working 8-10 hours a day, and providing excellent service.

But what if the me suddenly becomes a we. The server host that tells you you need to contact support, but it’s actually the same person. The clan server host that claims he has 3 support staff….but he’s actually paying them with a COD 4 server and a bag of nuts.

Being liberal with the truth, stretching the truth, or outright lying?

All my personal opinion, but a hopefully a few pointers to keep you informed all the same

Until tomorrow

You wouldn’t know there is a credit crunch on. Houses being repossessed. People out of work, unable to go to the pub, or eat out at their favourite restaurant. People staying in with cheap bottles of vodka, and turning to old games. The economy collapsing before us.

So why are gameserver providers getting cheaper?

Well at least, you wouldn’t know if you were a gameserver host. Ever day I witness an ongoing challenge to host gameservers cheaper, and ‘better’. Claims of more affordable. Affordable to the person renting the clan server, perhaps. Affordable to the provider hosting the server?

It really hit me just now, when someone on MSN Messenger just claimed we were expensive because he could get a 32 slot Call of Duty 4 gameserver for £23.  BTW, that’s £23 for 12 months. Blimey. Ok, so there’s cheap, and there’s…..suicidal. Some people are thick.

I don’t think so. A few facts to consider:

• Power and rack prices have increased up to 6x what they were 4 years ago.
• So gameservers are far more costly to host on dedicated servers.
• Game server customers expect more, and rightly so.
• Granted server hardware is more powerful, but that doesn’t cancel out the huge cost increases.

‘Affordable’ versus ‘Cheap’ clanservers, the myth uncovered!

So you might ask, why do gameserver hosts price themselves so cheap? What do you call affordable game servers.  And I won’t try and claim this applies to every host. Economies of scale means larger hosts can push out gameservers at a cheap price, because their overheads are lower.

But the kiddie host with the one old colocated server, pushing the old 50p a slot. Do me a favour. It does not add up. So back to the point, why are these clanserver hosts doing it so cheap? And is it affordable?

In a nutshell, no.

Such gameserver hosts are very often:

• Running at a loss, because it’s only £20-£30 to lose each month
• License fees, what license fees? Are you sure your Ventrilo / Teamspeak 2 server is authorised. I’m sure you wouldn’t want it going offline halfway through a war
• Not offering the 24/7 support they claim. Do you think someone doesn’t sleep to lose money? I’d have them commited if they were.
• Unable to compete with the big players. They cannot beat their level of support, uptime, and promises. There’s nothing unique in what they offer. They are just another one of many gameserver hosts. So what’s the *only* thing they can do? You guessed it, price. They make themselves Cheaper. And most definitely they’ll be the cheapest gameserver host on the internet. Yeah, right

So why are affordable gameservers better?

With total reference to the above, any gameserver host worth its salt will not be looking at whether they can pay their hosting bills at the end of the month. They will be looking at the next 12 months, and beyond that.

I would like to think an honest, and affordable gameserver provider will not pluck prices from the sky, in order to compete on the only thing they can do- being cheap.

Clanserver providers that price themselves as affordable, are thinking about keeping in business, and won’t be running away with your rental fees.

To the boys, you remember what you were told about cheap girls? Well gameservers aren’t any different.

And finally, remember. If it looks too good to be true. It probably is.