Rumor: Gears 3 Could Have Dedicated Servers

[ChaoticLegion]

I'd say it's a welcomed change for console games, seems like they're finaly catching up with a far improved system that PC games have been using for years. Hopefuly it will also show PC designers that keeping dedicated servers is deffinately the way forward as no one wants cursed match making.

 

[hazabaza1]

So long as they keep splitscreen campaign and Horde, I'll buy it. Not much of a MP person myself.

 

[Cabisco]

I like the idea, nay love it if it gets rid of the lag because I do feel that Gears of war 2 would have been my favorite online shooter of all time had it not been for the silly lag issues. If gears 3 is pulled off well, i'd be a very very happy bunny.

 

[mogamer]

So if they go the dedicated server route (ala EA). Does this mean that they'll close it down right after Gears 4 is released? Or maybe Epic will give new game buyers a free code worth $10 to play online, while charging used game buyers. Be careful for what you wish for people.

 

[Pingieking]

Wow, that ALMOST get's me interested, until I find out, that Epic doesn't want to give us PC games any love. "Hey let's Release Gears of War 1 on PC, which has no closure, and then not release any more for PC!"

Calumon: It's just standard now. : /

Calumon, you are my hero.

I like the idea, though I am not holding my breath for an official announcement. Hard to imagine any devs wanting to throw this feature back in after all these big titles abandoning it.

 

[GloatingSwine]

What exactly are dedicated servers?

You enter the multiplayer menu, search for servers and are presented with a list of servers (and their details such as number of players) to choose from.

In short: so much better than matchmaking it hurts.

Fascinating, so all those private matches I see when I open up the multiplayer menu on, well, every game on the Xbox are dedicated servers, right, right?

Oh wait, no, that's not actually a useful description at all is it..

What a dedicated server means is that the game server, the computer which maintains a definitive record of what actually happened when you put your crosshairs over a dude and fired, is not also one of the players of the game.

The reason that this is an issue for Gears of War is that the Unreal 3 engine is infamous for what is called "host advantage", where there is a perceptible lag between input and action for every player except the one whose console is also running the game server.

You can have matchmaking with or without dedicated servers (with dedicated servers all that needs happen is that the matchmaking system either adds you to a server within it's criteria or instructs the next available server to start a new game and plonks you on it, possibly after waiting until a threshold of matched players are found.

 

[Woodsey]

What exactly are dedicated servers?

You enter the multiplayer menu, search for servers and are presented with a list of servers (and their details such as number of players) to choose from.

In short: so much better than matchmaking it hurts.

Fascinating, so all those private matches I see when I open up the multiplayer menu on, well, every game on the Xbox are dedicated servers, right, right?

Oh wait, no, that's not actually a useful description at all is it..

What a dedicated server means is that the game server, the computer which maintains a definitive record of what actually happened when you put your crosshairs over a dude and fired, is not also one of the players of the game.

The reason that this is an issue for Gears of War is that the Unreal 3 engine is infamous for what is called "host advantage", where there is a perceptible lag between input and action for every player except the one whose console is also running the game server.

You can have matchmaking with or without dedicated servers (with dedicated servers all that needs happen is that the matchmaking system either adds you to a server within it's criteria or instructs the next available server to start a new game and plonks you on it, possibly after waiting until a threshold of matched players are found.

The fuck are you talking about?

In matchmaking you don't get to choose your server, with dedicated servers you do.

 

[MetalDooley]

Well if it sorts out the problems then I'm all for it.Gears 2 is my favourite online game but the matchmaking and lag are a pain in the ass

Played too many hours of Gears 1 and 2, almost never had any problems.

You're lucky.The matchmaking is slower than any other game I've played and as for "occasional lag" they've got to be kidding.I reckon 7 out of every 10 games I play suffers from some degree of lag

 

[GloatingSwine]

In matchmaking you don't get to choose your server, with dedicated servers you do.

Not necessarily. It is quite possible to use matchmaking instead of a server browser but still have dedicated servers, just as it is possible to have a server browser with client hosted games.

Most Unreal 3 engine games do the latter, go and boot up something like Rainbow Six Vegas, go to multiplayer and you'll see a server list, but those "servers" are actually client hosted, the console of one of the players is running the server, it is not a dedicated server, a computer which provides the game server but which is not also home to one of the players of the game.

That's what a dedicated server means. It does not mean no matchmaking, which is the process of attempting to automatically place plauyers on a server, dedicated or otherwise, using some form of automatic process.