Many EA titles to lose online services on June 30

[Sicklyboy]

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.

Notable games losing their online services include some of the older Battlefield games across various platforms (BF 1942, BF 2, BF 2142, BF Vietnam, across PC, Mac, and PS2), Bulletstorm (PS3) Crysis 1 and 2 (PC), Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 (PC), Neverwinter Nights 1 and 2 (PC, Mac, Linux), and Star Wars: Battlefront I and II for PC and PS2.

Some of the other games in the list are some likely less-appreciated titles, but this is still a huge shutdown - 50 games in total! Of course, more will come in the future, as is the nature of online gaming, and for the games that really matter, there are likely dedicated server programs available for those truly dedicated to the game. The shutdown of the GameSpy platform has affected many games from many different publishers, and those who still play some of the classics are really starting to feel the impact.

Source
List of service shutdowns

 

[FAST6191]

That is a pretty impressive list, though most appear to be the DS stuff we already knew about (and already has a fairly advanced project to save http://gbatemp.net/threads/save-nin...e-online-servers-for-ds-and-wii-games.362717/ ). Nothing I was waiting to play multiplayer for (not that I tend to go in for multiplayer).

Assuming there is not already an option I might have to go look what the Neverwinter nights people are doing as that would probably be a pretty interesting hacking project.

I wonder why it is only the PS3 version of Bulletstorm.

Also anybody know if the multiplayer crysis games were any good? I have done worse when it comes to single player games but never did any multiplayer for them?

 

[yoyoyo69]

Didn't they confirm not long ago that they were in the process of transfering a few games to Steam? I'm sure it was Battlefield 2, Battlefield 2142 and possibly 1942.

 

[Qtis]

Does this mean NWN1/2 will lose multiplayer completely?

 

[Obveron]

BF2?? Noooooooo!

 

[migles]

i have a billion dollar idea! but no company is interested about!

what if we pay a year fee to play\keep old games servers online! i would pay a fee for use nintendo WFC on ds....

so this is the best of both worlds... people interested in old games still can take advantage of multiplayer, and nintendo\companies can cash a bit of moners to keep up server costs etc....

 

[Arras]

i have a billion dollar idea! but no company is interested about!

what if we pay a year fee to play\keep old games servers online! i would pay a fee for use nintendo WFC on ds....

so this is the best of both worlds... people interested in old games still can take advantage of multiplayer, and nintendo\companies can cash a bit of moners to keep up server costs etc....

What, you mean Xbox Live Gold/PS+, or something more like World of Warcraft?

 

[Tom Bombadildo]

Looking at most of the game on that list, quite a few of them have dedicated servers and custom servers for the not-so-legit copies of the games.

And it looks like the only games that really matter there are the Battlefield, Battlefront, Need for Speed and Command and Conquer, the rest are kind of meh.

 

[migles]

What, you mean Xbox Live Gold/PS+, or something more like World of Warcraft?

something applied to old game servers, its a good idea D: but not tied to specific game... wouldn't you like to pay a fee for play mario cart on wii\ds for lots of years and as an alternative to shutdown online services? its not mandatory.. you can play freely in new game servers, but if you want to play on old game servers pay a fee


edit: i dont know how ps+ xbone goldish works

 

[Videomanman87]

something applied to old game servers, its a good idea D: but not tied to specific game... wouldn't you like to pay a fee for play mario cart on wii\ds for lots of years and as an alternative to shutdown online services? its not mandatory.. you can play freely in new game servers, but if you want to play on old game servers pay a fee


edit: i dont know how ps+ xbone goldish works

Yes I have also thought of this idea. However my understanding is Nintendo is not interested in keeping older games alive. They would have to do a update to the Wii, which if I recall correctly, was tied to wiiconnect24 and they shut that down last year. If Gamespy wasn't shutting down, I think it would be a option, but because the host that Nintendo hired is shutting down, well it would mean a large change to the WFC system in the Wii. And perhaps each game, which as we know is not really feasible. At least from Nintendo's point of view. It has already been proven that a patch is possible, but I just don't see Nintendo bothering. They are all about the WiiU these days. If they even remotely thought it was worth it, they would be doing a patch that redirected the games to their new multiplayer network they built for the WiiU and 3ds.

Of course they may not have thought that we would actually PAY for it. But I doubt they would believe us. Perhaps if Nintendo started a kickstarter or such so that we could put our money where our mouth is. I don't see it great happening though. :/

 

[Gahars]

EA: It's (No Longer) In The Game.

 

[Obveron]

I don't really understand why the Battlefield games need to disappear. The vast majority of the active game servers are private. EA just needs to get rid of the account log-in crap, which was pointless anyways.

 

[Sicklyboy]

I don't really understand why the Battlefield games need to disappear. The vast majority of the active game servers are private. EA just needs to get rid of the account log-in crap, which was pointless anyways.

Part of the problem with games like that is what I'm assuming is the same thing that happened to Halo PC. Halo PC used GameSpy as the in-game server browser; all servers were dedicated servers, but you could look through the public server list and connect to any of them. Alternatively, if your server was open but not public, you could and still can specify an IP to directly connect to that server.

So the problem lies not so much in multiplayer no longer working for games like those, but not having a built in server browser anymore. Players might need to resort to something like Xfire now *shudder*, though I don't remember if they just curated the GameSpy info or if they were pulling their own information completely separatefrom GameSpy.

 

[Mario92]

DS/Wii games: was already happening before this announcement.
PC games: LAN enabled games just use Hamachi or Tunngle. Direct IP should work in some cases.
Other console games: Too bad, so sad.

Players might need to resort to something like Xfire now *shudder*...

I have both Raptr and Xfire on all the time. Fuck the police!

 

[Sicklyboy]

DS/Wii games: was already happening before this announcement.
PC games: LAN enabled games just use Hamachi or Tunngle. Direct IP should work in some cases.
Other console games: Too bad, so sad.



I have both Raptr and Xfire on all the time. Fuck the police!

DS/Wii games - yeah, them's the breaks.
PC games - Hamachi/Tungle (direct connect if you've got port forwarding set up is easier in the end) works, yes, as long as there's a dedicated server app/functionality built into the game. If there is no dedicated server app or the game binaries don't have server hosting built into them, there will be no way to play them online because that means EA will be cutting server support for them on their end as well. If there is dedicated servers though then no big deal, you just don't have any "official" servers or a server browser built into the game anymore then.

I used to use xfire a long time ago but its usefulness quickly petered out after my old Halo PC clan disbanded. Never got on raptr.

 

[shakirmoledina]

EA: It's (No Longer) In The Game.

That a actually a good one, no one noticed however

Those are some old games. I guess u can't live in the past however some noms are very nice was really hoping they would stay as they even surpass their successors.

 

[DJPlace]

just going stick with my laptop to hell with buying new systems if they keep killing online severs for it. everyone's not made of money you know.

 

[Sicklyboy]

just going stick with my laptop to hell with buying new systems if they keep killing online severs for it. everyone's not made of money you know.

If you looked at the list, you'd notice that a majority of the games that are losing online services are FOR the PC, followed by Wii/DS games, which is outside of EA's control.

 

[Guild McCommunist]

Most of the more popular games (like Battlefront II and some of the Battlefields) will probably live on with fan servers. The rest, who really cares.

 

[Mario92]

Never got on raptr.

You can literally buy brand new GPU by just playing PC games: http://raptr.com/store?category=hardware
I did win few AMD sweetakes myself. Also combines console trophys/achievements and shows if friend plays other than steam game or console game.

Xfire I mainly use for FPS and clock overlay lol