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Virtual Private Webserver Hosting
Ishbu
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I've recently got into indie game development, but I've realized that my home server is going to be insufficient if I attract any kind of traffic whatsoever. I'm looking into alternatives for hosting. The right solution for me seems to be a Virtual Private Webserver, but I have a few concerns.
Will I be able to install whatever software I want? For my games I'll need the server to be able to run Java for Applets, Python/Pygame, and whatever C/C++ executables I come up with. My games are networked, so I'll need to be able to open multiple ports.
For moderate use what specs do I need? Godaddy and the like seem to offer 256mb standard/1024 mb boostable RAM. That seems low. Am I going to be able to run a game server hosting ~100-200 people at a time off of that?
39.95 a month seems to be the going rate. That seems a bit pricy. Are there any cheaper alternatives to do what I need?
Thanks.
Will I be able to install whatever software I want? For my games I'll need the server to be able to run Java for Applets, Python/Pygame, and whatever C/C++ executables I come up with. My games are networked, so I'll need to be able to open multiple ports.
For moderate use what specs do I need? Godaddy and the like seem to offer 256mb standard/1024 mb boostable RAM. That seems low. Am I going to be able to run a game server hosting ~100-200 people at a time off of that?
39.95 a month seems to be the going rate. That seems a bit pricy. Are there any cheaper alternatives to do what I need?
Thanks.
Play my game and serve beer to angry dwarves: The Tavern
Ishbu on
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I would expect nothing less from their virtual server, which you can price pretty low, but they scale up automatically if you see traffic spikes.
You'd have to ask them about that custom EXE stuff, but luckily they have very good live-chat/telephone support.
we also talk about other random shit and clown upon each other
Some of the vps I have used in the past and have been fantastic are(i have no affiliation to any of them):
KnownHost
AquariusStorage
HawkHost
I do not know what type of game you are making or how intensive it is for one person.... so I cannot comment on the amount of users you are expecting to connect. Check em out and see what is available.
"Thoughts are a persons imagination going rampid…" - ME
Yes. It's a machine to which you have root access, it's just a virtual one.
You can run anything you want, so that's fine. Understand, of course, that applets and such are running on the client machine, not your server. Your server and your clients don't have to be written in the same language.
Depends entirely how efficient your game-server is. You also have CPU usage and bandwidth. If you're sending chess moves, that's one thing. If you're sending full-tilt 56kbit streams to 200 people, that's another.
Linode has a $20/month option that you can upgrade if you have capacity problems.
The issue with EC2 is that you pay by the hour, so if you want to keep the server up and running 24/7 for a month, that's $0.10 an hour or $72 a month ($0.10 x 24 x 30) for the smallest instance, even if it's just sitting there idle. The nice thing is that it's very easy to allocate and deallocate more instances, but of course you're wholly responsible for making sure traffic goes to the right place and load is appropriately balanced, and so on.
Have you done any load tests on your home server?
Also colour me curious as to what kind of game you've got rolling here.
Can trade TF2 items or whatever else you're interested in. PM me.
It really more is a question of bandwidth than processing power - my home server has plenty of power. However, I also want to host it offsite anyway so that I can do true backups.
I've got a couple of games in the works...a turn based 2 player puzzle game (written as a Java Applet), an mmo platformer (written in Pygame), and soon a single player platformer.
To the people who suggested linode - that seems to be a good option. If I pick a lesser plan and choose to upgrade later, do I have to reinstall everything? Or will they just allocate me more resources?