Author Topic: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.  (Read 333192 times)

LadyVamp

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #660 on: December 19, 2013, 02:21:16 AM »
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oh I wouldn't that (unless you work for an anti virus company or a certain OS company).  I run such a setup on my laptop.  It's great being able to test that nifty new program that can screw up your system or play some really old dos game.  There's nothing quite like cloning your gaming vm, installing patches and have it blow up, and being able to kill the vm and restore the clone.
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blacksly

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #661 on: December 19, 2013, 06:42:21 PM »
Which is a choice you make if you abandon interoperability -- as you described it, your system couldn't possibly work with transferred characters anyway -- "a mage from another shard would not be able to cast any spells in this shard since he didn't have any spells memorized," -- so why would you worry about transferred characters? -- its not like an agreed standard record could hurt you.

I didn't make the point clear enough. You see, the custom magic system WAS a draw to that particular shard. And almost every shard had their own custom systems, and did not want to be just like all of the others. The idea that we would be able to transfer characters from one server to another relies upon those who run servers to be willing to just run pretty much all-standard. But players want new stuff, and the admins running the servers will either be coders themselves or have coders willing to volunteer. So unless they're getting new stuff put out regularly by some kind of "CoH Underground Center", they will mostly want to write unique stuff. Because it's more fun working on your ideas than just making sure that you are one more working station in a large underground server network.

It's not just that customized servers are pretty much directly opposed to the idea of easy character transfer. It's that customized servers are what we will get if the code allows for customization (and I expect that it would even if you have to learn the language that it's compiled in), just because the people who will put up the money and effort to run the servers are probably going to be big enough geeks, and strongly enough interested, to do the work to put in their additions to the game. The kind of personality that is fine running a standard station without their input into how it runs, is likely not the kind that is going to go out and get the software, set up a server, run it and maintain it, handle player disputes, etc.

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #662 on: December 19, 2013, 08:28:10 PM »
I would imagine that most private CoH servers, should they exist, won't modify things like a spell-casting system. Perhaps they'll add new powersets, sure, but with any luck that won't be too hard to port from server to server. Sure, there may be a few that end up drastically changing things, but by and large, because most people will want to upload Sentinel files, all the servers will probably have a baseline common system. Even if parts of the Sentinel file, like Enhancements or inventory, don't carry over, the basics of costume & powersets kind of has to, right?
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blacksly

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #663 on: December 20, 2013, 04:57:14 PM »
It depends. Say that a server makes no changes to the underlying character design, and just adds a new powerset named Jedi Mind Tricks. Then a character made on the server with standard powersets should have no problem in porting over to another server.

Now, say that a server decides to add in a new feature for characters named Weight, used to affect Knockback. When a character made on this server is loaded at another server, it will have a new variable that is in the middle of the character, and that could cause everything after that variable to fail to load. It also COULD load, if all of the saved items are given their name... a standard server would load a piece of data named Weight, that would not fit into anywhere in its standard character load, and that would be discarded, but the rest of the load could continue.

Basically, if the default serialization/deserialization of characters includes field names, then fields that don't exist on your server can just be discarded. You may have some missing data from a character, but other than that, it should load. But if the S/De-S is just done by order and number of fields, then you can't have any fields added or removed, and you can't port characters to/from any server that saves unique data for its characters.

I suppose we'll have to wait to see the implementation of the code. I'm hopeful that they considered this issue when writing it, but I'm worried that if they just tried to most directly reverse engineer the code, since there was no such need to worry about different versions of character data in CoH, it's possible that the code that they copied would not make provision for characters with slightly different systems.

Tacitala

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #664 on: December 20, 2013, 06:09:12 PM »
I suppose we'll have to wait to see the implementation of the code. I'm hopeful that they considered this issue when writing it, but I'm worried that if they just tried to most directly reverse engineer the code, since there was no such need to worry about different versions of character data in CoH, it's possible that the code that they copied would not make provision for characters with slightly different systems.

I have absolutely no technical skills what so ever but I'm going to guess, based on all of the references from past developers as to how tangled and piecemeal the code was at the end, that any attempts to add in something as complex as new character data would be incredibly difficult and take an extraordinary amount of time to test and implement.

Personally, I'll be delighted to get the game back as it was at closing.
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Twisted Toon

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #665 on: December 21, 2013, 12:59:19 AM »
I have absolutely no technical skills what so ever but I'm going to guess, based on all of the references from past developers as to how tangled and piecemeal the code was at the end, that any attempts to add in something as complex as new character data would be incredibly difficult and take an extraordinary amount of time to test and implement.

Personally, I'll be delighted to get the game back as it was at closing.
I'm going to assume (I know, stupidity.) that the spaghetti code was server side and not client side. If that is truly the case, as long as the variable inputs/outputs server-side match the inputs/outputs client-side, the rest of it could be as clean or messy as the coder want. And, since they'll have to recode everything server-side, I'd guess they'd go for a more clean code.
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Atlantea

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #666 on: December 21, 2013, 02:26:37 AM »
I wonder if perhaps the reason you're not seeing a private server "out in the wild" is because - IF - and I do mean HUGE "IF" - there is one, that they've taken the lessons of the past to heart and gone deep "underground"?

Think about what happened to the attempts to set up private Tabula Rasa servers and how hard NCSoft stomped them flat.

I'd think any COH server group would have taken the hint and will NEVER announce themselves openly (Incidentally, I bet there's a few underground servers for Tabula Rasa too. But underground for the same reasons).

Mind you, it's odd that there's been no attempt that I've heard of by NCSoft at any "cease and desist" on even the emulator attempts. Maybe they really DON'T care.

Still - if there are any servers out there - they should STAY UNDERGROUND. At least until someone has figured out a way to release the code out "in the wild" in such a way that anyone can run it on a desktop or something. Propagate it such that nothing NCSoft can do will stop people from playing.

Then we can honestly thumb our collective noses at NCSoft and say, with all honesty -

"You can't stop the signal."

saipaman

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #667 on: December 21, 2013, 07:44:45 AM »
I wonder if perhaps the reason you're not seeing a private server "out in the wild" is because - IF - and I do mean HUGE "IF" - there is one, that they've taken the lessons of the past to heart and gone deep "underground"?

So, you're suggesting the rest of us were judged unworthy by deep cover private server groups?

Atlantea

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #668 on: December 21, 2013, 12:51:40 PM »
So, you're suggesting the rest of us were judged unworthy by deep cover private server groups?

Not at all. In my hypothetical scenario I was thinking more along the lines of "research groups". Which was why I was quoting the Firefly "Serenity" film tagline. In other words, I figure we'll see "open" private servers only when they can no longer be shutdown by a single "cease and desist" and if any DO exist then they are probably small to the point of having only a handful of players who are also the "hackers" or coders playing and testing the code and haven't figured out how to "release it into the wild" yet.

By which I mean - and this is completely hypothetical wild-ass guessing on my part - I would think you can't just run it off a "server farm" like the old game was. That's asking for trouble. Anything that exists "in the wild' has to work more like Team Fortress 2 servers. Something that can be set-up "On the fly" as it were. And any reverse coding taking place has to take that into account. Which is why if there is a "private server" out there, they'd have to be INCREDIBLY security paranoid that they don't attract attention. Which gets back to my idea of "small research group only" servers. 

That is - IF such a thing exists. It may be that I'm completely wrong and that the current research on the emulator and the current Icon is all we've got in the way of preserving the old game's functions. In fact it's more likely that I am wrong. I'd love to be pleasantly surprised at some point in the future though.
« Last Edit: December 21, 2013, 01:01:08 PM by Atlantea »

Azrael

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #669 on: December 23, 2013, 02:12:46 AM »

Ohioknight

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #670 on: December 23, 2013, 04:41:58 AM »
The most critical would be a way to use the mission builder in AE so a stand-alone could populate its world with custom missions -- I imagine those missions could be "shareable" by posting the created files online.  But I don't really know what I'm talking about.
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Gleech

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #671 on: December 23, 2013, 04:57:47 AM »

Of course, there's doing it in a way that doesn't clash with I.P.  But the key ingredients are sitting on most user's hard drives.  Recreating all that artwork, zones, animations and powers would have been a formidable task.

This is why all fantasies of making a CoH Private server IP-free are pretty much out the window. Take how long it took the professional, paid developers to come up with all those art assets and all, and then multiply that by about 3. That's how long it would take us to completely re-make CoH with custom assets. Sure you could say "The community will help!", but that's what we all figured with SEGS, and look at it now: A team of 1, working on a source. The whole CoH community is there to help, but no one has the skills to do so. Leaving a project like this up to the community isn't going to help.

No matter what way you look at it, making a private server will involve "getting dirty". Though the state of CoH IS in purgatory, that doesn't make it any less against the rules to use this stuff.

Now am I saying we shouldn't do this? Crap, man, I'm saying I wish it was done a month ago on the 30th (Was REAAAAAALLY hoping for SCORE to release some nibble at progress on the anniversary of CoH's closing... :( )

Even just changing the assets of the game to not involve CoH's IP wouldn't be enough. You're still using their graphics, their models... Even just the likeness of the PS to the real game is a candidate for a lawsuit. Avoiding this isn't something quick and easy, and I'm doubting any actual possibility. I want CoH back as much as everyone else, but we have to think logically about this.


Still - if there are any servers out there - they should STAY UNDERGROUND. At least until someone has figured out a way to release the code out "in the wild" in such a way that anyone can run it on a desktop or something. Propagate it such that nothing NCSoft can do will stop people from playing.

I'm curious why they don't just distribute the source to people via PMs, and those people distribute it to their friends, and etc. Or, websites like Ragezone hold sources for Private servers of games still running (E.g. Maplestory). As far as I know they haven't had any issues with that (And I know I saw someone there asking around for a CoH PS).

Once the code runs through so many people, if someone gets caught and is forced to "trail it back" to the source, NCSoft would have to go through a lot of different people in order to get to the original source, and even then they couldn't prove anything unless they had access to the PM (Which could be deleted, couldn't it?).

My guess though is that NCSoft doesn't care a crap about CoH anymore. They're sitting on that egg so hard I think they forgot it. Assuming that they're sitting there behind their computers, waiting for the second that a PS launches so they can sue sounds a bit conspiracy theorist to me. I'm sure they have people put to doing a LOT more important things than stalking a (supposedly) dead game's community. If that doesn't convince you, then I'd like to see how many employees are currently still employed to do with anything involving "City of Heroes". Though, I could always be wrong and it could turn out horribly.

It depends. Say that a server makes no changes to the underlying character design, and just adds a new powerset named Jedi Mind Tricks. Then a character made on the server with standard powersets should have no problem in porting over to another server.
If the server is looking for the assets labeled "Jedi_Mind_Tricks" and it fails it cause an error. Thus if the player somehow managed to get into the game on a server not running this "Jedi Mind Tricks" set, they'd have no powerset (or a broken one). See I'd assume that it will be possible to add in new things like that, and if a server's code doesn't support or have any record of this said set, it won't be able to load it in.

If that discussion is/was about whether we'll be able to have a universal database of all our characters, I'd say "no". It's HIGHLY unlikely, due to the modifications each individual server can have. It's not impossible, but very highly unlikely.

Now for those of you afraid of CoH's community dying because of a lack of 1 unified server, lemme' answer with this:
What Titan Network can do is host one server. A huge server, with the whole community on it. Now obviously they wont be on all the time, but this could be the "official" server. SCORE could run it and everyone would play it. Why would everyone play it? Simple: Content. SCORE has the man power to create new content. Other servers would have to rig up the content in a patch-work way. Most likely it wouldn't be as official and clean as SCORE's code. Why play on a server with broken code stuck on the same 'update', when you can play on the "official" SCORE server hosted on everyone's favorite forum? That keeps the community generally centralized into one location. NOW: For those who want to run their own servers with friends (Like me), they get what they want, too! They can go and play their own server, and risk not being able to add new content (until they learn the language), or if they want to go in and do raids and stuff, they can go play on the SCORE server.

You're all forgetting this fact: Even if CoH came back as ONLY one server run by SCORE, with one server in that SCORE Server (e.g. Pinnacle, Virtue, Freedom), the community would be split. Think of how well Freedom and Virtue got along (If you don't remember: it wasn't very well. I played on Virtue a lot, and all I heard was bad things about Freedom). The community will be divided between PVPers, Casuals, RPers, etc... You honestly can't deny it. Sure, for awhile in the beginning it wont be like that, but once the communities start to be forced to collide, it'll get on everyone's nerves. What's the solution? Add different servers to the SCORE server (E.g. Pinnacle, Virtue, Freedom, etc)! Sounds good, right? Everyone's on one global server, and everyone can play together. But wait, you're dividing the game up. Now people on Virtue will be playing on virtue, people on Pinnacle will be playing on Pinnacle, and people on Freedom will be playing on Freedom.

Point is: No matter what you do, you'll find a split community to some degree. I feel like my incentive of "more content" is probably the best way to go... but what do I know? I'm biased towards my own opinion. :P

As for all of you saying you'd prefer to just have a single player experience and you hope for LAN or single player support: This actually can be all solved by distributing the server's source. Just run it over your LAN IP address and only you and others on your network can play. It takes the least amount of time to set up (I guess it really depends on the source, but usually it does).

Anyway that's my rant. Hope no one gets offended. I'm not trying to bash anyone, I'm really just stating the realism of all this. I do believe a private server is in the works, but I don't believe it'll be all we expect of it.

blacksly

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #672 on: December 23, 2013, 05:18:24 PM »
Quote
Even just changing the assets of the game to not involve CoH's IP wouldn't be enough. You're still using their graphics, their models... Even just the likeness of the PS to the real game is a candidate for a lawsuit. Avoiding this isn't something quick and easy, and I'm doubting any actual possibility. I want CoH back as much as everyone else, but we have to think logically about this.

Let's consider the uses of the IP, though. The IP that would be protected, artwork and such, resides on the client's machine, that the player purchased legally from NCSoft. That we purchased the game intending to use it on their servers is irrelevant. I own several copies of the game, still have the disks, and have the freedom to install it on my machine whenever I want. There is nothing to connect it to, but I can certainly install the game, including all relevant artwork.

Now, the server side does not furnish up artwork or such. They just send to the client a packet that says "display image 0x512a". Therefore, as I understand, most of the server sides does not actually use or send any IP-protected information. So the issue whereby any server emulator is using IP owned by NCSoft seems like it's a non-issue if taken all the way in court (the real problem is the possibility that a nuisance lawsuit from NCSoft could just scuttle an emulator project even if there is no legal merit to their suit).

In the US it is legal to reverse-engineer both physical items and software, in order to provide replacement and add-on parts (or modules). Creating a server for the use of CoX clients, as long as the server emulator code copies the functionality but not the coding of the original server, and as long as it's not sending IP-protected information, is, as I understand, legal. 

Gleech

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #673 on: December 23, 2013, 06:44:22 PM »
I believe I understand what you're saying, but the problem is the likeness of the game in the first place. If you create a game that works 90% like CoH, they could sue for stealing even the likeness of the game. Probably doesn't seem legit, right? Well I can assure you people sue for more dumb things than that (Trust me, my dad is a lawyer and I hear about this stuff all the time). Even if the code is different, I'm sure they could find some loophole to try to sue. Remember: They do have a whole team of lawyers sitting on standby eager to find anything they can to sue about. And if it's not 90% like CoH? Then it's not CoH. It might as well be a new game. (Obviously not taking exact percentages, you get the idea)

Now I agree that it is technically possible to redo all the artwork and stuff.. but I don't know if you guys realize, in order to make it completely IP free, you'd have to remake all the 3D models, animations, clothing items, hairstyles, etc... Every piece of the character customization would have to be remade. That stuff was made under the artists hired by NCSoft, meaning NCSoft still owns those assets. It's not as simple as retexturing. You also have to keep in mind this is 8 years worth of textures, models, zones, etc. It took the devs even longer to develop them before the game was even made. Let's say, giving them grace, it took 2 years to make the content for the launch. Then it's 10 years worth of content we'd be remaking.

Think of making a fan character (take Sonic fan characters for instance if you're aware of them), you can re-texture them all you want, but it will still be the original character you're coloring over. Just because you give it a new paint-job doesn't make it any more original.
Example:
Spoiler for Hidden:
Take, as said before, a Sonic fan character compared to SEGA's actual Sonic design. Is the picture on the left any more original just because it's using new colors? It's still the same Sonic underneath the paint job.

As would City of Heroes be. It'll still be the same City of Heroes underneath the re-texture. Now that's great for us players! But knowing NCSoft's elite team of lawyers I'm sure they could find a way to sue. Considering EA was able to sue Zynga for something similar as I'm talking about:
Quote
In August 2012, Electronic Arts (EA), via its Maxis division, put forth a lawsuit against Zynga, claiming that its Facebook game, The Ville was a ripoff of EA's own Facebook game, The Sims Social. The lawsuit challenges that The Ville not only copies the gameplay mechanics of The Sims Social, but also uses art and visual interface aspects that appear to be inspired by The Sims Social.
Now, CoH has closed down, but NCSoft still does own the rights to it. They could technically open the game up again. This means that despite the game not being public anymore, the rights are still there.

Also, if we do go down the road of re-doing the assets, I just want everyone to know it will literally take years to get our City back. By that time, CoT and the other PlanZ projects will be out and it might not even be worth it.

Oh also, they have all the evidence of us talking about this being a private server. If they wanted to they could dig it up and use it against us knowing the original intentions of the project.

Ohioknight

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #674 on: December 23, 2013, 09:44:34 PM »
Gleech, likeness of the game?  Games cannot be copyrighted (as I understand it and I believe this is settled law), only IP content.  All the necessary IP content is available in the client software that was given away publicly for free.

So a server that helps the client software to use it's assets to play a game, be it just running the character creator like ICON or fighting mobs, would not violate any of NCSoft's rights.  Running the "Statesman task force" is likely another story, as I don't believe the mission content is client-side.  But putting mobs of characters on the streets of Paragon doesn't have to be more than sending codes to the client.

Of course they could sue anyone running a server -- you can sue anyone for anything.  The only protection is that it exposes you to counter-suit, and if you don't have a solid basis for action the court is likely to do nasty things to you.
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Gleech

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #675 on: December 24, 2013, 03:24:09 AM »
If you don't believe me for suing for the likeness of the game re-read my above post. EA did it, NCSoft could do it. They didn't say Zynga stole art and assets, they said it was inspired by their game. It looked like their game. They sued on the charges of similar game mechanics, as well.

My point is not so much that the server will be sued, I'm saying it's impossible to avoid the potential. No matter what you do, NCSoft has the potential to sue. Working with private servers is never a clean business.

The whole point of me saying this is for those saying "just remake CoH's assets and rename stuff!". It's not as simple as that, and it wont destroy the potential of NCSoft suing someone over this. In fact, they could sue SEGS any minute now for their stuff I'm sure, but they don't. Why? Because I honestly don't think NCSoft cares anymore.

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #676 on: December 24, 2013, 04:54:38 AM »
ok so no private server yet... just checking..

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #677 on: December 24, 2013, 06:22:58 AM »
Always remember the golden rule: The one with all the gold makes the rules.

NCSoft has more gold than we do. They can tell us what to do and force us to do it, with regards to City of Heroes.

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #678 on: December 24, 2013, 07:35:35 AM »
Always remember the golden rule: The one with all the gold makes the rules.

NCSoft has more gold than we do. They can tell us what to do and force us to do it, with regards to City of Heroes.
NCLimp can sit on a mountain of gold for all I care - and they can then proceed to kiss my ass.  We'll do what we want with CoH at this point - watching them try to play "whack-a-mole" with a thousand private servers will be the funniest thing I've seen in decades.

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Re: OK, what now? I need a private server or the ability to run my own.
« Reply #679 on: December 24, 2013, 09:56:34 AM »
Hopefully if anyone really is working on such a project. They'll take their time and make to were even if NCSoft wanted to do anything. They wouldn't have much of a leg to stand on, so hopefully it wouldn't seem worth it to them.

I honestly think NCSoft almost completely walked away from City of Heroes and will over look most things concerned with it. Though like one person here has continuasly caution. If anyone is working on such a project. Please take your time and do it right. Cover your own back sides in cause NCSoft is more protective of the City of Heroes IP then I foolishly believe.