Battlezone Forums

Not seeing any servers/games for the last 2 days.

yes, been down for 2-3 days for me as well.

The server is 404ing.

Pinging masterserver2.raknet.com yields a reply ping, yet still not listing BZ2:
66.118.161.138

Hence why I am getting 404 and not a timeout.

I sent Raknet a support email early today, and this is the response. They got it back up and working, for now.

Hello,

masterserver2.raknet.com is the server which connects Battlezone II's matchmaking. For the past week, matchmaking is down and not working, yet I can ping masterserver2.raknet.com (reply 66.118.161.138).

Is it safe to presume Battlezone II will no longer be supported, or is there an underlying cause for this?

Any information would be appreciated.

Thank you!


Kevin Jenkins <rakkar@jenkinssoftware.com>
11:24 PM (3 hours ago)

to me, support
It looks like the server ran out of memory and would just shut itself
down everytime I restarted it. I had to delete all old data to get the
server working again.

Since I sold the company I recommend transitioning to Parse. It can do
much the same thing as masterserver2, and I think is free under a
threshhold
https://parse.com/

It's strange there are free licenses and stuff for RakNet and yet the new owners don't seem to be taking any control of that. It's like they just open sourced the non licensed code (the console stuff still has a cost) but didn't give any server side code.

I am going to probably have to code a server at this rate.

Also, surprised the email worked. The normal contact method is the forum where he has been entirely unresponsive.

EDIT:
Looking at the code and licenses and what not, honestly I'm just more confused. The new licenses don't seem to make sense with the old stuff, and masterserver2 appears to still have a paywall on it's source, though there is no actual indication of this other than a small mention of licensing.

There is a system called "Lobby server" or "Rooms plugin" which I will look into when I have time. It is starting to look like we are going to need to run our own server AND code it. If I do this I'll ofc end up releasing the code we use, but as we are going to have to either fully emulate Raknet MasterServer2 (which may be against license) or switch to a new system it would be nice if GSH could provide some core interface needs so we can look. The more whatever we find matches BZ2's core system the easier it will be for GSH. Maybe he can even make it load a DLL with specific endpoints or something so we can try to get something working to provide him.

I Kind of get the impression from that response that raknet's functioning days may be numbered. He sold the company but still has the server.

I Kind of get the impression from that response that raknet's functioning days may be numbered. He sold the company but still has the server.

It's strange there are free licenses and stuff for RakNet and yet the new owners don't seem to be taking any control of that. It's like they just open sourced the non licensed code (the console stuff still has a cost) but didn't give any server side code.

Raknet was purchased by Oculus who was purchased by Facebook. We all know what greedy corporations do with anything decent. The writing i$ on the wall.

I wonder if Parse would be worthy as Kevin Jenkins suggests?

Since I sold the company I recommend transitioning to Parse. It can do
much the same thing as masterserver2, and I think is free under a
threshhold
https://parse.com/

The problem is GSH invested a lot of time into Raknet. If bz2 were migrated over, that would require testing. Unfortunately we don't have any active testers, that I am aware of.

It probably wouldn't hurt to ask if the source to server2 is available or can be made available.

agreed (and i'm thinking kevin wouldn't appreciate having his e-mail address spammed on a forum)

agreed (and i'm thinking kevin wouldn't appreciate having his e-mail address spammed on a forum)

His email is spammed on raknet's site, under support: http://www.jenkinssoftware.com/company.html

I am aware GSH spent alot of his free time coding for raknet, and I am greatly appreciative of this. Unfortunately I see the same occurring when the next matchmaking solution is bought out by yet another behemoth.

Neilk1 has the right idea, hosting our own matchmaker may be the best bet. Let me know if I can help in any way as far as cost or hosting.

Juggernaut wrote:

agreed (and i'm thinking kevin wouldn't appreciate having his e-mail address spammed on a forum)

His email is spammed on raknet's site, under support: http://www.jenkinssoftware.com/company.html

I am aware GSH spent alot of his free time coding for raknet, and I am greatly appreciative of this. Unfortunately I see the same occurring when the next matchmaking solution is bought out by yet another behemoth.

Neilk1 has the right idea, hosting our own matchmaker may be the best bet. Let me know if I can help in any way as far as cost or hosting.

Don't start ringing that particular bell quite yet. We don't know if this downtime was a result of the buyout or an unrelated issue; let's at least wait until RakNet starts declining before we jump ship again. As Commando pointed out there was a huge amount of work involved last time.

yes, i have contacted him privately multiple times in the past to alert him that the bz2 server was down, but never felt the need to post his e-mail responses or address multiple times...