Rental Gaming Servers

[ttjereth]

Question, anybody have any information about companies in Japan which rent dedicated servers for games?

Before I get the first 3 pages of google results copied and pasted at me, I mean Windows (or if necessary Linux) application based games like Team Fortress 2, Halo etc., not php/cgi based games.

I have only found two companies and they are insane. I know comparing prices here and back home is just begging to be disappointed, but the average monthly rate back in the states is about $15-20 a month and the cheapest I have seen here so far is 4 man! Prices even go up to 30 man a month for some places!

At that rate it'd be cheaper to just get a second fiber optic line installed and run a box from the house myself

[American Oyaji]

Huh, I had never heard of such a thing, but apparently it's big business.

[ttjereth]

Whoops, didn't mean for this to be on the front page

[ttjereth]

Huh, I had never heard of such a thing, but apparently it's big business.

Especially here if you can charge more than the price of the server for a single month of use and the setup fee

[American Oyaji]

Ya know, I think I know the reason for it.

In the U.S. a clan is usually the idea of one person and it's usually the leader of the clan that sets everything up and foots the bill for the most part.

In Japan, if one has a clan, it's usually a group of people and group mindedly, it's easier for EVERYONE in the group to chip in. So if you break that 4man into say 10 pieces, it's only 40 bucks a month. Sure it's highway robbery, but you have to admit that they know their market.
Now if multiplayer gaming was a bigger market and there was serious competition for services, you might see that price drop to about 1man, but I doubt lower.

[GomiGirl]

Am not sure if they will meet your needs, but Amazon.co.jp have a dedicated virtual server solution for rent that seemed really reasonable - kinda an offshoot service and not really well publicised as it is not their core business. Mobile solution as well. Makes it very easy and cheap to ramp up. But this is virtual rather than a co-lo or regular hosting.

If you are interested, drop me a line and I will dig out the business card of a chap who is setting it up. He is not a salesman, but an evangelist and really friendly and seems to know everything about hosting and servers and stuff and things like that. Am back at work on Monday.

(NB: I am in no way connected with this service and will receive no personal gain from an introduction. )

[Greji]

[quote="GomiGirl"]
(NB: I am in no way connected with this service and will receive no personal gain from an introduction. ]

Smells like a spam sandwich to me! You didn't immigrate from Nigeria did you?

[GomiGirl]

Smells like a spam sandwich to me! You didn't immigrate from Nigeria did you?

No, but I am a mule for the illegal smuggling trade of goats.

[Greji]

No, but I am a mule for the illegal smuggling trade of goats.

Call me right away, we need to talk!

[ttjereth]

[quote="GomiGirl"]Am not sure if they will meet your needs, but Amazon.co.jp have a dedicated virtual server solution for rent that seemed really reasonable - kinda an offshoot service and not really well publicised as it is not their core business. Mobile solution as well. Makes it very easy and cheap to ramp up. But this is virtual rather than a co-lo or regular hosting.

If you are interested, drop me a line and I will dig out the business card of a chap who is setting it up. He is not a salesman, but an evangelist and really friendly and seems to know everything about hosting and servers and stuff and things like that. Am back at work on Monday.

(NB: I am in no way connected with this service and will receive no personal gain from an introduction. ]

Thanks for the offer, but I imagine this is the same as the service provided on the U.S. version, which is more or less a storage service.

I need an actual dedicated server (game applications are generally too demanding to be run on shared servers) but it looks like I might just be better off running my own server of a fibre optic line here in Japan.

[Mulboyne]

...I might just be better off running my own server of a fibre optic line here in Japan...

From the other thread:

...We live in a tiny little 2ldk and I have 8 PCs lying around in various states of operation/disassembly...

[American Oyaji]

I need an actual dedicated server (game applications are generally too demanding to be run on shared servers) but it looks like I might just be better off running my own server of a fibre optic line here in Japan.

TTJ, who knows. You might end up starting your own service in Japan.

In any case, you'd probably get better service and a good price by doing it yourself.

Or maybe get a friend (or 2) to go in on it with you.

[GomiGirl]

Thanks for the offer, but I imagine this is the same as the service provided on the U.S. version, which is more or less a storage service.

I need an actual dedicated server (game applications are generally too demanding to be run on shared servers) but it looks like I might just be better off running my own server of a fibre optic line here in Japan.

I know of a couple of other places but I think they are going to be hellish expensive.

We run all our own servers in-house due to control, the weird stuff that we do as well as cost.

[ttjereth]

From the other thread:

Notice the "various states of operation/disassembly."

I actually do have the hardware to do it, the problem is in our current little place there is nowhere to actually set up another pc in addition to the 3 I use for work and my wife's

[ttjereth]

I know of a couple of other places but I think they are going to be hellish expensive.

We run all our own servers in-house due to control, the weird stuff that we do as well as cost.

Yeah even for regular webhosting, ftp etc. the prices here are outrageous (and the service fairly lacking) so I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that other types of server rental would also be outrageous, but ah well.

Thanks anyway!

[ttjereth]

[GomiGirl]

If you know what you are doing, perhaps you could set up a little 6man a month apartment, put in a big pipe and fill it with servers (cheap from recycle places) and start your own rental service... seems to be an opportunity in the market here.

[ttjereth]

If you know what you are doing, perhaps you could set up a little 6man a month apartment, put in a big pipe and fill it with servers (cheap from recycle places) and start your own rental service... seems to be an opportunity in the market here.

The problem being that maintaining servers is a full time job and I already have too many of those.

Can't go running off to respond to customer problems or provide any type of support that would be worthwhile, and hiring someone who is capable of doing so full time would take a huge chunk out of any money that could be made anyway.

For webhosting and ftp, the best bet in Japan is to use a host elsewhere, like the U.S. or Australia, since you don't really need to have superfast connection speeds to serve websites. Just about the only reasons any Japanese hosting companies manage to operate for those purposes are language and xenophobia (can't trust the foreigners with our websites! ).

For game servers, ping/response time is a major factor. You can't play a game with someone who has a ping rate 300m/s better than yours. Well no, you can, but you aren't going to have a chance of competing at the same level, the game will be choppy, etc. So for game servers it is important to have a server physically nearby so that yourself and any other players located near you can connect to the server at decent pings.

The thing is that as far as I have found there is practically no interest in paying a monthly fee to rent a game server in Japan except for a hanful of gaijin. The Japanese who are are interested in running their own game servers all seem to set up their own.

It was an interesting idea, but it just doesn't look like their is any demand for it. I've actually contacted two of the companies I found offering game hosting and neither of them even has any current customers for that service