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CyberDyme's avatar
CyberDyme
5 years ago

Re: Offline version with private servers would be godsend

Though I totally understand what you desire @dragonslayerxxx1 and reasons why, then I wouldn't get my hopes too high up on such any time soon.  Mainly because it doesn't fit into the mold of where EA wants to be in the gaming market and their business modeling.

In the BF2042 portal you can actually set up totally private servers.  Even with password protection, so its either only you as a single person or your friends that you share the password with, who will be able to access that server.  So the screaming kiddies shouldn't be a problem, except the ones you might have on the floor around in your own house.  :o)

So while I understand your desire to be able to play the game entirely offline, then that is not possible by current design of the BF2042.  And I doubt it ever will be, as the client/server software architecture obviously rely on heavy processing on the server side for controlling the gameplay for all the clients.  So theoretically this could of course also be released to the 'public'.  But as said, the EA business model and pricing for that sake, is not built with that in mind.  You can actually say that you probably would need an entire separate 'open source project' to create something like this from the ground up. 

Which actually is closely connected to the last point that you raise.  Namely a DMR free version of the game.  EA is of course not going to launch a royalty free version of their brand new game, just to see all their millions of $ investment into R&D not coming back in sales revenues first.  EA is not a charity organization.  Another thing is that its actually quite challenging to keep old IT tech functioning for many years later.  As aka 5.25" disk drives are not that easy to find anymore these days, likewise with graphic drivers used like 10 years ago, active x plugins, many of the different underlying supporting DLL libraries are no longer kept up to date, etc. None of it are certainly compatible with current versions of Windows/Mac/Linux/Android... So all this makes it cumbersome and most often practical impossible to keep all retro games playable, unless you keep like a time-capsule of all components you need from the époque you want.

1 Reply

  • dragonslayerxxx's avatar
    dragonslayerxxx
    5 years ago

    Yes, you're correct. Although I didn't get my hopes in a first place. I'm aware, as every gamer who is following what's going on in industry, how EA operates. It's not that hard to figure it out-it's EA. 🙂 However-change is always good when things get stale as well as listening to what community wants. And community has been pretty clear about offline solution. 

    Regarding private servers I was thinking about third-party servers not run by EA. I'm not sure something like this have even been attempted by developers, only via fan mods and such. Being not familiar with BF2042 client/server software architecture I can't comment on that but it may indeed be the case you mentioned. There was talk about similar thing on Diablo 4 forums back when game was announced and why it can't be run in offline mode/solo. A little enthusiasm on their side would be welcomed though. The reason why I brought this subject up is shutdown of BF2 servers. AFAIK nothing has been done to bring them up and the game currently works only with BF2Hub (someone check that fact). I'm not sure something like this is even legal-selling a half-working product. Regardless, time will come when BFBC2,BF3 and even BF2042 will no longer be supported and it would nice that company preserves them instead releasing a statement ''our people poured our hearts into these games but now it's time to forget them and buy our newest product''.

    Yeah, DRM free version somewhere down the road (5-10 years?)... If they even decide to go for it.

    You missed me a bit on last part or I wasn't clear enough-keeping server options updated so people can play is a must with multiplayer titles-hence my post. Rare are the devs that keep games working on new hardware and I'm aware of the difficulties.

    Still, I think these game will live on through community efforts and because we love them so much. I played BFBC2 3 or 4 years ago and had absolute blast for some short time. Cautiously optimistic for BF2042, what's your opinion @CyberDyme ?

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