Epic has ended Master Server Support for all Unreal Tournament Titles - How to play Online

[UnrealWarrior]

What suprises me is that yesterday I thought about this...That they gonna close doors on the UT servers for some reason.

I don't know about the techincal details here, but you guys said that UT99 and Unreal won't be hit as bad as UT2K3 (If anyone still plays it, I know I play offline), UT2K4 and Unreal II. I think UT3X will be an "updated" version of UT3, because it's the last "fully released" Unreal game ever released.

Unreal Tournament 2004 will be hit hard the most. If they shutdown their servers, will we be able to play online ever again? Or is this the end? I'm gonna miss it a lot.

We should record those final moments, we have a month or so, let's make the best out of it. Let's pull a Halo 2 on them, we won't leave their servers so they won't shut them down lol

Let's organize a few matches and have fun with the game for the last time Doesn't matter what gametype. Anything. I'll record a few demos or figure out a way to record videos, fraps eats hdd space a lot.

[Feralidragon]

Unreal Tournament 2004 will be hit hard the most. If they shutdown their servers, will we be able to play online ever again? Or is this the end? I'm gonna miss it a lot.

It appears that the community is starting to investigate how to implement a custom master server for UT2004.
So maybe, by the time January 24 rolls around, there might be an alternate master server available.

Either way, the community is not stopped, and ironically this announcement made some people to actually return and become more active again.

[papercoffee]

Soooo and now try to get any Unreal Tournament game on steam when you are from Germany...
not even the non indexed versions are viewable... the UT3X page is not reachable.

From I heard latest, Germany unban UT. Possible it need take time for it appear and be unlocked.

To get off the index the publisher/producer has to write a reevaluation application to the BPjM "Bundesprüfstelle für jugendgefährdende Medien"
...then the BPjM will check again and when they see that media is not longer worth being banned then it gets off the index.

I doubt it that Epic even cares enough to contact the BPjM.

[Old UT Veteran]

Well I hope UT2004 community finds a way to keep on going with that amazing game. From the looks of it, the European scene seems far more active than the NA scene (onslaught and DM). Certain online 2k4 communities have hosted tournaments in the last 1-2 years as well, with well known pro players participating in them.

What saddens me is that it looks like UT4 is completely going to go away. While many don't like it, I have very much enjoyed playing quick-matches with randos online. I could play for an hour straight with random people or find a match during any time of the day, from time to time- the game has a dedicated group of old players that I have seen show up over the past 2-3 years. A game that started with community support ended up in permanent alpha. And even after it was discarded, there were efforts by the community such as UT4UU that continued to make improvements and customizations to the game. Maybe there is some effort put forth to make the game somehow playable afterwards, idk - it kind of sucks seeing it go away.

It had a good foundation that it was built on imo.

[Buggie]

It appears that the community is starting to investigate how to implement a custom master server for UT2004.
So maybe, by the time January 24 rolls around, there might be an alternate master server available.

Already exists: http://beta.openspy.net/en/howto/ut2k-engine/ut2004

[sektor2111]

Let's organize a few matches and have fun with the game for the last time

I have already witnessed such "last time" a few years ago when Master Server GameSpy went out and Epic demonstrated a lot of outages. The main thing in UT is that community will decide if "last time" will ever come - at least this is my conclusion. The only ones affected are those ignorant ones that are not reading anything about changes and they still launch the game in plain configuration and yelling later at clouds: "Hey, help me, I don't see any server On-Line".
The rest of UT versions are punished by their own community because nobody bothered to setup a "backup" for those "MasterServers" - factor ignorance is reacting as expected. You can say X times THANK YOU at Darkelarious for his efforts in setting up and writing assets for Community MasterServer.

And then ? And then Original Master Server was X times turned off but community was still active - nothing new here and I don't see any potential explosion. Panic is useless.

[JimmyCognitti]

Just read Steam UT3's front page and now I have even more questions...
Turns out the game I paid for will be turned into some sort of filthy F2P title, and according to the Verge's article there's no "catch" behind it, no microtransactions whatsoever... Yeah, right (like we don't know Epic).
Once again, I might be wrong about this.

[Que]

This is such a gut punch. If I bought the game on Steam, will I be able to reinstall it or install it on a new computer after January 24th?

Who can I talk to or what can I read to understand Epic's arrangement with OldUnreal?

if you have steam version 436 then you can copy the installation to somewhere else on your PC.
apply the 436 No Delta Patch

and good to go..

you can also make another copy of the same install and apply the 469c patch to it

[darkbarrage99]

My Original Post has been updated with a synopsis of what's happening as well as links to patches and instructions. Feel free to share this thread to anyone that needs information.

"PC crossplay between the Epic Games Store, Steam, and GOG". Holy shit "crossplay" now applies between stores on the same platform.

My jaw hit the floor over how stupid of a sentence that was when I first read that.
This is just a BS excuse they used to undermine the glitch that kept Steam users from connecting to the master server after their second connection.

While im pissed off with these bad news, whats the real value or advantage for relaunching againg ut3 with changing name to X and f2p?

They're probably just trying to corral the unreal community into one game. It kinda makes sense though, despite what many will argue, UT3 is the most modern, balanced and complete unreal game to date. If anything, they should have made UT3 free to play and built on it, maybe porting it to UE4 instead of starting on UT4 from scratch. Doing so would have made the community much bigger and therefore built an audience for a potential sequel down the road. And I'm not mad about it... But they should have done this 10 years ago. What's inexcusable is the fact that they have now made it next to impossible for normal people to find UT99 and UT2k4. I'm wondering if they did this so they could try to cash in on some kind of HD release. If they do that, I hope they don't steal code from the community.

If you have bought the UT games in Steam before, and have them in the library, they are still downloadable.

I backed up my copies of Unreal Gold, UT99 and UT2k4 just in case. Everyone ought to do this just in case.

Just read Steam UT3's front page and now I have even more questions...
Turns out the game I paid for will be turned into some sort of filthy F2P title, and according to the Verge's article there's no "catch" behind it, no microtransactions whatsoever... Yeah, right (like we don't know Epic).
Once again, I might he wrong about this though.

Considering the age of UT3 and the current goals at Epic, I doubt they're going to alter anything other than modernizing compatibility. I don't even think they're going to fix the UI, I think they're just going to slap an X on it and leave it alone forever as a way of saying "Hey guys! Here's UTX! What's UT4?" like an apology from a gaslighting narcissist.

[mist]

We were hoping for a continuation of the UTs series, but instead shitty-epics decide totally kill UTs series? They take away the our last pleasure!

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Automatically merged

lets make petition to epics against killing UTs series!?

[Eternity]

Petitions make no change.
They have calculated UT is not effective project anymore.
First of all, big companies choose direction that brings more money.
The cold, hard numbers decide everything nowadays...

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Automatically merged

Hope, v469d, finally, will have OpenSpy service links in the default configs (on the first place, instead of Epic's one).

[darkbarrage99]

lets make petition to epics against killing UTs series!?

how about a petition to fire epic's pr team since they didn't explain anything

[Forum|User]

Eyo, why the fakk they doing that? I never understand that dick move like from other developers, We ShUtInG dOwN oUr $eRvErz... They didn't have money to run the servers?
Looks like they don't respect the game what they made, and also looks like they don't give a shit about the community, and what happens to the people who put effort to the UT4 development?
I know... Fortnite is making a lot money, BUT PLZ - killing such a CLASSIC FPS game is just a crime! Thank god UT99 is safe! <3

[Letylove49]

Will it still be possible to install the game with the license key or not? ( i have the UT Anthology dvd rom

[Buggie]

Hope, v469d, finally, will have OpenSpy service links in the default configs (on the first place, instead of Epic's one).

Already used in v469c.
Default.ini:

Code: Select all

ServerActors=IpServer.UdpServerUplink MasterServerAddress=master.openspy.net MasterServerPort=27900

Code: Select all

ListFactories[4]=UBrowser.UBrowserGSpyFact,MasterServerAddress=master.openspy.net,MasterServerTCPPort=28900,GameName=ut