How Will the Killzone 2 Servers Hold Up?

Let me preface this by saying that you would be hard pressed to find anyone that is anticipating the launch of Killzone 2 more than me. But based on my history with Sony,(and game launches in general) I can't help but to anticipate being left with nothing to do but wait for the servers to be fixed next weekend. Call me a pessimist if you want, but based on my past experiences, I'm only being real.

[MURKERR]

anticipating kz2 more than you ....me included

[Lifendz]

Not a big deal to me. When LBP's servers were acting up I played the amazing story levels until they got it right. IF the same happens for KZ2, which always does for any major release with multiplayer (see: MGS4, LBP, and Warhawk), then I'll just play the single player campaign and work on my trophies.

Trying to get my plat in R2 before KZ2 drops is a real pain btw. I need to beat the game on super mode or whatever its called and get to level 30 in coop.

[earwax]

Nobody is on PSN anyway.That demo was WEAK and you know it! I was going to buy this game day 1 now I am going to wait for the $49.99 price drop.

[MasFlowKiller]

earwax stop trolling

[LoVeRSaMa]

Id Just like to point out that COD 4 servers are not run by sony and that they do not use dedicated servers but P2P like xbox.

Other then that he speaks truth, but I doubt Sony are going to let this online experience become compromised, they are new to this online thing, slowly but surely they are getting better...

Killzone 2 is going to be Immense [=

[phosphor112]

I'll be playing single player a couple times through.

[Ryo-Hazuki]

give me a damn break...the demo was the intro tutorial. What do you expect from a demo. People like you are truly ignorant

[Doppy]

I hope they will be ready at launch. Most top tier games have server problems during launch (especially PS3 games). They need to have the servers ready for at least 3 million people at launch.

[BiG_LU]

Love my ps3 and can wait for anything, that's why I got both system to wait until the fix the issue, is like when I play socom for the first time I wait until they fix it and now I can stop playing cuz for me is the best shoot game out in any console and I'm talking about the accuracy, it feel real and the aiming is awesome.

[Sheikh Yerbouti]

It is not like an RROD...? Some things always present challenges, and an onrush of 1 million players (based on pre-orders) will definitely be a challenge.

But ya never know; it might go off without a hitch.

[FrankenLife]

@earwax

You are going to be waiting a while. In the meantime I will be enjoying the PSN just a little bit more knowing you aren't on there. Better yet, don't buy the game at all.

[callahan09]

LittleBigPlanet had the misfortune of having to save and distribute people's creations in addition to letting people play together online. Of course complications would occur. Resistance 2 was miraculously flaw-free at launch, with clean matches, fast search times, and no lag at all. I think the chances are at least decent that Killzone 2 will have a smooth launch. But even if it doesn't, it won't bother me, because I'm not touching the online til I've had my fun with the campaign, and there have been enough 80+ reviews just for the single-player campaign, so I know that this game will have a fun campaign to keep us all occupied for a while, it's not JUST about the online play (though online will turn out to be the primary draw for most of us)

[Why o why]

to provide some real dedicated servers and they have had more hits (warhawk resistance 1+2 Motorstorm 1+2 wipeout) etc than misses (SOCOM tekken dr) in terms of netcode My glass is half full on this 1. Its something that sony has done RIGHT

@MURKERR u know u can pick up kz2 right now in east london right?

[Tryst]

What shop in the UK is selling this them?

[Kouzmich]

No game had perfect servers from the start. There is that first wave of ppl when the game comes out, biggest stress on servers. Then some ppl where expecting something deferent and are not interested in that game any more they leave. Servers stabilize.
I was in the KZ BETA there was this one thing that bugged hell out of me. You shoot a guy , he shoots you back kills you , then second or two later you see that he died and that you killed him. So I just started to count bullets, 3-4 bullets kill a person. Shoot at someone , he got hit seen that hit indicator, ran away , second or two later he died. There where no lag battles , those where the best , till game crashed :)
Hope that was fixed , everything else was cool.

[chewy317]

Your exaggerating... its 0.3 sec when its lagging not 2....

[scottmichael]

i agree Kouzmich, i cant thnk of a game on the playstation 3 thats 'perfect servers from the start'

[Kouzmich]

@ scottmichael

I meant in general on all plaforms , even PC in some case ( personal experience).

Nice try, you evil person.

[thehitman]

Resistance had perfect servers and the best that I can remember. Never had game lag once and if I seen some sort of lag it was someone's connection probably dling porn lol.

[Yipee Bog]

did pretty well with the servers for both of their Resistance games at launch, but I understand with the new game server issue. Heres looking at you Socom Confrontation

[Kleptic]

yeah Resistance 2 has always been fine...but that is about it...LBP had some minor problems for a few days...Socom was simply a broken game when it released, which I think was more of an issue of it simply not being complete...than just being buggy...

the beta for killzone 2 was pretty solid...some network errors here and there, but by the end of it with the server side updates, that had it running pretty well...

but yeah...stats and ranks will be broken...just plan on it for a few days at least...this game is going to sell well, and that is what snaps stat databases...lots of users...

[Mr PS3]

But it wont stop anyones fun
Think for most it will be ok
Either way come fri its all Good

[Spawnofgods333]

dont worry about it GG has a MASSIVE server room and have tested and fixed all the problems in the beta

[BiG_LU]

Hope you right but any way I think if has any problem I will play the game no matter what cuz I have to finish that beauty of game lol.

[sugard0]

I thought about this too. There is atleast 2.5 million pre-orders and another million most likely going to pick this up on release date or on the weekend Worldwide, so the KZ2 servers WILL be beaten too a pulp. I mean just look at Gears 2, Halo 3 these servers were smashed on release date, and XBOX Live died for a while in XMAS of 2007, so please dont tell me the servers wont suffer in some form around KZ2 release date.

Plus try to keep expectations low on whether the servers will work or not, you dont want to be in for a shock.

By the way, props to HipHopGamer for making a decent thread for once, which uses P.E.E (Point, Evidence, Explain).

[DelbertGrady]

Was written by bakerboy. If it was hiphopgamer who had written it you wouldn't be able to read it.

[FrankenLife]

XBL is PvP not Client Server. That is why all of XBL crashed. The stress from those games overloaded the whole network.

[outlawlife]

not all of live crashed, the only time all of live was unavailable was the day they shut it down to fix the issue

it was mostly regional, my friends near my and myself had no issue finding games and playing but people we knew as little at 10 miles away were affected

not every game works the same on live either, there are 3 options a developer has for live development

realistically you should expect problems with KZ2 online at launch, it happens with most all high profile games

there is always some unforeseen issue

[OmarJA]

They will be fine, Sony always deliver dedicated servers for their games unlike some fuucked up laggy P2P servers...aka...Live.

[scottmichael]

he forgot to mention the MGS4 and HOME launch, and probably a few more... SONY couldnt even handle the fifa 09 demo release, crashing the store completely for 24hours....

but not to worry, after a few weeks of half the people who bought the game giving up trying to play online, we'll have no problem then.

EDIT : wasnt gta4 down for a few days on the playstation too at launch? :|

[TheBand1t]

MGS4 isn't ran off the PSN, so that wasn't Sony's fault.

And of course a hotly anticipated game will lag a bit at first. That's MILLIONS of people trying to play at once.

EXAMPLE: Gears 2, Halo 3, Home, SOCOM

[Kleptic]

yeah people need to be careful pointing this problem at just Sony...

Gears 2 still doesn't work right does it?...and if it does, it was from a patch that came earlier this month or something...as it was still hopeless matchmaking in January...

[outlawlife]

actually your wrong about gears 2 not working, it works fine for a lot of people, there were issues at the beginning if you were trying to find a game with a party of 1 or 4, that was promptly fixed in december

a lot of people including myself haven't had a matchmaking issue since then, most of the problem in gears stems from the users internet connection(DSL=bad) and their router(linksys=bad) and a combination of those 2 renders you unable to find a game at all

[Ryangp]

to know how Resistance 2 had such amazing connection, more developers need to take tips of Insomniac.

[cpuchess]

I was thinking about the SOCOM release last year too. At least we will have bots to play if we have to wait for them to fix something.

[SuperSharpShooter]

scaffolding and duck tape i think,(joke)the wifes away next weekend,hope the servers do hold up,ive 48hrs 10 cans of red bull and match sticks for my eyes, whos with me??

[cayal]

Sorry but no. I have a life.

[SupaPlaya]

to take a break from "life" sometimes. When you are married, it's more difficult to have some alone time, especially if you have kids.

Enjoy your intense game session :) HAPPY GAMING FTW!!

[Kleptic]

cayal he obviously has a life...he is simply stating that he will get some time for killzone 2 next weekend, which is hard to come by...

why does it seem like everyone on N4G is such a prick lately?...

[hardcorehippiez]

only ive shipped my wife and kids to a holiday in spain ( im in ireland )so ive got a whole week outside of work to play kz2 and i cant wait.

[II Necroplasm II]

Well if there is problems then at least the campaign will be so amazing to repeat it a few good times till the servers calm down.

[PotNoodle]

In the beta, i didn't have a single laggy match.

You're not given the option to host a server on your own machine, but you can create servers and have almost full control over it and it is hosted on GG's own high speed servers.

I could join matches in japan, america, europe and didn't find a match where i was lagging, it was great.

Of course, it could all just crumble under the pressure on day 1, but from what i saw- i think it will hold up pretty well.

[N2NOther]

How many people were playing the beat? Over a million?

The article has touched on my main concern, especially after that piece Socom was released. I returned the game after 2 days because it was terrible. Also, I never touche MGS online after I went through nearly an entire match (not the game type I selected, mind you), ranked up, upgraded my P90 and then lagged out. No problem, in Call of Duty all of your progress is saved no matter what...Not so here. All that work I did was gone. Not TOO big a deal to some, but knowing that that can happen at all? Sorry, but no thanks.

I really want Killzone 2 to be my favourite online shooter...In fact, I'm counting on it...I just hope they can get these servers up.

[PotNoodle]

Actually no - there were only around 30,000 european codes sent out and around the same for the US.

There was rarely ever over 100 people online on the beta in the EU servers.

[N2NOther]

That's my point...It had far less people playing that what's going to be trying to play next weekend.

[sugard0]

I think Resistance 2 was the only game without server issues. Am I right?

[labaronx]

Had very few server problems at launch. Insomnia helped set up the online with GG, so any problems may be minor.

[GVON]

kz2 uses the same system as R2,cool thing with that is you create a room on their servers so if you got a cack connection you could still host a 60 player room oe 32 player in KZ2 case

[crillyconlig]

...to the network was the only problem, but once in never lag, never a disconection, just the kill delay was annoying, they said in the beta forum, it would be fixed

[NateNater]

With all the hype built up for KZ2 so far, Sony has no room to mess up its launch. If they messed up, it would be a disaster for sure.

[marcindpol]

i have really high hopes for online part of KZ2,

i wish everything will work smooth and that we finally will be able to use some QUALITY in game voice chat !:)

[MrJack]

I heard that game was broken for months, but I have heard amazing feedback from the Beta, so I reckon it will be fine.

[crillyconlig]

pain in the arse, ruins it

[outlawlife]

the game wasn't broken for months, it had matchmaking issues which were fixed within 3 weeks, matchmaking worked it just took a while sometimes

what was broken about the game was people finding and exploiting glitches to cheat

and when you say "you heard" i assume you "read on n4g", while gears 2 had problems they werent what they were made to be by people on here

i still hear people complain about the matchmaking but it doesn't take me any longer to find a match on gears than it does on cod4

the only problem with gears is the people playing it, glitchers, cheaters, and quitters

cod4, halo3, also had the same exact issues at their launches

[rhood022]

I usually don't play MP until after I've played the story. So, if there are issues with MP, hopefully they will be worked out by the time I finish the game.

[PureGamer]

Hopefully they are spot on because the SP is very short ive seen someone complete it in 4 hours already. Im not feeling the SP at the moment but im at level 3 and im 50 mins in.

[Claudinho69]

yea day one 360 fans gonna storm here sayin kz2 suck "cant even get on a game for few minutes without getting kickedout" psn sux blablah

[Hallucinate]

yea..and there will be no ps3 fans on here cause we'll all be playing KZ2 =D so its a win win i guess

[hwbrewer3]

every game so far that has been released for ps3 has had server issues for online play.that why i own most online shooters for xbox.after metal gear and socom i was almost ready to sell the ps3,i will give it one more chance with killzone 2.the demo is outstanding,i know the single player is going to be beyond outstanding but what if this crappy playstation network fuc*s up another hyped games online mode.killzone 2 will make or break ps3's online shooter communities confidence.also these big companies that create block buster games should push psn to make shure these servers work like they should.it seems to me ps3 is heading in a single player game system direction.we will find out

[labaronx]

Resistance 2, Street Fighter 4, Madden 09, NBA Live 09, NBA 2K9, MLB 08 The Show, Resistance 1, Wipeout Pulse, Burnout Paradise, Midnight Club LA, are all games that hadn't had any problems on release.

Secondly, There's a difference between a game having online problems being simply awful. A good example was SOCOM Confrontation and Gears 2. Both games had severe matchmaking problems however both were playable if you were willing to wait for a match: Socom as long as 10 min vs Gears as long as 20 mins.

I'm not saying your wrong but not all games had issues at launch.

[outlawlife]

you named about 10 EA games, all of which use EA online which has nothing to do with any thing here because they operate on ea's servers which have been up and running for years without issue

resistance 2 did have issues when it was launched, some people weren't able to get in games at all for a few days

the reality is most games have issues at launch, KZ2 probably will

street fighter also shouldn't be counted because its a 1v1 situation, not 10-15 players all interacting at once

1 is a lot more stressful than the other

[Qorious]

I think the servers will hold up fine. Guerrilla released a multiplayer beta for a reason: to test their servers. I think the servers will be a lot better than CoD4, R2, and LBP by launch.

[DJ]

This generation has had some kind of issue(s) during the first few weeks, or even months. If Killzone 2's online is flawless, I will straight up worship Guerrilla Games.

[earwax]

Nobody is on PSN anyway. BTW that demo was WEAK and you know it! I was going to buy this game day 1 now I am going to wait for the $49.99 price drop.

[Tryst]

I come to the conclusion that....your full of sh!t

[deadreckoning666]

I hear ya earwax. The first couple times I played it I thought it sucked too, but then as I kept playing it I got good and started to realize that it was the most entertaining fps ive ever played...campaignwise. Killzone 2 in my opinion has this satisfying gunplay that ive only experienced otherwise in COD4. Its like Warhawk, the first couple of days u thk it sucks because u dont know how to play the game, but once u learn the ropes...it becomes awesome.
Try not to judge games on one or two playthroughs. Graphics were great, but I wouldnt say they TOTALLY stomp Gears 2

[Bits-N-Kibbles]

clean out the earwax

[Pootie Tang]

It's a legitimate concern, especially after playing Socom

I think what worries me more is how many ppl will be online, i sure hope it sells sh@tloads because with Socom right now the games are terrible- I haven't been in a 16v16 yet, the best was i think 11 per side but it's usually like 5 on 5's on your kicked back to lobby for lack of players

So I'm more concerned with the # of players online than with the servers holding up

[Magic_The_Celt]

Better be good, im going to be p*ssed if they dont.

[silverchode]

the servers will probably crash.

[L-a-i-n]

The simple fact is you can never plan for server issues. You can do beta tests, but you can never truly find out how your servers will handle the strain until you reach retail. Everybody should know this already. There are some problems you should know about before launch that is match making. You can easily test this in beta versions of the game. Did Gears 2 or Socom have a beta I can not remember. The first few days of launch I always give the dev time to figure out what is wrong. There should also be a patch in that time frame as well. Both Socom and Gears 2 went past my time line so I dropped both of them. I hope GG is ready because I look forward to seeing 1 million at least in the first week. So I can shoot them all in the face with my shotgun. 8)

[Campy da Camper]

Well said. Bubbles for using common sense. The only thing required is that GG be "ready to fix" any unforseen bugs that arise. Of course the sessions won't be perfect right away but as long as the dev is on top of it and keeps us informed, I can live with it.

[N4U]

....sorry, bad joke.....riiiight, so... *averts eyes and ponders for a moment* riiiight...heh.

[villevalorox]

this is just about the only thing i am worried about, But I know they will have it fixed before long if they do go crap.

[PS3istheshit]

cuz ill spend about a month on the story mode
i dont really like 2 go online b4 i beat the game cuz it ruins the experience
but my first week online on killzone 2 ill prob get raped but wat ever

[Creep]

how come this article wasn't made for gears of war 2 cuz last time i heard that game was laggy as f*ck specially with P2P how pathetic is that, come on it's sony's triple A shooter they are gonna make sure it runs badass

[jBat17]

if there are a few hiccups in the first week.. but i'm hoping everything will be smooth, like R2 for example

maybe you guys from europe can tell us how's the online part.. you will be getting it earlier than us, right?

[Jeppe]

I don't care, just want the single campaign. Not much of a social person anyway and never cared much for on-line gaming. Well, I may pick it up just to shoot you a little or so.. Don't forget to wear a helmet.

[Raoh]

as a ps3 fanboy

i have to say its a good question...

[gauravraw]

I guess they had a Beta for a reason; but so did Call of Duty 4 and still had some lag problems. Have already got the game and keeping my fingers crossed.

[Chaoticsoulx]

That is about the time all the anti ps3 sites will decide it's a good time to review the game. and won't wait a few days for it to get patched first, and people will talk about the errors for the next year or so.. that's pretty much it, people hate the ps3, no idea why though.

[Slabs]

PSN is new. When LIVE Launched it sucked badly and went through growing stages.

[snipermk0]

HHG /facepalm

[Aven86]

The servers will probably be just fine, thats what the closed Beta was for right? Well if not You still have the single player.

[NaiNaiNai]

if the game sells as well as everyone says. then yes the servers will crash, halo 3 had issues andit had 16+ TB
-nai-

[knightoftears]

With such a high profile game I believe Sony knows it NEEDS these servers to operate very well on launch day. If they did things right they have reserved extra servers ready to put online if things get heavy so that players experience no lag. Also, alot of time you can't blame the server due to most ISPs today being total crap. I am confident they are ready for KZ2 to blow their servers off the racks. I can't wait!!