I’m currently investigating several hosting options for my game’s multiplayer service.
Can you guys recommend any?
game-hosting.eu looks promising so far but wondering if there are any other good ones you can recommend.
Note : I am looking for companies who offer US as well as Europe server locations.
Thanks
1AND1, see my link in my signature
hell no not 1and1. as soon as you try to cancel with them they make u think they cancelled ur server but then sends u a threatening letter saying if you dont pay such and such money they will take you to court. and im not the only one who has had that done to them by 1and1.
I say use google to shop for a vps.
Thanks for the heads up Chris.
I also get suspicious when someone recommends a company and they have a link to them with a referral id in their signature.
I have a VPS from burst.net, can’t complain. The price is solid and I actually live in scranton, pa, so I thought it was funny that the datacenter was a mile away from my house.
For Game Servers location is key, check out some maps and learn a bit about current infrastructure. Dont pick the first best, check em out make sure there located on one of the big crossings and are connected to the big carriers. (aka level3 Abovenet, Sprint, …)
Looking at there maps you can figure out allot, keeping in mind that you want your servers to be located on major intersections and close to target audience and you can strike off allot of hosts not suited for real time games.
Level3 maps: http://maps.level3.com/default/
Abovenet maps: http://www.above.net/maps/index.php
In US: Denver → Chicago, looks interesting …
In Europe: Paris → Amsterdam → Frankfurt The famous golden triangle
More Reading, make sure you don’t miss the 4 sub entries on that blog.
And then last but not least a tool to located data-centers and hosting providers:
enjoy the hunt 
Thanks koen.
After all the research I’ve done, and after looking at 15 different providers features, pricing and infrastructure, softlayer.com seems to be the best so far. They are absolutely massive, and their prices are great, and their sales team very knowledgeable.
They have data centers at Chicago, and Amsterdam, among many other locations in the US.
Right now two servers is going to be the starting point. Since I’m on their cloud they can duplicate one of my server images to another location in under 5 minutes, which is pretty impressive.
really nice find, us, eu and assia all in one, well connected with private peers to almost all big crossings …
ugh … gone have to trow some money there way and try them out now 
Leaseweb is even more affordable. Although they don’t offer cloud in the US.
http://www.leaseweb.com/en/dedicated-servers/dual-core-servers
5000GB free bandwidth. Dedicated dual core’s from 35 Euro a month. Much better deal than softlayer. I’ve asked them for a quote as well.
Has anybody tried Gamespy’s? It’s pretty much free for low volume usage, though I don’t know how larger volume pricing or performance stack up against the competition. Still, it seems a good option for prototyping, with potential to scale up later.
Nothing comes up on Google regarding gamespy hosting aside from their free service was shut down in 2009.
I don’t see any stuff on their site relating to hosting.
I’m a happy leasweb customer, they do have some issues expanding in to us (and not just lack of vps options down there). If your about to release a game and expect the need for more servers make sure to let them know well in advance so they have stock and extra space ready to go.
For development I’m currently setup with cloudvps in Netherlands, but yha I’m bias towards them for several reasons. There a bit more expensive then leaswebs vps, but very flexible with payments, day contracts, refunds in credit and so on (leasweb doesn’t like that). Tech wise you should set them next to leasweb’s ‘Premium Cloud’, personaly I would not consider using leasweb’s standard cloud for anything but small websites or a quick tmp fix to get some extra resources.
will be messing with softlayer somewhere next week.
Their website leaves a lot to be desired! I find it hard to find what I’m looking for.
See the feature page here - bottom left corner, “User Generated Content Cloud Data Storage”. It’s brief, and clicking on it doesn’t help, but if you download the SDK and look at the documentation for Sake you’ll get an idea of what it provides.
http://www.poweredbygamespy.com/features/
Oh, there’s a blog post about it here too:
http://www.poweredbygamespy.com/2011/11/02/gamespy-technology-sake-web-admin-panel-demo-screencast/
There’s some pricing information somewhere too, but again it’s really hard to find.
I’d imagine that, as their C# support is a new feature, they’ll be glad to have new users in this area, especially if your game will demonstrate the services in an impressive fashion.
We have been using rackspace (.co.uk or .com) to set up cloud servers and they have been amazing. We tried several before them and its not comparable. Namely because of service but also pricing structure. You can get something up and running and it will cost very little… if your game goes nuts you can up scale at the click of a button.
Hope that helps!
N
p.s. they offer US, UK off the shelf but have centers in Aus and other in Europe.
I don’t see how rackspace is affordable compared to Leaseweb or even Softlayer.
In order to host windows with them, you need minimum of a 1GB RAM server = $58 a month.
That price is with NO outgoing bandwidth. Add 1000GB (which softlayer gives for free, and leaseweb gives 5000GB for free), and your cloud server is costing you $236.80. And they still don’t even say what CPU that includes.
My burstnet 1500mhz/1gb vps is $12.95/mo 
they have a 1000mhz/512mb package for $7.95/mo. Great for dev, I’ll probably upgrade when (if) I ever go live.
What puts me off them is their site. Every page I go to says it’s being updated. And should be finished by December!
“The BurstNET® website is currently undergoing a complete overhaul.
The revised website will feature new services and updated information!
This page/section should be completed this month (December 2011).
Please check back shortly…”
So hard to take a company with a site like that seriously.
What pages are they? I’m pretty sure the only section like that is cloud.
All the cloud stuff (which is what I’m interested in).
If a site/business has pages that haven’t been updated since December 2011 you have to wonder 
Can I ask why nobody considers Amazon EC2? i just want to know if there is something wrong with them, because they have really cheap prices for example you can get a 8 Core server around $400 - $700 per year, other options are cheaper or whats then cons and pros?