GameRanger

[Grimmie]

So, we all like an old game now and then, right?
Sometimes I put on my rose-tinted nostalgia goggles and drive down video-game memory lane to relive some classic oldies (and by old, I mean made in the last 15 years or so).

The one problem I've recently ran in to when trying to get things like C&C Generals, Dungeon Siege II and Age of Empires II is actually networking with other players. It seems as though it should be simple enough with a program like Hamachi or Tunngle which sets up a neat little VPN for you, but when the game has an option to "Dial a telephone number of the other player's modem", simply selecting LAN game doesn't quite cut it.

Cue GameRanger. Glorious, spectacular GameRanger.

A friend told me about this when I sang my AOE2 woes at him, and I immediately pounced on it. I can't praise it enough, it's simply brilliant. Pnut and I must have spent the better part of four hours trying to convince Dungeon Siege II that we wanted to play it online. Having endured the disabling and re-ordering of network connections, battled version mismatches, and discovered odd game quirks we finally gave up. GameRanger (once we all had a sweepy version) got us up and connected in 5 minutes.

GameRanger's a VPN at its core, but it's made specifically for games.

It has a public server browser for all supported games, a lobby system and friends list. Everyone sits through a quick movie trailer (it's ad supported and free, with premium options for profile customisation). When you host a game (two button clicks) it opens your game, runs some magic macro to hit the correct multiplayer buttons for you, Names your server appropriately and edits the game settings you specified earlier (2 players, 4 players etc). Once the host is in it automatically starts your lobby-buddy’s games up, macros them to the server browser and deposits them into your game. It’s painless and fast. Bits and I were in an AOE2 game within 30 seconds of clicking “Start” on the desktop.

I’ll stop with the sales pitch now, it’s a bit cringe-worthy, but I felt as though I had to share this around my favourite gamers.

www.gameranger.com

[Joose]

That sounds rather good. Will it make Generals go?

oh, wait, it says it does on the website. Yay!

[buzzmong]

Grimmie was telling me about this late last night, he was rather animated about it in his conversation, so I think its probably a Good Thing.

[Grimmie]

Grimmie was telling me about this late last night, he was rather animated about it in his conversation, so I think its probably a Good Thing.

I was very excited.