Glim Days at GameDaemons

[jbiloh]

For those of you who don't yet know, GameDaemons (http://www.gamedaemons.com) is no longer selling AA Honor servers. Honor servers were widely known as their bread and butter.

 

Speakeasy cutting costs? Stripping the outfit? I think so. Bean counters are a great thing.

 

http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details?q=gamedaemons.com&url=gamedaemons.com/

 

That doesn't look too hot either.

[Todd Holley]

For those of you who don't yet know, GameDaemons (http://www.gamedaemons.com) is no longer selling AA Honor servers.

 

Site will not even load for me.

[adamnp]

http://www.gamedeamons.net , odd they moved off the .com and created the new domain...In May of 2007.

 

Hence the low traffic @ alexa ? Do a further search back on alexa, and you'll notice it changes back to gamedaemons.com data.

 

Odd, I didn't know alexa would xfer stats like that. Go figure.

 

Seems they are still operational though?

[Todd Holley]

What the hell is up with their pricing? Makes no since to me. =[

 

https://shop.gamedaemons.net/index.gdx?product_id=18

 

Some are at 3.00 a slot some are at 4.00 then the daytime server package? Wtf.

[adamnp]

Daytime/ Nighttime.... During the day the majority of people arn't playing on a private server, most play at night, so therefor he can stuff a crapload more servers on the same machine...Or atleast thats what I would assume the advantage of that would be?...Lotta good thats going to be when matchtimes are evening

[jbiloh]

That goes to show you they haven't adapted to the new market conditions in the slightest. Sales must be in the TANK.

[Defcon|Rich]

What the hell is up with their pricing? Makes no since to me. =[

 

https://shop.gamedaemons.net/index.gdx?product_id=18

 

Some are at 3.00 a slot some are at 4.00 then the daytime server package? Wtf.

 

 

GD back a few years ago were widely considered the premier provider of game servers which is why their pricing is higher. I don't have any experience personally but reading about them if clans wanted top of the line and didn't mind paying for it they rented from GD.

 

Jon's right though, They haven't scaled with the times which will be their downfall unless they can figure out a way to offer something of value to draw in new customers.

 

On the other side of that I believe the newer crop of hosters has damaged the gsp model beyond repair by offering unrealistic pricing by trying to undercut the next guy. It's a cycle that's been happening over the past 2 years or so and will continue until people get smarter about the economics of the industry.

[jbiloh]

Sounds a lot like the web hosting industry, eh? Super low prices do nothing but hurt us all.

[Daersun]

GD back a few years ago were widely considered the premier provider of game servers which is why their pricing is higher. I don't have any experience personally but reading about them if clans wanted top of the line and didn't mind paying for it they rented from GD.

 

Jon's right though, They haven't scaled with the times which will be their downfall unless they can figure out a way to offer something of value to draw in new customers.

 

On the other side of that I believe the newer crop of hosters has damaged the gsp model beyond repair by offering unrealistic pricing by trying to undercut the next guy. It's a cycle that's been happening over the past 2 years or so and will continue until people get smarter about the economics of the industry.

 

Not just the game hosting industry, all web based industries are hitting this, the dedicated server market is in the crapper right now as well.

 

My prediction is softlayer will pull a planet within the next 18 months.

 

I had about a 3 hour talk with Lance Crosby, CEO of softlayer while at hostingcon and there are just too many dedicated hosts taking huge risks and looking long term and completely ignoring short term. These guys are assuming VC will always be there when they run out of money and are just buying market share. I see very similar things in the game hosting market, companies with ever lower prices buying market share but without the knowledge or financial backing.

[ECF]

Doing what we do, I come across many 1 box wonders, as I call them. The $1 a slot model does not work. It has been proven not to work 99.9% of the time.

 

We even had a larger client of ours try the $1 a slot model for a period of time, filling the boxes to more than capacity. At the end of the day, the profit (if any) is simply not worth the time and effort put into it.

 

For those of you asking why GD would be charging $3 a slot, the answer is simple. They are a valid business and need to make a profit. They are not a 1-2 rental box shop. They have overhead such as hardware, co-lo fees, bandwidth and staff for both sales and support and much more.

 

I think many new GSPs are turning a blind eye to the obvious. You really aren't making what you think you are. Take into account the time you spend on setup and supporting your company and clients. Take those hours and divide them into the amount of profit you make each month. Many will be surprised that you could make more flipping burgers at a fast food joint, than you will working as a GSP.

[Daersun]

I know that we used to look at it like that.

 

Now we own all of our hardware, our staff (paid, 1099) do all of our support (thank god, I would have slit my throat if I kept doing support for no money like we used to)

 

We are on the low end of costs, but have done ALOT to minimize our costs.

 

What I keep telling alot of these new GSPs is that their business plans dont work when they get over 100 customers, but so many of these kids dont care about making money, they just do it for fun for a few months, run it into the ground and move on when summers over.

[DougK94]

And the customers suffer, and then go to other GSP's and complain cause they were paying $1 a slot before.....

 

A majority of my customers have been with me for 2-5 years. They know they can go to a $1 a slot "GSP" at any time, but will not even consider it due to the service and quality they are receiving now.

[ECF]

School will be starting soon, and the kiddie GSP rush will be over

[Defcon|Rich]

That's why I'm glad ventrilo only allows select companies to sell their product or that would be beaten to death too..

[Kuwl]

You may be glad that ventrilo licenses to select companies, but the smaller companies who got a later start in the business aren't. Yeah, I would like to offer ventrilo but the chances of me (or any other smaller company for that matter) are slim to none. More like none actually. I just don't like depending on other peoples services when dealing with resellers. Call me a control freak, but the services are out of my hands when dealing with resellers. Pray something doesn't go wrong or that company doesn't shut down their services (Make-a-voice anyone?)

[Todd Holley]

School will be starting soon, and the kiddie GSP rush will be over

 

We will still be running full speed.

[Defcon|Rich]

You may be glad that ventrilo licenses to select companies, but the smaller companies who got a later start in the business aren't. Yeah, I would like to offer ventrilo but the chances of me (or any other smaller company for that matter) are slim to none. More like none actually. I just don't like depending on other peoples services when dealing with resellers. Call me a control freak, but the services are out of my hands when dealing with resellers. Pray something doesn't go wrong or that company doesn't shut down their services (Make-a-voice anyone?)

 

Bad example, Make a voice never had a license to sell ventrilo. I don't know what their story is but that came directly from flagship.

[Kuwl]

Well, at one time they were selling ventrilo licenses.... makes me wonder if they were reselling a reseller license. I'd have to look into it a little more, but I don't think thats quite up to par with EULA of ventrilo. I think it was some kiddies out to make a quick buck (seems to be the topic in service provider land as of late...)

 

Either way, still sucks :-P.

[jbiloh]

I'm pretty sure MakeAVoice had some connection with NationVoice.

[JasonF]

The only people that like the Ventrilo licensing rules are the people that are already in. Once they get in, they don't want anyone else in so they can get more clients. If they were being left out in the cold they would be up in arms also.

[Daersun]

Rich knows my view on the vent licensing, all I will say is, if you guys were Flagship, and you knew that you could either have 10 direct customers or 1 million and it wouldnt change how much product you sell, how many customers would you have?

[DougK94]

I can not argue at all with Flagship's basic licensing model. This way they can hopefully have people reselling their servers that are reputable and stable. Some are very good, some are OK and some are lousy. But for those of us that have been in business for a while (My LLC was formed 2 /2002) it sucks that we cannot get our own license and have to go thru a reseller and not be integrated into TCAdmin. As a result, I push Teamspeak that I can make a decent profit on, and only do Ventrilo by request since my profit margin is much less. I knew I should have gotten a license years ago when they were still available

[bryan]

As for the ventrilo. I have continued and will continue to send in my application once a week every week. I don't agree with there ways, about the same as EA anymore. Those 2 companies are so 1 sided its unreal.

You all sit here and wonder why people run GSP into the ground. Its because when they try to start a GSP, they cant get anything. Such as BF2, BF2142. Thats a big money maker, and everyone wants ranked. People sell unranked servers for pennies on the dollar to get what they can. Honor server is somewhat the same way. $1000.00 + ?

You have to either one pray your luck is good or two stick it out and do what you can. Myself, I just say to heck with AA and EA games and try to run everything else. For ventrilo I'm forced to go resellers in order to offer it. Its a shame that although I went and followed what Ventrilo wanted ( Registered LLC ). I'm still unable to obtain the license.

 

Nothing like a donkey kicking contest with no legs or arms. Know wonder people have to offer low end prices to even compete.

 

 

(My two cents)

[adamnp]

Not sure why flagship doesn't remember their own record keeping, but MakeAVoice Most definately had a Ventrilo license.

 

 

http://web.archive.org/web/20041021084312/ventrilo.com/hosting.php

 

Using the web archive feature, you'll see that up until the beginning of Feburary of 2005 BBServers had a license, BBServers referred to bbgameservers.com and bbservers.com, of which are owned by

 

Domain name: BBGAMESERVERS.COM

 

Administrative Contact:

Bigelow, Michael ****@bbgameservers.com

1837 Rosebella

Ottawa, ON K1T 1G4

CA

123-456-7890

 

One, MakeAVoice.com owner, Micheal Bigelow.... Go figure. After which date, Jon was right he was actually reselling NationVoice up until the close of the his vent selling in the end of April 2007.

[Defcon|Rich]

Not sure why flagship doesn't remember their own record keeping, but MakeAVoice Most definately had a Ventrilo license.

 

 

http://web.archive.org/web/20041021084312/ventrilo.com/hosting.php

 

Using the web archive feature, you'll see that up until the beginning of Feburary of 2005 BBServers had a license, BBServers referred to bbgameservers.com and bbservers.com, of which are owned by

 

Domain name: BBGAMESERVERS.COM

 

Administrative Contact:

Bigelow, Michael ****@bbgameservers.com

1837 Rosebella

Ottawa, ON K1T 1G4

CA

123-456-7890

 

One, MakeAVoice.com owner, Micheal Bigelow.... Go figure. After which date, Jon was right he was actually reselling NationVoice up until the close of the his vent selling in the end of April 2007.

 

 

You answered your own question Adam, MakeAVoice never had a license to sell ventrilo and I will explain why.. Under ventrilo's legal terms the 'company' operates as the exclusive license holder not the 'individual' who sent the application which means for example if I were to leave defconservers I couldn't then open another business using a different name and sell ventrilo under the original license just because I am the principle applicant. The license is listed under the business name defconservers not me therefore it is not transferable.

 

There's also a clause in case some of you are wondering that you cannot simply purchase a company with a ventrilo license and therefore assume the license. From my understanding there is pending litigation on a few that tried doing that so it's not really advisable.