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From: Justisaur <justisaur@gmail.com>
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action
Subject: Re: A Nostalgic Ramble: Online gaming services of yore
Date: Sat, 17 May 2025 18:35:33 -0700
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On 5/15/2025 4:06 PM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
> <ramble type=nostalgic>
> 
> I know we got some old timers here; how many of you remember having to
> pay to play your games online?
> 
> The other day, a few friends and I were reminiscing, and we brought up
> services like TEN and Kali and other programs, which were middleware
> necessary to meet and play games over the new fangled internet. Even
> though there were a lot of games of that era (we're talking mid to
> late 90s here) that supported network multiplayer, this was either
> through IPX or direct modem-to-modem connections.  The TCP/IP of the
> Internet had yet to dominate as a gaming standard. This was fine if
> you were gaming on the same LAN, but if you're friends were in
> different cities, it wasn't really an option. As such, you often
> needed software to act as an intermediary to translate. And this
> software often wasn't free; the idea of advertising-supported apps had
> yet to be invented.
> 
> Kali was the one I remember most, but there were others: Gamespy was
> another big one, and publisher-specific platforms like Blizzard's
> Battle.Net and Microsoft's MSN Gaming Zone started out serving similar
> purposes. Sometimes games came built in with their own translation
> software, but they tended to be specific to certain games; products
> like Kali or TEN also offered chat-rooms where you could meet and then
> use to play any game in your shared libraries.
> 
> Like I said, a lot of these software packages --especially the bigger
> ones-- weren't free. A few were a buy-once-and-you're-good deal, but a
> lot of them required monthly subscriptions to keep using. Thus, in
> addition to paying for your Internet and the game, you'd also be
> paying $10-15 per month for matchmaking. This added cost meant a lot
> of people just didn't bother with Internet multiplayer, and those that
> did tended to be siloed off from one another because there was no easy
> way for Mechwarrior 2 players to meet up with Duke Nukem 3D players.
> 
> As Internet broadband phased out dial-up connections and TCP/IP
> connections became the norm, software like that became less necessary.
> Eventually, they were pretty much all killed by Steam, which offered
> matchmaking for every game on Valve sold on the service. It's just
> another way that Valve helped invigorate PC gaming.
> 
> Like I said, I best remember Kali but I'm pretty sure I tried TEN and
> Gamespy. I know for a while I paid a monthly subscription for some
> service (I can't remember which one though! Maybe it was HEAT.Net?
> MPlayer? INN? There were a lot of them back then). I didn't stick with
> it long because none of my IRL friends were on there, playing with
> strangers only had limited fun, and most of the games I was interested
> in supported direct IP connections anyway (even if they were trickier
> to use).
> 
> But it still makes me smile remembering that this --something we now
> take for granted will be included for free-- was a service we once
> paid extra for. How things have changed.
> 
> Did any of you ever use these services (assuming you were gaming back
> then?) Or did you avoid them because of the cost, or for other
> reasons?

I think I used Kali for multiplayer Master of Magic once.  That was fun.

I played Counter Strike a little bit later, but you just found and 
connected to the servers.

Then there was MMOs.  Ultima Online was my first, and horrible and quit 
quickly.  Then I played EQ for 3 years, realized I was addicted and 
ruining my life, and not really enjoying it, and put it down and swore 
not to get involved in them again.

That didn't really happen though. There was Anarchy Online fairly short, 
a month or two.  City of Heroes for like 6 months initially and I kept 
coming back on and off after until it was shut down, and then about a 
month and a half on it's rebirth.  I never got in such a bad place as I 
did with EQ though.

I play a few short mission online connection games now off and on, like 
the Souls games, or Vermintide, or Warframe.

-- 
-Justisaur

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