Following Ambush mentioning this service in a different thread a few days ago, a few of us tested this service last night. And were very impressed..
For those who missed the previous post, the url is http://www.matchcreate.com.au. You have to connect with your steam account (something I was a tad dubious about at first, but proved to be safe).
The service essentially creates a match in "tournament mode", providing a server etc and setting up a game of 6 v 6 tf2. Map is decided based on players setting preferences, and once players are "ready" the service automatically loads the game and connects you to the server.
The service also appears to deal with Left 4 Dead, Left 4 Dead 2, Bad Company 2, Battlefield 2, Counter Strike: Source, Soldat (?) and Medal of Honour, although I haven't tested those games.
A few observations that were made during the game (and there were only a few of us in the server, not the full 12)..
It's frikkin' awesome
Crits need to be turned off for proper competitive style play
Class restrictions should be added (1 Demoman, 1 Medic, 2 Soldiers, etc)
It needs promoting! I'd never heard of the service, and I doubt many would've. I'll ponder this point myself.
Hopefully people find this service, it really is bloody brilliant.
_________________ "A modern day warrior, mean, mean stride; Today's Tom Sawyer, mean, mean pride.."
Last edited by Freewheelin on Mon Jan 10, 2011 5:35 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Crits are off now. I'll look into the class restriction stuff another day (I've been off sick today)
For those interested: it runs on the GameArena servers, so it's unmetered usage for those on BigPond.
There's an inbuilt ranking system and you can also register yourself and your team. Personal and team ranks run separately(or if they don't already, that's what we'd planned to have if it took off). The system picks up on most things like round changes etcetera, and you may only be required to enter a win or a loss when the game is over. We wanted to keep it as automated as possible so people weren't bogged down in score entries, organising dates and times that aren't necessarily convenient, when all most people really want to do is have a good match and maybe get ranked on it.
It was made for people to have a more relaxed approach to clan matches, since it's not always easy to get a team organised for specific dates and time slots. This allows teams to play when they like, when their team is together, or play just with a few team mates or even just yourself with some other randoms if your own team aren't around.
Steam accounts can be used as an OpenID, which is exactly how this login system works. Everyone playing TF2 has one, and as most of the other games are on Steam, it was the best solution to provide people with a login and persistent ranks and stats, but also didn't require people having to sign up for another site and mess around when they just want to jump in and play.
As you said, it would be great to see it really take off, and given what has happened with the GA TF2 ladder recently, it could be a viable alternative, since we actually run the service.
Stickied
I've also put a link to it in the TF2 MotD now for greater exposure.
_________________
Last edited by Freewheelin on Mon Jan 10, 2011 5:54 pm, edited 1 time in total.
If the servers are intended to be of competitive nature, I suggest you use these configs for the TF2 servers. The config to be used depends on which map type is being played. Implementing the item blacklist would also be a very good idea.
Possible Reasons: * You may be behind a firewall that prevents you from connecting * NoScript or another script blocker is active and blocked Flash and Comet connections. NoScript does not allow Comet to work correctly without being disabled entirely. * A server side error has occurred
i try turning off firewall but no help, later on i will try turning this option on in my router (is called P&P or Plug and Play, something like that, he cause trouble with BC2 so i turn off but need him for PS3 online!)
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