Discord Game Servers Experiment
Hosting a private server for your favorite game to play with your friends has always been approachable, but can be costly to the person who is paying for it. Today, Discord released its help article for its Game Servers feature (web archive snapshot around the time of writing), which makes those game servers available to rent monthly with server boosts. This feature is not rolled out completely and is still experimental, but I had some thoughts on it…some of which did not seem popular when I expressed them amongst a group of fellow developers.
In terms of the good, there’s plenty. Game server hosting can feel daunting and complex, which is a niche Discord is attempting to fill; it also allows “crowdfunding” a game server, which is also awesome. I help run a couple of communities, and one of the bigger ones is sitting at 30 unused server boosts. Which means a feature like this could be very useful, and we could host a couple of game servers for our community. Another good thing is that Discord also partners with ShockByte for the servers, which means they’re outsourcing it to a company that actually knows what they’re doing. This brings us to a strong list of positives:
- Crowdfunding with boosts
- Viewing server details and the game server from within Discord
- Full functioning panel so you can change anything and everything about your server
- Experienced, from what I can tell, server host, although I should clarify, I’ve never used them before
It’s a pretty solid solution. However, there’s one major issue I have, and it’s right there on the support page
It’s a ripoff
Yup, you read it right. There are no restrictions on the game server (past configurations like whitelist only mode on games like Minecraft) that Discord provides.
Is that really such a big deal, though, Matt?
I’d say so, yes. Let’s take a look at that community I help run for a Twitch streamer that has a lot of extra boosts. We would want to restrict access to subscribers only, and by default we can’t. If we wanted to do it we’d have to use plugins and set up all the integrations we need to do that, on top of having to figure out the best way to link the Discord account to the game account. I’m keeping it super generic here because I know plugins exist for some games, but I’m thinking more across all games.
This feels like a big shortcoming considering our users essentially pay $3.50 with Nitro or $5 without Nitro for the boosts (yes, I know you get 2 “free” boosts with Nitro, but it’s not free, it’s just built into the price). To put this cost in perspective, let’s look at their plans in the example image.
For a Rust plan with 12GB RAM it will cost you 12 boosts, that’s $42-60 boost value per month. When reading it, it just felt expensive to me. Let’s compare that with ShockByte’s own Rust offerings:
Well, that’s interesting. ShockByte’s 12GB Rust plan costs $40/month directly. Even accounting for Discord’s bulk pricing, they’re charging a 5-45% premium for…essentially nothing beyond Discord boost integration. I have no problem with them profiting and actually think it’s completely fair. It’s the lack of value added for the premium you pay.
I love the boost integration, I think it’s a good idea and provides value, but if your community doesn’t maintain or someone stops paying Nitro someone else will have to pick up the slack, which means you’re directly paying the premium with no real benefit.
If you’re looking for something that integrates with your community and could be a perk of getting a role then there is no real point in hosting a game server through Discord with the current implementation based on the information available. You may find it cheaper and better long-term to just host directly with ShockByte and do it yourself, or just not at all.
If I’m feeling like I am as a developer, it makes me wonder how many other potential customers ShockByte could be missing out on by a lack of functionality. There are tens of millions of monthly active users on Discord, and millions of servers. You can go through the Discovery page and find thousands of servers just sitting there with boosts that could be spent on a game server. How many of those server admins or owners will see the same flaw that I do and find it not worthwhile?
What can Discord provide to make it worthwhile?
For simplicity’s sake, here’s my idea: Discord should work with ShockByte to create integrations with the Discord platform that leverage the existing connections, roles, game profiles, etc., to allow restricting the server to roles or members only. This would also carry, ideally, into game server bans, but that could be hit or miss for me.
If you’re looking for just my thoughts, then that’s it. I don’t think Discord Game Servers are a worthy investment for communities at this time. Discord Game Servers could be, pun not intended, a game changer for communities that don’t want the hassle of a single point of failure for payment, trying to find the right host, and want a game server to “just work.” But without basic access controls they’re essentially asking communities and admins to pay a premium for similar functionality than going direct to ShockByte or other game server hosting platforms.
However, when expressing this stance and my opinions…I was getting some heat from other people, which is strange, right? They said it wasn’t possible. Well, if you’re interested in how I proved it was, read on, my friend.