It’s a pain to keep buying loads of games just so we can all play together online, isn't it?
It’s a pain to keep buying loads of games just so we can all play together online, isn't it?
I’m trying to get my computer network set up with Ethernet, and I was thinking about a really ambitious storage solution. Basically, I wanted to connect a bunch of hard drives to a fast switch – like, faster than most computers can read or write data. My idea was to fill a box with these drives and then hook it up to the switch, aiming for enough space to download loads of games. I’d probably want six copies of each game I played, and my friends could all connect their computers via Ethernet to play them using that network storage. It would be like setting up a little local gaming server.
I was just wondering if it's even possible to do something like this – whether we’d all need to own the games or if there’s a way to buy a game and then find the files on the storage so we wouldn’t have to download them again.
Steam offers family share up to five people but cant play at the same time. Obviously not what you want.
Each of you need an Steam account, or whichever else platform ie Ubisoft, Rockstar, Origin, and each game bought separately. From there you can just download/ install game on first PC and create a backup install and copy it to the storage box for others to install from.
It’s like, you know, if you actually *owned* the game, not just played it online, would you still be messing around with it if you could download it from a box? Like, seriously?
They'll still need to install the game on their machine but yeah, you providing the heavy lifting (downloaded), will make it faster from your local server. This is not streaming though, just installing to their PC from your already downloaded backup..
Ok, I might try a proof of concept for that first, maybe a python program that facilitates the file transfer between machines. It'll be worth it if I do it though just to see the look on my friend's faces when I say a game the size of D2 will install in like 10-15 minutes.
It all comes down to what everyone’s playing – some games are pretty straightforward. For most of those Paradox titles, really just one person needs to own the DLC, but anyone joining in can still enjoy it. And with C&C 3, you just need the disc to get started, and then you can copy it over to any computer until it’s running smoothly. Of course, if you were trying to install everything separately on every single machine, that would be a different story. But thankfully, most platforms like Steam and Battle.net have built-in features that check for existing games and only download what's needed – they even let you back up your games and reinstall them from backups!