I'm going to be doing a server migration over the next few days. The site will be down on and off during this time.

Anything uploaded to the site after this post was made will be lost during the transfer. Content submitted to the site (posts, reviews, user accounts, etc) will not be lost. Just files will be lost during this time (like screenshots).


There are 2 reasons for the migration:

1. The site hasn't been paying for itself in quite a few months. The site fees are $450+ month, the site revenue is less than $100 a month. I'm consolidating all of the servers into a single server, and while that server is still expensive (around $260), it's a lot cheaper than the $450. The current servers include the site sever, netplay server, minecraft server, and file server.

Unfortunately, new server will not be able to contain all of the games from the Retro Game Room, as it's only a 2 TB hard drive. It'll be able to contain all of the music and cartridge based games, but the CD based games will be too large, which means most of those games will be taken down. I'll take the top 10% most popular games from each of the CD systems and those are what I'll keep.

2. The current server software is very outdated and can't be updated. Having better hardware/software will allow me to do things with the server that I've never been able to do. It also gives me the power to improve the site performance by utilizing features that prevent bot abuse.

I should also point out that the new server is 2x more powerful than the current main server, which is crazy because they're about the same price.


With all of that said, the site will perform a lot better after the migrations. I've already purchased and setup the new server, all of the files have already been migrated. The things I have left to do include:
1. Configuring the new server to match the configuration of the current
2. Figuring out what things I need to install on the new server so that nothing stops working
3. Transferring the database
4. Pointing the domain name to the new server

Davideo7: so would this effect any of the game pages?

The CD games don't have to be lost forever. It could be a good occasion to relaunch the Play Your Games feature we used to have. This way, people can still play their games as they did and run more and better tests with all the emulators Vizzed has.

Unless I'm missing something with that feature it could do us the trick. But, like I said, it seems a bit faulty as of now and has been left untouched for years. If at all possible, some time should be dedicated to fixing it so not much is lost in this migration.

Sad to see the site in such a down moment. Even I am failing to contribute with my time because real life has become a pain, and it's gonna get worse once I get a full schedule in October. I do have holidays for the next two weeks and I plan on dedicating my free time to writing again, but it won't be much.

That new server looks impressive, though. Aside from the size shortage, everything is on par or better than the current server and for a considerably lower price, so it's a winning move despite the losses we could experience.

I'm not done with the migration, but the site and database are on the new server. So far everything is blazing fast. There still might be some pages and features not working, since I'm not done.


EX Palen : That's a good idea. I'll be backing up all of the games on one of my local hard drives for future use if things pick up again.

Heyo just wanted to say so far I've been really impressed site wise it's never been this fast so feels like a big upgrade. If I'm reading the post right I assume the mc server is probably down atm cause it will need transfered so let me know when thats done so I can confirm everything is good on that end.

I can tell it's way faster than before, now the only thing slow is my computer, so yeah, I never played any of the games other than Bomberman and like, 2 others, so I say it's a win for me. Everything feels better, and site hasn't gone down!

So overall, I like this change, glad that the music stays.

Can't have been an easy decision, but sounds like the right one! Definitely +1-ing EX Palen's recommendation, giving the Play Your Games feature the spotlight will help fill the void for people who were used to playing their games here.

Really hoping the site revenue picks back up, too - any chance of finding ways to sneak more ads into niche places (dono or ad-free item to go ad-free), like between songs or mixed into screenshots for game pages?

I've loaded a few pages since reading this, and the longest render time I've had is 0.136 seconds - much faster!

The Minecraft server is giving me the most troubles at the moment.

I believe all of the games should be working now in the RGR.

claytune : I can't seem to get it to be compatible with the new server. Not sure how long it'll be down for.

merf : Significantly faster, which is amazing. I'll be looking into more opportunities for ad placement.

I know I might be a bit late to this, but I was wondering since you mentioned the CD games are going to be taken down, if there are any way to still have access to the games, or if there are any of the games that might still be available to run. I was actually going to try to return to adding new videos to the YouTube channel and was going through the CD games to make a list of some that I could play.

Davideo7: so does this mean I won't be playing any retro games while using the RetroArch Web Player Emulator right now? If so, when will I be able to use it again?

Davideo7: Is this server migration the reason I can't play retro games with the RetroArch emulator while using the Chrome browser? Because I've been having trouble trying to play Final Fantasy on NES with RetroArch while using Chrome.

I just happened to see the post. Once I clear up some space on my computer, I will start downloading from that and then everything should be good again. Thank you!

when will we be able to play the games again? can you at least give us an estimate days?

clovercarmen5 : All of the RGR games should be working as stated in the 3rd post he made in the thread, but If you're having issues let him know on this thread. Right now RetroArch is giving people issues on chrome (use firefox to fix the issue).