Installing a Server

Extract It

Download the archive for your game from its own page and unzip it anywhere you have write access. Avoid Program Files on Windows: the server writes its database and logs next to itself, and Windows will quietly redirect those writes somewhere you will not find them.

You get this:

<game>-v<version>/
  README.md              the short version of this page
  settings.cfg           the file you edit
  settings.cfg.example   the same file with the password blanked
  start-server.bat       Windows
  start-server.sh        Linux
  server/
    windows/             the server binaries
    linux/               the same binaries, built for Linux
  client/                what your players copy into their game folder
  database-mysql/        the schema, if you use MySQL instead of the default
  db/                    the default database, created on first run
  logs/

Edit One File

Open settings.cfg. For a server on your own machine you can usually leave everything alone and skip to the next step. The two settings that matter are the address the server listens on and, if you are not using the default database, your database credentials. Both are covered on the configuration page.

Start It

On Windows, double-click start-server.bat. On Linux:

chmod +x start-server.sh
./start-server.sh

The first run takes a few seconds longer than the rest: the server creates its database, applies the schema and imports the game’s content data. You will see it say so. After that a restart is immediate.

You know it worked when the log shows the server listening on its port and reports the number of maps and monsters it loaded. If it reports zero monsters, the content data did not import, and troubleshooting covers that.

Connect to It

The client/ folder in the archive is what a player needs. Copy its contents into your game client’s folder, run the launcher, and sign in with an account.

Accounts are created through the launcher itself, or on the server’s own website if you are running one. There is no separate account tool and no admin step: the first person to register is just the first account.

Keeping It Running

Nothing in the archive installs a service. On Linux, the usual answer is a small systemd unit pointing at server/linux/gameserver with the archive directory as its working directory. The working directory matters more than the path to the binary: the server finds settings.cfg, its database and its content data relative to where it is running from.

Updating

Download the new archive and extract it over the old one, keeping your settings.cfg and your db/ directory. The server upgrades its own schema on start. Read that version’s changelog first if you have players, because the client files in client/ sometimes change too, and a player on old client files will fail to connect in a way that looks like a server problem.