How to host your own Eco server

You can use your own ideas to design the game world with your own Eco server. Ex­ter­nal­ly rented hardware is rec­om­mend­ed as a hosting base for optimal per­for­mance. In­stal­la­tion is con­ve­nient with the Steam client.

Save the world together in the online mul­ti­play­er game Eco. Players build their own civ­i­liza­tion with their fellow players on a virtual planet which is being threat­ened by a meteorite. The project is doomed without a strategy to create sus­tain­able way of life. Players with an Eco dedicated server are in a great starting position for this task.

There are several public community servers where you can play Eco with other players. However, you have no choice in when the server is online, which con­fig­u­ra­tions apply, and with whom you ul­ti­mate­ly play. This all changes with your own Eco dedicated server, whereby you have two options in terms of hosting:

1. You host the server on your own PC.
2. You host the server in the data center of a provider.

Running the server on your own device will save you the cost of rented hardware and you won’t become dependent on a provider. However, in this case, your Eco server is only online when your computer is running. As well as this, many private devices reach their per­for­mance limits rather quickly, es­pe­cial­ly if you are playing with more than three players. In terms of Internet con­nec­tion, hosting with a provider has its ad­van­tages, as very few private con­nec­tions are suitable for the smooth operation of a gaming server.

The hardware re­quire­ments for an Eco dedicated server ap­pli­ca­tion depend on two factors: the world size and the number of players active on the server at the same time. You choose the world size when creating the game world at the beginning. The world will have a total size of 0.52 km²/0.32 miles² if you keep the default values for the X and Y axis (72 x 72). Larger di­men­sions require more computing power and memory for the server to calculate the game world. The same applies if the number of players increases during the game.

The developer Strange Loop Games states the following minimum setup in the official Wiki for a server with the smallest possible game world:

• Processor (CPU): Intel/AMD 2.4 gigahertz and more
• Working memory (RAM): 4 gigabytes
• Hard drive space: 20 gigabytes (including save point; not including standard game world backup)

In addition to these server ap­pli­ca­tion re­quire­ments, there are also the re­quire­ments for the operating system used. For example, the Microsoft Windows Server 2019 system would require the following ad­di­tion­al ca­pac­i­ties:

• 1.4 GHz processor (64-bit)
• 512 MB or 2 GB RAM (without or with graphical user interface, re­spec­tive­ly)
• 32 or 36 GB hard disk space (without or with graphical user interface, re­spec­tive­ly)

Many hosting providers offer rented hardware for gaming servers. They are typically available at different prices and for different types of servers, which can make choosing a suitable solution difficult. At IONOS, you can choose between the following server models, which in turn have different plans:

• vServer: A vServer from IONOS, known also as Virtual Private Server, or VPS for short, gives you access to vir­tu­al­ized resources. You share the un­der­ly­ing hardware with other customers, but you still get a top per­for­mance for a rea­son­able fixed monthly price.
• Cloud Server: The Cloud Servers from IONOS are also based on vir­tu­al­ized resources. They are billed by the minute, so you only pay for the per­for­mance used.
• Dedicated Server: Dedicated servers are also billed by the minute. However, the hardware is reserved ex­clu­sive­ly for you. This gives you full control over the resources and con­fig­u­ra­tion.

In the following section, we have sum­ma­rized three possible scenarios, which differ in terms of world size, number of players and online time and assigned suitable server plans from IONOS for each scenario.

You can start in­stalling and setting up your Eco server once you have the ap­pro­pri­ate hosting en­vi­ron­ment and cre­den­tials. We describe the process for IONOS customers (vServer, Cloud Server, Dedicated Server) in our detailed tutorial. Windows Server 2019 is used as the operating system.

Run the .rdp file in the default selection “Remote Desktop Con­nec­tion” and start the setup process by clicking “Connect” when the security notice appears. Enter the login data for your server (the initial login data can also be found in the Features section of the Cloud Panel) and confirm the server’s security cer­tifi­cate as trusted to establish the remote con­nec­tion.

It may take some time for the new rules to be adopted by the server. You can see the progress in the status indicator in the Firewall Policies menu.

Press the “Start” button once the server ap­pli­ca­tion has been installed. The client will then au­to­mat­i­cal­ly check for updates for the Eco server, update the program files, and start the game world.

You can al­ter­na­tive­ly run EcoServer.exe in the in­stal­la­tion directory if you choose to start the server later. The following path is used by default during in­stal­la­tion:

Configure server settings:

You can choose the basic server settings in the “Network” tab. You must also select the “Config” sub-tab prior to this, as you can only see who is currently connected to your server in the al­ter­na­tive “Display” tab. You can then set the server to be listed publicly in the Config menu: