Why can I connect to some games and not others?

Posted: Tue Oct 26, 2004 10:33 pm

I can connect to Star Wars: Battlefront games without any problems. No disconnects, can play all night.
I can see HALO (UK-PAL only) games on my XBOX, but when I attempt to connect, the connection is lost.

I also (may) be having problems hosting. I have hosted games, but a friend could not see it or connect. This 'may' be a problem only since he is having other problems.

Any clues anyone?

Thank you.

Additional info:

Is your network reachable? Yes
Are you using a port-forward? Yes
Is your console being detected? Yes
Brief description of your network setup: Vigor 2600, Laptop (400MHz) and XBOX, all on 100Mb cable. DSL 512k up, 256k down
Do you use a software firewall? What brand? Have you made any changes to it? Firewall, standard XP-SP2.
Operating System? Windows XP Pro + SP2
Problem description? Of the games I have that people are playing. I can connect and play Star Wars: Battlefront, all night, no problems. Whenever I attempt to connect to another HALO-UK PAL game, I see the game(s) listed on my XBOX, but upon connection, the connection is lost.

[KaiUserConfig]
kaiPort=30000
kaiDeepPort=0
kaiAccept=LOCAL
kaiTimeout=NOUI
kaiNIC=0
kaiLaunch=BOTH
kaiHomebrew=OFF
kaiPAT=OFF
kaiAutoLogin=ON
kaiAllowBadNICS=OFF
kaiWireless=
kaiUI=Default

Posted: Wed Oct 27, 2004 12:53 am

Moving to help requests..

Quote:

I have hosted games, but a friend could not see it or connect

Make sure the host's status is SET TO HOSTING Smile

Team XLink Moderator Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 1215

And which games are you trying it with? (except SWBF and Halo). There are some games with have issues with PAL-NTSC (eg Halo), or beta-retail and stuff like that.

About your Halo probs.. I never play it, so I can only guess. Maybe a Halo expert can jump in on this:

If you have a NTSC Halo copy and you go to the (for instance) UKPAL division, will you see the hosted games on your xbox (even though you can't join because of the PAL-NTSC issues)?

If this is a yes, this might explain your Halo problem, you'd have to figure out which version of Halo you have.. Or wait 2 weeks until Halo2 arrives of course.

Furthermore, I would suggest testing with a game which is known to have no connection problems, like RainbowSix Black Arrow. See if you can join those games (probably yes, if SWBF also works) and host a game (+set KAI status to hosting) and ask if anybody sees your game.

You might find out that the connection problems are to blame on the game and the hosting problems are to blame on your friends problems (if I read right he had those).

Hope this helps!

-tz

Posted: Wed Oct 27, 2004 6:40 pm

Naa with halo PAL can't see NTSC and NTSC can't see PAL

Usualy if you get a disconect right after joining, one of you has a software firewall usualy that is causing it.

Does your freind have a software firewall?

Posted: Wed Oct 27, 2004 9:12 pm

dfunked wrote:

Moving to help requests..

I have hosted games, but a friend could not see it or connect

Quote:

Make sure the host's status is SET TO HOSTING Smile

I presume that the process is:

Go into an arena like "Arena/XBox/First Person Shooter/Halo/Halo PAL-UK"

While in "Arena Mode", I press "Create Private Arena", press "Create", in "Am I hosting?", enter "Yes, I am hosting now", press "Set Status", set up the XBOX to create a system link game.

And thats it, wait for people to turn up.

Thanks, Mark;

Posted: Wed Oct 27, 2004 9:25 pm

[SaD]TizzO wrote:

And which games are you trying it with? (except SWBF and Halo).

I have tried:

* SWBF, all OK

* Halo, drops out.
Interestingly, I can get my XBOX to see (but not join) UK-PAL games but not PAL-Italy games, any host.

* Crimson Skies, XBOX locks up.

Games I have to try, but there are never any open games:

* XIII
* Wolfenstein
* Unreal Championship
* Timesplitters 2
* Ghost Recon/Island Thunder

I have even resorted to telling my HW firewall to DMZ my Laptop and uninstalled the SW firewall from my Laptop. So there should be no rule trouble.

One thought that did cross my mind was the speed of my Laptop. Only 400MHz, celeron.

What does anyone think, could it be host machine speed related?

Thanks, Mark;

Posted: Wed Oct 27, 2004 9:27 pm

try opening up Task Manager and watching the performance it should work fine on 400 as long as you don't have too many things going on the laptop at once.

Quote:

While in "Arena Mode", I press "Create Private Arena", press "Create", in "Am I hosting?", enter "Yes, I am hosting now", press "Set Status", set up the XBOX to create a system link game.

No just get into the Arena and change your status, don't bother making a private arena while testing. PAL Halo is usualy not crowded enough to need private arnea's at all.

Posted: Wed Oct 27, 2004 10:41 pm

My problem is with SWBF, Splinter Cell 2 and it looks like Counter Strike, I can't see any games.

Many other games work fine such as Halo, Outrun2, PGR2, Rallisport Challenge 2, Top Spin.

Any thoughts?

Posted: Wed Oct 27, 2004 11:41 pm

As stated earlier, most likely to do with Live updates that either you, or the person who's hosting, may have..

Team XLink Moderator Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 1215

Yeah, did you ever have Live?

Posted: Thu Oct 28, 2004 10:53 pm

[SaD]TizzO wrote:

Yeah, did you ever have Live?

Doh!

Tell me more.

I do have Live. I am trying to get XLink going because friends do not.

I could understands games that are Live enabled, that have had patches downloaded not working with other peoples that are not patched.

However, Halo has never been patched.

Mark

Posted: Thu Nov 04, 2004 6:44 pm

all i can say about the halo thing is make sure you have the same version as the person you are trying to play

Make sure the others in the arena are running the UK Pal version as they my just be in the wrong arena.

Live updates affect all live games. Unreal Tournament is the only game that i can recall that the updates don't cripple the system link mode when trying to play with others that have not updated.

Posted: Tue Nov 09, 2004 6:00 am

Not solved, just gone very quiet! Confused

Posted: Sat Nov 13, 2004 7:11 pm

Besides opening ports, does anyone have rules in "Firewall" settings to permit portocols on certain (Kai) ports?

In desperation.

Posted: Sun Nov 14, 2004 2:32 am

Some routers don't actually set up the firewall exclusions when you do a port-forward. Try making a new rule (I assume this is the router we're talkign about), that allows 30000 UDP.

Update: User did not respond within 5 days. Setting to Problem Solved.