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Move from GameSpy to OpenSpy

Since GameSpy master servers were shut down in 2013, the OpenSpy community worked on supporting games dependent on GameSpy master servers. Painkiller and Painkiller Overdose are supported by OpenSpy.

GameSpy (now OpenSpy) is required to advertise your game server online. This will allow players to see your server in their in-game browser and join it without knowing its IP address and port. Otherwise, you would have to type in the IP and port manually in the game to join a server and add it to Favourites for convenience.

There are two ways to make the game understand the transition from GameSpy to OpenSpy:

  • Modify the hosts file.
  • Modify game DLL files.

Choose either of them. Modifying DLL files is the recommended way since IP addresses are subject to change.

Warning

This change should be done on both the server and the client side.

Hosts file

The location of the hosts file:

  • Windows - C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts
  • Linux - /etc/hosts

We need to redirect GameSpy hostnames to OpenSpy IP addresses. Add the following lines to the hosts file.

  • For Painkiller (painkiller subdomain):
157.245.212.59 painkiller.master.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.available.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms0.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms1.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms2.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms3.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms4.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms5.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms6.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms7.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms8.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms9.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms10.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms11.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms12.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms13.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms14.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms15.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms16.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms17.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms18.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms19.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.ms20.gamespy.com
64.225.19.20 painkiller.natneg1.gamespy.com
64.225.4.169 painkiller.natneg2.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkiller.natneg3.gamespy.com
64.225.4.169 motd.gamespy.com
  • For Painkiller Overdose (painkillerod subdomain):
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.master.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.available.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms0.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms1.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms2.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms3.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms4.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms5.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms6.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms7.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms8.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms9.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms10.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms11.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms12.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms13.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms14.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms15.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms16.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms17.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms18.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms19.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.ms20.gamespy.com
64.225.19.20 painkillerod.natneg1.gamespy.com
64.225.4.169 painkillerod.natneg2.gamespy.com
157.245.212.59 painkillerod.natneg3.gamespy.com
64.225.4.169 motd.gamespy.com

Modify DLL files

If you choose this method, you don't need to add anything to the hosts file.

There is a prepared patch for Painkiller and Overdose. Just replace the DLL's in your game folder.

If you want to modify the files manually, follow the steps below. Here is the guide but it is general and is not a perfect fit for Painkiller.

GameSpy is mentioned in the following files:

  • Painkiller
..\Painkiller\Bin\Engine.dll
..\Painkiller\Bin\Editor\Engine.dll
  • Painkiller Overdose
..\Overdose\Bin\OverdoseEngine.dll
..\Overdose\Bin\OverdoseEngineEditor.dll
..\Overdose\Bin\OverdoseEngineServer.dll

Note

You don't really need any Hex editor to modify those DLL files. Nonetheless, you need an editor that supports various encodings like Notepad++. Standard Windows Notepad is not suitable for this purpose.

Open the DLL file with Notepad++ and replace all instances of gamespy.com with openspy.net. Save the file.

Make sure the size of DLL's should not have changed. If it's changed, it means that the encoding was not interpreted correctly by the editor. In this case, you can try using the HEX-Editor plugin for Notepad++ or another Hex editor program.