A feature so awaited by the community of players since the arrival of the "convoy" mode, the official multiplayer of Euro Truck Simulator 2 and American Truck Simulator. Truckers can finally launch dedicated servers.
Remember the difference with the launch of a standard multiplayer session: a dedicated server is made to run permanently, even without any player online. This means that players are free to join the session to continue their work and leave freely whenever they wish. You can also run a dedicated server without owning the game or DLCs.
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How to install an ETS 2 or ATS dedicated server?
Very simple, just go to your Steam library and display the tools there:
You will see “Euro Truck Simulator 2 Dedicated Server” or “American Truck Simulator Dedicated Server” appear in your list. It is enough to launch the installation (approximately 400 Mo).
How to configure an ETS 2 or ATS dedicated server?
Once installed, you have to go through the configuration box. And there it gets a little complicated, even if there is nothing insurmountable. The server is going to need your “installation profile” (to simplify the matter). This involves extracting 3 files from your game (server_config.sii, server_packages.sii et server_packages.dat).
The file server_config.sii is the most important. It contains session description and configuration, connection port information, connection token and list of moderators (ports and connection token must be different for each session instance running at the same time).
To generate it, you must launch the game in Developer mode with access to the console. To do this, you have to edit the file config.cfg which is located in the directory “My Documents\Euro Truck Simulator 2\” for ETS 2 (or “My Documents\American Truck Simulator\” for ATS) with a text editor such as notepad for example. Locate the line with the term g_console "0" and change the value "0" to "1". Do the same for g_developer "0" which you will turn into g_developer "1". Save the file and launch the game.
You must launch a game on the basic environment (Europe for ETS 2, America for ATS). Once in game, press the ² key (the one at the top left of your keyboard) to bring up the developer command prompt. You must now launch the “export_server_packages” command (without the quotes) in order to generate the 3 files mentioned above. They will be created in the directory "My Documents\Euro Truck Simulator 2\" for ETS 2 (or "My Documents\American Truck Simulator\" for ATS).
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At this point, the dedicated server is able to be launched. But you have to personalize it with the name of your lobby, the description, the welcome message for the players, the password, the maximum number of players (limited to 8 for the moment) and especially the number of the port of connection.
All this information is in the server_config.sii file, which you will have to edit with a text editor like notepad. Here is an example of the contents of this file:
It is very important to note the port numbers, because you will have to configure port forwarding on your internet box. The input port number must be open and point to the (local) IP of your server PC. If you don't know what we're talking about, click here to see an example on an ADSL box from the operator Orange. This manipulation of port opening/forwarding is commonplace for setting up game servers.
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Normally, if you have configured your server and opened the ports of your router, you should be able to launch the ETS 2 or ATS dedicated server, without encountering any error, directly via Steam.
If everything went well, you should find the game in the "convoys" menu of your game. Don't forget to use the "advanced filtering" so that only the "Dedicated server" and find your server more easily. All that's left to do is hit the European or American roads 24/24 with your friends.
Great Tutorial. The ETS and ATS servers also work very well on "Pterodactyl" (the game server manager under linux)
I want to rent a dedicated server from a host. I hope this will be done by the euro truck simulator 2 teams.
Do you happen to know how to make someone a moderator can't seem to figure this part out?
Yep, You can register moderators in server_config using their steam_id to automatically promote them once they join the session.