How do I create or start a Dedicated Server under the new 0.5 version?

Dec 29, 2018
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Gamertag
Mabuka
#1
I ran a dedicated server under 0.4 and that has worked fine when starting with h2server -lan. Now the server still appears to start and says online, but my server does not show up in the game browser list with the Halo 2 client running on the new version 0.5 (Online was selected from the Halo 2 menu). Is there something new to do to get the dedicated server to register properly?
 
Dec 29, 2018
5
6
3
55
Gamertag
Mabuka
#3
I ran a dedicated server under 0.4 and that has worked fine when starting with h2server -lan. Now the server still appears to start and says online, but my server does not show up in the game browser list with the Halo 2 client running on the new version 0.5 (Online was selected from the Halo 2 menu). Is there something new to do to get the dedicated server to register properly?
I finally got this working. It turns out it was a firewall issue I overlooked based on my old ports before these latest updates. Assuming you have the Halo 2 dedicated server installed
1. copy the files from the latest mod zip file into your halo2 dedicated server folder
2. Either enable UPnP in your router if it is supported OR use port forwarding based on the latest instructions for this release
3. In the Windows Firewall settings of the device or computer where you will be running h2server.exe make sure you set Inbound rules. You can either setup based on ports/UDP/TCP combination or set a rule based on the .exe. I chose the first option. h2server by default uses a base port of 2000 so in my windows firewall I have 2 inbound rules for h2server.exe:
UDP 2000-2008
TCP 2009-2010
4. Open a command prompt, change to the halo2 ded server directory, run the following:
h2server -live
5. After some startup messages you will get a prompt: h2server$
6. at that prompt type:
live signin username
It will prompt you twice for the password. You can also use live autosignin so when you run h2server it will automatically signin. I prefer to do it manually

This username is a project cartographer username/password NOT a Microsoft Live email. I used the halo2 client to creat a 2nd username and password to use for the halo dedicated server
Good Luck!