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What is a game server?
A game server holds the shared state of a multiplayer game. Every player connects to it, it decides what is true, and it sends each player the updates they need. Your device renders the world. The server owns it.
What the server does #
Three jobs, every tick. It takes input from each player, applies the game rules to the shared state, and broadcasts the result. Movement, damage, inventory and chat all pass through this loop. A client that disagrees with the server loses the argument, which is what stops basic cheating.
- State: positions, health, inventory and the world itself.
- Rules: damage, movement limits and win conditions, applied the same way for everyone.
- Relay: updates to each player, many times per second.
Ticks and latency #
A tick is one pass of that loop. Minecraft Java runs at 20 ticks per second. Fast shooters run higher. Between ticks the server is blind, so a lower tick rate means coarser hit detection and choppier movement.
Latency is the round trip time between player and server, measured in milliseconds. Under 50 feels local. Past 150 every action lags behind intent. Distance sets the floor, so server region matters more than server size for how a game feels. See Region status for where Kraftify plans to run.
Hosting options #
| Option | You manage | Good for |
|---|---|---|
| Self host | Hardware, power, network, updates | Free play with friends on your own machine |
| Rented VPS or dedicated box | The game server and its files | Mods, full control, fixed monthly price |
| Managed host | Almost nothing | Someone else handling updates and backups |
Self hosting costs nothing past electricity and needs port forwarding so friends outside your network can reach the machine. A rented box costs a fixed monthly rate and puts the server near players. A managed host adds updates, backups and a console for a higher rate. See How servers work for the general shape underneath.
What to look for #
- Cores and memory sized to the game. Simulation eats CPU, players and mods eat memory.
- Fast storage for the world. Chunk loading stalls on slow disks.
- A region near your players. Latency beats specs past a point.
- Backups of the world files. See Backups.
- Console access for commands and logs. See Console access.
A Kraftify game server target is this same object: a kind, a version, a size and files, with a console and an address. See Deploy a target and Templates.
kraftify deploy will not start anything. The hosting comparison above still holds for self hosting today. For the status of record, see Region status.Sources #
Vendor docs for the game, plus the general explainer behind this page.
- Minecraft server download. Mojang. Official Java and Bedrock server software, free to download.
- What is a virtual private server. IBM. How rented slices of hardware work, for the hosting comparison.
- How servers work. Kraftify docs. The general request and response shape underneath.