As you'll all probably know, BF3 is set to come out pretty soon now. The release date is set at the 22 of October and we would like to run a full 64 player server. I know this might seem over the top, but hey, we want to provide the best gameplay experience possible and we believe the best way to do so is by having a server that supports the maximum amount of players.
However in the last year the donations to BlackIntel have pretty much dried up and we're quickly running out of resources, even without the "need" for a BF3 server. Effectively we have about 51,66 Euros in the BlackIntel funds. Since we currently pay about 40 Euros a month for the server + about ~3 Euros a month for domain names etc. It isn't hard to guess we'll run into problems at some point
Of course we're not going to shutdown BlackIntel, but since we want to invest in a BF3 server as well, money will be a bit of an issue.
BudgetWe plan on renting a full blown 64p BF3 server at
www.i3d.net for at least 6 months but preferably for 1 year. The costs of this would be 425,90 Euros and 845,30 Euros respectively. Together with our normal (predicted) costs we would need about 680 Euros for the upcoming 6 months or 1353 Euros for the upcoming year.
DonationsSince we (the admins) are just mere students, we don't have that money readily available. Because of this we would really appreciate any donation made to the BlackIntel fund. Even small amounts are really helping us out here, because every Euro you're willing to put in is one we don't have to put in. This may sound a bit cheeky, but let me explain. There are only 2 admins and there are a lot more people enjoying BlackIntels services in one way or another. If a lot of those people would donate even just a little bit it would already make a huge difference in costs.
Gameserver rentalAnother way you could help us out is by renting a gameserver or some webspace from us. This would benefit both parties as it reduces the costs of the server that we'll need anyway. We have rented out to external parties before, but that was mostly Renegade related and those parties have left the Renegade scene, so didn't need their servers anymore unfortunately. So if you or someone you happen to know needs something like this, please do contact us.
Some numbersAll these numbers are since 2006.
Total costs: € 4.480,39
Total donations: € 3.987,50
Total rental: € 544,55