Yes, you can book servers using GameCreate. GameCreate supports the most popular supported titles on GameArena and is a busy service, so you may need to try several times before you can find a suitable booking.

We are currently accepting GameOps applications for select games on our GameOp Application page. Please note if the game you're looking for is not listed, it generally means that we're not looking for GameOps for that particular game.

If you're interested in becoming a GameOp, there a few things you can do to help your chances. The first and foremost is to be an active community member on GameArena and gain the respect of your community, which can be done by conversing with your fellow gamers on the message boards and in the game servers (in a friendly, helpful manner!) Helping out GameOps and fellow gamers, offering constructive feedback, being fair and objective and the like are all qualities we look for in GameOps.

We generally select GameOps based on recommendations from the GameOp team and our own observations.

GameOps must be 18 or over.

While GameArena does everything possible to ensure that all the services are run in accordance with the GameArena Terms and Conditions, it is the nature of the Internet that some stuff will eventually sneak by, especially in such a large, multifaceted service as GameArena. We rely on our extensive team of GameOps to help moderate the various services, but sometimes even that is not enough.

As a result, we have created an Incident Reporting System which allows members of the community that are interested in helping us ensure that troublemakers are dealt with appropriately to lodge a report. These reports are investigated by the GameOp and Admin team on a case-by-case basis and are actioned accordingly.

Due to privacy restrictions, we are unable to let you know the results of your complaint, unless we feel there is not enough evidence to support your claim, or we decided that there was no real breach of the Terms and Conditions. However, generally speaking, all cases that have enough evidence and are clearly in breach of the Terms and Conditions will result in a ban for the offending user.

For more information on the incident reporting system or to report cheaters & abuse, please click here. Users are encouraged to take their time when submitting reports - please note that we do get a lot of these, and we request that only serious infringements get reported to avoid us wasting time that could be better spent elsewhere!

GameArena endeavours to maintain the best possible gaming experience possible. All our servers are high-end systems and we have an excellent level of connectivity to the Internet backbone in Australia. We run monitoring software to ensure the servers are running nominally at all times.

Generally speaking, almost all issues with high pings are a result of a connection issue between the user and the server. This can be a temporary problem or a permanent problem. The best way to tell if it is a server issue is to check the pings on the server and to see if all the other players are having the problem. If that is the case, it could be a server issue and we'd like to know about it. If it is not the case, it almost certainly means it is a problem that is only affecting you, and we are unable to help.

If you are a BigPond Broadband ADSL or Cable customer, playing on the GameArena game servers will not count towards your BigPond usage limit.

BigPond dial-up customers WILL find traffic counts towards their usage limit (whether expressed in time or MB downloaded). For more information on this, you will need to contact BigPond technical support.

GameArena is a BigPond site and as such issues around usage for BigPond customers are in keeping with BigPond guidelines and policy. If you are not a BigPond customer you should contact your ISP. For more information about your BigPond usage, please visit the BigPond website at http://www.bigpond.com.

GameArena employs a global banning system across all the Half-Life-based servers. That is, if you are banned for something on one server, you will be banned across all servers.

If you feel you have been unfairly banned or don't know why you were banned, you can lodge an unban request here. Please note that all the unban requests are handled through this system - emailing support asking to be unbanned will only result in you being redirected to this page.
There is no definite service time for unban requests - these are processed as soon as possible, but it may take up to several days before your request is processed.

Yes, you can book servers using GameCreate. GameCreate supports the most popular supported titles on GameArena and is a busy service, so you may need to try several times before you can find a suitable booking.

GameArena currently requires you to install software to play on the game servers. The software is called 'The Arena' and is available for download here. 'The Arena' provides you with everything you need to get started on GameArena. It is important to note that you must have 'The Arena' installed to play on GameArena! 'The Arena' utilises a firewall system to ensure only authenticated 'The Arena' users are able to play on our servers.

If you wish to request any changes of the server setup, such as a new server, a new mod, or any server settings changes such as a new map cycle or different game settings, we generally ask that users propose their changes as threads in the
appropriate gaming forum on GameArena messageboards and then refer the thread to one
of the GameOps for that game. That allows us to view the feedback from the community about the suggested changes more easily and increases the chances that they'll be done faster!

GameArena runs a large number of game servers. Usually, we run the latest version of each game, which means you'll need to download various patches to ensure your software is up to date. Additionally, we may run several modifications or alternate maps which you may need to download.

In order to make it easier for users to know what they need to install, all this information is maintained through COGS. If you click the "Information Tab" and scroll down, you will see a section called 'Required Files'. This section maintains the full list of files that you need to play on GameArena. Please make sure you download all these files before trying to play!

Each game uses different ports - we don't maintain a full list of each game's individual setting, but you should be able to find out more information on Google about which ports are used by specific game types.

Unfortunately, due to the large variety of games that we support on GameArena and the simply huge number of problems that users can have, we cannot provide direct support for problems with game server. The only support we can provide is if you are having problems connecting to our game servers, after you have set up and configured the game successfully.

If you are having problems with a game, we strongly recommend posting in the GameArena messageboards for the game in question - there are many GameArena users that have a huge amount of experience with many games, and they are often able to provide significant levels of assistance in getting games working!

Steam is Valve Software's new system for content distribution for their hugely popular title, Half-Life, and its associated mods - such as Counter-Strike, Day of Defeat, Team Fortress Classic, and Natural Selection.

Steam is a significant part of the online gaming experience and it is important for users to know how it works and how it affects you as a gamer. To help GameArena members understand Steam, we have created a separate Steam FAQ which deals with the most common issues. Please consult it carefully for more information!

You may be asked for your Steam ID at some point. Your Steam ID is a publicly available Unique ID that uniquely identifies you on the Steam network. To find our your Steam ID, please visit our Unique ID help page.

You may have been asked to provide a Unique ID for a game by a GameOp or GameArena staff for support purposes. Unique IDs are individual identification codes that many popular multiplayer games use in order to uniquely identify users for administrative purposes. Not all games have them, but for the games that do support them GameArena take full advantage of them to help users with their support queries.

If you are not sure how to find out your Unique ID for a given game, please visit our Unique ID help page which includes examples of IDs and instructions on how to obtain yours for all games which support them.