Game Server VPS Hosting

Game server hosting means running a game's dedicated server on a server that stays on all the time. A dedicated server is its own program, separate from the game you play. It keeps the real copy of the world, and every player's game connects to it. On GreenGeeks VPS, you get full root access on AlmaLinux 9 and a dedicated IP that gives players one address. Any game that ships a Linux dedicated server can run there, several at a time. Windows-only servers, like ARK Survival Ascended, can't, since GreenGeeks VPS doesn't offer Windows.

It depends on the game, and the light ones need a fraction of what the heavy ones do. As a starting point, a small Terraria world needs about 500 MB, Valheim 4 GB, Hytale 4 GB, Rust 12 GB free and Palworld 16 GB. Each figure grows with players, mods and the age of the world. When several games share one VPS, add their numbers together and leave room for the system and cPanel's own services. CPU matters too. Palworld wants 4 cores or more, and GreenGeeks' 8 GB plan has 6 vCPU.

You pay one price however many games share the plan. GreenGeeks VPS runs $69.95 a month on the 4 GB plan, $129.95 on 8 GB and $179.95 on 16 GB, and adding a second light game or more players doesn't change that. LinuxGSM and SteamCMD are free, and most dedicated servers download with an anonymous Steam login, so the software adds nothing. If your games outgrow the plan, you can upgrade to the next one online with a support ticket. Managed game hosts usually charge per player slot or per GB instead, for each game separately.

Yes, you can install anything the game supports on Linux, because you have full access to the server's files. Rust servers take plugins through Oxide, also called uMod, or Carbon. Terraria has two popular routes, TShock for admin tools and tModLoader for content mods, and both run on the .NET runtime, which you install with dnf. Mods add to the server's RAM use, so leave some room. Palworld's official mod loader is Windows-only, so it won't run here. Each game's own page below covers its mod tools in more detail.

GreenGeeks doesn't back up VPS servers, so you set up backups. Make one archive per game, so one bad save never means rolling back the others. LinuxGSM's backup command saves a whole game server as a .tar.gz file. It keeps 4 backups by default and can run nightly from cron. Copy the archives off the server. cPanel's daily backups can send files to Google Drive or Amazon S3, but they only cover what's stored in a cPanel account, so game files under a separate user may fall outside them. Restoring means stopping that game's server and swapping its folder back.

Yes, as long as the RAM adds up and each server listens on its own port. Terraria, Valheim and Hytale are light enough to share the 8 GB plan. A heavy game like Palworld or Rust takes most of the 16 GB plan by itself, so two heavy games need more than GreenGeeks VPS offers. GreenGeeks VPS doesn't offer Docker, so nothing caps how much memory each game can use. Leave some spare RAM, and restart a game that grows too large. Every server also shares the same CPU, so check the load with the top command now and then.

Size the plan for the heaviest game you'll run, then add the lighter ones on top. On GreenGeeks, the 4 GB plan fits one light game like Terraria, 8 GB fits two or three light games, and 16 GB fits one Palworld or Rust server. Player counts matter less than the game itself. Valheim is capped at 10 players. Terraria defaults to 16, and you can raise that. Rust lets you set the cap yourself, and each extra player mostly adds CPU load. Two heavy games together need more than 16 GB, which is beyond the largest GreenGeeks plan.

LinuxGSM is the best fit for GreenGeeks VPS. It's free, runs on AlmaLinux, and installs, updates, monitors and backs up 143 game servers without a web panel. Pterodactyl won't work, because it runs every game inside Docker, and GreenGeeks VPS doesn't offer Docker. AMP is a paid panel, $20 or $40 for a lifetime license. Its installer supports Red Hat-family systems like AlmaLinux and it can run games without Docker, but GreenGeeks doesn't support it, so test it on your plan before you rely on it.

Every game covered here keeps its world in a folder you can copy, so a move is mostly a file transfer. Stop the old server first so the last save finishes. Then archive the world folder, upload it to the same spot in the new install and start the server. The folder differs by game, and the game pages list each path. Some games also need a config line or launch option pointed at the world's name, so set that before the first start. Keep the old copy until the world loads the way it was left.

GreenGeeks' 24/7 managed VPS support covers the server itself, with OS updates, security patches, monitoring and cPanel. The game servers you add are outside that scope, so installing, patching and backing up each one falls to you. Valve warns that running SteamCMD as root is a security risk, so run your game servers under a regular user. With several games on one server, each one patches on its own schedule and needs its own port. LinuxGSM can update and monitor each server and send you alerts.