How do I set up a direct IP game?

[PhdVic]

I'm very new to online gaming. I've tried to play Civ 4 online for the last two weeks through gamespy. I can usually start a game, but it seems after about 30 minutes I get disconnected. This weekend I tried to launch a direct IP game with a friend. I sent him my IP address, but when he typed it in he got a message after about a minute indicating that the connection had timed out. I think there is something I need to do on my computer to make it possible for my friend to connect, but I don't know how to do this. Can someone give me a step-by-step guide for setting up an IP game? What exactly do I need to enable/disable in order to make it possible for my friend to connect? I am running Windows XP and only have a dial-up connection

PhdVic

 

[Mysterio10000]

When your friend attempts to connect to your IP address, his PC is trying to send info to your PC. He's probably seeing the "Connecting to host..." message before it times out. This means the info his PC is attempting to send to your PC is not reaching your PC. In technical terms, it means port 2056 on your PC is closed to the outside world.

Since you're on dial-up, you don't have a router, so you're likely running firewall software that's preventing info from entering your PC on port 2056. You need to either:

a.) turn off your firewall software (not recommended)

b.) lower the level of security on your firewall software (lowering ZoneAlarm (a popular firewall software program) to medium level allows UDP packets to pass through)

c.) add Civilization4.exe to your firewall software's exception list (a list that tells the firewall software program to allow communication through the firewall for that .exe)

d.) open port 2056 to UDP traffic in your firewall software program

You can refer to this post by Firaxis for additional info.