San Jose, Calif. (GDC Booth #838) - GameSpy Industries, a leading gaming content and technology company, today announces that its technology will be will incorporated in Microsoft Game Studios' upcoming PC title, Rise of Nations. Microsoft Game Studios will be utilizing multiple GameSpy.net Toolkits in the game, and GameSpy will also run matchmaking and other servers for the title.

Rise of Nations, a much-heralded real-time strategy game from game studio Big Huge Games, will incorporate GameSpy.net's Matchmaking and Administrative Toolkits. GameSpy’s Matchmaking Toolkit, combined with the GameSpy.net master matchmaking servers, will provide the game lobby and player matching functions for the game. The GameSpy.net matchmaking servers currently support matching for more than hundreds of thousands of simultaneous users searching for game rooms and game servers for more than 400 games.

Rise of Nations also will be utilizing the CD-Key solution from GameSpy's Administrative Toolkit to increase the strength of its anti-piracy efforts. In addition to providing Microsoft Game Studios with an added layer of security – pirated copies of games will not be able to play the game online – the CD-Key solution will also provide Microsoft with important data on its customer usage and tools to not only monitor but throttle piracy attempts.

"GameSpy is providing tools to Microsoft Game Studios to create the best possible online experience for Rise of Nations," notes John Dongelmans, Product Manager for Rise of Nations. "Being able to outsource these tasks to GameSpy saves us valuable time so we can focus on the craft of making excellent games for our users."

"GameSpy is proud to work with Microsoft Game Studios on a title like Rise of Nations," notes Mark Surfas, Chief Executive Officer of GameSpy Industries. "We look forward to working with Microsoft Game Studios in the future to help it continue to bring more of its popular PC products to the online community."

GameSpy.net offers game developers and publishers four distinct toolkits that easily integrate with a game to provide Matchmaking, Community Building, Administrative and Networking functionalities.

The GameSpy.net back-end infrastructure supports these functions for hundreds of thousands of players across hundreds of games across multiple platforms. GameSpy.net also offers consulting, custom development, file serving, and server hosting services to its technology customers. GameSpy.net customers include such leading game publishers as Electronic Arts, Activision, Infogrames, Take 2 Interactive, CDV, and Dreamcatcher Interactive.

Rise of Nations combines the epic scope of traditional turn-based strategy games with the fast-paced action of RTS games. The game allows players to create new cities, improve their city infrastructure and expand national boarders. Players have the option to win through military might using everything from slingshots to cannons to stealth bombers, corner the market on key commodities, and wheel and deal with a wide variety of Nations. Unlike other historical RTS games, Rise of Nations allows gamers to quickly play through eight historical epochs of time from the Ancient Age to the Information age, covering 6,000 years of history. This latest title from Big Huge Games Inc. founder Brian Reynolds (designer of Civilization 2 and Alpha Centauri) is scheduled for US release this Spring. For more information about Rise of Nations, visit the official site at www.riseofnations.com.

About GameSpy Industries
GameSpy Industries is a leading content and technology company targeted at the gaming and entertainment industries. Its GameSpy Network of web sites, including GameSpy.com and FilePlanet.com, reaches the largest audience of hard-core gamers available on the Internet, according to all the leading Internet measurement firms including Media Metrix and comScore. GameSpy is also the publisher of GameSpy Arcade, GameSpy 3D and Roger Wilco!, leading software products that enable multi-player gaming for millions of gamers worldwide. GameSpy also develops and licenses technology products and services which are incorporated into hundreds of PC and console games, providing multi-player functionalities, security, data collection, and in-game advertising to most major game publishers. The privately held company, which was founded in 1995, is based in Irvine, Ca.

GameSpy Arcade and GameSpy 3D are registered trademarks and GameSpy Industries and design are registered service marks of GameSpy Industries, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective holders.