For those who got their hands on Borderlands for the PC today there have been multiple users stating they can’t connect to play co-op with their friends. Due to a lack of immediately available information on the problem I hunted a bit on Gearbox’s forums and found the following post, basically describing how to setup the port forwarding necessary to play the game online for those users with routers.
Because their forums are getting bombarded right now I’ll quote the post in full below, along with a link.
“Borderlands, like many other online multiplayer games, requires that you forward a few ports if you plan on hosting a game. This basically means that if you want people to join your game you need to open up a path in your internet connection for them to get there, otherwise you’ll be left to loot all by your lonesome.
But don’t worry! This is a pretty easy thing to do!
First, determine whether or not these ports are already open
There are some cases where port forwarding is unnecessary, such as when you connect directly to a single port cable or DSL modem.
To test for this just click each of the following links, it will tell you if the port is open or not. [this section is broken, it'll say closed even if they're open right now, I'll fix later]
7777
28900
27900
28910
28902 – seems like this needs to be open too.
If the ports were closed, we need to determine what kind of router you’re using
You’ll need to find the model name of the router or router/modem combo you’re using. This shouldn’t be too hard. Usually, the internet comes in through your modem (box connecting to the wall either through phone line or cable line) and is then passed to a router which sorts and distributes your internet connection to the computers in your house. Go find the latter, turn it over, and look for a brand name and some kind of model number (Ex.: Linksys wrt54g, D-link DI-804). Once you have that go to this link and locate your model:
http://portforward.com/
Follow the instructions provided. The ports you need to open are:
7777 (TCP/UDP)
28900 (TCP)
27900 (UDP)
28910 (TCP)
28902 – not in the readme, but opening this port helped alot of people
Once you’re done click each port to test if it’s really forwarded. Bear in mind that sometimes it takes a minute for the router settings to apply (occasionally you’ll even need to reset it before the settings take effect).
Forgot to mention!!!: You’ll need to either add an exception to the windows firewall or disable it altogether. I disabled mine; it’s all but useless. I’ll write up a guide when I’m done with class.”
UPDATE: Seems like there are multiple people who can’t get Borderlands to connect with friends, even by implementing the ports above. Still investigating this issue.
UPDATE 2: There are still multiple users having connectivity problems, however, a dozen or so pages deep into the forums I found a specific set of ports that worked well for me, and I could host a private game afterwards. Note that I still could not invite a player from within my game, I had to quit and go to the lobby and start a private game from there for it to work. Quoted from the forums below:
“Solved it. Can run private games (Where people can join them). Tested on multiple computers/routers. Works just fine.
Do this Port Range Forwarding.
TCP: 7777,28900-28902,28910,29900
UDP: 6500,7777-7787,9989,27900″
UPDATE 3: As another alternative, one of my friends who has a restrictive router setup because of his ISP came across this program on download.com. It’s called SPI Port Foward and it basically forwards ports outside of your router via software, and according to him worked like a charm. Also worth a shot if you’re interested and it can be downloaded at the following link.
Source: Gearbox Forums
