Eset Smart Security firewall does not detect PlanetSide 2 connecting to Internet

Hi all,

I'm having an issue running PlanetSide 2 with ESS 5.0.95.0.

I currently have the ESS firewall set to "interactive" mode and this normally works very well, i.e. when an application I trust wants to connect to the Internet I create a rule to allow it. However, when I run PlanetSide 2 the ESS rule creation dialog box does not appear. In other words, ESS does not detect that "PlanetSide2.exe" is trying to connect to the Internet.

As a consequence of this PS2 times out and crashes each time I try to launch it. I know ESS is at least part of the problem because PS2 works just fine if I temporarily the disable the firewall. A further strange issue is that I only need to disable the firewall to get to the PS2 menu screen—once I'm actually in the game shooting people I can turn the firewall back on with no further problems.

My question is this: Why isn't ESS detecting PlanetSide 2 and asking me to create a rule? I have never seen a rule dialog box for "Planetside2.exe" appear. It seems to me that there is something this application that is very hard for ESS to see?

I'm a complete newbie, so sorry for my ignorance.

 

Maybe there's a rule already created that is blocking the communication. Enable logging of blocked connections in the IDS setup, reproduce the problem and eventually copy the relevant firewall log records and paste them here.

 

Hi Marcos,

Thanks for the assistance!

I checked the "Troubleshooting > Log all blocked connections" check box in "IDS and advanced opitions." I then started PS2 at approximately 4:49am. It timed out about a minute later and I was dumped back to the desktop with a a generic PS2 error message.

Here is the log file (I hope this is what you meant):


http://i.imgur.com/DeRxF.jpg

It doesn't mean much to me I'm afraid, but that IP address is from Sony Online Entertainment (SOE), the makers of PS2!

Thanks again.

 

Hi Phyxion,

I've also tried manually adding PlanetSide 2 to the firewall but so far I've had no success -- it still gets stuck at the loading screen and freezes my computer. Turning off the firewall fixes the problem.

I've tried adding a rule for "PlanetSide2.exe" and allowing both Outbound and Inbound communication but it doesn't have any effect for me. The problem is the same.

Please, would you be able to explain exactly how you did it?

 

After fiddling around some more, I was able to solve my issue.

I did this by doing two things:

1. Added a custom rule to allow Outbound TCP & UDP connections for "PlanetSide2.exe"
2. Added a custom rule to allow Outbound TCP & UDP connections for multiple Sony Online Entertainment servers.

For me at least, creating a rule for "PlanetSide2.exe" by itself was not sufficient.

Regarding point number two in my list, I identified the blocked SOE servers by following Marcos's logging advice in the second post. As per my screencapture in the third post, the IP addresses that ESS was blocking (pr screwing with) for whatever reason were 64.37.171.24 and 64.37.171.32, both of which are SOE addresses. So, all I did was create another custom rule to allow the IP range "64.37.171.24 to 64.37.171.32" for "PlanetSide2.exe":

http://i.imgur.com/w5MAz.jpg

Thanks to everyone who helped. You guys provided me with the tools and I eventually figured it out. Hopefully this post will help other people who had the same issue as me.