Can host games but can't join them?

[RabidGibbon]

I've just started playing multiplayer games on the gamespy server these last few weeks. However I've noticed that I can very rarely join someone elses game - I just get a message up saying "Failed to join game (GS)".
When I do manage to join a game more often than not it goes through to the "Waiting for other players to join game screen", shows everyones loading bars at full and then just stays there for an awful long time (Once as long as 20mins when I left it for a while) until I quit.
However I dont have any of these problems when hosting a game. Does anyone out there suggest a solution/reason why this is happening?

Cheers

[Craterus]

welcome to the org!

i don't have online play so I don't know what might be wrong! Where did u get the online program from?

[RabidGibbon]

cheers for the welcome craterus, I just clicked on the multiplayer option in the main menu of Rome: Total War. Simple as that.

[cunobelinus]

have u checked ur cd key and ur connection

[Craterus]

If you can get online then it won't be the cd key, it might be your gamespy connection.

[NihilisticCow]

I often have the same problem, I can usually host games with no problem (there are always occasions I need to restart RTW) but have significantly less success joining other people's games with that GS error message... Not always though... I guess you'll be the same in that regards... A lot of other people have the same problem, nobody seems to know why.
My best guess for me is that since I'm behind a router I'm reliant on the router being configured to forward certain ports to my computer, which I have done so I can host... but there may be other ports you need to forward for joining _some_ other peoples games (it may depend on the configuration their end as well)... So you could try digging up all the lists of all RTW ports and forwarding every single one of them, or just host and be happy