Will Lag be the only winner?

[Miir]

It'll probably become more apparent as the open beta starts and some larger battles take place (300-500+ people) But I'm a little concerned..... most of the regular FPS games are small in scale compared to PS yet there is still lag, so how is PS going to differ?

I'm wondering what people are thinking is going to happen in a mass battle scenario with regards to LAG and from your past experiences with FPS games what happens to your gameplay when you play in really bad lag. :( <---me with lag

I'm coming over from Dark Age of Camelot where the large epic battles were generally very very laggy, pretty much a slide show. But for the most part the computer was in control of your character so it was bearable and we learned to live with it.

What are your thoughts?

[Fire_Monkey]

I'd like to see video of current large scale battles. But, they say that 56k are minimum requirements for a reason. Those with cable and T1 are going to be very happy. To cut down on lag they don't have the greatest graphix if you'll notice, and are more focused on gameplay. The bodies will become coffins, also cutting dwon on lag. Later serious gamers will want cable or T1.

[Dravz]

I too come from DAOC, so I know exactly what you're talking about.

However, I think the primary difference is that there are no NPCs in PS. In DAOC, in the big relic raid lag, the guards and anything computer controlled tore you up, because they weren't affected by lag. Then you have PS, where everything is player controlled, and realize that everyone will have the same lag.

So even if there is lag, it'll affect all players equally, unlike DAOC.

Those are my thoughts.

[Nightmare]

I prefer DSL, but that's just me...

I hope a lot of people consider getting BB. Not only would it help them in the game, it would help everyone around them as well.

[Miir]

Good point Dravz, I never thought about it that way.

Lag still makes me :(

[FireFrenzy]

I think a lot of you people are getting lag mixed up with fps

lag != fps

In a 300-500 player battle, a 56k would probably get a very high ping, but on top of that, everyone would have ROTTEN frame(s) per second. It is going to be very interesting to see how it goes, not too many first persons that have ventured into such a mass fight.

[Moleculor]

....

ARGH!

Get your terms right! It's graphics strain and frames-per-second loss, not 'lag'. Lag is where you have an inordinate (say, a second or more) of time between your computer and the server.

Large scale battles in such games as DAoC are problematic because of all the models and polygons on your screen at once, NOT because of lag.

So how do you solve this in PS? Lower your graphics settings. Upgrade your graphics card (and possibly your processor). It has NOTHING to do with your connection.

[Spy]

Originally posted by Nightmare

I hope a lot of people consider getting BB. Not only would it help them in the game, it would help everyone around them as well.
Whats BB?

[nerveRX]

bb is broadband.

and also, low fps is still lag, thats why people say "my frames are lagging"

dderrrrrrr:eek:

[MrVulcan]

guys, games like this are run all server side, you are just a log in to it, the actual data going back and forth is very little.
56k i am sure will have some lag issues, it is just 56k, but I expect almost no lag from beyond that.

Anyone here ever play battletech 3025? it will be run the same way, all server side, with all core data your side, so all you are doing is sending a single line of a text file back and forth.

also, unlike other games, the lag is not compounding, since it is server run, if someone has lag, it will be just their problem, unlike in many other games, where everyone has to wait for that person.

in the end, dont worry about it, lag wont be that bad....

[mikkyT]

Vulcan I think what hes trying to say is the screen lag on large scale encounters will be ridiculously high.

[TimberWolf2K]

Originally posted by FireFrenzy

In a 300-500 player battle, a 56k would probably get a very high ping, but on top of that, everyone would have ROTTEN frame(s) per second.

I dont think anyone with a 56K connection is gonna get any enjoyment out of PS (including myself). they just cant keep up with the data flow. I remember playing Teamfortress Classic once, 2Fort (small map) with 32 players, Suddenly! 10+ guys where all in the same room fighting, my FPS droped like a stone and I lagged around trying to shoot while everyone ghosted around me.

I think when your comp started to lag real hard it gives the illusion of poor frame rates. I know my comp can handle the Half-life engine no problem so it must just be some kind of illusion brought on by packloss.

[simba]

im kinda of a idiot, so I was wondering what T1 is (not tribes) and what is the diff with broadband and cable? Which is the best?

[Miir]

Anytime a game slows I consider it lag.

I read that when you die you'll have the option to respawn either in a safe spot or where a battle is taking place. So if you can choose the battle to respawn. Unless it's a random spawn, there is potential for large scale battles to get over populated real quickly.

In DAoC too many people resulted in servers crashing.

I'm looking forward to seeing how PS will compare in the big battles.

Ok lets say that the lag/fps is horrid at the mass battles. So what's the solution? In DAoC most of the enjoyable PvP combat was done in smaller groups. If you figure people might just avoid the large battles and fight in 100 people scurmishes. Then the game starts to become very similar to exisiting FPS games.

So then....why pay for the "massive" side of things?

[mikkyT]

Ok simba here goes...

In simple laymans terms a T1 is an (american) telecommunications industry term for a data connection at 1.544 Megabits per second. Commonly used to connect companies to Internet Service Providers or other offices.

In Europe it is referred to as an E1, and in laymans terms these can be considered equivalent. But an E1 is infact a data connection 2.048 Megabits per second.

Basically the carrier system consists of a number of 64kb channels, the T system carries 24 channels, the E system 32 - The T system does some bit-robbing for its signalling whereas the E standard, developed after the T standard, does not giving a larger number of available channels down the same physical wire.

"Cable" is a term used to refer to the internet access provided by a cable operator (as opposed to your telco. operator). Typical access speeds are 128Kb, 512Kb, 1Mb, 2Mb lines.

"DSL" is a term referring to Digital Syncronous Line - provided via your telco. operator via your telephone copper wire. Its a method of squeezing data down the un-used frequencies of that copper wire. Data rates can be affected by many things, most noticably the distance you are from your telephone exchange. Data rates are similar to that of cable, although technically you wouldnt be able to reach the same theoretical maximum, as DSL protocols do not permit.

[mikkyT]

So then....why pay for the "massive" side of things?

Would DAoC ever be the same if the servers where limited to 100 players!? No!

100 player skirmishes forms part of the persistent multiplayer world on dedicated servers not some billybobs Linux box running a mickey mouse operation.

You will never ever see 1000 players fighting at the same time in teh same place, the world is too vast. By design.

You will only see battles with 100-200 players at a maximum (not fixed maximum but a logical maximum, people do have lives :D )

But those battles, happening at the same time on different sides of the world then affect the tides of change accross the whole planet, with bases changing hands etc.

Like in DAoC where you had things to capture, just because you cannot see the battle(s) raging doesnt mean it wont affect you.

[TimberWolf2K]

Originally posted by mikkyT

You will only see battles with 100-200 players at a maximum (not fixed maximum but a logical maximum, people do have lives :D )


What are these "Lives" you speek of?

[Miir]

You will never ever see 1000 players fighting at the same time in teh same place, the world is too vast. By design.

I think there are still chances that you will see a large number of people fighting for a specific base or target. Perhaps not all the time but it's bound to happen.

PS = massive battles

That's what is appealing about it.

Can't wait till they release some larger scale battle footage to see how it handles.

[MrVulcan]

Originally posted by mikkyT
(not fixed maximum but a logical maximum, people do have lives :D )
..................................
Vulcan I think what hes trying to say is the screen lag on large scale encounters will be ridiculously high.



Life? wha???? But you post here too? How dare you try and be a gamer and have a life??? why why ..... its just wrong! The only life a gamer has is the number on the right side of his screen :p
......................................

Ya, but you have to understand that if you have the sys requirememnts it will run, just like many people are having major problems with C&C generals since they are running it on systems that couldnt run RA2 well, much less generals... Or having the min specs and playing it with all the effects on, you just cant do that.

I am sure that if you have the required system that it will be fine, and if you have the recomended system if will work in high rez and not have issues, regardless of how many polys and textures are on screen at one time.

[Discordja]

one of the dev team also noted they spent lots of time working on bases to compartmentalize (sp) them to limit the number of players on screen. this makes large battles more a large series of skirmishes which will help the fps issue. without lookin at their net code there's just know way to know how you'll do latency wise in those situations tho.

[DarkDragon00]

Terran Elite Airborne Regiment

First off many of the FPSs are base on people runnig there own servers while they themselves play, there are a few places with Dedicated Servers and even those sometimes lag because u know after while they get old and mantainence must be performed. Such Things will not happened in PS because servers will be maintained and upgraded (hopefully) as demand grows. Plus these aren't just any old dedicated servers these are F*(kn huge servers that will have no problem handeling our seamingly weak connections! HOPE THIS ANSWERS YOUR QUESTION!

-Dark- CO [TEAR]

[Hamma]

If they didnt think about lag in an MMO when they started this project, they would not have started it.

[Miir]

It's probably better not to compare PS servers with public run game servers, I totally agree it'll be way better than those. But I assume Mythic's - Dark Age of Camelot had pretty up-to-date servers and technology. But even on Mythic's servers 300-500 people in one spot (relic raids) equals lag and I didn't need to aim to kill someone. I'm picturing trying to actually aim and hit someone in lag comparable to DAoC lag, it would be ugly.

I agree, I'm sure PS dev team thought about lag... but everything looks good on paper. Every generation of MMORPG has had better technology and servers to work with. Yet every time you walk into a busy town you feel the strain of LAG. I don't suspect it will be any different with PS.

Basically I'm just wondering how bad it's going to be and if it's going to effect gameplay.

[mikkyT]

If your talking 300-500 people in one spot, thats a hell of a lot of polys to draw, and any system will have its choke points.

But the dev team have stated (I will get a link) that theres not likely to be 150 people visible on screen at once as you WILL experience teh grahpics lag as your system strains to cope NO MATTER what card or processor or memory you have, you will reach a choke point. Granted you may get more on screen at once but you will reach the point eventually.

The people might be there, but the system will only display a small number that it can see. that number of people in spot at once is still gonna look like a hell of a lot and it avoids the problems we see all too often in MMOGs. IMO it wont affect gameplay at all.

[mikkyT]

Im not explaining properly, I dont mean a coded hard maximum I mean with things like hills and buildings the game will not draw items it cannot see, so if there is a 300 player battle you are never likely to see all 300 people at once as they will be in buildings, behind hills. And we know the netcode wont even tell the client if it knows that a person or object is out of view.

[NeoTassadar]

No worries with broadband :rock:

[Revulsion]

Originally posted by Hamma
If they didnt think about lag in an MMO when they started this project, they would not have started it.

Well said :D

[FraBaktos]

I used to play 128 player Tribes 2 battles, and I didn't get as much lag as you would think. Also, I play 64 player battlefield 1942 games and get absolutely no lag at all, even on the highest detail. I have a P4 2.4Ghz, 256MB DDR ram, Radeon 8500LE (I had hardware when I started playing T2 tho)

[afex]

dont say lag when you mean poor graphics performance.

it just confuses the newbies.

[Pingpang]

This is where having a tank certification comes in handy. If I can simply blow large groups of enemies up, there would be less people on the screen to give us lag :)

[Miir]

Originally posted by 9v.Pingpang
This is where having a tank certification comes in handy. If I can simply blow large groups of enemies up, there would be less people on the screen to give us lag :)

I like your style. :D

[OmnipotentKiwi]

My Answer: I'll find out when it comes out. :D

[Nightmare]

*traumatized by memories of 56k days* :scared: no... no! not that! NOOO, LAG!! AUGH!!! *sees DSL modem* ahhh, you're always there for me :love:

[Discordja]

buddy of mine got offered a 45k a year development position in a small kentucky town ... the first question he asked the fella that offered it to him was "does the town have broadband access?" since he'll have to be moving heh

[Scarab]

There's actually 3 different things that cause slowdown in MMOG's.

One is video slowdown when there's lots of players, etc on the screen at the same time which slows your performance down.

Another is network lag, where many players and/or NPC's are lagging your connection because of a lot of information being pushed around like player hps, NPC hps, etc.

A third which happens a lot in DAoC and too many people try to claim it's one of the first two is SERVER network lag or server computer slowdown. If too many players in one area are doing a lot of things to cause lag, it makes it slow for everyone else who is in the same zone. This could happen in PS as well, such as a huge battle on the northern shore of a continent causing your little skirmish on the southern shore to be super laggy.

Casting spells in DAoC when there is a huge battle going on in a different area can cause 2-3 second delay between pressing the button and actually casting the spell. And everyone is feeling the exact same thing no matter their connection and/or computer power, so it's definitely a server thing.

I really hope Sony is going to have state of the art servers for this if they want 3-5 thousand per server.

[Gortha]

I think the PS Servers will be well dimensioned Machines....

Cluster-Servers.... means many Computers/Machines are hosting a world together ... lets just say every continent is calculated by a Cluster of 20 Quad-Xeon-Machines wich work together within a Gigabit-Ethernet-Network. Okay this might be overdimensioned, its just an example.

So it wouldn�t be a problem to calculate a battle which contains 500 players or more.

And i think a battle which contains over 100 Players isn�t playable for a 56k-modem-user. Because every shot and movings are showns wich are around the players, so i think there will be more than 6,5 kbyte per second. To much f�r 56k, very big lag or a freeze.

In CS or BF for example ... put on your netgraph wich shows you the up- and downstream of data and the packetloss and packetchoke. All the more palyers are shooting around you the higher the downstream gets and choke rises.

OKay the PS-Netcode is certainly programmed to solve this better then the standard FPS-Netcodes (HL, Q3, UT, BF).

Greetz
Gortha

*hopingmymachineisfastenoughfor
thisgodlygameanditsbigbattles*

[OmnipotentKiwi]

Originally posted by Gortha
I think the PS Servers will be well dimensioned Machines....

Cluster-Servers....

DAoC had the same thing, lag still occurs, especially when your overall server is crowded.

In major raids on Guinivere (most populated server), we often crashed the cluster.

[sYn pHrEAk]

Argh... Yeah someone already addressed this but you guys must've missed it....

Lag- Lag is generally an extreme delay between a client machine (players) and a server. This delay is caused by either slow communication across the network/Internet or lost data between the two hosts. If you are still seeing a high rate of frames rendered every second but people are jumping around on your screen, then you are experiencing lag. Lag has nothing to do with slow graphics. It has nothing to do with your processor speed (ok maybe a little but not in this case) or graphics card.

Low FPS- Low Frames Per Second is caused by your computer trying to quickly render more graphics than it is capable of rendering quickly. That means too many poly's or effects on your screen. If you are seeing a "slideshow" then you are experiencing Low FPS. This has nothing to do with communication between the client machine and the server. It has nothing to do with your Internet connection.

You guys sound like you are talking about Low FPS from there being too many people on the screen. That just means your computer can't handle the detail you're trying to run at or just can't handle the game in general. That's your fault, not the game designer's.

Sure, large battles in current MMORPGs can cause both of the above but it is far more likely that it's just your computer having Low FPS, not lag. Unless you're a 56klamer. ;)

[Miir]

Originally posted by OmnipotentKiwi
DAoC had the same thing, lag still occurs, especially when your overall server is crowded.

In major raids on Guinivere (most populated server), we often crashed the cluster.

Yeah! It hurts when you trying to do a big raid and BOOM "Connection lost" message comes up. Arg! :(

I've come to expect slow downs in gameplay in large battles. But it's going to be interesting to see how PS handles it.

Edit: Yes yes... there is a technical difference between LAG and low FPS (not sure why people keep re-explaining this) Bottom line is they both result in a slow down on your system which effects gameplay.

[Hellsfire123]

This thread is to long already so ill be brief.

Reasons we wont lag:
-You only get information from people in your line of sight.
-Low poly models.
-Distance fog, and later weather
-Advanced servers.
-no hit locations
-no rag doll physics
-No high partical effect spells
- No NPC's
-no unnessiary data (IE counterstrikes annoying player added sounds)
- High system requirments.

This last one needs a comment. The requirments are high for a reason. If your computer doesnt add to your ping or frame lag, there is less. If you think you can run the game on 256 sd with a 1.0 ghz processor and a geforce 2, think again. The devs mean the game loads and the player can move, possibly shoot. Upgrade to the previous syst reqs and beyond and the majority of the problems you mention disappear. For example, my friend can run Unreal 2 : The awakening, at 1600 X 1200 X 32 with 4x anti aliasing on, and not lag at all. Why? becuase his system is that good.

[Flameseeker]

I am sooooo screwed. 28k here. Yes, they still exist. I DON'T LIVE IN A MUSEUM EITHER!

[Hellsfire123]

Damn, no museum joke.....wait....lemme think. OH OH i got it! You work at the museum! wait....thats lame....


Im actually sitting next to a 56k modem. We pulled it out my friends computer last week when he finally got broad band and replaced it with his ethernet card. If you are using a modem, i dont believe there are any lines that dont support 56k anymore, go out and get a 56k modem. They are cheaper then a month of planetside.