Online is so laggy!

[Eternal]

Well I got this game to play online but its almost unplayable due to lag. I have no trouble playing any other games online so why is this 2d game so laggy..

I even forwarded my ports to reduce the lag but that didn't help.

Its like I try for 10 mins to get a smooth game going then once I do I'm playing against an MK master for 5 or so rounds until I leave to find someone more on my novices level... Its sucking the fun out of this game for me.

Is this game laggy for you to, or is it just me?

 

[Eternal]

I'm playing this on ps3 btw.

 

[MKB]

Well I got this game to play online but its almost unplayable due to lag. I have no trouble playing any other games online so why is this 2d game so laggy..

I even forwarded my ports to reduce the lag but that didn't help.

Its like I try for 10 mins to get a smooth game going then once I do I'm playing against an MK master for 5 or so rounds until I leave to find someone more on my novices level... Its sucking the fun out of this game for me.

Is this game laggy for you to, or is it just me?

Play hardwired. Don't use the wifi connection.

 

[Eternal]

I am using a wired connection.

How often do you play laggy games DCIguy01?

For me its about 90%

 

[Dark_Rob]

Online is always going to have some degree of lag, its just the nature of the beast. Thats why online is the least preferred way to play any fighting game.
Your connection could only be one of many different issues. Your opponents connection is also a consideration.
The distance between you and your opponent is also a big issue. The further away your opponent is located from you the more lag there will be. This is because the speed at which information can travel between you and your opponent is finite. So the more distance between the two of you, the more delay you will notice. This is a problem of physics, not technology, so as long as there is online gameplay there will also be lag. This will never change.
Solution= Play offline.

 

[Eternal]

There seems to be a few more things I can do to reduce lag for this game other then just forwarding ports..Looks like I should enable UPnP and DMZ


This thread found here is helpful http://www.ultimatemk.com/vForum/showthread.php?t=4309

I hope this works. I'll keep ya posted

 

[Umon Daisuke]

There aren't enough words in the English language that I can use to describe how much I hate playing fighters online. When I must, I connect the console directly to my modem (not even through a router).

 

[X820]

So the more distance between the two of you, the more delay you will notice. This is a problem of physics, not technology, so as long as there is online gameplay there will also be lag. This will never change.
Solution= Play offline.

Not necessarly so.

Me beeing from Europe I play next to offline with several people who live in the United States all the time, with zero lag.

It all comes down to both parties having a good connection and both knowing what not to do when playing online in terms of net dedication while playing.

I must say that this type of play is only possible for me with people that far away from me via P2p.

When I play on a server I have to deal with delay, but again if my opponent's connection is decent, zero lag.

 

[Shock]

No matter what, the greater the distance, the greater the latency will be on average over land. Sometimes you luck out and get a clear connection across the pond. I also preferred to play people in the UK in fighters back in the day than people from California for example.

 

[X820]

Luck has little to with it really Shock, bad luck is involved when either side's IPS's act up.
I also play with people who live in Moscow with the same type of connection (zero lag).

-Slow net
-unecessary processes + services running

These two pretty much cause the lag in 95% of the cases.

When playing on a console, all you can really do is make sure you have fast net and nothing else is using the connection at that time.

 

[Dark_Rob]

Not necessarly so.

Me beeing from Europe I play next to offline with several people who live in the United States all the time, with zero lag.

It all comes down to both parties having a good connection and both knowing what not to do when playing online in terms of net dedication while playing.

I must say that this type of play is only possible for me with people that far away from me via P2p.

When I play on a server I have to deal with delay, but again if my opponent's connection is decent, zero lag.

Well you may think you are playing with zero lag, but the truth is, your not. As I said information being sent between two points can only move so fast. The speed is finite and cannot be made to move faster. You may think there is no lag and if your primary way of playing is online you can even become accustomed to it and think your not playing with lag. But you are.

Lets do a little example shall we. You say you live in Europe.(I dont know where exactly but lets use Gothenburg Sweden as an example) I live in New York. The distance between Gothenburg and NY is 3774 miles. The fastest speed that information can travel barring any impediment which would slow it down is 186,000 miles per second(The speed of light) This is the absolute fastest speed information can travel. It cannot go faster.(Natures rule, not mine)
Now lets assume we have an absolute flawless connection(unlikely of course, but if I show you lag in a perfect connection then its easy to see how bad it can get in an average connection.) and that the only delay we have to contend with is that of delay due to the time between signals.
Now divide the distance to be covered(3774 miles) by the speed the information is moving(186,000 miles per second) The anwser is .02 seconds. So bear minimum with nothing else causing slowdown it takes information .02 seconds to travel between New York and Gothenburg Sweden. Pretty fast eh? Well, not as fast as it sounds.
Lets see how this affects the gameplay now.
Lets say UMK3 runs at 58 frames per second.(Im not sure of the exact framerate but I know this is close enough)
The first thing we need to do is find out how much time each frame takes up.
There are 1000 milliseconds in a second. So divide 1000ms by 58 fps. Each frame takes 17 milliseconds to elapse. But wait we are losing .02 of a second due to the time it takes the data to traverse the distance. We need to see how many frames that is. So multiply 1000ms times .02. We are losing 20 milliseconds.(Just over 1 frame) So we are losing 1.03 frames just due to the distance between us. And thats in a perfect connection. All I took into account was the distance that needed to be travelled and that alone causes us to lose over 1 frame. Now one frame may not seem like much, but in a fighting game 1 frame can mean the difference between hitting a difficult link and winning or dropping a combo and losing.
Also bear in mind few connections are ever flawless.
In reality we would probably be dropping somewhere between 3 and 4 frames a second. Ouch, that makes me not want to even play. lol

 

[9.95]

Good calculation, Rob. Actually, you also have to factor in that along with frame drop, you also get button drop because of the skipped frames to compensate for lag. When this happens, sometimes you don't really even drop the combos...sometimes it's dropped simply because it skips the frame you press the button on.

 

[O Juggernaut 0]

Well you may think you are playing with zero lag, but the truth is, your not. As I said information being sent between two points can only move so fast. The speed is finite and cannot be made to move faster. You may think there is no lag and if your primary way of playing is online you can even become accustomed to it and think your not playing with lag. But you are.

Lets do a little example shall we. You say you live in Europe.(I dont know where exactly but lets use Gothenburg Sweden as an example) I live in New York. The distance between Gothenburg and NY is 3774 miles. The fastest speed that information can travel barring any impediment which would slow it down is 186,000 miles per second(The speed of light) This is the absolute fastest speed information can travel. It cannot go faster.(Natures rule, not mine)
Now lets assume we have an absolute flawless connection(unlikely of course, but if I show you lag in a perfect connection then its easy to see how bad it can get in an average connection.) and that the only delay we have to contend with is that of delay due to the time between signals.
Now divide the distance to be covered(3774 miles) by the speed the information is moving(186,000 miles per second) The anwser is .02 seconds. So bear minimum with nothing else causing slowdown it takes information .02 seconds to travel between New York and Gothenburg Sweden. Pretty fast eh? Well, not as fast as it sounds.
Lets see how this affects the gameplay now.
Lets say UMK3 runs at 58 frames per second.(Im not sure of the exact framerate but I know this is close enough)
The first thing we need to do is find out how much time each frame takes up.
There are 1000 milliseconds in a second. So divide 1000ms by 58 fps. Each frame takes 17 milliseconds to elapse. But wait we are losing .02 of a second due to the time it takes the data to traverse the distance. We need to see how many frames that is. So multiply 1000ms times .02. We are losing 20 milliseconds.(Just over 1 frame) So we are losing 1.03 frames just due to the distance between us. And thats in a perfect connection. All I took into account was the distance that needed to be travelled and that alone causes us to lose over 1 frame. Now one frame may not seem like much, but in a fighting game 1 frame can mean the difference between hitting a difficult link and winning or dropping a combo and losing.
Also bear in mind few connections are ever flawless.
In reality we would probably be dropping somewhere between 3 and 4 frames a second. Ouch, that makes me not want to even play. lol

Best post in this thread, good stuff Rob!

 

[X820]

LMFAO Rob, seriously...

Why would you even assume that I don't know how an offline game feels like, or anyone else for that matter. LOL

Nice numbers throwing around, yet I play (again with certain people) with zero lag, delay (signal latency) is a WHOLE other subject now isn't it.


I always find it funny how hardcore offline fans talk about half or even whole frames just for the sake of it.

Even with 3-4 frames beeing dropped, hell even 8 is more then sufficient to do anything and evrything in UMK3.

Unless you are replicating one of ded's video's online, then you can bitch about omg I'm 0.123654 of a frame off.

LOL

 

[9.95]

LMFAO Rob, seriously...

Why would you even assume that I don't know how an offline game feels like, or anyone else for that matter. LOL

Nice numbers throwing around, yet I play (again with certain people) with zero lag, delay (signal latency) is a WHOLE other subject now isn't it.


I always find it funny how hardcore offline fans talk about half or even whole frames just for the sake of it.

Even with 3-4 frames beeing dropped, hell even 8 is more then sufficient to do anything and evrything in UMK3.

Unless you are replicating one of ded's video's online, then you can bitch about omg I'm 0.123654 of a frame off.

LOL

X, so then what happens when a player who is capable of blue blocking a sweep(single frame block) has that exact frame skipped and takes the damage because of it? If the 3-4 frames dropped in that 1 second is the difference between "danger" and losing a round/match/online tournament, then I think there's more than enough reason to justify choosing to play offline when you have the people and resources around you to do so. To say that there is no basis to complain about online play due to frame/button drop is beyond a valid argument.

What about players who can block Sektor's and R.Smokes TP Uppercut on sight of the first contact frame and punish accordingly? What happens when they miss that 50%+ punisher because of that block frame being dropped, or the frame causing the block button to drop and the player gets hit instead of performing the punisher? Again...more reason to complain about 3-4 dropped frames per second.

Keep in mind, players who play SSF4, particularly the highest level Abel players, need to do a single frame link in order to perform some of his best combos and play him at a top level. What happens when those frames are dropped? See where I'm going with this?

This is a day and age of frame counting, frame traps, frame links...etc. In today's modern fighting mentality, frames have become and integral part of strategy, gameplan, and gameplay. Take some of those away and you see that deteriorate to some degree. The character and game will determine the level of deterioration. (Games with wider input windows obviously are affected less, but those 1-frame links...ugh...)

X, you know I respect your opinion, so I don't say this with any disrespect, but you're talking to alot of people who's primary way of playing is offline. Your primary way of playing other people is online and that's what you've learned on, become used to, adjusted to, etc. You don't complain about it because that's simply what the game is and has become for you. That's fine...and credit where credit is due, it's become obvious that online players can practice online and be just as good offline... but you simply can't discredit the offline players' argument when they say they don't want to deal with 3-4 dropped frames per second in a fighting game.

 

[X820]

Phil thanks for your oppinion in this, it's appreciated.

We all know the downfalls of online play as opposed to offline play, I'm not disputing that, at all..

So playing theory fighter isn't necessary.

Who made this into a offline vs online topic anyway? lol

I reacted to Rob's essay in wich he hinted that I obviously know nothing while he has no clue off what I'm talking about.

No disrespect intented, nor should people start blowing steam at me because I shared my experiances.

It's not like I'm the new cat here.

 

[Dark_Rob]

LMFAO Rob, seriously...

Why would you even assume that I don't know how an offline game feels like, or anyone else for that matter. LOL

Nice numbers throwing around, yet I play (again with certain people) with zero lag, delay (signal latency) is a WHOLE other subject now isn't it.


I always find it funny how hardcore offline fans talk about half or even whole frames just for the sake of it.

Even with 3-4 frames beeing dropped, hell even 8 is more then sufficient to do anything and evrything in UMK3.

Unless you are replicating one of ded's video's online, then you can bitch about omg I'm 0.123654 of a frame off.

LOL

X, I think you misunderstand me. Nowhere did I say you dont know how the game plays offline. I have no idea whether you play offline so why would I claim to? I was making a general statement and if you believed I was singling you out directly, I apologize. That was not my intention.

However, I was not just "throwing numbers around". Everything I have said in my example is undisputable fact. I was never talking about whether you play offline. In your initial post, you claim to be able to play online with people in the U.S. with zero lag. All I was trying to show you is that is not possible. As I said this is natures rule not mine.
I was not saying its impossible for you to have a decent connection with people in the U.S. But you didnt say decent connection, you said "zero lag"
And that most assuredly is impossible. The limitations of the speed at which information travels makes it impossible
.
If you didnt understand the equations, then the fault is mine for not explaining it better. Id be happy to walk you through it.
Again, no disrespect was ever intended.

 

[X820]

LOL, ok rob.

 

[summoning]

you guys are mad smart i cant even spell, but online play is horrible , even on the best connection your still going to play better offline

 

[ded]

dont want to throw a flame here, but online play could be more than acceptable if there is no delay and lag. remember chi umk3 scene established the hi-level of umk3 in the mid 90's via wavenet netplay arcade machines which had 4-5ms during that time.

it all comes down to how much ping/ms is needed for the game to not be noticeable. of course you cant predict when lag is going to happen, and noone denies that offline is better, but what i mean is that there is a difference between online and online....

 

[Shock]

ded_ you are playing on was is like a college ethernet type of connection in your country, so of course being on the same network you will get extremely low pings. We can't have that here, especially over great distances, it's just not possible as there multiple computers between everyone. If there was no delay or lag, it wouldn't be what we know netplay to be today. Maybe someday there won't be, but for not, ethernet/intranet and internet are incomparable.

If you have any more than single digit ping to someone, the difference in quality becomes noticeable to almost everyone. More than 20, and it's definitely a noticeable difference. Many players still consider that playable, but it's not acceptable for competitive play, on top of that is the lag and hiccups in gameplay that don't exist offline.

X820, net traffic is a factor you cannot control, so luck is definitely a factor. You also are not talking about US traffic, which is extremely heavy. Perhaps by you it's better, but it's still not lag, or delay free.

I would rather drive 90 minutes and spend $25 to play Phil and Rob in person, than play them online with 20ms ping. Of course, for larger distances, I just would rather not play people at all. 8 frames of loss is absolutely completely unacceptable. Anymore than 5 really is not worth it. 8 frames of loss is a minimum of over 1/8 second delay. That wipes out counter timing for many things, and turns a lot of guarantees into 50/50s. Play on an arcade machine, then play on mame, then play on XBL, then play on either of those online using a land connection in the US, and only then will you understand.

 

[ded]

lol yeah, its been ages since i touched umk3 cab... you told me mame is the closest to the arcade but still different, and Simon told me too that umk3 for cab feels a little different from even mame offline...

can anyone compare mk2 cab with mame mk2 and ps3 mk2 (offline)?

 

[AC1984]

I haven't played MK2 on a Cab since 1995. Once Nit fixes the board on his cab I would compare it. From what I've experienced with UMK3 on the cab, I can tell that the game runs exactly the same way as mame (maybe just a bit smoother) but the input is so much better...As Matt said "runs like butter"...Considering the fact that right now there are issues with wrong wiring on this cab and the sticks weren't placed properly, It was still better than playing on mame.

 

[Dark_Rob]

I haven't played MK2 on a Cab since 1995. Once Nit fixes the board on his cab I would compare it. From what I've experienced with UMK3 on the cab, I can tell that the game runs exactly the same way as mame (maybe just a bit smoother) but the input is so much better...As Matt said "runs like butter"...Considering the fact that right now there are issues with wrong wiring on this cab and the sticks weren't placed properly, It was still better than playing on mame.

especially after we found something to sit on lol

 

[AC1984]

yeah...standing for so many hours with your hands bent isn't nice at all.