Ping to high

[Vektor T]

I'm from Brazil, most guys I play with are from Europe or North America. Usually the oval circuit with top 8 players is the only good map that I can play without the game lagging like hell. I works wonder in singleplayer with top graphics, so I suppose it's ping releated. Anything good I can do to help improve it?

[jannesBB]

It really depends a lot on the server, and your best bet is to try to find a server with a stable connection. Even with a higher ping (200 - 300) the game remains pretty playable as long as there's not too much packet loss. We're working on improving the server browser to make it easier to find stable servers.

[Fila!]

The game depends ALOT on whoever is hosting it. I've only had problems when I've joined games however whenever I've hosted people have told me their experience has been great.

[Vektor T]

Yeah... I play other games wiith ping around 200 without problem, even FPSs. But in NCG the lag is enormous. I downloaded a program who is helping a little... the fps still is lower and I'm far from competitive, but at least the game don froze then come back after I crashed.

[Fila!]

I'm pretty sure (and I think bugbear kinda confirmed it in the hotpatch notes) that it also depends on the hardware of who is hosting. Not just bandwidth but the computer performance.

[jannesBB]

Absolutely, since the host is acting as a server the system performance plays a crucial part. If you're system is already struggling to keep a stable framerate you will not have enough juice to host a multiplayer game. When hosting it's recommended that you lower the quality settings if you cannot otherwise maintain a stable framerate.

[Vektor T]

I think it's more related to the ping itself, since in some races with 12+ players I was the only one reporting lag. Maybe when dedicated servers comes out things got better. I will try to create a group of fellow brazilians to play together. Anyway I think things got better eventually since NCG still is in pre-alpha and it is it first try in multiplayer. The multiplayer really gave this game a total new depth!

If anyone is interesed, I'm using Leatrix Latency Fix, it helped a little and dropped my ping in about 30 points and prevented enormous lags. But it also seens to make the game freeze from times to times.

[jannesBB]

Sure, the ping is also a critical factor, and more so is the rate of packet loss. The game remains largely playable even with high pings as long as there's not too much packet loss. Unreliable connection is what's poison to the game.

[Latetzki]

I'm experiencing lag (ping 150-15k) and also there's lag spikes that weirdly make my car freeze and few seconds after I'm somewhere outside of the track. Unplayable. I've got decent 4G connection. (~50mb down and ~10mb up)

EDIT: Few recent games now have been spike-free though. Ping still is high.

[Fila!]

Yes, I suspect those lag spikes and freezes are not purely down to ping. I think they're a combination of ping and the host hardware not being fast enough to handle all the cars from a graphical point of view.

I've hosted yesterday alot of races with people from Europe so people had pings from 50ms (North America) to 220ms (Europe) and for the most part the experiences (based on their feedback) has been enjoyable and lag free. And definitely no "lag spikes".

[Adenru]

We played with ping 273 and had zero lag.

[Purple44]

Originally posted by Adenru:

We played with ping 273 and had zero lag.

But there was just you and me. But I was surprise I was not laggy with that PING to your host. :O

Later I join a Euro host with 10 players and I had PING of 208 and did not notice any lag.

I do think when you get around 16 players, more likely to have laggy players. And today I'm learning I may be a bad host here on the west side of US, since even players in US, in mid-west and east coast, getting PINGs of 150 to my host, Euro players getting worse. Alt3 from Ukraine could not even join my host, then Heddly gave it a try and he live in the mid-west and Alt3 got PING almost as good as me:

http://www.lay-zmattress.com/flatout2/purple44/Next%20Car%20Game/A-class-euro-car-310.jpg

Here pick of my lobby showing what PINGs Euro players got when joining my host:

http://www.lay-zmattress.com/flatout2/purple44/Next%20Car%20Game/myhost-PINGs.jpg

[Vektor T]

Well, maybe when dedicated servers comes out things will be better?

[Cheese is Life]

There was no lag tonight on my side.

[SlomoRacing]

i am in Australiia and no pings anywhere under 250, but with an unstable 250-350 the first lap is unplayable, huge 3-5s gaps of time and the like. Had some other great races though and really loving the new build.

[Adenru]

Originally posted by Purple44:

Originally posted by Adenru:

We played with ping 273 and had zero lag.

But there was just you and me. But I was surprise I was not laggy with that PING to your host. :O

Point is ping is not crucial. 273 normally considers very, very high ping value but in NCG you can play just fine with it.