Lag in multiplayer games

[TNT Hillie]

Sometimes multiplayer games suffer from lag—the game gets jerky and slow. The problem is often simple: if one PC lags, the whole multiplayer game lags. In this thread I want to share my experience and thoughts with you about the circumstances that cause this annoying lag. I am talking about lag here, not about low frame rates (fps). This text is not written as a guide, but perhaps the info can be helpful to you.

I know that some players use an older PC that is below the minimum requirements. Their PCs cause lag, especially with large maps. These players should do something about it.

Game requirements

The developers have specified the minimum and recommended requirements for the game. Reference:
game requirements

MINIMUM:

• OS: Windows 7, 8, 10
  
• Processor: AMD or Intel, 3 GHz Dual-Core or 2.6 GHz Quad-Core
  
• Memory: 6 GB RAM
  
• Graphics: AMD Radeon HD 7850, NVIDIA GeForce 660 series
  
• Storage: 12 GB available space

RECOMMENDED:

• OS: Windows 7, 8, 10
  
• Processor: AMD Quad-Core @ 3.8 GHz or Intel Quad-Core @ 3.2 GHz
  
• Memory: 8 GB RAM
  
• Graphics: AMD Radeon RX 470 or NVIDIA GeForce 1050 Ti series and above
  
• Network: Broadband Internet connection
  
• Storage: 12 GB available space

My experience

I have tried SS4 on several PCs and laptops. This is what happend:

My PC
I use a PC with an Intel i7, 3.5 GHz, 8 GB DDR4, SSD and a GTX660 graphics card. The game runs great without lag (lag-free) at highest game graphics settings.

Update: Jan 2018: I have updated my PC with a GTX 1080 and the game runs similar as with my GTX 660 graphics card.

My other PC
I have another PC with an AMD A8 6500 APU, 3.5 GHz, FM2, 8 GB DDR3, SSD and an integrated HD 8570 chip. The game runs with lag on all maps with lowest game settings. If I plug in an AMD RX 480 8GB graphics card in the PC then the game runs lag-free on all maps with highest game graphics settings.

My laptop
I have an ASUS laptop with an Intel i7, 1.7 GHz, 8 GB SO-DDR3, SSD and with two graphics chips. One is an Intel HD chip for the LCD display and the other is an NVidia 425M for the external HDMI. The game lags with the Intel HD chip and it runs lag-free up to 3v3 maps with the NVidia 425M chip. The NVidia chip is only used for an external display via HDMI. Most laptops with two graphic chips do this. The game graphics settings are set to low.

My business laptop
I have a HP laptop with an Intel i5, 2.5 GHz, 8 GB, SO-DDR3, with one internal HD graphics chip. The game lags badly with internal display. An external display improved the speed, but it did not remove the lag. The game graphics settings are set to low.

My friends laptop
A friend of mine has a Microsoft Surface laptop, with 8 GB RAM and an onboard graphics chip (no second chip). The game runs with great lag. Only when he connects the laptop to an external display via the HDMI port, the game becomes faster. In this case, the graphics chip clocks to a higher frequency when an external display is connected. Most laptops do this. When he sets the screen resolution low, the lag is almost gone. The game graphics settings are set to low.

Notice

Based on this experience and my knowledge about PCs, I can tell a few things

1. Any PC based on DDR2 internal memory is far below the specs and the game will certainly lag. You need a new PC to play SS4.
   
2. Any PC based on DDR3 with 4GB memory will almost certainly lag. 8GB of memory is best.
   
3. A PC based on DDR3 (8 GB) and older APUs (all Intels and AMDs with FM2) will lag the game when its integrated graphics chip is used. An APU is a CPU+GPU processor based on shared DDR3 memory. The rendering time for shared DDR3 memory is too low for the game. This causes lag.
   
4. The previous PC in point 3 with a modern graphics card (8GB) and with the onboard graphics chip disabled may not lag.
   
5. A PC with APUs based on FM2+ runs smoother, but also a modern graphics card (8GB) is highly recommended.
   
6. This is the same for PCs with DDR4 memory.

I think this game is not very suitable for laptops. You can increase the performance of the game by connecting an external display via HDMI, lowering the resolution and lowering the game graphic settings.

By mentioning DDR2, DDR3, DDR4 I also imply the associated generation of CPUs and APUs.

Graphics performance

The cause of lag by poor graphics performance make sense. SS4 is based on a 3D engine and it processes lots of 3D detail. The maps require a large amount of memory. The 3D rendering of the detail (i.e. trees, terrain, units, buildings etc.) also requires a fast GPU. Thus, sufficient amount of memory and a good GPU are essential for this game.

CPU performance

The use of a fast GPU will demand lesser performance of the CPU. You can test your CPU performance. Simply start a Skirmish game with 3 or 4 AI players on a 4v4 map. Observe if your game will lag. If it lags then you can consider overclocking the CPU. However, you will experience lesser lag in multiplayer games without AI.

Tips for developers

• I think it would be good if the players can see in the game which player(s) is/are lagging the game. This should not be based on network ping, as in the older SS games, but on lag detection.

Here I add useful tips from forum members.

Check your PC, and update to enjoy SS4

I think the minimum and recommended requirements of the game are true. Players with an older PC should look at these requirements.

IF YOU HAVE AN OLDER PC, PLEASE UPGRADE YOUR PC.

Please, share your experience about lag with respect to system requirements and settings.

Ps. I will update this text.

[Warzkins]

Ye ye and what about connection errors, or dissconets on the begining? It a PC fault too? Don't justify devs ^^

[TNT Hillie]

Hi Warzkins. I am talking about lag. Not network errors.

I think that the network errors are the result of exceptions/errors at the end of a player. If one side of the game goes into error then the connection is broke.

[Warzkins]

Maybe u have right with the lags but still in other games servers trying to balance the lag here there is nothing like that.

[TNT Hillie]

You could be right. I don't know how the game does it, or not. This topic is just about lag.

[DNW 🇮🇹]

hi TNT!
my card is FirePro W7170M, how is compared to AMD Radeon RX 470 or AMD Radeon HD 7850??
imo the spec is good but time age DEV told me that is a bad videocard.

[TNT Hillie]

Hi Ft.Mec NOSE,

The FirePro W7170M is a fast mobile graphics chip. I think it should be fine. It is comparable to a NVidia GTX 660.

https://www.techpowerup.com/gpudb/2768/firepro-w7170m

[DNW 🇮🇹]

Great! Grazie mille

[Cpt_Love]

Hi there !
Thanks for your wrap-up.
For french readers (should not be diffcult to other anyway) we made something similar there : http://forum.sudden-strike-alliance.fr/support-technique-et-configurations-t2873.html

[borsalinoK]

ya ya I said it in another dedicated post. Its essential to display network information to kick laggy players. Networking is no rocket science if one player lags everybody lags. The game engine has nothing to do with rendering onscreen (meaning if FPS is slow it doesnt impact game logic engine). For devs: this is ez improvement to code but big impact on gameplay!

[TNT Hillie]

Originally posted by borsalinoK:

The game engine has nothing to do with rendering onscreen (meaning if FPS is slow it doesnt impact game logic engine).

I am sorry, you got it wrong. The rendering has a lot to do with lag we see in this game. The network latencies can also play part, but low rendering performance causes significant lag. It has impact on the synchronization of the map info at each end of the network. This thread is about the lag based on rendering by GPUs. As you read in the first message, I do not focus on FPS.

[TNT Hillie]

Update: Jan 2018: I have updated my PC with a GTX 1080 and the game runs similar as with my GTX 660 graphics card.

[Cpt_Love]

According to the support, even if you get more than 45 fps @1080p High
=> i7-8550u + mx150 are insufficient to play the game.

That also appears that this is the only answer they are able to produce.

---------------------------------
Tryied Q8200 and GT730, almost fine, around 37 fps @1080p High
I guess this oldies meet the requirements (pfff)

[TNT Hillie]

The mx150 is a mobile graphics card (chip) and it uses shared memory. The bottleneck is the memory access causing low rendering. The low rendering slows down the game and we experience it as lag.

It is also possible that if you connect your laptop to an external monitor that the clock of the mx150 goes to turbo. This can reduce the lag. The mx150 goes to low clock on laptop display.

[Cpt_Love]

MX150 got 2 Gb GDDR5 dedicated
I am connected to an external display and GPU frequency has been manually set to mid turbo (1500 Mhz while max is 1780) using AfterBurner.
I have quite constant fps according to fraps, overcloking VRAM with +1Ghz increase 20% average FPS

I monitored while playing, GPU usage stay between 78 and 98%, moreover, with medium/low settings VRAM usage is near 715 Mb, growing up to 1200 Mb with highest settings (still 1080p).
Average CPU usage stay below 25%

Using nvidia drivers settings to force constant 30 fps max reduces GPU usage to 58% which is my current setting.


This lead me to consider that my laptop is fully able to play SS4 without being hardware limited ;)

[TNT Hillie]

Ok. The 2 GB GDDR5 should be fine. And you still experience lag?