Lagging

[deblake60]

Here lately, there's been some serious lagging. (I know it's not my PC. Heck, I can run Ark on Epic all the way and it's smooth). Some days, which are becoming very rare, the game will run great, but mostly, lag. It doesn't matter what time I try either, before work, after work, day, night, late night, early morning. Please address this issue. I (and others) sure would appreciate it.

[Red Stone]

I hate to hear you have had trouble. I forwarded your comment to the developer.

[deblake60]

Thank you Red Stone, I appreciate it.

[deblake60]

It seems that the lagging had gotten worse. I have a high end PC and a great Internet connection. Has the developers mentioned anything yet? I know it had only been a couple of days, but if they can change the loading screen to the new items, I don't see why they can't tweak the other items??

[JoJa15]

Hi deblake60, I am sorry you are having this problem. The first thing to know is it FPS lag or network lag. The zero key in game will toggle the FPS/Ping display, If your FPS is dropping below 24-30 fps then it is FPS lag. If you are seeing yellow and/or red bars in the ping graph then it is network lag due to packet loss. You can have a great ping but if packets get lost then that will translate as lag. I am assuming you are experiencing network lag since you say you have a high end PC. Please check the FPS/ping graph though to make sure that is the case. For network lag the way the game is currently engineered it is sensitive to the network connection between the player and the server. This will be a detailed answer so please stick with it until the end.

Our setup is considered server authoritve. What that means is that when you press a key that key press is sent to the server, the server simulates the game state, and then sends back to you the state of the game. Your client then renders the scene. So if there is any issue in the network between you and the server it will be experienced as lag. An issue with the connection could be anything. It could be between your computer and your router, it could be between your router and your internet providers first hop, it could be somewhere between your internet provider and the servers connection, it could be at the servers network provider. There are so many potential causes. The reason we went with this setup is that having a browser be able to play a game (especially a battle royale game with the size of map of Fortnite) takes a lot of processing power. If we had to simulate collision detection/game state on the client it will take more than a browser could handle. There are also anti-cheating reasons to have a server authoritive setup.

Some other games have a client server setup. What that means is that you press a key and the client simulates the game so you move instantly. You do not feel any pauses when their is packet loss. It still impacts the game (usually in hit registration, or getting killed behind cover/corners) but it is less obvious to the player. So it does not mean other games have better network connections it is just that they do a better job of hiding when those problems occur. A client server setup puts more strain on the client (not good for a game that also runs on a browser) and makes the game more vulnerable to hacks like speed hacking and other manipulation of the client data.

The good news is that we have updates in the pipeline that will make the game less sensitive to network issues between the player and the server. These changes will feel similar to how a client server game plays. These changes are not easy so they will take some time to implement but we are well on our way with them. We currently have the changes implemented and we are testing them over high ping/high packet loss connections. Once we have ironed it out and verified it is performing well we need to test it/implement it on all the levels. Once we have done that we can release it to the public. This process will probably take 4-8 weeks. So it will not be an instant fix but we are working hard on it and it will come.

[deblake60]

The lagging had gotten worse, as well as the bullets pass through the enemies. I was told once because of the pinging on my end, but when checked, I only had green and blue, no red and no yellow. Granted, when I started the game was under $2. It also either need more USA servers or the ability for players to create their own non-dedicated ones..

[deblake60]

Please address lagging and the "phantom" shots. My arrows and bullets are literally passing through the enemy. Lagging is frustrating. Opening up more servers may help too.

[JoJa15]

Hi Deblake, are you able to capture video of what is occurring? It is hard for us to debug/help you if we are not experiencing the same thing on our side. We would like to figure out your issue. If you only have blue/green bars and your pings is low (what is your ms ping?) you should not be experiencing lag and you should under any circumstances not have "phantom" bullets. We would like to watch a video so we can try and figure out what is happening.

[deblake60]

It seems when the game is 10+ players (including me) it starts to lag. The phantom bullets happen from time to tome with and without lag. I will look for a free screen recording program and recorder it in the next couple of days.