Online gaming lag

[Suzie10]

@mae-3 

Yeah I've seen that my speed is rather low for my stats. Highest it's ever been on the download is about 70800-ish. However, it's always been this way since I went from the old 40/10 to the 80/20 package and this game used to play fine online. I had no issues with it. This particular issue started sometime ago and has never gone away. 

The latency to the game servers seems to be fine. It's low (between 7-20ms ping usually), stays stable and rarely drops packets. Yet still, the game runs like there is a problem with my connection. 

@jamesn123 

Coverage seems to be OK in my area. However,. this game doesn't work well on Wi-Fi and mobile connections. Testing mobile will likely lead to poor performance in-game as well. An Ethernet connection is mandatory for this game. If you don't use Ethernet, the game performs far worse leading to freeze-and-catch-up lag or disconnections from the server. 

[jamesn123]

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@Suzie10 wrote:

Coverage seems to be OK in my area. However,. this game doesn't work well on Wi-Fi and mobile connections. Testing mobile will likely lead to poor performance in-game as well. An Ethernet connection is mandatory for this game. If you don't use Ethernet, the game performs far worse leading to freeze-and-catch-up lag or disconnections from the server. 

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Just as a test it may be worth playing 1 game using mobile data to see if the game 'feels' any different to using your Sky connection. It may help figure out if the problem is more related to your broadband connection or kit. 

[Suzie10]

Just updating that this is still an issue and the lag does feel like it's getting worse. Something tells me it isn't a game problem. I can't help but think there is a problem somewhere with my connection that's causing the game to run sluggish. It isn't making much sense because the ping seems to be fine (it's low and stable) and packets don't seem to be getting lost, yet the game plays like something is wrong.

Would it be worth exploring taking off the MK4 faceplate and testing what it's like connected to the test socket? Is it possible an issue with the faceplate could be causing problems? It's something I haven't yet tried. 

[Chrisee]

@Suzie10 a lot of fault finding is down to making a series of changes until the fault is sorted so while it may not help it is worth checking the test port which bypasses any internal phone wiring. However given your.fault is rsstructed to one game logically it shouldn't. 

[Suzie10]

Well, I'm not sure if it's just this specific game. I only know about this game's performance since it's the only game I currently play online. 

Other players do complain about experiencing similar lag on this game. However, the main difference is it does actually go away. They get a mixture of good and bad games whereas mine are always bad no matter what time of day I play. As it's been happening for well over a year now, it makes me question whether it's being caused by some strange fault on my connection.

I'm currently connected to the test socket and as expected no changes. Game still runs sluggish and heavy. 

[Suzie10]

I have noticed that when performing a quiet line test, I can hear some really low noise. It's a bit difficult to describe. It's like a rythmic buzz/ticking noise that does take some effort to hear. You can't hear it with just the dial tone as the tone drowns it out (because it's so low).

I thought it might've been the faceplate doing it, which is one of the reasons I decided to remove it. It's still doing it via the test socket, so that rules out the faceplate. 

I am going to try getting a new phone just to see if maybe it's the phone itself as it is quite old. If the noise remains after replacing the phone, I am guessing this would be something to report as a fault since the line should be completely quiet?  Wondering if this could potentially be why the game is lagging all the time?

[Suzie10]

Here's another graph from the thinkbroadband quality monitoring test 

I was playing today between the hours of around 3-7am. Does the test reveal anything that might be causing the game to feel sluggish?

[MisterSmithson]

@Suzie10 did you ever manage to resolve this? I am experiencing similar issues. 

[Suzie10]

@MisterSmithson Unfortunately not. I think there is a connection issue somewhere, but I don't know what could be the cause. Other people in the UK play the game perfectly fine as there's several servers nearby. The game uses Google servers. 

In fact, the lag I am experiencing is getting worse. I just can't tell if it's an issue with the game or my connection. That's what's bothering me about this issue the most. Is it the game or is something weird going on with my connection?

[Suzie10]

The lag online is getting worse for some reason. It still feels like there's something wrong with my connection. Every single match is laggy. I am directly connected to the router (SR203) via Ethernet, so all problems associated with Wi-Fi can be ruled out. The game uses Google servers which should be decent. There's several servers near my location that give low ping, so I should be having a good connection to the game like many other players do.

I can't help but shake the feeling there is some odd fault with my connection that's causing the game to never run well. I've ran the basic Sky diagnostic test online but that doesn't find anything. Is there any other tests Sky can run on the connection to check if maybe something is wrong, perhaps additional tests that the online one doesn't do?

I've tried things like changing DNS servers, ethernet cables, several different PCs (laptop/desktops) and even went back to the old ER110/115 routers (to rule out router issues) yet the issue still remains. I've tried playing at all times of the day, the lag is the same even if server load is low. No matter what I try on my side it doesn't make the connection to the game any better. 

The game clearly senses something is wrong and reacts accordingly. I only suspect it's something on my side because it's every single match. I never have a good connection yet everyone else that plays the game gets decent connections, especially those in the UK.