Hello All,

I’m doing a bit of research into how Online Gamers enjoy their multi user games.  I understand (from this forum) that there is a problem with ‘lag’ sometimes over a slow or congested broadband connection, and that if the ‘ping rate’ drops below a certain time span the enjoyment of the game play can really suffer.  I also understand that there are some routers which try to combat this problem. 

I’m trying to gauge how much of a problem this lag is, and to what extent Gamers would go to fix it.    For example if there was an easily available package from your ISP which guaranteed your gaming ‘traffic’ would get top priority to ensure seamless game play, would you be prepared to pay a little extra for your service.  If so, how much a month would seem reasonable? 

I’m *not* trying to sell you anything, nor do I work for an ISP, just investigating whether there is a demand for something like this….

Many thanks in advance for opinions!

I haven't played online with my Wii yet, but I played Halo 3 at my friend's. It lagged a bit, but not a lot. I would give it a 8/10.

I have played online on my DS, and it has a tiny bit more lag than the X360 had, but NOT so much I would pay to get it better.

If I had to pay for online gaming, I would stop online gaming.

I'm not a huge online gamer but I do have several games which I regularly play online and in the near future this is likely to increase as I upgrade my PC equipment and buy another console.

I would not be prepared to pay an ISP extra just to guarantee lag free service because currently here in UK I feel ISPs are not offering the best service available in all areas, cities get much more choice of service and higher quality (speed typically) compared to more rural areas which are given less choice and pay a premium for a half baked service.

In the future I will get a router with QOS (Quality of Service) which will help to alleviate some problems but I am not likely to pay extra for a specific gaming service!!

Lag and ping issues are also related to the online service provided by Nintendo, Sony or Microsoft. If they don't have the infrastructure in place to cope with demand for online gaming paying an ISP extra will have no affect on their problems! As this generation of consoles sees all three offer online services/content for the for time (Xbox Live has a generation headstart remember) I expect their to be many teething problems that will need to be ironed out over time.

From my understanding the lag in games is not caused by the ISP provider but by the companies that make the game and run the servers. I have two games on the PS3 that i play online all the time, and one runs perfect with zero lag and the other one lags like crazy no matter how high pings are.

But if the lag was caused by a bad ISP and there were no other providers in the area, i would pay upwards of $5 to have perfect online gaming each month.

@ Griffin

You want low ping, not high. That could be your problem.

Yes, but no one expects Griffin to be correct anymore. Well, I hope not. He'll get better.

From the way post sounds, not a single moment has been spent playing a game online. Lag is often a part of any game, but games that need split second reactions (Which is often most of them) will often just end up lanning. Also, ping is certainly not the sole determinant of lag.

generally lower ping = better playing experience

fps people want pings no Higher than 300 preferably less than 100- game is faster= lower pings means you get player positioning etc faster than higher pings

mmo people -since the game -generally- is a lot slower than fps games- you still want low pings but the UPPER end is much more lenient...preferably under 100, but no MORE than say 500 - anything over 500-800 is PLAYABLE but there will be jumpiness in positioning etc..over 800ping, i'd just turn off the game and try again

 Bad netcode can make games laggy, that is true. There was much ado about nothing with Gabe Newell (or was it Romero?) claiming that they had written some god engine that could make dial up feel like broadband in games. 

 Latency (lag) is controlled by a lot of factors. Most importantly is probably your ISPs connection. If you have some kind of high latency connection (EV-DO, et al.) you will notice lag. More bandwidth doesn't necessarily equal less latency, but many times an upgraded connection from an ISP will boost your priority on their pipes. There is also ISPs giving priority to certain traffic, which if done incorrectly, or not at all, could lead to problems. 

Another factor would be locations and distance. If you live in Israel and try to connect to a Korean server, your lag will inevitably be higher due to the long distance and frequent routing. This can be further complicated by the route the connection is sent. A more direct connection will have lower lag.

The software also has an important role. The operating system's handling of networking can lead to significant lag, (see Windows) as well, as stated before, the actual game can affect latency. 

Lastly your own hardware can be important. The way your router handles packets, and the overhead on your network can cause lag. Further your networking controller on your computer can cause some latency, though its generally been shown to be negligible. You can pay the extra 150 dollars for a "gaming" networking card, but as a general rule, anything with the word "gaming _____" that is either itself not a game, or something that plays games, is probably incredibly overpriced and not worth it.

Finally, as a reference latency is measured in milliseconds.

 lol, the crappy DSL at my apartment and the good 7mb cable modem at my parents house say hello. 

I think the problem is part ISP, part game developers servers, and part non-dedicated servers that can cause the lag.

It sucks, TF2 rocked at home and was good when I went back to my apartment with my computer in the days before everybody came back to town from winter break. The second everybody came back, my DSL chugs even if I join servers that have a ping of 40 or less and it shoot up to at least 100 and 600 at most. 

i recently bought a new D-Link router that has "GameFuel" or something that prioritizes my bandwidth towards gaming. Works pretty nice. Was getting 1000+ pings on my old crappy router, now im back down to ~15-20

It just depends on your ISP and how many bit-torrent users you have around your neighborhood.