Does GeOW suffer from excessive lag?

[KungFuJoe]

I know every internet game will suffer lag if you're not the host. However, is it just me, or does it seem like the "average" amount of lag in Gears is greater than most other games?

For instance, due to lag, shotgun battles are a crap shoot. Most of the time I have to "lead" someone into my shotgun blast because if I aim at where they currently are, by the time my "shells" reach them, due to lag, they are no longer there.

What I normally do when I enter a game is test the lag. To do this, I run right up against a wall, facing it, and fire off a shotgun blast. If you have ZERO lag (meaning, you're the host), you will hear ONE blast as the shotgun blast and the shells hitting walls happen simultaneaously. If you can hear two distinct blasts, you are experiencing lag and the time between the two blasts is the amount of lag. MOST of the time, there is a good half second between blasts for my games. That may not sound like much, but when you're in a shotgun battle up close, that 1/2 second means you aren't hittin NUTHIN unless the other guy doesn't move or you "lead" them into the blast.

I guess my main question is...do others experience this as well (try that test I mentioned), or is it just me?

[Special K]

no, not usually. but not enough people are playing this game, sometimes i've gotten really laggy hosts, and i can't go find another room...becuase there isn't another room.

[Smurphy]

Good point. Somhow I get stuck in foreign games so my bullet lag is like maybe 2-3 seconds and its like shooting a pistol at somone for 1 mile away in real life really dont understand.

[KhaoZ/Se7n]

What's GeOW? You mean GoW?

[KungFuJoe]

Wow...2 to 3 seconds is horrible and I wouldn't even attempt to play.

Also, the lag gets worse (understandibly) as more people enter the game.

Another test I ran was...I hosted a game and invited just one buddy. I had zero lag (of course), and my buddy said the lag was VERY minimal...he could hear 2 blasts but they were so close together he had to try to hear them.

Then a few more people jumped in and my friend did the same test and he said it was noticeably worse.

My internet connection is a 4mb down, 384k up.

[KungFuJoe]

What's GeOW? You mean GoW?

No...I mean GeOW.

GOW = God Of War.

[Knight Marquise]

Honestly, I don't experience any more lag on Gears then I do with Halo 2. Actually less, which is surprising considering the graphical difference. I notice it most on Gears when playing on a foreign host, sometimes that gets really bad, other then that, it's a pretty smooth playing game for me. What kind of connection do you have, how fast is it?

[r4wrawr]

this game has so much potential, its just the lag from host advantage. if there was a party system or no lag what so ever, i would piss in my pants for all the joy there would be mang!

[Zoso Fan]

It actually has LESS lag than most games on 360.

I am very happy with it right now.

You will never find a online game without some form of lag after playing for a respectable amount of time.

[KungFuJoe]

Honestly, I don't experience any more lag on Gears then I do with Halo 2. Actually less, which is surprising considering the graphical difference. I notice it most on Gears when playing on a foreign host, sometimes that gets really bad, other then that, it's a pretty smooth playing game for me. What kind of connection do you have, how fast is it?

What's funny is I was just going to mention Halo 2 in comparison and how I never experience enough lag to "notice" it.

I have cable...4Mb down, 384k up. And honestly, ever single game I've ever been in where I'm not the host, I experience a good 1/2 second of lag.

When you get a chance...try that little test I mentioned where you shoot the wall with a shotgun and time the blasts. I'm curious to see what you get.

I guess what I'm looking for is what kind of lag should I expect if everything is ok with my internet connection. If everyone else out there is only getting 1/4 or 1/8 of a second lag...or nearly none at all...then I know to work on my internet connection. But, if it's the game itself and there's nothing I can do about it, I don't want to waste my time fiddling with my router.

[KB UZZI]

People Who Complain About Lag Usually Have A Bad Connection And Thats Y They R Lagging But It Is Sometimes The Host Also

[SquallWindblade]

GeOW = Geometry Wars. It has no lag whatsoever.

GOW (On a Gears of War/Xbox 360 forum) = Gears of War

GOW (On a plaguestation forum) = God of War

[Mike072490]

Uh the lag is usually so minimal it does not make a difference... stop complaining because you suck, or don't join foreign games?

[KungFuJoe]

Uh the lag is usually so minimal it does not make a difference... stop complaining because you suck, or don't join foreign games?

I absolutely LOVE replies like this and I knew it would be a matter of time before a 7 year old decided to voice his opinion.

[Britainz-Finest]

I experoence lag sometimes,

But it all depends on what the Hosts connection is like, whether hes bandwidth is being used by ne thing else or whether my bandwidth is being used..

Now i have a 4mb connection also, but i know that when i host a game, the connection for other players isnt great.

So, i genraly join a friends game who i know has a good conection and the game is fine for me.

But i have had some major lag issues.
It seems like my connection speed varies, and sometimes it seems like no matter whos game i go in, i have major lag, but i think thats more a problem on my end, then other peoples seeing as other people say they are fine.

[Britainz-Finest]

I absolutely LOVE replies like this and I knew it would be a matter of time before a 7 year old decided to voice his opinion.

I know what you mean, i just to give them a big sloppy slap sometimes :p

[ur huklbry]

Yea, I take the Lancer and shoot the wall to test it and the bullets will hit anywhere from 1/4 sec. to 1/2 sec. later. When I host or my buddy hosts the lag is none or less than that. It mainly depends on the hosts connection not yours.

[T Ghost]

I experience a LOT of LAG even with american hosts (I'm in the US).

My connection is cable 5Mbps DWN and 500Kbps UP and no other game has lag as consistant and strong as GoW here.

I play a lot with people in south america (Brazil) and no other game has the ammount of lag that GoW has when playing my foreign friends.

The thing about GoW lag is that you don't see it on the characters skidding or flashing but ONLY on the delay between your shot and the bullets actually leaving your gun.

I believe that's why some people say they don't have ANY lag.

I would rather Epic made the MP portion on GoW less visually impressive but with considerably less lag.

[Enzo]

no, it doesnt

[Macdeth]

YES!!! i hate it so much. the host in gow online has such an advantage it's retarded. on rare occasions when i don't have lag, i do perfectly well...the rest of the time i get ****ed hard.

[SD rulez]

Yes, everyone knows the host has no lag on his/her bullets. Everyone else does. Try and get in rooms with people you know have a good connection to minimize lag, I've seen rooms where everyone swears they are host as there is no lag.

[DiscombobulatedThi]

WOW I skimmed this thread and saw so many ignorant comments. To the original poster:

YES, there is lag in this game. And it has recieved little to compensate for it.
Some xbox games have client side hit detection (so whoever was comparing this to halo2 without client side is foolish). You can tell this, by sniping a guy in the head, he walks another 2 steps, then drops dead. No leading required, but it did take a while for the shot to register.
Some PC games have dedicated servers, which basically put lag at a minimum, so even without client side hit detection, there is little need to lead shots.

And then, you have Gears of War. This game has no client side, and no dedicated servers. Basically, the host's connection has to be good and near to you, otherwise you will lag. This has given birth to more problems. Some people will then resort to hosting to deal with the lag, and their internet is woefully inadequate. And the vicious cycle continues.

My personal recommendation is to keep joining random player matches, find a great server with a great connection, and add the host to your friend's list. You eventually become friends and play with him often, and you get little lag (I found 2 hosts who make me feel like I host!).
The problem is that epic is downplaying the lag problem, simply stating that we just need to find a host with better connection. Well, without dedicated servers or client side, they basically screwed over 90% of gamers. Anyone who plays ranked will likely end up with laggy games, and they can't leave either, nor can they test if the host isn't laggy before hand (like in playermatches, where you switch between security cameras, and see the response time from you pulling the trigger and the screen changing images).

All in all, you are not alone, in fact, you are one of many who suffer from bullet lag. Look up past topics, there are tons of people complaining about lag, with many threads posted.

Edit:
The reason why people don't talk about lag anymore is cause Epic is never gonna fix it. So we have to do what we can with the few good hosts. When the game was fresh, it was the lag and the glitches that prevented it from becoming a true masterpiece. Without lag and glitches, I can honestly say that gears is one of the greatest games I have ever played, and possibly my favorite multiplayer one (and thats saying alot).

Edit #2:
And by ignorant comments that I mentioned at the top of the page, I meant Mike072490 and Enzo. Must have been the only 2 I skimmed and read heh.

[ScorpZ]

WOW I skimmed this thread and saw so many ignorant comments. To the original poster:

YES, there is lag in this game. And it has recieved little to compensate for it.
Some xbox games have client side hit detection (so whoever was comparing this to halo2 without client side is foolish). You can tell this, by sniping a guy in the head, he walks another 2 steps, then drops dead. No leading required, but it did take a while for the shot to register.
Some PC games have dedicated servers, which basically put lag at a minimum, so even without client side hit detection, there is little need to lead shots.

And then, you have Gears of War. This game has no client side, and no dedicated servers. Basically, the host's connection has to be good and near to you, otherwise you will lag. This has given birth to more problems. Some people will then resort to hosting to deal with the lag, and their internet is woefully inadequate. And the vicious cycle continues.

My personal recommendation is to keep joining random player matches, find a great server with a great connection, and add the host to your friend's list. You eventually become friends and play with him often, and you get little lag (I found 2 hosts who make me feel like I host!).
The problem is that epic is downplaying the lag problem, simply stating that we just need to find a host with better connection. Well, without dedicated servers or client side, they basically screwed over 90% of gamers. Anyone who plays ranked will likely end up with laggy games, and they can't leave either, nor can they test if the host isn't laggy before hand (like in playermatches, where you switch between security cameras, and see the response time from you pulling the trigger and the screen changing images).

All in all, you are not alone, in fact, you are one of many who suffer from bullet lag. Look up past topics, there are tons of people complaining about lag, with many threads posted.

Edit:
The reason why people don't talk about lag anymore is cause Epic is never gonna fix it. So we have to do what we can with the few good hosts. When the game was fresh, it was the lag and the glitches that prevented it from becoming a true masterpiece. Without lag and glitches, I can honestly say that gears is one of the greatest games I have ever played, and possibly my favorite multiplayer one (and thats saying alot).

Edit #2:
And by ignorant comments that I mentioned at the top of the page, I meant Mike072490 and Enzo. Must have been the only 2 I skimmed and read heh.

Couldn't have said that any better. Gears had and still has the potential to be the greatest multiplayer shooter ever made, but for that to happen. They need to incorporate Client-side hit detection.

[RAZORMM]

why don't you try getting a better connection it sounds like it is a problem more from your end then it is anything else especially if you only have a 384k upload. i have no problem playing with anyone in the US only with european hosts. They seem to have either worse connections or the distance just kills it. I can't answer that one for you. other than that i'd have to agree with what some others have said and find someone that you have a connection with and play with them.

Also i can't beleive you'd try to up-play god of war over gears... god of war was such a horrible game IMO. nothing really changes in the world of fighting games.

[Strokin Man]

Except "God of War" was a completely useless game.

[Leper DCE]

yeha lag sucks on this game.

[PunishedOne]

why don't you try getting a better connection it sounds like it is a problem more from your end then it is anything else especially if you only have a 384k upload. i have no problem playing with anyone in the US only with european hosts. They seem to have either worse connections or the distance just kills it. I can't answer that one for you. other than that i'd have to agree with what some others have said and find someone that you have a connection with and play with them.



Most broadband connections are capable of <100ms ping when there is absolutely no activity on the network. >80ms ping is a death-wish in PC games, and it still applies to Gears. Having a host and giving the game server side hit detection is not the ideal way of having hit detection on Xbox Live, which is one of the laggiest online gaming services I've ever encountered. The best I've encountered is in America's Army, where the netcode is so good that there are often "trades", people killing each other in a firefight.

For the less tech literate, ping is basically the time that it takes for packets of data to transfer from the client to the server. The lower, the better, and it is calculated in milliseconds. So, a 100ms ping means that it takes approximately a hundredth of a second (.01) to transfer data.

[sting7k]

I am not sure if halo2 has client side detection either. Remember that bungie's match making system automatically picks the person with the best connection to host each game so you always get someone with a good connection and not the mixed bag you can get with some games of gears. This makes for more consistency in the games connection so the things that people complain about in gears show up less since chances are good you will always have a host with a good connection.

Also to note is that you do need to lead a little bit with the sniper and also halo2 has some auto-aim assistance so your bullets are more likely to hit their mark just pointing the gun near the guy and your target will get slightly pulled toward a person. Also using the shotgun in halo2 is very similar to using the shotgun in gears, it was in halo2 where my friends came up with the "shotgun lottery" in which its basicly whoever the game calculates fired first wins the battle, this started because my friends and I have seen a person appear to take a shotgun to the chest point blank and see their shields light up like they took damage only for you to fall over in a hump .02 seconds later, like happens in gears (except you could lose your head or be blown to bits in gears ;) ).

But like i said i am not totally sure about halo2's detection, I am not a computer programming expert but I have seen many things that people complain about in gears lag wise (especially shotgun and the sword) also happen while playing halo2. So its not just gears that has these problems.

Maybe when the next xbox comes out after the 360 MS will give us Halo:CE on the arcade with full xbox live support and then all my hopes and dreams would be realized.

[DCXXX]

Unless the host lives VERY close to you, there is lag on the every single weapon. If you play on LAN you will see that there is no need to lead any of your shots, but when you play online, all your shots will have to be led by a bit.

This has yet to be explained fully because games like Halo 2 don't suffer lag nearly as bad as this game does.

[SofaKingGnarly]

this is how I test lag. when the round starts I turn to the closest wall and shot it to see how long it takes my bullets to hit. they take 1 second to hit the wall!!!!!! If it was a real gun the bullets would appear to hit almost INSTANT!!

[SofaKingGnarly]

once you figure out how to do this for RANKED games you let use know oK pumpkin

[snl25]

To say GoW has no lag is very laughable. I have a pretty good connection, when I hosted a match a few months ago nobody had lag. But I get lag a lot, in every match. Though I cannot say all matches are very laggy. 99% are pretty laggy, I have gotten quite a few good servers though which had very minimal lag. But the majority of the servers are pretty damn laggy.

My connection is 6.5 Mb download and 848 KB upload. I am not trying to sound like I am complaining, because I do fairly good in every game. In Ranked I average 25 - 30 kills a match (off-host, every time), sometimes less depending on how bad the lag is.

But I have also had matches where I couldn't do a damn thing, I pump someone with a full shotgun clip at 1 foot or less just to have them shoot me once or twice and I'm dead. I wish Epic would really fix this mess.

[aashkab]

i always have some lag. i've opened up all my ports on my router and tested xbox network connection and shut down all my other computers. i don't think it's the internet because my speed tests are fine. it just depends on the host...

kind of sucks but my best advice is to get used to the lag and try to lead your enemies into them...i am trying to master the sniper rifle right now and its WICKED hard but hey...angel of evil did it

for the first week of the game i was so frustrated because of the leading lag crap but i am getting used to it now

[izda1]

Nah, my lag isn't too bad but sometimes I don't even attempt to VS the host in a shotty battle because I get a red skull really far away.

[jasonking18]

I know every internet game will suffer lag if you're not the host. However, is it just me, or does it seem like the "average" amount of lag in Gears is greater than most other games?

For instance, due to lag, shotgun battles are a crap shoot. Most of the time I have to "lead" someone into my shotgun blast because if I aim at where they currently are, by the time my "shells" reach them, due to lag, they are no longer there.

What I normally do when I enter a game is test the lag. To do this, I run right up against a wall, facing it, and fire off a shotgun blast. If you have ZERO lag (meaning, you're the host), you will hear ONE blast as the shotgun blast and the shells hitting walls happen simultaneaously. If you can hear two distinct blasts, you are experiencing lag and the time between the two blasts is the amount of lag. MOST of the time, there is a good half second between blasts for my games. That may not sound like much, but when you're in a shotgun battle up close, that 1/2 second means you aren't hittin NUTHIN unless the other guy doesn't move or you "lead" them into the blast.

I guess my main question is...do others experience this as well (try that test I mentioned), or is it just me?

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