We Were Warned About VF Online Play......

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2007/02/7200/

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2007/02/virtua5/

https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna17474231

https://www.destructoid.com/reviews/destructoid-review-virtua-fighter-5-online/


Its amazing how the view of the game has changed and how the priorities of the players have changed.

 

Wow! Interesting articles.

 

Okay so I read through all of the articles.

And coming from a tech like myself, one of the things that stood out, is the part about VF being online, especially lag, in the ars technical article by Frank Caron. This guy gets it and understands the drawbacks of VF being online, unlike those evo pros, and hype men on youtube, telling their fanbase that rollback is the future and key to solving lag.

And to add,...
People don't seem to understand, tech wise, rollback netcode is not going to solve any problems for VF. Or any other fighting game. But yet they still listen to, follow, and believe pitch men and hype dudes all on youtube, that rollback can save the world. And that is not true at all.

In the case of Virtua Fighter, if you want to play it online without lag or input lag, rollback or not, you will need a 100% stable signal, from point A to Point B, that consistently doesn't dip at all.

Other fighting games like Tekken and SF5, can get away with lag and input delay, but more advanced, deeper, more precise games like VF, as mentioned in the same article I mentioned above, can't afford any kind of lag at all, because it would break the experience if it happens. And that is true.

The other downside is, if they put button input delay in VF6, to somehow cater for rollback (and hopefully they don't do that ), that can cause alot of problems. And moves that are supposed to come out immediately, will take a while, or take longer to come out online, and in VF that is not good at all, for offline or online.

Many of us even here know that rollback, or other forms of Internet netcode, while they do solve some problems which is good, can't fully save the world from input delay or online lag.

To be real, forget Maximillian Dood, Cannon Bros fanboys, and all of those hype men, and Sony evo promoting pitch men and women on the internet and youtube. Roll back is important in a sense, but not the most important factor here for solving lag. A 100% (not 99.9%) consistent signal and connection that does not break, or a device that can do that, is the main key to deal with, and erase lag and delay for online play.

Also, I find it surprising yet interesting, that Frank Caron guy, who wrote that article back in 2007, as a journalist, actually somewhat understands the whole online play problems, better than people from 2008, all the way to 2022. Stuff like that makes me wonder sometimes.

But that article in a sense, is the same thing gamers including myself, have been saying for over two decades. And him using VF as an example for online, is a good choice. Since VF is like the only fighting game, that can be properly used in tests, to understand how to design a device, and write and run netcode, to run a fighting game online properly, without lag or input delay.

The articles were all interesting, especially that ars technica one. Thanks for the links masterpo.

 

Namco and Sega are the last one holding out for delay based, despite rollback being the better option. Rollback isn't anything new in online gaming. When both connections are at their best, rollback will still be the better of the two.

SF and Tekken still require precise timing just as much as VF, or any other fg worth its salt.

 

I remembered having read those articles...

The diva message inherent of those ones "VF are too deeeeeeeep to feature online play between players" is such bullshit and baffling in the face !

And no, priorities of the players didn't have changed since back in the day ! Majority of players already wanted online play as much is was possible to incorporate and were mad at the release of VF5 ps3, because everybody knew it was possible. Later, when the momentum was passed, VF5 360 was released with a solid online, and it was praised, but well... Still too late. Not having listend what all people wanted in the right time had doomed the promising success of the game, sadly.

Sega, Don't repeat the same mistake with VF6 and add Roll back netcode or whatever other better solutions to enhance online experience between players...

 

Talking about online, i'm really starting to think that VF5US online is kinda (very ?) bad ? And VF5FS overall felt better and a bit more playable.

 

Solid Online???? Praised? Don't you mean it was a little better than expected. And where is that same solid online now what happened between VF5 360 and VF5FS

Just like Seiji Aoki said: "Virtua Fighter 5 Ultimate Showdown is the "definitive" version of Virtua Fighter"

Lag + Lobbys + Purple, Blue, Yellow, and Red Hit Sparks

 

Yes. For the time, it was good enough, that's why Vf5 on 360 has made some of those elitist statements of your articles laughtable. The game did proved that not only Sega could have released VF5 vanilla on ps3 with online but they should have to ! Because at this time, online battles feature was maybe the biggest expectation from players.
Now, expectations in term of online experience has raised again, cause people want to play at any time with no delay with the widest amount of people possible.

And story repeat again : Some say it's impossible, but for VF6 (a whole new game moreover) Sega has to do it.

I like paraphrasing that movie : "it's not possible, it's a necessary !"

 

Years ago, I might have disagreed with that so called diva message. But after playing lots of fighting games competitively for years, since I was 11 years old, including Virtua Fighter, that diva message, is not exactly false, and there is some truth behind it.

 

@shad fair enough.,., Let's follow that logic a little more. For a time it was good enough for a fighting game not to have a real story, back story, in game character profiles, significant single player etc. But that time is gone. There are no examples of very successful fighting games (of any kind ) that don't have significant backstory, character profiles, and single player content. So if we're talking about staying up with the times, Virtua Fighter is going to need a helluva lot more than rollback and Hit Sparks Maybe RGG, Seiji Aoki San and crew should take a few notes from SIFU.

 

3rd strike has rollback and enjoys consistent play numbers in the 400s on fightcade. CvS2 enjoys a daily count of around 70 players. KOF 02, 00, 99 98, 97, and 95 all enjoy hundreds and hundreds of players daily. all after mentioned games have either execution-heavy defense tools, tight link combos, or excellent movement requirements.There's your precise game success story.

Marvel 2 enjoys consistent 100s and it features some incredibly difficult movement, combo loops, and execution. Every old marvel game has been enjoying rollback since ggpo came on the scene. There's no excuse.

No one thinks rollback is 0ms from earth to mars. Everyone knows, by experience, it's VASTLY better than delay-based netcode in any fighting game. Everyone also knows, when the connection isn't 100% stable, rollback handles the lag and desync far better than delay.

Thus, people clamor for it for all fighting games and is the whole reason why persona 4 arena: Ultimax is buzzing.

 

A offline purist might say "being the best choice between two bad choices, still leaves you with a bad choice"

A offline purist might say that online play will never offer the same match as its offline version.

Also a game programmer, in particular a C++ graphics programmer might say programming animations and frames in a 2D graphics context is a totally different animal than programming animations and frames in a 3D graphics context.

Just because network programming technique is passable or somewhat acceptable in a 2D graphics engine (KOF .e.g) , does not mean that same network programming technique would give you the same result in a 3D graphics engine scenario (VF e.g).

And once tournaments, high stakes, ego's championship titles, fame, pride, money, bragging rights, sh#t talking is on the line, online play will be seen as a seriously flawed and inferior alternative to offline competitions and tournaments.


Of course the solution is for the game developers to artificially add lag to the offline version of the game But the problem would be that artificial offline lag would still be more consistent and offer a superior match in comparison to the online lag version and artificial offline lag would only serve to piss off the players.

 

online doesn't need to be 1:1 with offline, just good. We see this play out already, players of 2D, hyper-execution-heavy games, do plenty of online tournaments, online matches, and enjoy pretty responsive gameplay. Of course, wifi connections, +120ms pings and the like will occur, but based on the feedback from players of other games, and other 3d games, you see this play out.

graphics means nothing. Killer Instinct is a 2D game with 3D graphics with some of the best netcode you'll ever find. Smash Bros. Melee features rollback now and it's incredibly fast, 3D, and highly-execution heavy. There's really no excuse for better online.

 

@Radical777 Yes! having rollback netcode is a good thing But that's not good enough. RGG/Sega could put rollback netcode into VF today and it would make very little difference in growing the current size of the community. Yes ! the current hard core players would be happier Yes! we would pick up a few new players here and there However if RGG/Sega added rollback netcode into VF today, 2 1/2 months from today VF5US online would be a ghost town again even with fully functional rollback netcode

Without significant Single Player Content, i.e. something for noobs, casuals, and occasional players to play, the player base will not grow significantly. It will not grow in any sustainable fashion Rollback netcode is good to have, its just not enough. No where near enough to add big numbers to the VF player base.

@Radical777 Networked 2D game engines face difference performance challenges and use different techniques than networked 3D game engines. The performance deviation between 2D game engines and 3D game engines over a global network is proportional to the network distances involved as well as proportional to the throughput deltas at the GPU execution levels between the 2D rendering engines and the 3D rendering engines. Further the human visual cortex perceives 2D graphical information differently than it perceives 3D graphical information. This perceptual difference is magnified in a online networked environment, which leads to varying degrees of cognitive dissonance with respect to the lag's impact on game play as encountered in 2D fighting games versus 3D fighting games.

@Radical777 I understand you want to make your case for rollback netcode. You've made the case my friend. Rollback netcode is a good thing a for fighting games to have. The problem is that rollback netcode alone is not good enough to create a growing, strong , vibrant fighting game player base. Especially if the rollback netcode is not accompanied by significant Single Player content And VF5US only has the barest of bones Arcade mode which means all the rollback netcode in the world can't help it.

 

This delay netcode ruined it so bad... VF5US is in the special place of the "ugly" bad online fighting games to me.

And i hate to believe that the older and previous online or delay netcode (not perfect either) in VF5FS was better, easier, smoother...

Too much fake evades at -13 -15 -17 or more, too much fake counter hits at -3 -5 -7 -10 -13, destagg got harder, punishing lows got harder, sometimes you get an evade when you want 2P 2K 2K+G 2P+K, it became almost impossible to whiff punish, duck high or duck throw is almost impossible to punish, basic stuffs after evading an unsafe move is not guaranted anymore, 2P is even more cancer, buttons feel heavier...

This is not the same game online that we played for years. VF5US is a bit too much random online.

 

This version of the game or this online are less playable/stable and less smooth than VF5FS, 100%.

I don't know why it's so silent in the VF community... But this shit online is unacceptable in 2022, it's full of bullshit everytime or a mash fest.

Playing the real VF is almost impossible, VF5US online is too random.

Delay netcode is cancer.

F*** their Tekken costumes, and by the way VF5US online give me a worst impression than Tekken 7 online when it was very bad the first years...