I love the fact that people always respond with "it's your connection". It's quite clearly the fact that Spiral Knights is the only MMO targeted worldwide yet having only US servers, when even your average Facebook flash game can manage to have widely distributed servers. Inter-continental connections simply aren't good enough for a flawless gaming experience, and adding server load to that just makes things worse :(

Give us Europeans some loving would you OOO? :P

Oh, and I don't think client sided is the way forward, but maybe something that took the client's shielding into account would be nice!

It has the double whammy effect too: you are left thinking "WTH I've just walked across half the room with my shield up, why didn't it work?", and to make it worse on every else's screen you look like a total n00b for walking straight into an easily shieldable attack >:(

The thought of living with the internet in Australia.

U mad bro?

Seriously, you rage at a game, then rage at someone for pointing out the game isn't responsible. No one told you to move. They told you to get over it.

Patito. You got your definition of rage wrong. I may use crude language, but it's more for some social emphasis rather than rage. However, since people like you tend to take it the wrong way I'll start using a factual manner of grammar. On a separate note: never once have I said or implied anything about people telling me to move. To be accurate, I was stating directly that he was implying the fault lies with the residents for the lack of adequate service. And nobody told me to get over it, they inaccurately pointed out a lack of patience in people with patience.

People like you always think they are so cheeky. Typing with the same few phrases and getting pretty much every fact wrong. Admittedly, this does annoy me. So I guess you've accomplished your goal.

Garbeld. I'm inclined to agree that it's really nobodies fault. However, you've also gotten something wrong. I've stated 'players' and 'customers', never have I targeted an individual. If enough people wanted a claw weapon, the company would consider it, no? If enough people wanted shurikens, I'm sure that would also be considered. IF people really thought the game wasn't a satisfying experience without player-usable claws and shurikens, then somebody will surely hear that plea.

Whether you like it or not, this game is a business. And in a business final and foremost priority is to satisfy the needs of its customers. False promises can be made, only to be reprimanded by the player-base and gaming media. I know they've never suggested anything like having full internet coverage across the globe. However to me, especially now that the game is on steam, it seems like the game is targeted to the gamers all over the globe. And believe it or not, that includes Australia. Now if their target really is players all over the world, failing to adequately cover apart of that would be counter-productive to that goal wouldn't it? So yes, it is their responsibility.

WHY THE *core* IS EVERYTHING SERVERSIDED?!

It's not just a matter of hackers, which you touched on, and although you dismissed it is still a completely valid reason for everything to be managed by the server. In addition, there's the matter of synchronization. Inevitably, the clients of players in a party will have different notions of when and where things happen, and the server must be the final arbiter of what has actually happened. The simplest, and in my opinion the most sensible, way to do this is to simply manage everything server side and respond to player actions as they reach the server. Lag is unfortunate, but inevitable. If you do more on the client side, you don't get rid of it, you simply change how it manifests. For example, if someone else's client informs the server that a monster was shield bounced M milliseconds ago, and you receive the notification that the monster is now right in front of you and attacking N milliseconds later, you're now suffering from an effective M+N millisecond lag on that event instead of the N milliseconds you would under the current system. Plus, the door would be open a lot wider for hackers? It's lose-lose.

Yes, lag is a pain. Feedback on things like when the shield is actually active could be improved. But you can't just wish away the lag.

Couldn't**

I've got a 2500K @ 4.5 Ghz, and a hd 5830 to match on 8 gigs of ram and a 15 mbps connection (all the time, not burst).
Why is it that a game that is on par with Bomberman 64 is performing so poorly?
Lag. I'm getting kinda tired of playing now and seeing my character bumble around like a drunken idiot.

Try to go down one hallway?
Oops, lag teleported you around the corner.

Trying to kite a monster?
Oops, you're actually running into and not around that block.

Trying to block a gremlin's throw attack?
Oops, you can't get your shield up in time. Ever.

Trying to use your 3-hit combo?
Oops, only 2 will ever connect, but will it be the one with knockback? Who knows!

The power of your machine has absolutely no bearing on network latency. All powerful hardware can help you do is draw the visuals faster and avoid fighting a low framerate, which I'm pretty sure you're not. Spiral Knights isn't a resource-heavy game so any reasonably contemporary machine should be able to run it well.

What you're describing is a combination of a high ping time and lost packets. Ping time basically describes the time it takes between when you press a button and when you see an action on the screen, though a lot of contemporary games have "lag compensation" to make the game look and feel smoother. Just be aware that at any given tim you're around a quarter second BACK from where it seems like you are. Lost packets are what causes the "stuttering" or "rubberbanding" effects, and those are instances where you issue a command to the server, but that command never reaches it. When that happens, your client has a set amount of time to wait for a response from the server, and if it doesn't get one, it re-issues the command, slowing it down considerably. Depending on how many times you lose the same packet, you can end up seeing your commands take 3/4 of a second to execute.

When people say "it's probably your connection," it's because it usually is. Not YOUR connection in particular, but you only have control over the connection between your PC and your exterior wall. From then on, it's your provider's connection quality, and then from then on it's the quality of whatever network hubs you're being routed through and their providers and their network quality. If you trace your internet calls to practically anywhere in the world, you'll notice that they jump through about a dozen stops, and each of those stops adds time and runs the risk of losing connections. If a line between you and the Spiral Knights is crappy, neither you nor OOO can do anything about it, especially if it's a third country somewhere in the world.

For those interested, I'd suggest running a http://www.speedtest.net/ test for your connection both to your physical location to test your provider and to wherever the Spiral Knights servers are located and see what you get, both for connection speed and ping, and if you really want to know, for packet loss, as well. Chances are your results will deteriorate FAST as you move away from your physical location.

---

Now, I'm not saying that there's no chance of anything being wrong with the Spiral Knights servers. I've been playing MMOs to know that even professional development studios sometimes goof up in very simple ways. However, what I AM saying is that this is fairly rare and if it is the case, everyone would be feeling it. I'm in Eastern Europe, myself, and I've never noticed much of any "lag" to complain about outside of no more than two or three separate instance over about 12 hours of gameplay. I like to think my provider is good, but more than that, I like to think Spiral Knights has some pretty aggressive lag compensation, as there's no chance in hell I'm running at less than 100ms of ping to ANY US-based server.

Incidentally, can I call up a netgraph or other network performance tool in-game somehow?

Any game that makes money of player grinds really can't operate without direct quality control, otherwise it's fairly easy to make a trainer for it and just give yourself wads of resources. Anything that's local on the client side is prone to hacking as no protection is really secure enough to determined specialists. And when the actions of one player can impact the experience for the whole community and, by extension, the developer's bottom line, that's a big no-no. So I wouldn't expect to see Spiral Knights playable offline unless they make a separate version of that and sell it as a full-priced game. I might actually buy that.

However, I keep wondering if there isn't a better way to handle that kind of quality control than to have the server oversee everything in real time. I wonder if it isn't possible for the game to play largely on the client, at least when solo, and just give the server periodical event logs so the server can judge if the player is cheating based on what has happened and why. You'd still have to deal with real-time positioning when playing with other people, but I still find it better for their characters to seem laggy on my screen than for MY character to lag for me. Sure, it ain't pretty for team-mates to be laggy on your end, but at least it doesn't impair your ability to block and dodge.

have you tried fiddleing with the advanced settings at all?

After the most recent patch it was "lagging" horribly, but then I fiddled with the adv settings and unchecked "enable vertical sync" and it cleared right up.

... in a game with no pvp ...

There is no PvP now, but there will be.

Ppl will start complaining like this.

Wtf???!!
I(read: my game client) already killed that noob(read: u)??!!?
Why is he not spewing heat marbles on the ground!!?!?!??
Wad? U say u shielded? Nonsence u did no such crap.
I am gonna report u as a hacker!
GTFO NOOB!! HAXX!!

Its a rough outline. Read it with a dash of imagination.

What if for some strange (banana) reason no water reached you? Do you think "(Apple), my fault for living here"?. What if some guy smashed his car into your house? Do you think "(Rambutan), my fault for being in his way"?. I don't think so man. The driver has the responsibility to watch out for others. The government has a responsibility to provide water coverage for all residents. And a game company has the responsibility to satisfy the gaming needs of its customers. The players.

You switch to a very different definition of "responsibility" for gaming companies. The public waterworks has a legal obligation to provide water to people living in its residential zones. Drivers accept a legal obligation to drive safely when they receive their license. Companies have an economic impetus to attract new customers. Until a contract is entered, a company has no legal or moral debt to the people who would consume their products.

If pressed, I might agree that Three Rings has a responsibility to investigate the possibility of international servers, comparing the potential for a wider playerbase and increased revenue against the costs and technical challenges. But here's why people react so poorly to these kinds of posts: why would anyone assume that Three Rings isn't already doing this? Does Crimsonsteel really believe he knows more about international servers and clientside programming than a company that has designed a number of successful MMOs?

I'm not saying people shouldn't voice their opinions, absolutely not. But Crimsonsteel could have simply asked if the Spiral Knights team had any plans to add Australian servers and noted that, while he likes a lot of things about SK, the lag is a serious problem for him. Instead, he resorted to immediately questioning their competence and commitment while simultaneously demanding better service. It's the combination of being both arrogant enough to assume that the Spiral Knights team doesn't already have skill and experience designing MMO client-server models and access to detailed data about population by region and average ping as well as the immaturity to open his post with "Why does it suck so bad" that makes me wonder why anyone would defend him, or anyone else in this thread who followed his example.

I was intending on giving rise to situations where individuals are handicapped due to an external influence beyond their control. Consequently, the question this brought up should have been: "In such a situation, would you blame the handicapped individual?".

Well, "blame" is a very different word. I think everyone can agree that you can't blame the handicapped individual. The interesting question is, what's the role of the provider (be it government services, a for-profit company, etc.) in that case? I think that's too large a question to tackle here, but I will say this: Spiral Knights is a free-to-play game provided by a for-profit company. It's entertainment. It's a luxury. It's a FREE luxury. Trying to assign "blame" or invoke "responsibility" or label lag-affected players as "handicapped" is making a mountain out of a molehill.

Responsibility is not about legal or moral debt,

Actually, Miriam-Webster defines "responsibility" as "the quality or state of moral, legal, or mental accountability".

nor is it about entering a contract, it's about taking on the consequence of a self-initiated event.

Typically, "responsibility" does not refer to that final definition. That IS one of the definitions of "responsible", as in "liable to be called to account as the primary cause, motive, or agent" (note the use of "liable", which goes back to "legal accountability"), but the definition of "responsibility" refers only to accountability or burden, not merely "being the primary agent of".

This is getting pedantic, though. You've already rescinded your parallel between "lack of access to potable water" and "lack of access to lag-free gaming", which is what really bothered me. But you're still trying to use "responsibility", and I'm just saying that implies far more than you actually seem to be arguing.

My intention was not to subjectively force people to believe that Three Rings must fix this issue. The entire reasoning behind everything I have been posting was to get people to understand that this lag is not the fault of the players.

I don't actually see anyone arguing that it's the fault of the player, though? I don't think there's any contention about who decides where the servers are, just level of obligation a gaming company has to its players. I may be missing something, though. SoSpecial, who you initially responded to, just says that it's not the fault of the company, which is a reasonable stance. His overall point is "being offered something for free, even if ultimately that something isn't good enough for you, is a poor reason to complain", which I would agree with, if not his roundabout way of putting it.

To clarify: I'm not defending or following the example of Crimsonsteel, nor am I making assumptions about Three Rings. Don't make sentences that sound like you are assuming that I'm assuming things that are presumably wrong.

You were at least sort of defending him by telling SoSpecial not to tell him to have patience. I think it's more a matter of civility and perspective than patience, but... well, anyway. I didn't mean to refer to you when I talked about people following his example, but I think I being unclear. Sorry about that.