Part-way through a match, suddenly you get a loading screen and "The Host has Left"?

I mean, I know SEGA don't have dedicated servers or are able to prevent it, but it does grind my gears when just because someone has a bad match and quits, the whole game is cancelled. I'd say, without exaggeration, about 25% of my matches have ended this way.

If things go so horribly wrong (usually because my team decide to go running around like they're playing COD rather than, oh I dunno, WELDING THE FREAKING DOORS SHUT!), that I have to leave, if I get a warning that I will cancel the game, then no matter what I'll stay until the round is complete first. That way, no-one loses any XP.

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Weyland Yutani Corp. Bio-Weapons Division - "Superior Weapons through Superior Genetics"

I would of thought they would impliment a 'Host Migration' method thats exsisted since Modern Warfare 2, if its able to be done. leaves me wondering, why it was not included.

_________________
Easily distracted by shiny things...

Just one of the major frustrating MP issues with this game.

I'm not a hot programmer, nor have I ever been involved in any games development; but I really don't understand why more of the underpinnings for solid MP isn't included in the Xbox/DirectX or PlayStation SDK.

As a naive outsider, I would ask: Even if every game has to have it's own, bespoke MP code for orchestrating the game while it's in progress and resolving paradoxes etc, why can't the SDK provide host-migration in the background? The host must hold a data-structure that contains the complete and consistent state of the game from second-to-second. Would it be too heavy on bandwidth for the SDK to "automagically" replicate this data, checkpointed maybe every second, to another client such that all clients can reconnect to that secondary host and restart the game from that checkpoint?

If it were to target only the case where the host quits (rather than powers-off or crashes), giving the system warning of the host's departure, then the problem would seem even easier...

I know that is over-simplified, and it would always increase the chances for bugs - but if it was done really robustly "behind the scenes" by the SDK then these bugs would only surface during host migration (and I'd say that unreliable host-migration is better than none?) and the testing load would be minimised.

I am pretty sure I'm missing something so I'm hopeful that people with experience can set me straight.

I'll try to dig out some papers on developers approach to network code.
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/3 ... hp?print=1

Was getting a lot of host quits yesterday, and messages accusing me of cheating. My Marine is rank 60 and my xeno at 41, maybe I've played enough to be pretty good

_________________
A11/TQ1.0.32150E1 Murphy, J - Covert recording headcam. There is no flashing red light when you are on Kona-Cam
Weyland-Yutani: Their projects are intentionally full of bugs. Avoid!

Getting Rupture for my Spitter has caused some grief too, but as 99.99% of players (CoD/Halo fanboys probably) don't have headsets, I've only had a few messages.

Playing the private match last night, the other player was bewildered why it took a lot of shots to put my xenos down, until I told him I had all the health/regen upgrades fitted. Rather like someone's thread on here about kill issues.

_________________
Steve
Corporal in 69th Regt. 1st Batt. Homer’s Heroes.

"I'd like to die at the age of 80 in my own bed, with a belly full of wine and a girl's mouth around my c**k."

oh the old you must be cheating because your better than i am retort, i used to get that alot playing xwing vs tie fighter online

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SSgt Kris "Bloodsucker" Kobus, VAS.
A09/TQ2.0.12136E1

Seems legit.
I'm not aware of 'any' other reason you could be beating them without cheating.

Nope, none!!
I used to link up my PS1 with a friend and play Command & Conquer.
I'd just be busting through his walls and 'BOOM'...he reset his machine.
Now that took guts...no internet anonymity there...he was right next to me!!

_________________

I have fibre internet (75Mbps with crazy low ping) so I started off playing ACM MP with a tiny QoS queue and a bandwidth cap set for XBL on my router (so it wouldn't host any games) to stop me feel guilty about rage-quitting.

So, after some voice problems, I removed the throttle and realised that the game is actually fun if you don't have an artificially crap connection making it 10x harder. I'm still crap, but it at least means I can be crap without it being frustrating - you actually CAN down an Alien with one or two shotgun blasts if you don't have a 250ms ping ... And now I don't do badly enough to want to rage-quit ...

I've actually not heard much about glitches and cheating yet in A:CM, I know some other games are full of it (Operation Raccoon City isn't fun when you empty a belt of ammo from a HMG into someone's face, and they ignore it, CQC you, then at the end you see they have no deaths at all!).

I've had good games and bad, my marine died in about 30 seconds on survivor, another time went the whole match without even being hit once, those are the breaks. I'm an average player, so I'd expect a Level 41 xeno to be beating me to death with my own spine!

_________________
Weyland Yutani Corp. Bio-Weapons Division - "Superior Weapons through Superior Genetics"

DONT break your brain again

_________________
SSgt Kris "Bloodsucker" Kobus, VAS.
A09/TQ2.0.12136E1

What amuses me about multiplayer games like this is how people immediately think
you're cheating if you have a high level, and still have crap games.

I GRIND my way through games. It's not like I prestige after playing the game for a weekend
like a lot of these kids, I slowly climb through the ranks one kill at a time. Persistence doesn't equal
amazing skills.

My k/d rating normally sucks, but that doesn't mean ( most of the time) I'm not having fun.

_________________
"A writer needs a pen, a painter a brush, and a filmmaker an army." - Orson Wells.

http://www.rookscastle.com
http://www.alchemyarms.com

Hahahahaha, that's awesome!!!

I do find the cheating premise creeps up when I was playing CoD Black ops II (don't hate me!), and noticed guys going 30+ kills with 1-3 deaths. You empty a mag into them and they don't die, or they appear to move faster and have super-human reflexes.

I have found in A:CM it's entirely due to the lag being all over the place.

Pisses me off when the campers just stand on that fence on the Origin map. It's an almost unassailable position, and undoubtably a bug. I do so HOPE they fix it in an update.

You can't frag your buddies (I tried) but you can plant a claymore on a nearby crate. If a xeno trips it just right, it might get the campers too.

If they are up there and getting swarmed with xenos I won't do a damn thing to help them.

-HUMVEE Driver

If they camp that corner, the spitter with acid trap and rupture comes out to play.

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A11/TQ1.0.32150E1 Murphy, J - Covert recording headcam. There is no flashing red light when you are on Kona-Cam
Weyland-Yutani: Their projects are intentionally full of bugs. Avoid!

You know that some people are going to be far better at the multiplayer when you see they're marine level 45+, but when you check their trophies they're only done the first three missions of the campaign.

You see it with a lot of multiplayer FPS games, where people with have it for about a fortnight, then be almost incredible levels with most of the stuff onlocked, but no campaign play at all. They've just played multiplayer for 16 hrs a day, 7 days a week.

As to COD, yeah interesting things happen on that game, in fact I won't even play it any more. I think the one that did it for me was, a camper led on the floor facing a spawn point at a range of 2 metres with an M60, racking up kill after kill, and nothing my team could do to stop it. Spawn-die-spawn-die-spawn-die for 5 minutes straight isn't a fun game!

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Weyland Yutani Corp. Bio-Weapons Division - "Superior Weapons through Superior Genetics"

Oh, come on, spawn camping is a fact of life, just like in the real military!

oh, wait, that was that sarcasm thing I keep hearing about, wasn't it?

Spawn camping is a big problem in most FPS games. Ghost Recon Future Soldier
is a fun game, but you get people camping just out side your spawn point and you
might as well not even play.

I actually got into a n ACM game last night where all the Marines day buy the fence.
It was a bug slaughter big time because, as mentioned, the bugs could
get within range without getting killed.

I'd say half our squad was using Battle rifles with the smart scope, so spotting them at range
was quite easy.

The new DLC should come out pretty soon now though, so that will be nice.

_________________
"A writer needs a pen, a painter a brush, and a filmmaker an army." - Orson Wells.

http://www.rookscastle.com
http://www.alchemyarms.com

If the marines work together, you can make it hard for the xenos in the wide-open maps, but the indoors maps with lots of vents are a good challenge.

Last night, I got killed, respawned, stepped round the corner to see a crusher bearing down on me. I spent a full two minutes running, dodging, and weaving with the SOB on my ass all the way to the point I got tackled by the waiting lurker I got herded towards!

Thing is, despite the critical drubbing the game got, I usually have FUN, even if I get bottom of the leaderboard. Can't say that with a lot of FPS.

_________________
Weyland Yutani Corp. Bio-Weapons Division - "Superior Weapons through Superior Genetics"

True to that last point. I can't count the number of times I've wanted to
break the COD or Modern Warfare game discs in half due to the frustration level.

_________________
"A writer needs a pen, a painter a brush, and a filmmaker an army." - Orson Wells.

http://www.rookscastle.com
http://www.alchemyarms.com

One of my friends was telling me about this, and I was like "Oh, no!" then the very next match, as soon as it started on Origin, I saw some poor bastard up on the fence. I had picked the Soldier xeno from the start and was thinking "Oh great, now watch me get killed cause this guy is apparently unreachable!, Might as well dive in and make it quick so I can come back as a Spitter and try to spit on him to death!"

This is what happened:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Guavmnz28VY

_________________
Lt. Melissa L. Klassen, ALG
AL Colonial Admin. - Executive Officer (XO) -- 2021-2022
RCCM | Royal Canadian Colonial Marines - Commanding Officer (CO) -- 2021-2022

Read the AL Charter Rules & Regulations: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1i3gd9QUyIqI_6rfk8kpxspbKU-JT4MBAjLPxfCkvGJ8

Huh! I did NOT know you could do that! You rock, Moosh!

I am soooo adding you as a friend tomorrow night. We have to get in a few games together soon!

-HUMVEE Driver

Haha, thanks!, Was that pun intended? haha

Its funny cause you can totally see my dreaded thought play out in my head as I sit there staring at the guy before I dove in, then when I killed him so easily, I was like "really?? that was it??" hahaha

_________________
Lt. Melissa L. Klassen, ALG
AL Colonial Admin. - Executive Officer (XO) -- 2021-2022
RCCM | Royal Canadian Colonial Marines - Commanding Officer (CO) -- 2021-2022

Read the AL Charter Rules & Regulations: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1i3gd9QUyIqI_6rfk8kpxspbKU-JT4MBAjLPxfCkvGJ8

Cool, it's always good when you see someone "break" a glitch.

_________________
Weyland Yutani Corp. Bio-Weapons Division - "Superior Weapons through Superior Genetics"

Not at all; it never would have occured to me to just 'get under their radar' and simply aim up.

-HUMVEE Driver

Make sure you cling to the rocks so you are able to tail strike

_________________
Lt. Melissa L. Klassen, ALG
AL Colonial Admin. - Executive Officer (XO) -- 2021-2022
RCCM | Royal Canadian Colonial Marines - Commanding Officer (CO) -- 2021-2022

Read the AL Charter Rules & Regulations: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1i3gd9QUyIqI_6rfk8kpxspbKU-JT4MBAjLPxfCkvGJ8