I dunno where to post this really so sorry if this is the wrong section. It's sort of a map review but really more of a discussion about bnet and the sc2 editor itself.
Some time ago I made this typing trainer game called KeyBlasto. Pretty simple game: you shoot zerg by typing in words above them. For a fast typer, this type of game needs to be fluent. If there's any lag the game turns unplayable. I was aware of this when I made the game and did everything I could to reduce any calculation process to the minimum.
I would like to update this game and add alot more meat to it. Like abilities, boss battles, mored modes and general diversity but I dunno if it's worth the effort because of one thing: Battlenet.
After it got published I've gotten alot of reviews calling my game bad because it lags. It's truly disheartening because, as you may guess, when I playtest the map I have no lag whatsoever. I don't notice it on bnet either when I play on the european region where I live. However most of the bad reviews are coming from the american region (because blizzard featured my game there) and of course the lag is bad for me aswell if I try play there since I don't live there.
Is there a difference between bnet in the European region and the American region? And is it worth continuing on the sc2 editor? Should I just switch to another editor like Unity that don't have these restrictions?
The lag that you should estimate to exist in a game should be 4-6 game frames on fastest speed.
I've published a small simple map that measures the lag trigger input will have. It's called "Ping Test". The map measures the time it takes for a "mouse moves over dialog item"-event to be executed in the game. Obviously the time is different for you on each server:
- EU: I have 2-4 game frames delay (130ms real time)
- US: I have 6-7 game frames (300ms real time).
You can measure your own connection with that. Maybe you want to add that into your map, too.
People complaining about lag in an arcade map playing on any other of their home server, if the map is published in their region, are fairly stupid and should be ignored. They can avoid a big portion of the noticeable lag, but they fail to do so, instead they want you to be a magician.
Btw, I loled at "Whiners want Enter Key" trigger name. I took the liberty to crack the map to see if you do weird things in your triggers. :D I think the core problem is the clearing the text in the edit box because that currently overrides the input made shortly after space.
I'm not sure if that can be improved, though. I'm not using text fields in my maps, so I don't know.
edit:
In theory, you would require an action for the text field to just remove the first # chars of the current value instead of overriding its whole content. But there is no such feature, afaIk.
Solution approaches I would try to look into:
- Are there events for the input after the space after clearing the text that you throw away? I assume yes, but you throw them away. You might be able to add the inputted chars after the space to a label in front of the text box. Players wouldn't be able to edit their whole word anymore, but the input would still be there and input wouldn't be thrown away. Maybe there is a way to add the chars to the text field, but I assume that would be really tricky.
- use the button press events for typing instead of a chat box. This only works if the input is in order (or reverse order, so not random to allow you reconstruct the typed in word).
I might test a bit in the next days because this is a fun little problem.
Hey, I was one of those reviews here is what I posted.
Pretty good game thus far but the lack of sentence structure kept on making me want to hit enter instead of space screwing me over a few times because all of the words are broken up.
Also, after stress testing the game a bit, I discovered that if I pressed space and then started to type the next word too fast it would miss the first letter, making it frustrating to have to slow down a bit in order for a game about being speedy to properly work, so for example instead of saying the word "type" it would come out as "ype" even though i clearly hit the t.
This is a really good simple game though, so despite this last issue I will give it a 5 star rating, but it is certainly something that must be looked at.
I was thinking, what would be the harm of using the normal battle.net chat box other than it may look a bit less polished? I would be surprised if you got much latency from that. But I do know what you are dealing with, trying to eek out that extra frame or 2 of better performance ;)
Regarding the trigger: YES this is a problem indeed, but the editor is very restricted. Sadly I haven't found a better solution without having major drawbacks like, as you mentioned; not being able to edit the word, having to press enter repeatedly, force the user to change his inputs etc. None of these are hardly acceptable solution imo, this is a simple game; it should be simple to pick up and play. I stuck with my solution since it doesn't give me lag when I playtest at home and on eu region but it's still a dangerous trigger if it does lag because it "eats letters" as soon as there's a delay. If it can be improved, without drawbacks, it would sort of "save the game" :)
@joecab
I remember that review. It's good that I get a change to respond to it here:
Reason it's like that is because of that trigger Ahli mentions. If you type too fast and bnet has a delay then letters might get lost. Reason is that the trigger needs to clear the text box after you press space to get rid of your old word to have room for a new one - it might not "keep up" doing that before you hit new letters on your keyboard and when the trigger eventually does execute it "eats" these in-between letters for breakfast. It's a flaw that's difficult to do anything about.
I didn't use the standard chat box because of another flaw: you have to press twice. One time for opening it and a second time for sending you message. This slows you down quite abit. However, I've added the extra option to use it if you prefer in a later version. No harm in having two options to choose from imo.
I dunno where to post this really so sorry if this is the wrong section. It's sort of a map review but really more of a discussion about bnet and the sc2 editor itself.
Some time ago I made this typing trainer game called KeyBlasto. Pretty simple game: you shoot zerg by typing in words above them. For a fast typer, this type of game needs to be fluent. If there's any lag the game turns unplayable. I was aware of this when I made the game and did everything I could to reduce any calculation process to the minimum.
I would like to update this game and add alot more meat to it. Like abilities, boss battles, mored modes and general diversity but I dunno if it's worth the effort because of one thing: Battlenet.
After it got published I've gotten alot of reviews calling my game bad because it lags. It's truly disheartening because, as you may guess, when I playtest the map I have no lag whatsoever. I don't notice it on bnet either when I play on the european region where I live. However most of the bad reviews are coming from the american region (because blizzard featured my game there) and of course the lag is bad for me aswell if I try play there since I don't live there.
Is there a difference between bnet in the European region and the American region? And is it worth continuing on the sc2 editor? Should I just switch to another editor like Unity that don't have these restrictions?
The lag that you should estimate to exist in a game should be 4-6 game frames on fastest speed.
I've published a small simple map that measures the lag trigger input will have. It's called "Ping Test". The map measures the time it takes for a "mouse moves over dialog item"-event to be executed in the game. Obviously the time is different for you on each server:
- EU: I have 2-4 game frames delay (130ms real time)
- US: I have 6-7 game frames (300ms real time).
You can measure your own connection with that. Maybe you want to add that into your map, too.
People complaining about lag in an arcade map playing on any other of their home server, if the map is published in their region, are fairly stupid and should be ignored. They can avoid a big portion of the noticeable lag, but they fail to do so, instead they want you to be a magician.
Btw, I loled at "Whiners want Enter Key" trigger name. I took the liberty to crack the map to see if you do weird things in your triggers. :D
I think the core problem is the clearing the text in the edit box because that currently overrides the input made shortly after space.
I'm not sure if that can be improved, though. I'm not using text fields in my maps, so I don't know.
edit:
In theory, you would require an action for the text field to just remove the first # chars of the current value instead of overriding its whole content. But there is no such feature, afaIk.
Solution approaches I would try to look into:
- Are there events for the input after the space after clearing the text that you throw away? I assume yes, but you throw them away. You might be able to add the inputted chars after the space to a label in front of the text box. Players wouldn't be able to edit their whole word anymore, but the input would still be there and input wouldn't be thrown away. Maybe there is a way to add the chars to the text field, but I assume that would be really tricky.
- use the button press events for typing instead of a chat box. This only works if the input is in order (or reverse order, so not random to allow you reconstruct the typed in word).
I might test a bit in the next days because this is a fun little problem.
Hey, I was one of those reviews here is what I posted.
Pretty good game thus far but the lack of sentence structure kept on making me want to hit enter instead of space screwing me over a few times because all of the words are broken up.
Also, after stress testing the game a bit, I discovered that if I pressed space and then started to type the next word too fast it would miss the first letter, making it frustrating to have to slow down a bit in order for a game about being speedy to properly work, so for example instead of saying the word "type" it would come out as "ype" even though i clearly hit the t.
This is a really good simple game though, so despite this last issue I will give it a 5 star rating, but it is certainly something that must be looked at.
I was thinking, what would be the harm of using the normal battle.net chat box other than it may look a bit less polished? I would be surprised if you got much latency from that. But I do know what you are dealing with, trying to eek out that extra frame or 2 of better performance ;)
@Ahli634
It's a very good suggestion. I might add that.
Regarding the trigger: YES this is a problem indeed, but the editor is very restricted. Sadly I haven't found a better solution without having major drawbacks like, as you mentioned; not being able to edit the word, having to press enter repeatedly, force the user to change his inputs etc. None of these are hardly acceptable solution imo, this is a simple game; it should be simple to pick up and play. I stuck with my solution since it doesn't give me lag when I playtest at home and on eu region but it's still a dangerous trigger if it does lag because it "eats letters" as soon as there's a delay. If it can be improved, without drawbacks, it would sort of "save the game" :)
@joecab
I remember that review. It's good that I get a change to respond to it here: Reason it's like that is because of that trigger Ahli mentions. If you type too fast and bnet has a delay then letters might get lost. Reason is that the trigger needs to clear the text box after you press space to get rid of your old word to have room for a new one - it might not "keep up" doing that before you hit new letters on your keyboard and when the trigger eventually does execute it "eats" these in-between letters for breakfast. It's a flaw that's difficult to do anything about.
I didn't use the standard chat box because of another flaw: you have to press twice. One time for opening it and a second time for sending you message. This slows you down quite abit. However, I've added the extra option to use it if you prefer in a later version. No harm in having two options to choose from imo.