mudkipzjm Posted June 26, 2019 Share Posted June 26, 2019 (edited) Someone linked an article in a Discord channel I'm in explains how data in PSO works. I'll paste relevant information down below. Some of this is already kind of widely known but there were still a few interesting bits in there. Quote During the PSO era, players had limited bandwidth and speed. The developers came up with their own clever ways of reducing network traffic. PSO’s network was built as a decentralized server in the way it handle data transmissions. As a decentralized server, the clients process information and send that data to a server. The server only relays that information and send it to other clients. The clients would also send their data to the server which then relays it back to everyone else and the party leader. The party leader’s client is responsible for handling all synchronization processes. (Synchronization makes sure that everyone sees the same thing at the same time in the same position.) This is a contrast of a centralized server model where the server itself handles the processing of all data and synchronization. (Like OnLive) The leader of the party doesn’t synchronize everything, only important events such as when a monster is dead, when a monster is knocked down, and damage the enemy receives and deals. Enemy positions are not transmitted to other players. On your screen, enemies appear at a different position from the ones that are shown on your party members’ screen. Bosses are synchronized with all players. The clients themselves (I’m guessing the party leader) transmits commands to other players which controls their boss. The boss has a set of actions available to him. Its AI decides what to do, when to jump, who to target, and changes this at will. These actions are then sent as a command to other players, which are then stored inside their boss’ action queue. How they track your position: To reduce the amount of data that is transmitted, PSO limits the aspects of how your character moves. In PSO, at the time you press the button to move your character in a certain direction, the game will lock you in that direction for six frames of animation before allowing you to change. (I don’t believe this applies to those who stop moving and change directions.) With this method, the game can determine which point you are heading to on a map. (This data will be transmitted to other players which will see exactly where you are, given that there is no forms of lag) So at the moment you press towards a direction, your destination is set to that position. Basically what I gather from this is: Desync doesn't exist, since it never existed in the first place. It makes sense why DMC is worse on players with bad connection. Here's the article if you want to read it yourself: http://www.bumped.org/psublog/technical-concepts-of-phantasy-star-online-universe-and-portable-2/ Edited June 26, 2019 by mudkipzjm 7 2 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trigunman Posted June 26, 2019 Share Posted June 26, 2019 Good find and fascinating read Mudkipz, thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BoomShakaLarka Posted June 26, 2019 Share Posted June 26, 2019 When I play side by side with my brother, we'll do things like have the monsters aggro onto the other person on our own screen. Ends up with nobody tanking; the mobs just slap the open air. Could you imagine PSO2 with DMC? lmao rip 12 man mpas 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kikori Posted June 27, 2019 Share Posted June 27, 2019 (edited) Pretty neat way they worked around the limits of consoles back then, even if still inconvenient for the present. I wonder if we could use this to some advantage and figure out whose connections work best for hosting? Never have tested if a /ping command is in the game, but this would make it a pretty good thing to have. Edited June 27, 2019 by Kikori Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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