Gaming room (It's a geeks paradise)

[Keef]

So, no one can tell me anything about Fable 2?

On a Wii note, my sister ordered me the Ghostbusters game for xmas, which I've yet to get. Am looking forward to playing that, apparently it's short, but good fun.

[Sandperson]

'Flash out' raises a few eyebrows too.

[mockney piers]

You can borrow fable 2 if you like. Zero punctuations review of it is absolutely spot on, that said it's quite enjoyable if you ignore the ham fisted attempt at morality.

[SeanMacGabhann]

did you not get my PM about it keef?

You can download the first chapter or two for free to try it out on the xbox marketplace

[Keef]

Cool, may as well take mockers up on his offer, and just crack on. That said, Fable 2 and Obvlivion are probably a bit similar, so I'd best get something different to break up the experiences.

[mockney piers]

They're really not that similar even though both are big RPGs.

It's more like comparing IL2 Sturmkovich to Ace Combat respectively.

[Keef]

Er ... Okay.

No idea what you just said, but I'll take your word for it.

[mockney piers]

Simulation versus arcade basically. Oblivion requires a bit of commitment for a half decent session, at least an hour I'd say. Fable 2 you can just pick it up and let it go willy nilly.

[Narnia]

Geeks......advice please. My son is often complaining about his PING when playing his online games. I understand this to be broadband speed related. We have the Virgin 20mb deal. I was wondering if any of you have speed related issues with your broadband? What is the best broadband service available? I'd have thought Virgin being cable would be. We've spoken to them a few times and have had a new modem and router from them in recent months. Apart from his PC we use 2 other laptops regularly. Is the best/only option to upgrade to their 50mb service? I find the current service fine but don't do online gaming hence I'm asking you gamers for advice.

Thanks in advance for any help/information

[Loz]

I'm not an online gamer, but I have played with networks.

Ping speed is less a speed issue, but more what they call latency. This is usually made worse by either pure distance from you to the server you are talking to or, more usually, by the number of 'hops' (i.e. number of routers you pass through to transmit your request around the world). Network traffic peak times will also have an effect - I suspect he's not been happy over the last few days with everyone staying/working from home.

A 'ping' message is a very small test message. So, upping your broadband speed would probably have little to no effect on your ping speed. Besides, 20Mb cable is pretty good.

The only real things he can change are to find a more local server to connect to or, failing that, a different server. Each server will have different ping times (unless the problem is at your end). You could change provider (assuming Virgin is the problem), but that may leave you better/worse/the same.

Is he wirelessly connected to your router, or hardwired? Wireless may cause some latency, especially if you have a lot of neighbours with wireless broadband.

Apart from trying that, I doubt there is a lot he can do.

If he wants to see a bit more info that just ping speed, try the 'tracert' command from the windows command line. You can see how many hops a route takes and which hops are taking the longest time. You may not get a full trace, as some routers/firewalls block the traceroute packets for security reasons.

[mockney piers]

What loz said basically, my advice too would have been too would be to go wired.

I'm only on about 1.4 Mbits as I'm so far from the Brixton exchange on creaky old cable and creaky old exchange and that's fine for xboxing.

Yep, like most things it's the snow meaning people are clogging up the virtual roads in the same fashion.

[ratty]

also, if other are using the net whilst he is gaming then he will experience lag. It may be however that he is ping obsessed and is blaming his lack of gaming skills on it. Not be horrid, I used to do this with cs until I realised I just was not very good at it. :)

[Floating Onion]

BAh. Stranded away from the XBox. No gaming for me!

[Keef]

Or me! ;-)

[Floating Onion]

I know. Sorry!

[Loz]

Mockney Piers,

Have you tried the bellwire removal trick? It more than doubled my speed to about 5.5Mb, which is pretty good since my provider only thinks I should be getting about 4Mb.

Instructions here. No responsibility taken if you mess you wiring up. I had all six wires connected - you only need wires 2 and 5. Test your router in the master socket to see if it is worth doing - I noticed an immediate and significant increase in speed. Note down what colour wire goes where before removing and remove - don't cut - the wires.

Loz

[womanofdulwich]

Do you think if you are a compulsive on line gamer anything could make you change your ways? Would you have to take up another button fiddling devise or could sex drugs rock and roll take its place instead of call of duty x box live ( halo etc before that?)?

Would appreciate older gamers advise how they manage life and constant at home access to x box? ( opposed to mum saying time to stop to 18 year old after 5 hours?)

[mockney piers]

Cheers loz, will look into it, a comms engineer mate gave me similar advice but actual physical tech scares me, code and stuff is easy compared to that.

Womanofdulwich, I've been a gamer all my life, but I guess online stuff didnt happen to me til i was in my thirties so difficult to judge how to deal with it for a youngster in this day and age.

My parents did ration games, just as they did telly and everything else, so go with your instinct and make sure the homework is done.

Gaming can be addictive, I had to rein in a bit of a World of Warcraft addiction a few years back; it never got even remotely out of control, but I found myself a bit obsessive about it. The main thing is, as long as it doesn't take you over, then of all the things that one might do it's cheap, its not especially unhealthy and it's waaaaay better than drink and drugs isn't it.

I'm a bit obsessed with call of Duty at the moment, but it's a short term thing, once he hits level 75 he'll get bored, then it'll be months before the next decent game comes out and hopefully he'll get some fresh air in the mean time ;-)

Mind you...18, I'm sure they'll work it out for themselves, it'll be fiiiiine.

[womanofdulwich]

I am hoping so, what if they leave home, first day work /uni they have been up playing all night and are found a week later slumped over their console not left their room or eaten - does this ever happen? I watched a program about world of warcraft and some addicts can't leave the room to go to the loo.................Don't want that to happen.

Just some people seem much more vulnerable than others to this? any other youngsters out there find it a problem?

[Narnia]

Thank you for your responses folks. The cable is actually connected to his PC. He phoned Virgin again last night and they have agreed to send an engineer tomorrow as they can no longer use the excuse of the router affecting the speed (as they have provided us with a new one). Strangely enough he has declared today that his PING is the best it's been for ages. Is this a coincidence or can the ISP influence a particular customer's supply?

[EDKiwi]

There are various settings that an ISP/telco can change remotely both on cable and ADSL broadband, so it could be that someone looked at the settings for you connection and tweaked something or found something not set right.

[Shu.Kurimu.Sensei]

http://i495.photobucket.com/albums/rr314/Shu_Kurimu_Sensei/SGT-FOLEY-RAMIREZ.jpg

[ratty]

OK Chaps, some advice. I have a wii, two controllers, nunchuck with wii sports, mario kart, tiger woods 08, Pro Evo 2008 and Who wants to be a millionaire.

I want to sell this on as I need funds towards a new laptop - any ideas how much I should ask??

[Keef]

To be honest, I doubt you'll get more than ?100.

[ratty]

100 would suit me fine. :)