How is your Dreamcast gaming going on?

[BoneSnapDeez]

This thread has me itching to play Skies of Arcadia again. It's certainly my favorite 6th gen JRPG and I also believe it's one of the best of all time.

Too bad there is no sequel, but I would like to try out this game sometime - which looks like it has a similar style:

[RCBH928]

I said this before here, but I am still amazed no one came up with a way to play DC online for cheap

IMO the best current way to get a Dreamcast online is the "Netopia" analogue router method. It will cost you less than a BBA in most cases, is easy to set up, and will support every game because it is still using the modem. This is, of course, if you can't use the normal dial up through the console.

You know I never heard a lot of people talking about their experience playing online with the Dreamcast. Has any one here experienced that? Was it a paid service? Was there lag? I played the 360 on 1mb/s connection and it had a ton of lag.

[jay_red]

I said this before here, but I am still amazed no one came up with a way to play DC online for cheap

IMO the best current way to get a Dreamcast online is the "Netopia" analogue router method. It will cost you less than a BBA in most cases, is easy to set up, and will support every game because it is still using the modem. This is, of course, if you can't use the normal dial up through the console.

You know I never heard a lot of people talking about their experience playing online with the Dreamcast. Has any one here experienced that? Was it a paid service? Was there lag? I played the 360 on 1mb/s connection and it had a ton of lag.

Well, I dont have a ton of experience, other than a hand full of games, I didnt get into online play on the DC till after most of the games were shut down. I used to play Quake 3 every night over a standard Dial Up connection, and the main issue you had to deal with was you had to shoot in front of the people, so they would "run into" your bullets/rockets. Once you got used to it was quite enjoyable.

I also played Starlancer, and don't remember it feeling laggy or anything, though I did not play this one very much. As for PSO, there is no issue with lag because its not PvP or anything, and playing on dialup or broadband is fine.

I would also like to hear any experiences from when the service was in full swing, there were a lot of games that supported online play, and it would be cool to know how they were.

[BurningDoom]

I personally couldn't play because I had America Online, and something about that ISP back then just didn't work with SegaNET.

But my best friend had it, and I played a bit of Quake III: Arena, Unreal Tournament, and some motorcycle racing game that I can't remember exactly what it was. He also played a bit of Phantasy Star Online, in addition to those other games he'd play with me there. I don't remember lag being an issue, and it was 56k dial-up with some software that enhanced the speed a little.

[RCBH928]

Did the games just connect you online, or was there like some sort of a portal that you could log into. I think the Genesis had an online adaptor where you would log into something like a web portal and you can see and do different kinds of stuff over there.


Its amazing that you could play over 56kbps no lag, I have a 10mbs and I kind of get a lag. I know its HD and all more demanding , but I am willing to drop the graphics or the fancy stuff for solid action. The great thing about games is that , once a fun game is always a fun game. Playing something like Quake 3 will probably be just as much fun or more than a current super HD FPS shooter.

[BurningDoom]

Did the games just connect you online, or was there like some sort of a portal that you could log into. I think the Genesis had an online adaptor where you would log into something like a web portal and you can see and do different kinds of stuff over there.

There would usually be a multiplayer or online option on the game menu that you'd access. There was also a web-browser disc you could get for the system. But there wasn't an online hub menu like XBox Live or anything.

[Hobie-wan]

Its amazing that you could play over 56kbps no lag, I have a 10mbs and I kind of get a lag.

Connection speed and lag are different things. Lag is a delay in response. If I yell at you from the other end of a (insert your local popular sport) field to turn on the water hose, it will take a half second or whatever for my voice to make it to you. That's lag. Even if it is a super high pressure water system, it will take another little bit before there's water coming out my end. Once the water makes it, I can have a steady stream of super fast water, the entire time it is coming.

So if you click on a video to start playing, there might be a second delay before it starts, but if you don't pause or skip around, the other end can keep feeding you a ton of data until you say otherwise. Older games didn't pass as much data along and tried to guess where someone would be based off the previous data it received. Less players in a game also meant less data. So a slow connection was fine as long as there was low latency (less lag). For gaming, all the speed in the world doesn't help if there's bad lag. A speedy connection helps with downloads and streams that are just staying constant without constant instruction changes.

[ExedExes]

Any love for Air Force Delta around here? It's an Air/Ace Combat ripoff, but a surprisingly good one. I learned that the series continued on the PS2 and Xbox.

[RCBH928]

Its amazing that you could play over 56kbps no lag, I have a 10mbs and I kind of get a lag.

Connection speed and lag are different things. Lag is a delay in response. If I yell at you from the other end of a (insert your local popular sport) field to turn on the water hose, it will take a half second or whatever for my voice to make it to you. That's lag. Even if it is a super high pressure water system, it will take another little bit before there's water coming out my end. Once the water makes it, I can have a steady stream of super fast water, the entire time it is coming.

So if you click on a video to start playing, there might be a second delay before it starts, but if you don't pause or skip around, the other end can keep feeding you a ton of data until you say otherwise. Older games didn't pass as much data along and tried to guess where someone would be based off the previous data it received. Less players in a game also meant less data. So a slow connection was fine as long as there was low latency (less lag). For gaming, all the speed in the world doesn't help if there's bad lag. A speedy connection helps with downloads and streams that are just staying constant without constant instruction changes.

You make a good explanation , but I thought games will always have that constant "yelling" back and forth for every action and reaction some one takes on an online game. How would some one fix lag then, if not by higher speeds? I always imagined that lower speeds meant harder time to fetch data causing the lag.

[jay_red]

Its amazing that you could play over 56kbps no lag, I have a 10mbs and I kind of get a lag.

Connection speed and lag are different things. Lag is a delay in response. If I yell at you from the other end of a (insert your local popular sport) field to turn on the water hose, it will take a half second or whatever for my voice to make it to you. That's lag. Even if it is a super high pressure water system, it will take another little bit before there's water coming out my end. Once the water makes it, I can have a steady stream of super fast water, the entire time it is coming.

So if you click on a video to start playing, there might be a second delay before it starts, but if you don't pause or skip around, the other end can keep feeding you a ton of data until you say otherwise. Older games didn't pass as much data along and tried to guess where someone would be based off the previous data it received. Less players in a game also meant less data. So a slow connection was fine as long as there was low latency (less lag). For gaming, all the speed in the world doesn't help if there's bad lag. A speedy connection helps with downloads and streams that are just staying constant without constant instruction changes.

You make a good explanation , but I thought games will always have that constant "yelling" back and forth for every action and reaction some one takes on an online game. How would some one fix lag then, if not by higher speeds? I always imagined that lower speeds meant harder time to fetch data causing the lag.

You are confusing Ping with Bandwidth. Ping is how fast your "yell" would get to the other person and is dependent on distance, bandwidth would be how much "water" your hose could move per second. With online games, bandwidth is not as big of an issue as Ping is, since its mostly small packets of data being sent back and forth.