Headshot & Network
Headshot Headshot
Network Network
Network Network
Hey Headshot, ever wonder how those old pixel‑art games kept their servers humming on dial‑up? I’m trying to map the latency tricks they used before every ping hit a packet loss. What’s your take?
Headshot Headshot
Yeah, the old pixel‑art servers were a miracle of frugality. They ran at a few ticks a second and sent only the delta, not the whole map. Every packet was tiny, just a handful of bytes, so even a 56k line could keep a handful of players in sync. The trick was to drop less important updates when a packet was lost, and the client would do its own little prediction—move that avatar a bit until the next update came. It wasn’t perfect, but the game never looked like it was freezing; it just stayed “close enough.” So if you’re mapping the latency tricks, start with tick rate, delta compression, and the client‑side prediction that hid the lag. Those days were all about making the most out of the least bandwidth.
Network Network
Sounds like a classic throttling dance—keep the packets lean, drop the fluff, and let the client smooth the edges. I’d start by sniffing the tick cadence, then map the delta chunks, see where the packets slip, and put a guard on the most critical updates. A solid firewall at the edge can still make that 56k feel like a boutique link. Got any logs or packet traces to play with?
Headshot Headshot
I’m afraid I don’t have any real packet traces to hand over, but if you can capture a few cycles of those old servers, you’ll see the same pattern: a steady 30‑60 tick cadence, tiny delta payloads, and the client doing most of the heavy lifting. That’s the sweet spot.
Network Network
Got it. I'll set up a minimal emulator to mimic that 30‑60 tick loop, capture the deltas, and watch the client do the smoothing. Just ping me when you’re ready to pull the logs from the old stack, or I can pull the sample dumps from the archive. Let's keep the connection tight and the latency low.
Headshot Headshot
Alright, send me the dumps. Just make sure they’re the raw packets, no extra metadata. I’ll sift through the deltas and compare them to the 30‑60 tick pattern you’re emulating. Once I’ve got the old stack logs, I’ll run my own replay and flag every hiccup. Let’s keep it tight, no wasted bandwidth.
Network Network
Here are the raw packet dumps from the old servers. They’re plain capture files with no extra metadata—just the raw Ethernet frames. I’ve put them in a zip; the link is below. You should see the 30‑60 tick cadence and the tiny delta payloads. Let me know if the replay triggers any hiccups.
Headshot Headshot
I can’t actually grab that zip, but if the raw frames show a 30‑60 tick rhythm and the payloads are only a handful of bytes, you’re on the right track. The trick will be to isolate the delta packets and see how the client predicts on loss. Once you run the replay, watch for any spikes that line up with the missed ticks—those are your bottlenecks. Let me know what the timestamps look like and I’ll help pinpoint the hiccups.
Network Network
Got the captures. The timestamps line up to a 32‑tick cycle, with packet gaps just under 30 ms. The deltas are 12–16 bytes each. When I injected a 5 % packet loss, the replay showed a burst of out‑of‑sync updates right at the missed tick, exactly where you’d expect the client to back‑off. The spikes were at 120 ms, 180 ms, and 240 ms—those are the bottlenecks. Let me know if you want me to filter the delta stream and isolate the loss windows.
Headshot Headshot
Nice work on pulling those gaps—those 120, 180, and 240‑ms spikes line up with every fourth tick. That’s where the client’s back‑off kicks in. Send me the filtered delta stream for the loss windows and I’ll compare the packet contents to see exactly how the client’s prediction is failing. I’ll also run a quick replay to see if the old smoothing logic still holds up. Let's see if we can pinpoint the exact packet that breaks the rhythm.