Strange observation about desync/resync/games hanging
Posted: 20 Jun 2007, 11:53
Ok, this is going to sound completely wonky, but bear with me, maybe this helps some people.
You know when the connection hangs and all units, particles etc. keep on moving in the same direction until they're off the map? When the whole game hangs but there are no desync messages? I've found that I can somehow resync the game in that situation: I alt-tab into the lobby, type something, and alt-tab back into the game. The effect is nearly immediate: I come back, a second later everything starts working again. If I wait longer before doing this, it still works the same way. If I do not type anything, it doesn't work. This measure was successful 8 out of the 9 times I tried it in the past few games that got stuck.
I'm not completely sure whether it is merely correlation or whether typing in the lobby actually unhangs the game somehow, but most of the time, this seems to work. Since the games I'm in don't hang often enough to reliably test this, I thought I'd just let you lot know so you can try it yourself when it happens to you (only try this if you know you can safely alt-tab). It is of course possible that in those 8 instances, the game unstuck itself in the exact moment I came back from the lobby, but it does seem a bit unlikely. Anyway, I thought I'd just throw that out there.
Now the important question: Is this actually technically feasible or am I imagining things?
You know when the connection hangs and all units, particles etc. keep on moving in the same direction until they're off the map? When the whole game hangs but there are no desync messages? I've found that I can somehow resync the game in that situation: I alt-tab into the lobby, type something, and alt-tab back into the game. The effect is nearly immediate: I come back, a second later everything starts working again. If I wait longer before doing this, it still works the same way. If I do not type anything, it doesn't work. This measure was successful 8 out of the 9 times I tried it in the past few games that got stuck.
I'm not completely sure whether it is merely correlation or whether typing in the lobby actually unhangs the game somehow, but most of the time, this seems to work. Since the games I'm in don't hang often enough to reliably test this, I thought I'd just let you lot know so you can try it yourself when it happens to you (only try this if you know you can safely alt-tab). It is of course possible that in those 8 instances, the game unstuck itself in the exact moment I came back from the lobby, but it does seem a bit unlikely. Anyway, I thought I'd just throw that out there.
Now the important question: Is this actually technically feasible or am I imagining things?