Yet another extrapolation topic
Posted: July 18th, 2020, 10:06 pmHello, everyone.
I was wondering... What would Haxball be like today, without extrapolation?
A big issue I have with today's Haxball compared to early html or any point in flash is the gameplay. Perhaps it wasn't changed per se, but the feeling for sure isn't the same as it was before. I think it has a lot to do with extrapolation... Extrapolation was made as a cure for input lag, but once people realized how OP it is the gameplay started changing. Now we have many players who base their whole gameplay/gamestyle around this "feature", doing things that were never possible earlier. Sure, that may be a good thing, but it also means that the advantage the better players had before is now mostly gone. In today's Haxball the main focus is on skill (90% extrapolation and getting used to it imo, other 10% is pure skill), fake kicks, blocks, incredible angle shots, "tricking" in corners, backpassing to dm, dm instantly backpassing back, then more choking of the ball in corner, it's basically killing the game and personally, I don't enjoy that at all, I know many of us don't. Just imagine that most of us play on 20-50ms latency, yet a lot of people use 100-200ms extrapolation. Literally anyone could start using that much and in a week they'd be able to do amazing turns, fake kicks, overall become incredibly skilled and unpredictable... It does come at a cost of visual lag, but it's nothing compared to what you gain from it.
Let's say someone decided to use 100 extrapolation, at the start it will seem laggy and useless, but in the long run, the 100ms prediction helps A LOT with the skill, you bounce the ball on the wall, but you see everything 100ms in the future, you can control it way better once your brains adapt to it, do faster tricks, etc. Now imagine having 8 players on the pitch abusing the same thing. Movement is faster, but space is limited, you'll get a robotic gameplay with 0 creativity and 0 options, the only way to score would be through spam and fake kicks (and harsh opponent's mistakes obviously), which is what's happening nowadays. Even gameplay on a map that was usually the complete opposite to 4v4 3def - Real Soccer has completely changed after everyone started using extrapolation. Passing, teamwork and creativity used the be the main traits of this map, but recently everything revolves around abusing throws and closing space by blocking. Matches are 20 minutes long, but you'd easily spend 15 minutes with a "dead" ball around throw-in line, fighting for millimeters of space and trying to trick your opponents to get a throw for your own team. It has lost all it's charm. The game became robotic and boring, even if you wanted to play differently, you simply can't, there's no space to do anything if the opponents decide to play like that. It's same for both big and Real Soccer.
If you ask me, it's all a chain reaction - a few guys start using high extrapolation, they become fast, others want to do it, too, now we have everyone using it and considering everyone is now able to skill and do what they want, we have a simpler, dumbed-down gameplay where nothing works like before. Now, again, I don't want to be a part of that.
So it brings me to the question I want to ask you... Would you switch to 0 extrapolation if it meant everyone else would have to use 0 extrapolation as well? Would you sacrifice comfort and the skill u have now thanks to extrapolation for even playing field and a more enjoyable (I guess that's pretty subjective) gameplay, where every fs and offi feel different?
I was wondering... What would Haxball be like today, without extrapolation?
A big issue I have with today's Haxball compared to early html or any point in flash is the gameplay. Perhaps it wasn't changed per se, but the feeling for sure isn't the same as it was before. I think it has a lot to do with extrapolation... Extrapolation was made as a cure for input lag, but once people realized how OP it is the gameplay started changing. Now we have many players who base their whole gameplay/gamestyle around this "feature", doing things that were never possible earlier. Sure, that may be a good thing, but it also means that the advantage the better players had before is now mostly gone. In today's Haxball the main focus is on skill (90% extrapolation and getting used to it imo, other 10% is pure skill), fake kicks, blocks, incredible angle shots, "tricking" in corners, backpassing to dm, dm instantly backpassing back, then more choking of the ball in corner, it's basically killing the game and personally, I don't enjoy that at all, I know many of us don't. Just imagine that most of us play on 20-50ms latency, yet a lot of people use 100-200ms extrapolation. Literally anyone could start using that much and in a week they'd be able to do amazing turns, fake kicks, overall become incredibly skilled and unpredictable... It does come at a cost of visual lag, but it's nothing compared to what you gain from it.
Let's say someone decided to use 100 extrapolation, at the start it will seem laggy and useless, but in the long run, the 100ms prediction helps A LOT with the skill, you bounce the ball on the wall, but you see everything 100ms in the future, you can control it way better once your brains adapt to it, do faster tricks, etc. Now imagine having 8 players on the pitch abusing the same thing. Movement is faster, but space is limited, you'll get a robotic gameplay with 0 creativity and 0 options, the only way to score would be through spam and fake kicks (and harsh opponent's mistakes obviously), which is what's happening nowadays. Even gameplay on a map that was usually the complete opposite to 4v4 3def - Real Soccer has completely changed after everyone started using extrapolation. Passing, teamwork and creativity used the be the main traits of this map, but recently everything revolves around abusing throws and closing space by blocking. Matches are 20 minutes long, but you'd easily spend 15 minutes with a "dead" ball around throw-in line, fighting for millimeters of space and trying to trick your opponents to get a throw for your own team. It has lost all it's charm. The game became robotic and boring, even if you wanted to play differently, you simply can't, there's no space to do anything if the opponents decide to play like that. It's same for both big and Real Soccer.
If you ask me, it's all a chain reaction - a few guys start using high extrapolation, they become fast, others want to do it, too, now we have everyone using it and considering everyone is now able to skill and do what they want, we have a simpler, dumbed-down gameplay where nothing works like before. Now, again, I don't want to be a part of that.
So it brings me to the question I want to ask you... Would you switch to 0 extrapolation if it meant everyone else would have to use 0 extrapolation as well? Would you sacrifice comfort and the skill u have now thanks to extrapolation for even playing field and a more enjoyable (I guess that's pretty subjective) gameplay, where every fs and offi feel different?
