Besides drinking way too much, this weekend consisted of playing Mario Tennis Aces by Nintendo for the Switch. They had an open tournament for anyone who wanted to try the game out and so I played a handful of rounds. Come to find out, I am awful at this game and so is the net code.
This Game Might Be OK.
If we just talk about the game when you are facing off against an NPC, Aces feels pretty smooth. The controls are pretty responsive. There are a plethora of inputs that you can use to return the ball in different ways. By holding down a hit button you can charge your meter. The meter leads to special hits, slow time, and fully charged you can unleash a special. There is even more to it than that, that Ill get into when it comes out, which is all well and good. The problem is that this demo really did not have much when it came to the solo play, which meant a lot of online play; the online experience was not good.
It Was a Lag Fest
If there a definitive impression I got off of this game is that there is work that needs to be done as far as the net code goes. I did my best trying to match with players that had at least a decent connection but it all seemed in vain as it seemed at one point in every match I would have a lag spike. My inputs would take quite a bit of time to come out, I would head off in some random directions, my special attack would take me to some weird direction and those were just a few problems I had in this game. I could not for the life of me tell if I was just this that bad or it was just lagging that much. So many matches just felt like it was a competition for the best latency.
The matchmaking was also terrible as there seemed to be no ranking system and you could play anyone from points close to yours to people who had obviously been playing all weekend. You became fodder for people that understood the game at a level you couldn't have seen. It was annoying and you would just have to sit there as they used every trick they had learned thus far and struggle to even learn what is going on. In competitive games its a much more engaging experience if you play with people that make it feel like you aren't wasting your time. I got better but trial by fire is not the best experience.
So here is the thing, I am a little nervous now especially since I have pre-ordered the game and the online experience was just bad. A fulfilling single player could save this game for me but right now I am less than impressed. Not only are people used as player fodder but the lag and random movements drove me a bit nuts.
Comments
Post a Comment