An experimental estimation of latency sensitivity in multiplayer Quake 3

Quantifying the latency sensitivity of potential customers/players is critical for Internet-based game providers when planning the network placement of their game servers. Two Quake 3 servers were placed at different locations on the Internet in 2001, and instrumented to gather median latency information on every player who played over a multi-month period. Server logfiles showed an active yet distinct player population on each server. The median latency distributions suggest players actively prefer Quake 3 servers less than 150 to 180 milliseconds from the player's location. Quake 3 is often played as a multiplayer, Internet-based, highly interactive "first person shooter" game. Although Quake 3 is nowhere near as popular as games such as half- life: counterstrike, these results provide a useful ball-park indicator of latency sensitivity for this class of highly interactive online games.