MiSTer FPGA Forum

I was wondering games from the classic consoles suffer from lag when used on modern hardware but new games feel completely responsive.

What makes the new games feel completely responsive and old games lag on new displays with lag from both the display and controller?
I did read somewhere that new games have some kind of buffering system that allows for it but no idea what the process is

In short, games are optimized and created for the hardware that they are expected to run on and when we do not know better, we hardly notice.

The long answer is:

The "old games" were created when input and screen were more or less lag free, thus there were hardly any measures necessary to alleviate the negative effects of lag.

Nowadays games are created with lag in mind. Jumps in platformers still count for a limited time even after you are over the edge, which - named after Wiley Coyote from the cartoon Road Runner - is refered to "coyote time" if I am not mistaken. There are a lot of assists in games to smoothen out your experience, like in GTA V when you walk around a car the AI takes over your movements partially so that you do not constantly bump into the car and get stuck.

Here an article that talks about a "test" of input lag in some modern games: https://www.resetera.com/threads/ea-mot ... etc.80420/. "Test", because he is eyeballing the frames with a counter on screen and knowing to what lenghts our corner of the gaming culture goes to test lag properly, this is a very rough lag test at best. None of these games will have only one or two frames lag when your average TV adds at least one frame and the gamepads have a few miliseconds of lag as well. Note that even a Sega Saturn that was lauded as an excellent Shmup console has 3 frames lag on a CRT according to the link showing the inherent system lag of a Nintendo Switch later in my post.

Here my assumption as to why we do not feel the lag: The brain is a huge deceiver and creates in our mind what is expected. If you stay upside down for a while your brain will flip the world around again, because this is the expected sight. Similarily when you press the button on a gamepad you expect an instant reaction, thus your brain creates this impression that it is instant within a certain limit?

You can test this by playing with lag for a while and then switching to a system with no additional lag. For example, play ACA NeoGeo Blazing Star on Nintendo Switch and then change to Blazing Star on MiSTer. At first it feels like the game reacts before you press the button and the longer you pay attention to how well it reacts on MiSTer, the better you can make out the few frames of lag on Switch.

The Nintendo Switch has many retro releases, which is great, but it has inherent system lag as you can see here: https://electricunderground.io/shmup-in ... -database/ Playing Dragon Blaze with seven or eight frames of lag? That you notice.

This is what I mean with "when we do not know better, we hardly notice". Well emulated and near lag free retro games are so much fun, because they react so well to our inputs. It feels like you are truly in control and it is your skill that counts, but to know the difference, you need to experience it.

This is why the preservation of the original experience (which includes the accurate, "poor" visual fidelity) and in general the recreation on available hardware is so important. If we can show the next generation of players how much fun near lag free gaming is (where the games demand it), then they will know and notice when lag increases in games, like with streaming services (e.g. Google Stadia).

I would recommend watching the first few RGB Masterclass videos from the youtube channel My Life In Gaming. It's been a few years since I watched em but I think I remember them explaining things pretty well. Anyway the gist of it as I understand it is that modern TVs can basically only display one resolution: the highest one it's advertised as being able to display. For example 1080p TVs can only display 1080p, 4k TVs can only display 4k, etc. They usually support other resolutions, but a chip in the TV needs to convert (aka scale) these other resolutions to the TV's native resolution before it can be displayed. This takes time, and since most people just use their TVs for watching movies/TV shows etc, the manufacturers don't put that much effort into making this conversion go lightning fast. Many modern game consoles produce a signal that is already at the native resolution of a modern TV, which can take the need to scale the image out of the equation. The second major thing that can cause lag is that older consoles output an analog display signal, which needs to be converted to a digital signal before it can be scaled. This also takes time, and for the same reason as before, most TV manufacturers don't make processing speed for this an absolute priority. There are other factors I glossed over, such as deinterlacing etc, but I think this gets the point across. Old consoles simply weren't designed for a modern high res digital TV, but new consoles are. If you're interested in more detailed explanations, Displaced Gamers is another youtuber that can go super in-depth on how video signals work etc. Hope that helped

There are a few things happening that I can think of (not actually a game developer, but I follow some discussions around gamedev) that basically revolve around reducing the consequences of lag:

Animations tend to be much less "twitchy". Characters are rarely completely still, and animations are often designed to blend into one another over the course of several frames instead of instantly switching from one fixed sequence to another. This makes the transition much less visually obtrusive, which makes it harder to tell precisely when an input took effect.

Input buffering is more common in modern games than in older games. This is (perhaps oversimplifying) when you can hit an input early and still have it register instead of being dropped. For example, if you press the jump button just before landing in a platformer, a modern one will probably execute the jump as soon as you land, while an older one will simply ignore the input.

Canceling is also much more common. This is when actions can be interrupted by other actions instead of having to wait until the first action has been completely executed. Much like input buffering, this can make the exact timing of input less critical.

Sorry my original answer was out of context, but I can't delete it once someone respond after me.

ExCyber wrote: ↑Thu Jun 18, 2020 2:32 am There are a few things happening that I can think of (not actually a game developer, but I follow some discussions around gamedev) that basically revolve around reducing the consequences of lag:

Animations tend to be much less "twitchy". Characters are rarely completely still, and animations are often designed to blend into one another over the course of several frames instead of instantly switching from one fixed sequence to another. This makes the transition much less visually obtrusive, which makes it harder to tell precisely when an input took effect.

Input buffering is more common in modern games than in older games. This is (perhaps oversimplifying) when you can hit an input early and still have it register instead of being dropped. For example, if you press the jump button just before landing in a platformer, a modern one will probably execute the jump as soon as you land, while an older one will simply ignore the input.

Canceling is also much more common. This is when actions can be interrupted by other actions instead of having to wait until the first action has been completely executed. Much like input buffering, this can make the exact timing of input less critical.

Ah so that's how it works cancellation and input buffering. I was thinking there are modern games that emulate the gameplay style of old games such as
Bloodstained Curse of the Moon and Shovel Knight and those games feel perfectly responsive.

This also means that old games that are being emulated by the original developers must be taking this into account because when I play Daytona USA on the Xbox360 it feels much better than the emulated version on the model 2 emulator

Threepwood wrote: ↑Thu Jun 18, 2020 2:20 am

You can test this by playing with lag for a while and then switching to a system with no additional lag. For example, play ACA NeoGeo Blazing Star on Nintendo Switch and then change to Blazing Star on MiSTer. At first it feels like the game reacts before you press the button and the longer you pay attention to how well it reacts on MiSTer, the better you can make out the few frames of lag on Switch.

Yes it feels like that recently I upgraded to using the Gameboy interface through swiss for the Gameboy player the games are so responsive now its fantastic

Threepwood wrote: ↑Thu Jun 18, 2020 2:20 am In short, games are optimized and created for the hardware that they are expected to run on and when we do not know better, we hardly notice.

The long answer is:


Here my assumption as to why we do not feel the lag: The brain is a huge deceiver and creates in our mind what is expected. If you stay upside down for a while your brain will flip the world around again, because this is the expected sight. Similarily when you press the button on a gamepad you expect an instant reaction, thus your brain creates this impression that it is instant within a certain limit?

I think this is dependant on the individual as I have access to all my classic consoles I definitely noticed that the controls were not as responsive I wasn't able to play a game in the same way sometimes on an emulator as I could on on the original console. I thought it was just the controller that made it seem off but it was more than that I guess I noticed it less when Monitors used to be CRT.

Eventually I learned about lag and latency so now I know when the controls don't feel as you remember or just can't pull off a move that you can easily on original hardware it's definitely lag that is involved.

On the 3DS I got Punchout free as part of their points promotion and wow that game is near unplayable due to the lag

colonel panic wrote: ↑Thu Jun 18, 2020 2:31 am I would recommend watching the first few RGB Masterclass videos from the youtube channel My Life In Gaming. It's been a few years since I watched em but I think I remember them explaining things pretty well. Anyway the gist of it as I understand it is that modern TVs can basically only display one resolution: the highest one it's advertised as being able to display. For example 1080p TVs can only display 1080p, 4k TVs can only display 4k, etc. They usually support other resolutions, but a chip in the TV needs to convert (aka scale) these other resolutions to the TV's native resolution before it can be displayed. This takes time, and since most people just use their TVs for watching movies/TV shows etc, the manufacturers don't put that much effort into making this conversion go lightning fast. Many modern game consoles produce a signal that is already at the native resolution of a modern TV, which can take the need to scale the image out of the equation. The second major thing that can cause lag is that older consoles output an analog display signal, which needs to be converted to a digital signal before it can be scaled. This also takes time, and for the same reason as before, most TV manufacturers don't make processing speed for this an absolute priority. There are other factors I glossed over, such as deinterlacing etc, but I think this gets the point across. Old consoles simply weren't designed for a modern high res digital TV, but new consoles are. If you're interested in more detailed explanations, Displaced Gamers is another youtuber that can go super in-depth on how video signals work etc. Hope that helped

Thanks I'll take a look

I think both game design and our relationship with games has changed, too. Space limitations meant some games would ramp up difficulty to make them last longer, and we also spent much more time playing these "AAA games" (at the time) and developed muscle memory for them.

Today we have much many more games available (e.g. it's easy to pickup 10+ games for cheap on Steam during a sale) and games with tight controls have become a small niche among many other kinds of games. Lag is still a problem for online fighting games, but those games are still quite laggy compared to local game play from the NES and SNES eras.

No one has also mentioned that we are all getting older.. and as a consequence our timing and reflexes are also slowing and getting "laggy" .. maybe a subtle amount but face it folks.. you dont respond as quickly as you did when you were in your teens.. its a fact of life ..

ericgus09 wrote: ↑Sun Jul 05, 2020 5:59 am No one has also mentioned that we are all getting older.. and as a consequence our timing and reflexes are also slowing and getting "laggy" .. maybe a subtle amount but face it folks.. you dont respond as quickly as you did when you were in your teens.. its a fact of life ..

i can waggle my joystick just as much now on daley thompson's decathlon as i did in the 80's..

bazza_12 wrote: ↑Sun Jul 05, 2020 1:07 pm
i can waggle my joystick just as much now on daley thompson's decathlon as i did in the 80's..

I'll take your word for it.. .. no pictures please! ... lol