PA Release and 100% CPU

[MajorWoody]

This is the released version, bought it today on DVD. I bought it early specifically so i could host games.

Same problem with CPU usage that the demo had. Dual Xeon (HT) and it's pegged one CPU at 100% (25% overall).

I'll refer to the "demo" thread on the dame issue here:
http://www.mohadmin.com/forum/showthread.php?t=4608

But this is now the released version.

[BoSBrian]

Sooooooooooo Sad :(

Wouldn't you think that EA would have seen this problem in testing? :confused:

[Hambrgr_Helpr]

That was MY question....maybe RudeDog will give us an indication as to when we can expect a patch.

[rudedog]

EA is aware of the problem and is working on the patch ASAP.

Any other issues post here as they are watching these and other forums.

They have already found a fix for the mouse lag and now focusing on the CPU usage and network performance.

Don't know why they didn't see this B4

Will keep you guys updated on this and the patch.

[MajorWoody]

Don't know why they didn't see this B4


Closed Beta testing. Open it up to gamers and GSPs and the QC will be better. Same thing happened with UO (and still isn't patched). All the GSPs found problems in the first *hour* of release.

[rudedog]

way ahead of you there. We (mohteam) has offered this to EA

To play devils advocate, you also have to understand their side of this. They need to protect their game from pirates and leaks. If you look at past game leaks, very trusted game mag publishers and duplicators have leaked games. This is a very hard thing to overcome. I'm not trying to stick up for EA or justify their reasoning. Just trying to be realistic.

Still, I would hope the MOHteam has proven our dedication and commitment to EA. The whole MOHteam thing is new and making great headway ( Just look at the readme and other things they have done on our recommendations) I guess it takes baby steps....

[MajorWoody]

They need to protect their game from pirates and leaks. If you look at past game leaks, very trusted game mag publishers and duplicators have leaked games.

Agreed. Non-disclosures would be a must, they have enough legal teeth to keep anyone from sharing, IMO. I don't know if people from game mags, etc have been asked to sign them in the past. The least they could do is find one or two GSPs for this kinds of testing. Not including myself, i'd recommend one or two who are very reputable and well known in the community. Not that's *i'm* not reputable, just trying to get my point across :D

I would hope the MOHteam has proven our dedication and commitment to EA. The whole MOHteam thing is new and making great headway

I'd say you have. It's a great idea! I wish other companies would do the same.

[Hambrgr_Helpr]

IMHO, there have been many things about how EA has treated the PA project that are light-years ahead of past titles; the MOHTeam is a VERY positive thing, the obvious care taken with the verbose readme notes, the sworn dedication to make the multiplayer portion not just an afterthought, the new server launch tool, the new Invader game type, the new engine, etc. It shows that EA is both responding to the maturing MP market in general and more specifically is dedicated to the MOH community...and I know we ALL appreciate it a lot.

BUT! It's in EA's best interest to include more scrutinization in their QA test cycle. Whether this means more QA team-members or longer test periods or using GSPs I don't know. I DO know that it's most assuredly not in EA's best interest to release games (even game demos) that haven't been thoroughly tested...that need major patching the moment they hit the shelves or are posted for DL.

I'm sure we all can all agree that creating and launching a game such as this takes a huge amount of time and effort. We also can agree that there are so many details that making the deadline for a scheduled release date must be incredibly hard...not to mention that, no matter how much testing is done, nearly all games have both obvious and not-so-obvious flaws when they hit the shelves. However, the bugs in PA so far seem to be fairly major issues that should have been caught during testing. Demos have issues, yes, but for the full game to ship with such obvious bugs, risks the positive buzz and community support that usually go hand-in-hand with an anticipated game release. (It also says to me that the following could be true: the QA cycle was impacted…perhaps due to time overruns by the dev team – the dev team’s overruns were likely caused by unforeseen issues relating to, among other things, the development of the new engine (a huge job!). This, coupled with an unwillingness on the part of the management team to delay the release date (probably because of financial reasons), forced the release before the software could go through a proper testing and bug-fixing cycle. This is an archetypal problem with software releases…but one that is easily remedied by adopting the mantra of “not serving the food until it’s ready”. –Imagine if you went to a restaurant and ordered dinner and it came to you uncooked or was only partially prepared…would you go back to that restaurant? Maybe once or twice, but if it happened over and over you would loose your faith that they had everything under control in the kitchen. –Sorry for the odd analogy, but in this case it makes my point.)

Title loyalty goes a long way in the MOH & COD community, but honestly, although most of us REALLY DO enjoy helping and testing and making suggestions on how to improve game/s, it is unsettling to see such obvious issues with something that has (apparently) been receiving extra attention by EA.

I for one would rather wait an extra month (or more) if necessary for game titles that have been FULLY tested. Plus, there must be a way that the QA cycle can include more extensive beta-testing without risking malicious code-theft....keep it internal; just give the QA cycle more time and manpower...again it's JMHO, but, don't make QA an afterthought and don’t publically release a product until it’s ready. I'm betting RudeDog and the EA QA manager would agree with me.

-Good news on the mouse speed thang, btw....wahoooo!

:D

[rudedog]

very well said, Hambrgr_Helpr

[Billyfe]

Just on my own personal machine while playing in a server I am at 92-98% usage. Now on single player its down around 40%. I use a 2.8 gig p4 800fsb, 9600 pro o/c to 500 core and 660 memory.

Rudedog you guys are doing a great job helping EA figure this out and I hope a patch gets out fairly soon.

Thank you.

[FluffHead]

Same problem with CPU usage that the demo had. Dual Xeon (HT) and it's pegged one CPU at 100% (25% overall).



I wish I could tell you exactly how to accomplish this suggestion. I'm an AMD guy so I'm not up on Intel.

This is what we did on a FarCry server running dual Xeon's.

Establish two servers from one physical machine.

Dedicate one processor to each server configuration.

Run the servers as a service, FireDAEMON works well.

Disable unnecessary processes.

Disable Hyper Threading. HT will restrict process CPU usage as you have described.

I was not involved in the configuring of this/these servers so what I suggest is simply what I heard in TS as others worked on the server.

I imagine a Google search may provide you with detailed information.

Hope this points you in a positive direction.

did I mention I'm an AMD guy AMD AMD AMD AMD AMD AMD AMD AMD AMD and I'm building a new rig.
Chieftec Ultra Dragon (High Gloss Red) case, Abit AV8 3RD Eye MoBo, AMD 64 3500, Thermaltake Heatsink/FAN, Sappire X800 Pro (BIOS Mod to X800 XT PE) Antec True Control 550, 1.5GB Crucial PC3200, Plextor 712A DVD/CD Burner, TDK VeloCD CD Burner, SB Audigy 2 ZS (dont use it), Case fans(water cooling coming soon), UV Molex connectors, UV Round Cables, UV Cold Cathode, Blue Cold Cathode, panel mount SPST off-on switches(Yea Radio Shack)fasteners, adhesive, zipties and more.........

[svoller]

We have the same problem Dual Xeon 3.06GHz server and 1 CPU is at 90% when PA runs.

I hope they fix this soon?

[Trauma]

On your personal machine I can understand running 100% because all the fps games I play do and have since the release of Mohaa. I am noticing on our dual 2.8 xeon dedicated server a fluxuation of between 23-25 percent cpu usage. Thats just from PA itself and no other games. Coduo and Breakthrough both run around 7-9 percent cpu usage each. 16 percent higher for PA does seem a bit high. :(

[Hambrgr_Helpr]

D_Town pretty much summed-up the CPU resource problem. Read-up:
D_Town: The reason it's 100% for some, 50% for some, and 25% is because of the machines they are running on. It has nothing to do with speed. It's all about poor resource utilization.

The Dual Xeon boxes are CPUs with Hyperthreading. This makes windows think there's actually four processors, instead of two. What this means is that the server application isn't built to support more than one CPU, and it's going to use 100% of it since the app is single threaded (25% of the "total CPU power" for the server, but in reality it's 50% of the 2-CPU total. Which means 1 of your CPUs is running at 100%. Disable hyperthreading and you'll see what we mean.)

It's 50% for XP users that have a Pentium 4 Hyperthreading CPU. Again, hyperthreading makes windows think there's two processors in the PC instead of one, and the program uses 100% of the "single CPU." While it displays as 50%, in reality, it's actually using 100% of your CPU.

AMD doesn't have Hyperthreading, so it'll be 100%. Older P4's will be 100% too.

Some of you may have noticed that CPU utilization actually goes down when the program is put under any kind of stress. The reason for this is simple. For anybody who has programmed before, applications like these usually use "while(true)" to make a program run forever. If you use this concept without any kind of prioritization and/or built in "we're doing nothing, let's settle down" code, it'll appear like the CPU is working it's ass off, when it's actually running "nothing" really, really fast. So why does the CPU utilization go down when it's actually got something to do? Because the "while(true)" loop has to wait until the command it's processing is done before it can do anything else. So, it stops running "nothing" a billion times a second to do something that utilizies the CPU in a smarter fashion.


Trauma: On your personal machine I can understand running 100% because all the fps games I play do and have since the release of Mohaa
-Just to clarify; none of the other dedicated game-servers for the other MOH titles cause this type of resource drain. Our AA, SH and BT game-servers typically use 2%-10% depending on client-load. With any of these titles, only when you are running a "listening" server (a public game but you are playing IN that game, ON that machine) will you see the resource use Trauma is referring to.

:D

[svoller]

I just noticed that our PA server has dropped down to 25% CPU , I left it running all night as a test for our players and it seems the CPU % has just dropped right off.

Forget the above just realised its probably because its Dual Xeon , take away the effect of HT and thats 25% util goes to 50% and thats 1 CPU at 100%...

:mad:

[Trauma]

I must have not clarified what I meant when I said 1005 cpu usage was normal on a personal pc. I meant that if you were playing the game as a client and not as a server. When I run it as a server on our dedicated box then its running around 25%. Hope this clears up any misconception I may have made prior. Peace.

[HLC_Moses]

Thought I'd respond here with some information from EA that I got this weekend while I was there.

The "100%" dedicated server CPU usage was a misnomer in a sense. The issue will be resolved in the patch. It was a misnomer because the server wasn't really using 100% of the CPU, just reserving it. If another process requested it, the server would relinquish it. The fix will result in the server reserving only what it is currently actually using. This is why many admins running a Dual Xeon (with 4 virtual CPUs) with 4 game processes see each CPU loaded at about 25%, or about 50% if running 2 processes. So it is not really an "issue", but it is a confusing enough characteristic to warrant a fix.

Both RudeDog and I have been hounding EA about this issue, and it was one of the first questions I asked of EA's senior tech lead at Mod Day this weekend.

Not sure why they didn't correct the Mouse issue, as we brought this up as an issue to them when we were at Community Day. Obviously, the easier your system can handle the game itself (your system setup combined with the detail/resolution level you're playing the game at) the less mouse/control lag you'll notice. From what I understand, it is a result of how the mouse movement was being processed... instead of processing the movement then drawing the mouse, it was doing it the other way around... or was it vice versa? Either way, as far as I know it will be corrected in the patch.

~MOSES

[Hambrgr_Helpr]

Thanks, Moses!

Hey, they didn't by chance allude to WHEN we can expect that patch, did they?

[HLC_Moses]

Umm... yeah, but it's not *public* knowledge yet. All I can say is it will be soon...


;)

~MOSES

[BoSBrian]

Did they happen to mention fixing any of the following:

Private slots crashing the server
PunkBuster not working
Specifying an IP address not working correctly
Pinglimit cvar not working
Not being able to create a log file

I'm sure there is more, but can't remember right now.......

I actually like MOHPA, but I've literally spent 4 days getting a server running. Between uploading over 4 GB and trying to figure out the IP address issue along with the private slot crashing issue I've become pretty frustrated with the game... :(

[HLC_Moses]

Someone asked in another thread if we could get a list of issues that EA is aware of. We'll look into it.

In the meantime, can you be more specific about PB not working? What about it isn't working. I've tested it locally, and seems to be connecting to the Master PB server for authentication, and the PB commands are working.

~MOSES

[CoZ]

Someone asked in another thread if we could get a list of issues that EA is aware of. We'll look into it.

~MOSES

Was me.......and thank you ;)

[BoSBrian]

Thanks Moses

[Billyfe]

Ok my CPU was maxed out while playing in a dedicated server. Now for some odd reason it has calmed back down to the normal levels 45-60%. Weird I say but oh well its for the better.

[Wonder_boy]

Did they happen to mention fixing any of the following:

Private slots crashing the server
PunkBuster not working
Specifying an IP address not working correctly
Pinglimit cvar not working
Not being able to create a log file

I'm sure there is more, but can't remember right now.......

I actually like MOHPA, but I've literally spent 4 days getting a server running. Between uploading over 4 GB and trying to figure out the IP address issue along with the private slot crashing issue I've become pretty frustrated with the game... :(

In our testing, we are also experiencing those problems, as well as the clientside issue with the Escape key not always working when you are in-game.

[BoSBrian]

I've also heard complaints of the esc key not working, but I've never had the issue. I'm running 2000 Pro and the folks that have complained to me are running XP.

[Billyfe]

I've also heard complaints of the esc key not working, but I've never had the issue. I'm running 2000 Pro and the folks that have complained to me are running XP.
I have that problem. Playing in a MP server is not an issue it only is a problem when you set up one on your machine for either lan play or to just check out the MP maps.

Oh yeah I use XP with sp1

[HLC_Moses]

Must be an XP issue. I haven't experienced that problem, but I have Win2kpro.

~MOSES

[east2surf]

I have heard from at least 5 other people that the ESC key sometimes didn't function in MP. I finally had it happen to me in MP AND SP! Then, next time I loaded, it worked fine. Seems to be arbitrary. Some times it works, sometimes it doesn't. I haven't found a common denominator yet, but I've been paying attention. BTW, I use XP SP2.

[SNYPE]

Had my Esc key lock up in Single player running on Windows 2000 Pro. I was in the Training level and couldnt get out.... :eek:

[Wonder_boy]

When it happens, it seems you can open the console and type 'quit' to get out of the game quickly.

We have found another odd problem. While playing TDM, a person or two spawned just as the map was ending. Those people are stuck running around the map while everyone else is looking at the score screen. The map will not change during this time.

It happed a couple of times last night during gameplay, and we were able to reproduce it on a test box a couple of times afterward.

[Billyfe]

Kinda off topic here but is there anyway to enable the console in the single player part of the game?

[rudedog]

Guys check the front page for patch info. EA is testintg a patch with the help of the MOHTeam. We where given permission to release part of the readme, its posted as well.

If all goes well it should be released soon.

[BoSBrian]

GREAT news Rude! Thanks for the update!

[BoSBrian]

:( darn, I was hoping they'd fix the IP address issue in this first patch.

[rudedog]

I am uploading my copy to the MOHadmin.com's server.

I am also getting ready to copy it to a test box I have at home (for dedicated server testing). I will check the IP issue out.

Bad news is work is kicking my but again and I cant seem to find time to play test the new patch.

[CoZ]

Guys check the front page for patch info. EA is testintg a patch with the help of the MOHTeam. We where given permission to release part of the readme, its posted as well.

If all goes well it should be released soon.

Nice One Rude :)

[BoSBrian]

Bad news is work is kicking my but again and I cant seem to find time to play test the new patch.

I feel your pain Rude :o

[CoZ]

Dont know if your allowed to comment rude, but are EA also lookin at the netcode for MP, to deal with the lag and 15 - 20 second disconnects that seem to occur?

TIA

[HLC_Moses]

Dont know if your allowed to comment rude, but are EA also lookin at the netcode for MP, to deal with the lag and 15 - 20 second disconnects that seem to occur?

TIA

Hey there... those 15-20 second disconnects are due to the spawn hitching, not net code. This has been addressed in the patch. Check out the story on the main page.
:)

~MOSES

[rudedog]

Thanks Moses ;)

[HLC_Moses]

No problem buddy! :D

[CoZ]

Good news... ;)

[Hambrgr_Helpr]

wow...I think I just relaxed a little.

thanks for the heads-up, lads :D

[BoSBrian]

You know really though, our server has one cpu running at 80%+ because of the MOHPA server, but I've never had lag on our UO server running on this box or our MOHPA server.

[Target_Practice]

We run 4 Spearheads, a COD:UO, a PA server on our box and we're only at 70% CPU. of course, I did a lot of tweaking to get the servers to be that efficient, but it can be done

Dual 2.6 Xeons
Serial ATA drive
1GB ram

*hint* the key is to unlock the dual processor utilization features in the game engine ;-)

[BoSBrian]

We run 4 Spearheads, a COD:UO, a PA server on our box and we're only at 70% CPU. of course, I did a lot of tweaking to get the servers to be that efficient, but it can be done

Dual 2.6 Xeons
Serial ATA drive
1GB ram

*hint* the key is to unlock the dual processor utilization features in the game engine ;-)

1st if you have 70% with empty servers you'll lag like crazy with full ones

2nd How do you unlock the dual features?????

[Target_Practice]

No, the servers are full all the time and it's a 70% (50% when semi empty)..... It spikes up during map changes and such, but there is no real way to stop that en even when it does spike, it's momentary.

PM me and I'll send you info abotu unlocking dual processor support.

[BoSBrian]

70% when full running all of those servers is pretty good!

[BoSBrian]

I sent you a pm

[BoSBrian]

As expected, no response from him. If these game servers actually did supported multi-processors I'm sure it would have been documented somewhere.

[whistler]

He did'nt even mention how many slots per game he was running??? So basicly he could be running those servers with 8 slots per game... think a dual xeon is up to that.. :rolleyes:

[GabooN]

We run Dual Zeons 2.8 GHZ on Win2k3

CoD:UO BAS - 32 slots Full 15-25% CPU
CoD:UO CTF - 32 Slots Full 10-20% CPU

CoD: TDM - 30 Slots Full 10-20% CPU

RavenShield - 16 slots Full 18-25% CPU


If anyone can help get them lower that would be great, but I doubt they can. Also note the numbers above are not a constant meaning RvS goes lower as players are killed and the CoD servers can drop down to 5% even when full just depends what is going on. The observations above are me looking at the servers over a 5 min period of time.

BTW I also sent a PM with no response.

[Target_Practice]

Sorry, I've been in the middle of a PC upgrade and format.

Add this to your config (neat the top)


// dual processor addon
set r_smp 1


(and they are all 20 player servers)

;-)

[BoSBrian]

I've been told that cvar has been disabled. Can anyone from the MOHTeam verify this with EA?

[SNYPE]

I've been told that cvar has been disabled. Can anyone from the MOHTeam verify this with EA?
r_smp is a Q3 cvar that has had mixed success with other games. I have posted the question to the MohTeam board, we will see how they respond.

[rudedog]

Until there is a follow up from the MOHteam forums, I would assume this would be supported because of the INTEL splash screen with the "HT" logo.

[BoSBrian]

I've added it to my command line, but as of yet see no marked difference.

[Target_Practice]

Strange man, I noticed a drastic improvement.


Another thing to do is modify your PB config files (check codamin.com . A few guys tackled all the issues about COD:UO being a resource hog and the've posted fixes).

But other then the PB tweaks, that CVAR, and just some normal Windows speed hacks and mods, that's all I've had to do.



Hey Rude, if any of the guys on MOHteam need some servers to test these patches on or whatnot, let me know.

[kevn357]

This game is dead, done, next title. Cmon who wants to upload 3 gigs to run it server side, just to whore your CPU, Dedicated server launcher = 20th century. Yet this game doesnt have it. Nothin new about this game, but the bugiest game ever.

Yes a patch... F EA for releasing this garbage.
Yay a patch that fixes what? Many things mentioned but won't happen. Many more things that need to be fixed.

GJ EA for raping the customers and making the developers work 70 hours a week pushing this garbage out.

GJ supporting moh:aa and the expansions, not. How many ways can one crash a mohaa server? How many ways can one cheat on a mohaa server? Funny thing is, moh:aa will outlive this garbage thx to the modding community fixing your F up's.

Could be wrong but EA can eat my ass. Played Moh:AA for 3 years now and the expansions had nothing new to offer. Can't fix landsharking lol?

Activision owns EA on FPS games now. Was sooo looking forward to moh:pa. Sad it's awful, CoD suxed, but the expansion ownz the new buggy ass MOH. Patch won't help much.

[Hambrgr_Helpr]

We all share your frustration, compadre...and personally, I agree...mostly.

I also have to disagree with ya.

Keep in mind:

All games are buggy...it's the nature of software. I've heard complaints about software since the punch-card days. Y'know why? Because there are so many variables that it's nearly impossible to make sure you check and fix and tweak every one before a release date. Iterative builds and patches are a way of life in the software world....if EA worked-on titles until they were completely bugless, we'd wouldn't hear any complaints - because there would never be any releases!

I've said it before here, and I'll say it again, I think it's bad business for any game company to release a product with major problems...it creates rejection in the very community they are trying to appeal to. Complete the QA cycle...do several rounds of regression and functionality testing BEFORE the release date is even firmed-up. Only put an MP game on the shelves when it is stable enough for admins to serve it without all kinds of configuration hassle and playable enough for the public to jump-in a shoot stuff without frustrating connection issues.

I, for one, don't feel stupid for eagerly awaiting the patch. I think the game looks great, is historically accurate, has well designed maps, has excellent background sounds, has seemingly great support from EA and will be a game that helps continue the MOH title...which falls into the ranks of "best FPS titles ever" along with Quake, Half Life, Unreal, etc. But, I'll tell ya....that patch better be done SOON, or PA will suffer the same fate as BT...and we all know how well that did at the box-office. pppppfffft!

I also have hope that EA will release a DS and make the Linux binaries available sometime soon. I'm not holding my breath, mind you...I just have hope that they have seen how dedicated the MOH community is and will want to support us in the ways we expect them to, not just make their money and move-on.

The game rocks...but kevn357 does have some VERY valid points.

JMHO
:D

[Billyfe]

Hes right its time to throw in the towel on this one. I am anxiousely waiting on the patch that should have been here no later than yesterday. If it does not make this game playable its gone.

[Target_Practice]

Hes right its time to throw in the towel on this one. I am anxiousely waiting on the patch that should have been here no later than yesterday. If it does not make this game playable its gone.



I agree man... this will be a make it or break it patch. I think the developers know that and they are walking on eggshells to make sure it is 100%.

Personally, I agree with many of the statements above... I just hope the devs fix the problems because if they don't, I'll feel like I wasted $80 and will probably abandon any future EA games FPSs.

(speaking of which, half Life 2 just finished installing, see you guys in a few days). ;-)!!!!!!!!!

[MajorWoody]

I just counted only 60 servers in all seeing eye (north america only). That's gotta tell you something... EA, please patch us! :D

Oh... and Linux binaries too :rolleyes:

[kevn357]

I'm all for a solid patch guys. I just don't think it will happen. The developers are gonna go brain dead from the long hours. This game has plenty of potential, and have been looking forward to it for a while. But i'm just disgusted by it. It's unplayable on MP. And i will not upload it to our dedicated server. EA needs to get their heads out of their ass. Current Profit means jack shit when you lose your customers. Btw the asshat who thought the MPdemo was a good idea should be canned.

I like the mohteam concept, but I don't understand why EA doesn't listen to them. Were these bugs not there when you guys visited eala?
I like the premise of the game but don't understand why EA rushed it. It's obvious it's not done.

Yes Hambrgr_Helpr, EA can't release a bug free game, that would be impossible. But this game is far from done. EA knew it was buggy as hell, but released it anyway. I feel sorry for the devs, as much as the people who payed $60 for it. It's pretty clear that the dev's want to make a great game. Been reading their developer diaries on the official website.

Hopefully a patch will fix things, but not optimistic. Sick of our mohaa server getting crashed by lamers. Just looked at http://archive.gamespy.com/stats/
101 servers 47 players for PA. Will play Moh:AA, and wolf:ET til this game is done. Ranting done :rolleyes: CoD:UO isn't to shabby either.

[kevn357]

LOL, not having linux support by now is amazing. I'm done, i swear. ;)

[rudedog]

Kevn357, tell us how you really feel ;)

The MOHteam did not get to play with any server files when we where there, so we could not see the cpu usage.

The only real problem we seen and reported at community day was the mouse lag. We have voiced our concerns about why that was not fixed.

I know EA is working on a patch and it does fix the cpu usage. They are trying to cram as much in as quickly as possible (major bugs first).

The are also monitoring these and other forums for other issues. Once a patch is released, it will be posted asap!

The linux stuff is being worked on by Ryan and I personally would not want that to be rushed. Ryan does a great job but it's taking him a little bit longer.

Again, any news will be reported ASAP!

[HLC_Moses]

Well, RudeDog beat me to a response. I would have echoed his comments.

I'm sorry to hear you feel the game is fraught with bugs. I have only noticed two major server issues: inaccurately reporting cpu usage data, and the net_ip cvar issue. Both are claimed to be fixed in the 1st patch. Even though the mouse lag/control-responsiveness is an issue, it's also correlated with the client's system load. So it isn't so much a bug as it is an inefficient programming issue.

The Linux binaries have been out of EA's hands for over two weeks, almost three, at least. It's up to Ryan how fast he can supply Linux admins (like us) the port.

How many games have a dedicated server-only release? Only one that I can think of. That EA hasn't done this isn't a surprise, but it would be nice if they did. For our servers, a few of us each takes a chunk and uploads it... no problem.

I would beg to differ that United Assault is "so much better". We've yet to receive a patch fixing its high (and accurately reported) cpu usage problem, and its been left up to the community to fix the buggy maps (that allow landsharking). I enjoy UO, but I also have enjoyed playing PA.

In part, I was dissapointed to see that the mouse lag issue was not fixed before release, but what you are not seeing are all the issues that were addressed after we tested the game at Community Day.

~Moses

[joe]

This game is dead, done, next title. Cmon who wants to upload 3 gigs to run it server side, just to whore your CPU, Dedicated server launcher = 20th century. Yet this game doesnt have it. Nothin new about this game, but the bugiest game ever.

Yes a patch... F EA for releasing this garbage.
Yay a patch that fixes what? Many things mentioned but won't happen. Many more things that need to be fixed.

GJ EA for raping the customers and making the developers work 70 hours a week pushing this garbage out.

GJ supporting moh:aa and the expansions, not. How many ways can one crash a mohaa server? How many ways can one cheat on a mohaa server? Funny thing is, moh:aa will outlive this garbage thx to the modding community fixing your F up's.

Could be wrong but EA can eat my ass. Played Moh:AA for 3 years now and the expansions had nothing new to offer. Can't fix landsharking lol?

Activision owns EA on FPS games now. Was sooo looking forward to moh:pa. Sad it's awful, CoD suxed, but the expansion ownz the new buggy ass MOH. Patch won't help much.

Gosh Kevn... this looks almost like one of my posts a while ago... i feel for you man and i think its a shame they release a game in this condition.

[Ultra_Violence]

Yep I agree- The Demo is an utter disaster- It doesn't come near the performance of the demo for SH. Anyway, CODUO blows EA away. Hope they come out with an expansion set in The Pacific Theater, because if it is anywhere close to COD UO, it will make MOHPA seem like pong. Just incomprehensible how poor this title(PA) is-

[whistler]

The demo is'nt what we all expected it to be, but calling the game dead allready is a bit early i think?

Give EA some time to fix the biggest bugs and we'll see what they made of it.

Got my copy allready anyway :)

[kevn357]

Kevn357, tell us how you really feel ;)

The MOHteam did not get to play with any server files when we where there, so we could not see the cpu usage.

The only real problem we seen and reported at community day was the mouse lag. We have voiced our concerns about why that was not fixed.

I know EA is working on a patch and it does fix the cpu usage. They are trying to cram as much in as quickly as possible (major bugs first).

The are also monitoring these and other forums for other issues. Once a patch is released, it will be posted asap!

The linux stuff is being worked on by Ryan and I personally would not want that to be rushed. Ryan does a great job but it's taking him a little bit longer.

Again, any news will be reported ASAP!

I love you rudedog! Seriously, you have done much for the mohaa community from day 1. I used your server guide to set up our server.

Yes the devs are working hard, as well as ryan. I don't blame the devs at all. It's EA that pisses me off.

Would it be so difficult of EA to say "Hey guys, sorry for the massive bugs. We are workin on it, and please give us time to fix our mistakes to make this game fun and bug free"? It would calm many peeps who are returning the game.
Mohteam owns, and i was just wondering why they didn't listen you guys.

[kevn357]

Well, RudeDog beat me to a response. I would have echoed his comments.

I'm sorry to hear you feel the game is fraught with bugs. I have only noticed two major server issues: inaccurately reporting cpu usage data, and the net_ip cvar issue. Both are claimed to be fixed in the 1st patch. Even though the mouse lag/control-responsiveness is an issue, it's also correlated with the client's system load. So it isn't so much a bug as it is an inefficient programming issue.

The Linux binaries have been out of EA's hands for over two weeks, almost three, at least. It's up to Ryan how fast he can supply Linux admins (like us) the port.

How many games have a dedicated server-only release? Only one that I can think of. That EA hasn't done this isn't a surprise, but it would be nice if they did. For our servers, a few of us each takes a chunk and uploads it... no problem.

I would beg to differ that United Assault is "so much better". We've yet to receive a patch fixing its high (and accurately reported) cpu usage problem, and its been left up to the community to fix the buggy maps (that allow landsharking). I enjoy UO, but I also have enjoyed playing PA.

In part, I was dissapointed to see that the mouse lag issue was not fixed before release, but what you are not seeing are all the issues that were addressed after we tested the game at Community Day.

~Moses

Hey man, i do like the game, don't me wrong. I loved the boot camp scenery in SP, notice how amazing the backround was? But don't tell me this game has only 2 bugs server side... The client side bugs = how many? This game only has 150 people playing it MP. Half of them are pinging 999. I feel sorry for the guys who uploaded 4 gigs to run it server side. 150 clients playing it in MP? Thats on a good hour when the EA servers arent down for verification.

I don't know what United assault is? CoD:UO or allied assault? Either way 5000 more players in North America play both games in peak hours when PA = 150.

I have an AMD 2800 CPU, 1 gig of 3700 DDR ram, ATI 9800 256MB, Asus MB A7N8X-E Deluxe, and its my fault? Nope. Poor coding. Get a whopping 20 FPS in SP, and a whopping 999 ping in MP, with a Cable connnection that owns.

Yup must be me. GJ EA sheep. GJ on the 150 MP players at peek hours :(
All me? BTW i can name many PC games that have a dedicated server release. Moh:PA isn't one.

[-DH-]

Kevn357, tell you what...you have obviously made your personal feelings about the game known. Why not communicate your disatisfaction to EA and ask for a refund. Check this link, one of the items on this FAQ tells you how to return your game. MOHPA FAQ over at EA GAMES (http://eatech.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/eatech.cfg/php/enduser/std_alp.php?p_sid=vWinUKqh&p_lva=&p_li=&p_page=1&p_cv=&p_pv=2.1722&p_prods=342%2C1722&p_cats=0&p_hidden_prods=&p_scf_platform=%7Eany%7E&prods1=342&prods2=1722&cats1=0&p_search_text=&p_new_search=1&p_search_type=search_nl)

We are here because we happen to like the game and MOHADMIN specifically is for us Server Admins to exchange helpful information with respect to the game. We are all aware the game has a few issues but we are confident that EA and the MOHTEAM are working to ensure that these issues are cleared up. My personal experience with the game has been great, SP is amazing and fortunately my system doesn't experience the mouse lag that some people are getting nor does my server lag or have the high CPU utilizaiton that some do. I ping a steady 50 msec while in game on my server with no frame lag either except for the random spike which is seen rarely. Good luck with whatever game you play and hope you can find some satisfaction in returning the game which you clearly do not like or wish to play based on your comments.

[Hambrgr_Helpr]

Word.

Well put, my MoHAdmin brutha.

[HLC_Moses]

I don't know what United assault is? CoD:UO or allied assault? Either way 5000 more players in North America play both games in peak hours when PA = 150.

...Poor coding. Get a whopping 20 FPS in SP, and a whopping 999 ping in MP, ...

Yup must be me. GJ EA sheep.

Sorry about the "United Assault" screwup. Too many FPS games floating in my brains. I meant United Offensive. Yes, it has far more players playing it, and I agree the issues with MOHPA are significant enough to impact its success right now.

I didn't say it was "you", I commented on "inefficient programming", which basically means that the coding is great, as long as you have a top-of-the-line system (meaning an FX55 or a 3.8GHz PIV paired with a 6800 or a x800), which most people do not have. But as we've already said, the mouse lag issue is supposedly fixed in the patch. I can't speak to your 20 FPS in single player. I only know that I personally don't have problems with lag or low FPS.

I have purposefully avoided open forums for a long time because of discussions like this. The bottom line is that you have your opinion, to which you are entitled. I respect your opinion.

I'm not quite sure what you meant by the "ea sheep" comment. As it was worded, it sounded like an insult, but feel free to clarify if I am mistaken.

~MOSES

[GabooN]

The game is dead SP is a let down and MP is unplayable. Long live HL2!!!

[joe]

Well the patch seems to be released, http://www.fileshack.com/login.x?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.fileshack.com%2Ffile. x%3Ffid%3D5865


Here is some info from the readme included:

Medal of Honor Pacific Assault(tm) Patch Version 1.1
Read Me File

November 8, 2004
================================================== ================

Thank you for downloading Medal of Honor Pacific Assault(tm) Patch.
This readme file contains information describing fixes and changes.

================================================== ================
COMPATABILITY NOTE
================================================== ================
Once patched, please be advised that Medal of Honor Pacific Assault(tm)
will not be compatible with unpatched servers and may not be
compatible with mods written for the unpatched version. Patched games
can only play with other games that are patched as well.


================================================== ================
PATCH CONTENTS
================================================== ================

1. Mouse and Input Lag (single and multiplayer)

2. Dedicated Server CPU Utilization (multiplayer)

3. 999 Ping Bug (multiplayer)

4. Spawn Code Server Hitching (multiplayer)

5. Miscellaneous Single Player Bug Fixes

================================================== ================
Addressing Mouse Lag
================================================== ================

This patch improves the responsiveness of the renderer and greatly reduces
the time lag between user input (mouse movements, button clicks)
and the corresponding visual updates on-screen, and should result
in a much more responsive feel to the game as a whole. In
multiplayer games, the responsiveness is improved for all model
detail settings, but for performance reasons it only affects "medium"
and "high" model detail in single player games.

================================================== ================
Dedicated Server CPU Utilization
================================================== ================

win_dedicated_sleep

This cvar has a default value of 1, and will be saved to server.cfg
whenever it is changed. The cvar specifies the number of milliseconds
that a dedicated server will completely relinquish
control to the operating system each frame. Increasing the value of the cvar
effectively reduces the CPU utilization of a MOH:PA dedicated server process.
Increase this cvar if you are running multiple instances of dedicated servers
or other necessary processes on your CPU. Set this cvar to 0 if you want an
instance of the MOH:PA dedicated server to use the CPU whenever it is available
(100% utilization). A value of 0 can result in a slight performance increase,
especially on low spec machines with several connected users. Increasing this
cvar can result in a performance decrease. You may change this cvar at runtime
or at the command line; we recommend a range of 0 to 10 (integer only).

================================================== =================
Loading games saved from version 1.0
================================================== =================

Note that if you load a saved game with Medal of Honor Pacific Assault(tm) Patch
Version 1.1 that was saved from version 1.0, you will load to the beginning of that
level rather than to the exact location where the game was originally saved.

================================================== =================
Network Performance Tips
================================================== =================

If you are getting poor latency in a game, make sure your Connection Type is properly set.
Leaving it at the default ISDN setting will cause lag and other performance issues.
Set your connection type to LAN, or DSL, either when you are prompted to enter your
Call Sign and Connection Type the first time you click on the Multiplayer Menu, or
from the Player Setup screen, accessible by clicking the button on the top right
of any of the Multiplayer Menus.

================================================== =================
Optimization and Battle Ambience
================================================== =================

If clients are having latency issues on your server, you can turn some of
the ambient effects off from the console or from the DSLauncher:

• From the server console, type dm_effectscontroller 0 and this
will turn the effects off next time the server restarts.
• From the DSLauncher, go to the “Advanced 2” tab, set your
Bandwidth optimization to “Network Speed”.
• If you’re starting servers from some kind of batch file/command line,
just add +set dm_effectscontroller 0 to the shortcut.

enjoy

[MajorWoody]

How many games have a dedicated server-only release? Only one that I can think of.

Half Life (and all the mods)
Half Life 2 (and all the mods)
UT2004
Tribes: Vengeance
Battlefield: 1942
Battlefield: Vietnam
IGI2
Neverwinter Nights
Rogue Spear

And those are just the ones that i run :D

Having no interest in half of them, i would not be serving them if there were no dedicated servers. Releasing a dedicated server is an excellent way to get your game out there.

[kevn357]

Kevn357, tell you what...you have obviously made your personal feelings about the game known. Why not communicate your disatisfaction to EA and ask for a refund. Check this link, one of the items on this FAQ tells you how to return your game. MOHPA FAQ over at EA GAMES (http://eatech.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/eatech.cfg/php/enduser/std_alp.php?p_sid=vWinUKqh&p_lva=&p_li=&p_page=1&p_cv=&p_pv=2.1722&p_prods=342%2C1722&p_cats=0&p_hidden_prods=&p_scf_platform=%7Eany%7E&prods1=342&prods2=1722&cats1=0&p_search_text=&p_new_search=1&p_search_type=search_nl)

We are here because we happen to like the game and MOHADMIN specifically is for us Server Admins to exchange helpful information with respect to the game. We are all aware the game has a few issues but we are confident that EA and the MOHTEAM are working to ensure that these issues are cleared up. My personal experience with the game has been great, SP is amazing and fortunately my system doesn't experience the mouse lag that some people are getting nor does my server lag or have the high CPU utilizaiton that some do. I ping a steady 50 msec while in game on my server with no frame lag either except for the random spike which is seen rarely. Good luck with whatever game you play and hope you can find some satisfaction in returning the game which you clearly do not like or wish to play based on your comments.


Sorry. I'm here for the same reason as you. Love the MOh franchise, just have no respect for EA, and i took it to far. The developers get no credit.
Broke my wrist and the pain killers are owning me.

Since the patch is out i will look at the new threads and decide if i should upload the 4 gigs.