Qi, Hanghang and Malone, David and Botvich, Dmitri (2010) Optimization of Capacity in various 802.11 Gaming Scenarios. International Journal of Advanced Media and Communication, 4 (4). pp. 302-323. ISSN 1462-4613

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Abstract

As IEEE 802.11 wireless LANs are widely deployed and the popularity of multiplayer real-time gaming continues to increase, games are increasingly played over 802.11 wireless networks. In this paper, we consider the issue of how games traffic is likely to interact with wireless networks and give a framework to study this kind of application. Using Quake 4 as an example, we produce a multiplayer game traffic model. By introducing a model of MAC layer of IEEE 802.11 networks, we show how the performance changes as the number of players increases. The performance indicators that we consider include throughput, delay, jitter and mean opinion score (MOS). Several different network scenarios are considered and discussed, including when the game server and clients are connected wirelessly, and when the server is connected to the AP through a wired link and the use of multicast. We identify issues such as the Access Point (AP) or the game server becoming the bottleneck of the network. We also present solutions to these problems based on 802.11e. Using our 802.11e testbed, we demonstrate that our solution provides a subjective improvement in game performance. We believe the technique applied in this paper could be applied to improve the performance of other real-time applications, including other games.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	This is the postprint version of the published article, which is available at DOI: 10.1504/IJAMC.2010.036833 . The authors wish to acknowledge funding support from the Irish HEA PRTLI Cycle 4 FutureComm (http://futurecomm.tssg.org) programme.
Keywords:	802.11; multiplayer games; bottleneck; QoS; TXOP; multicast;
Academic Unit:	Faculty of Science and Engineering > Research Institutes > Hamilton Institute
Item ID:	6006
Identification Number:	https://doi.org/10.1504/IJAMC.2010.036833
Depositing User:	Dr. David Malone
Date Deposited:	08 Apr 2015 15:51
Journal or Publication Title:	International Journal of Advanced Media and Communication
Publisher:	Interscience
Refereed:	Yes
Funders:	Higher Education Authority (HEA)
URI:	http://www.inderscience.com/jhome.php?jc...
Use Licence:	This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available here

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