GGPO is an infrastructure with objectively the best fighting game netcode ever made. Made by two amateur dudes in their spare time. It's so good Capcom asked them to use it for some of their own old games because it fared better than what their own engineers could do. And then they copied their own version of it for SFV and it works like shit comparatively. GGPO is free of use, and peer2peer. I wonder what ghost company backed them all the required millions to be able to create something so good?
GGPO technology is achievable on a PS2 in terms of hardware and network capabilities of that time. So basically the beginning of console online play. It's not new tech. It's simply well optimized with the perspective of a player who actually understands what lag is, not focus testing random fratboys then calling it good enough and shipping it.
That's the key difference that smash/splatoon/mariokart netcode doesn't and will never have. Nintendo sucks shit with netplay infrastructure. Smash4 online wasn't shit because the poor multimillion company could not afford a better system or a better infrastructure. Smash online like any other nintendo online portion is shit because the company is clueless on netplay. Paying the fee won't solve anything, because the money they are asking probably covers the efforts of servicing ten thousand people at once. They clearly aren't asking because they need the money. They are asking now because it's the trend to get more money out of you. Make no mistake, you will still get matched with the nipponese crowd in splatoon 2 due to dogshit server browser for that privileged 300 ping experience. You will still experience massive teleporting and rubber banding in smash 5. You will still go through 85 hoops to download some fucking levels in mario maker 2. You are just going to pay for it now. It was never a matter of money, let alone for a billions worth of company, that assumption is a sad joke.
Alternatively we can talk about the free online of quake 3 being a 20 year old game working flawlessly ever since day one, too.
So no, "smash 4 online was bad because [insert any reason here other utter incompetence]" is not a point. Smash 4 online (and splatoon, and mk, and pokemon, and mario maker) is shit because Nintendo is complete dog shit network wise and doesn't value a good online experience for their enthusiast customers.
I encourage you to try out any game on GGPO even for just 5 minutes and then jump in on any Nintendo online game, playing with your buddy on both instances so you get a good feel using the same distance/ping. But that will likely result in you never wanting to go online ever again with the latter titles.
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