EA talks Army of Two region lock, points to lag issues

Electronic Arts is now under fire for Army of Two‘s confirmed region-lock not only for the Xbox 360, but now also for the Playstation 3. It takes two to dance that cliched dance, you know; so head over to the full article for EA’s detailed region-lock explanation.

Electronic Arts knew better not to stay mum on the confirmed Xbox 360 multiplayer region-lock of their latest gem Army of Two. Seeing how easily their co-op third-person shooter topped the charts in such a short time, EA can’t stay under a bunker for very long – especially now that its Playstation 3 version is also region-locked as well.

Army of Two lead designer Reid Schneider attributed the root of the region-lock on the game’s deterministic (peer-to-peer) networking approach for both Playstation 3 and Xbox 360. Schneider elaborates:

Army of Two uses a deterministic (peer to peer) approach for networking versus a traditional client-server approach.  We do this so we can have all the synchronized animation gameplay that exist in the game.

This solution is solid for our game but also exposes us to risk in terms of lag, if we’re not careful. In a peer to peer connection the person with the worst connection brings down the whole group to his/her worst connection level.

While not generally a problem for COOP (since most people play co-op with friends) when playing in Versus mode 3 people can be highly adversely affected by one player with a bad connection. We use the region lock to minimize the likelihood of this occurring.

EA’s other major consideration lies with territorial differences. Asian versions have restrictions when it comes to shooting down bodies. Since EA will not remove this feature for North American and European users, parity issues will emerge resulting in the eventual failure of the multiplayer session.

We understand how EA wants to safeguard Army of Two‘s gameplay quality with the region-lock and some gamers are all for it. But it’s always better when options are put into place instead of total restrictions. More updates here at QJ.NET as they arrive.

Buy: [ Army of Two (PlayStation 3) ]
Buy: [ Army of Two (Xbox 360) ]