Game Input with Delay - Moving Target Selection with a Game Controller Thumbstick

ACM Transactions on Multimedia Computing, Communications, and Applications (TOMM)

Special Issue on Delay-Sensitive Video Computing in the Cloud

Volume 14, Number 3, Article 57

https://doi.org/10.1145/3187288

June 2018

Hosting interactive video-based services, such as computer games, in the cloud poses particular challenges given the sensitivity to delay. A better understanding of the impact of delay on player-game interactions can help design cloud systems and games that accommodate delay inherent in cloud systems. Previous top-down studies of delay using full-featured games have helped understand the impact of delay, but often do not generalize nor lend themselves to analytic modeling. Bottom-up studies isolating user input and delay can better generalize and be used in models, but have yet to be applied to cloud-hosted computer games. In order to better understand delay impact in cloud-hosted computer games, we conduct a large bottom-up user study centered on a fundamental game interaction - selecting a moving target with user input subject to delay. Our work builds a custom game that controls both the target speed and input delay and has players select the target using an game controller analog thumbstick. Analysis of data from over 50 users shows target selection time exponentially increases with delay and target speed and is well-fit by an exponential model that includes a delay & target speed interaction term. A comparison with two previous studies, both using a mouse instead of a thumbstick, suggests the model's relationship between delay and target speed holds more broadly, providing a foundation for a potential law explaining moving target selection with delay encountered in cloud-hosted games.

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