Enhancing Cross-Regional Multiplayer Gaming: Implementing Client-Side Prediction to Reduce Network Latency

In the realm of online multiplayer gaming, network latency poses a significant challenge, particularly when players are distributed across diverse geographical regions. Elevated latency can lead to delays in player actions, resulting in a suboptimal gaming experience. This paper explores the implementation of client-side prediction as a strategy to mitigate the adverse effects of network latency in cross-regional multiplayer games. Client-side prediction enables the local system to anticipate the outcomes of player inputs without awaiting server confirmation, thereby enhancing the responsiveness of the game. By examining various client-side prediction techniques and their impact on gameplay fluidity, this study aims to provide insights into optimizing player experiences in environments characterized by high latency. Experimental results show that applying client-side prediction reduced average physics lag from over 570 ms to under 50 ms, while also cutting effective ping by more than half. Although this required higher bandwidth usage, the overall gameplay responsiveness improved significantly under high-latency conditions.