Most modern AAA games released on consoles or PC require some kind of online connection. Many of the games themselves have online components for gameplay whether it be multiplayer or leader boards. A common cause whenever players find themselves unable to access a game's online features, is that the servers are down.
The server for a game essentially acts as the go between for individual players on an online game. It processes all the data input by each user and transmits this data to other players, while at the same time maintaining a consistent version of the game for each individual player.
Unreliable servers are a common problem for players of online games, as it only takes one server somewhere to break in some way for all online capabilities for a game to go down across an entire region. Electronic Arts has now filed a patent on a system for testing these servers during live online play that could see servers becoming more reliable. The patent works by creating a list of recent player connections to a server and using these connections as a recurrent neural network to test the reliability of EA's servers.
An automatic system that tests both the reliability and availability of online servers should allow online matchmaking to run more smoothly across EA’s more online focused games such as Battlefield 2042 or FIFA 22. It could also decrease the number of outright server failures as EA is able to see from player connection data which servers are performing optimally and which are lacking.
Server issues are a problem faced by most major game publishers, including EA, and this patent does not guarantee a noticeable improvement in server reliability. This patent does however prove that EA is still in development on ways to improve its server reliability and player experience for online games. If the patent does end up vastly improving server reliability by allowing publishers to monitor reliability using real time data, it is possibly a system EA would be willing to loan out to other companies with common server problems, in the hopes of it becoming an industry standard, to which EA owns the patent.
From its description, the patented system seems to be designed for use in large public servers with multiple players connecting every minute. This would allow for a constant and varied data stream for monitoring the server’s reliability; it is perfect then for still popular multiplayer EA titles. But the patent would have less application for smaller titles, or those that use dedicated servers.