A method of and system for handling latency issues encountered in producing real-time entertainment such as games of skill synchronized with live or taped televised events is described herein. There are multiple situations that are dealt with regarding latencies in receiving a television signal with respect to real-time entertainment based on the unfolding games played along with the telecasts. Systemic delays, arbitrarily imposed delays of a broadcast signal and variances in the precise broadcast times of taped television programs have to be equalized so as to provide fair entertainment.

An electronic game server receives a request from a client device to establish a real-time interactive gaming session, determines a device capability of an output device associated with the client device, determines a connection capability of the network connection, determines one or more target quality parameters for the real-time interactive gaming session based on the device capability and the connection capability, selects a first virtual machine of the plurality of virtual machines based on the one or more target quality parameters, establishes the real-time interactive gaming session with the client device, and provides to the real-time interactive gaming session, in accordance with the resource profile of the first virtual machine, resources for processing inputs from the client device and generating gameplay outputs in accordance with the processed inputs within the real-time interactive gaming session.

Systems and methods for providing a shared augmented reality environment are provided. In particular, the latency of communication is reduced by using a peer-to-peer protocol to determine where to send datagrams. Datagrams describe actions that occur within the shared augmented reality environment, and the processing of datagrams is split between an intermediary node of a communications network (e.g., a cell tower) and a server. As a result, the intermediary node may provide updates to a local state of a client device when a datagram is labelled peer-to-peer, and otherwise provides updates to the master state on the server. This may reduce the latency of communication and allow users of the location-based parallel reality game to see actions occur more quickly in the shared augmented reality environment.

Systems and methods for reducing latency through motion estimation and compensation techniques are disclosed. The systems and methods include a client device that uses transmitted lookup tables from a remote server to match user input to motion vectors, and tag and sum those motion vectors. When a remote server transmits encoded video frames to the client, the client decodes those video frames and applies the summed motion vectors to the decoded frames to estimate motion in those frames. In certain embodiments, the systems and methods generate motion vectors at a server based on predetermined criteria and transmit the generated motion vectors and one or more invalidators to a client, which caches those motion vectors and invalidators. The server instructs the client to receive input from a user, and use that input to match to cached motion vectors or invalidators. Based on that comparison, the client then applies the matched motion vectors or invalidators to effect motion compensation in a graphic interface. In other embodiments, the systems and methods cache repetitive motion vectors at a server, which transmits a previously generated motion vector library to a client. The client stores the motion vector library, and monitors for user input data. The server instructs the client to calculate a motion estimate from the input data and instructs the client to update the stored motion vector library based on the input data, so that the client applies the stored motion vector library to initiate motion in a graphic interface prior to receiving actual motion vector data from the server. In this manner, latency in video data streams is reduced.

A method for cloud gaming. The method including generating a video frame when executing a video game at a server. The method including performing a scan-out process to deliver the video frame to an encoder configured to compress the video frame, wherein the scan-out process begins at a flip-time of the video frame. The method including transmitting the video frame that is compressed to a client. The method including determining at the client a target display time for the video frame. The method including scheduling at the client a display time for the video frame based on the target display time.

A method for cloud gaming. The method including generating a video frame when executing a video game at a server. The method including performing a scan-out process by scanning the video frame scanline-by-scanline and one or more user interface features scanline-by-scanline to one or more input frame buffers, and compositing and blending the video frame and the one or more user interface features into a modified video frame. The method including scanning in the scan-out process the modified video frame to an encoder at the server scanline-by-scanline. The method including beginning in the scan-out process scanning the video frame and the one or more user interface features to the one or more input frame buffers at a corresponding flip-time for the video frame.

A method of and system for handling latency issues encountered in producing real-time entertainment such as games of skill synchronized with live or taped televised events is described herein. There are multiple situations that are dealt with regarding latencies in receiving a television signal with respect to real-time entertainment based on the unfolding games played along with the telecasts. Systemic delays, arbitrarily imposed delays of a broadcast signal and variances in the precise broadcast times of taped television programs have to be equalized so as to provide fair entertainment.

A method is disclosed including setting, at a server, a server VSYNC signal to a server VSYNC frequency defining a plurality of frame periods. The server VSYNC signal corresponding to generation of a plurality of video frames at the server during the plurality of frame periods. The method including setting, at a client, a client VSYNC signal to a client VSYNC frequency. The method including sending a plurality of compressed video frames based on the plurality of video frames from the server to the client over a network using the server VSYNC signal. The method including decoding and displaying, at the client, the plurality of compressed video frames. The method including analyzing the timing of one or more client operations to set the amount of frame buffering used by the client, as the client receives the plurality of compressed video frames.

Client machines running game executables of a video game(s) may utilize a file system proxy component that is configured to track read operations made by the game executable during a game session, to generate access data based on the tracked read operations, and to report the access data to a remote system. This telemetry approach allows the remote system to collect access data reported by multiple client machines, to catalogue the access data according to client system configuration, and to analyze the access data to generate data that is usable by client machines to implement various game-related features including, without limitation, “instant play” of video games, discarding of unused blocks of game data to free up local memory resources, and/or local prefetching of game data for reducing latency during gameplay.

An illustrative server system receives a request from a client device to join a virtual world managed by the server system. In response to receiving the request, the server system identifies an avatar location for an avatar that is to represent a user of the client device within the virtual world when the client device joins the virtual world. Based on the avatar location, the server system determines a first priority value for a first asset of the virtual world and a second priority value for a second asset of the virtual world. Based on the first and second priority values, the server system provides to the client device a prioritized replication of the virtual world in which the first asset is replicated in a prioritized manner that allows the user to experience the first asset before the second asset is replicated. Corresponding methods and systems are also disclosed.