Explaining Lag Part 1: and Day 13

Explaining Lag.

Ok, I'm going to come at this from a semi-starting angle.  When people talk about games, there are several types of lag.  One is internet lag, this is caused by a slow connection.  Ideally this should never come up in Rocksmith, awesome, one less thing, right?  Ok.  The next is graphical lag.  Unless you're playing on PC, there's not really much you could or need to do.  The 360 and PS3 versions of the game were tweaked to make them work smoothly.

The one that Rocksmith has to deal with is Interface lag.  Technically the previous two types can cause this type as well, but as I said, not a big issue with Rocksmith on PS3 and 360.

Signals come in two basic forms, Analog and Digital.  Analog is a way of turning wave patterns into electrical patterns and back again.  The conversion is generally imperceptibly fast in doing so.  The problem with sending these analog signals is that certain wave patterns can get lost, static wave patterns can be introduced, and even outside signals can interact with them.  Put your phone beside a computer speaker, you'll start hearing a "beep beep beep".  Because of this, there ARE better, more expensive analog cables, an entire industry has arose around providing better analog connections.

Digital signals are these waves patterns converted into ones and zeros.  These ones and zeros can take up alot of space in the digital world.  Most are "compressed", made smaller by reducing similar signals, so that they can travel over a medium.  There's another thing that will many times come into play, encryption.  Netflix, Redbox, and all the Bluray people do not want you to be able to record their content while it is going through a cable.  So the signals are encrypted.  After all of this, the TV gets control as well.  Compression can cause low resolution videos to get splotchy, so manufacturers put filters to reduce it.  Colors could be set up for your specific screen, so now the manufacturers add color toning, skin whitening.  The audio might be 5 or 7 channel audio, but your TV is 2 speakers.  Now they have to convert that, and many times emphasize the signal that is used for voices.  So you have signal production, signal coversion, signal analyzing and compression, signal encryption, signal travel(speed of lightish), signal reception, signal unencryption, signal uncompression and reassembly, signal alteration, and finally signal output.  Got digital out from the TV to your  speaker system?  Well add ALL those steps again before your digital reception device outputs into analog speakers.  All of this takes milliseconds each... but add up to have pretty significant delay.  I am even missing a few steps here, but you get the general idea.

The bonus is that there is no such thing as "better signal" from more expensive cables.  High grade HDMI cables are a rip off.  Digital signals either work or don't, there is no signal loss.  If the cable is long enough(we're talking multi-room length), there will not be a shitty signal at the end, you'll either get 100% full audio/visual or 0%.

That's all for today.  Tomorrow I will talk about reducing each type of lag.  If you are reading this on the bleeding edge of reality and want answers NOW, then read the insert that came with Rocksmith or go to Ubi's site.


Day 13

Kind of long, I played a lot today.  It was 4 degrees outside my door today, which is strange this close to "Hotlanta",  So a lot of stuff to cover...

I think I may be coming to a crossroads here.  I have been purposefully going slowly through the lessons and not going through the other stuff fast either.  I wanted to make sure I had the basics down before really getting into the stuff I can not do.  Also, playing songs at an elementary and unrecognizable level is not fun for me, and I do not feel accomplished.  Add to that my notorious dislike of spending time on music I do not care for.

So, I have choices.  I want to continue using the Guitarcade for practice, and I want to continue doing lessons that matter to me.  The thing is, I think there is a lot of songs that will help me out a lot more than what is included on this disc.  Is that still keeping with the spirit of the 60 day challenge?  Is there a point to keeping a blog for the challenge if I'm deviating?  There are songs that interest me on the disc, there's a lot of them, there's also like 20+ DLC songs that would interest me.  I just do not know if I"m good enough to even attempt Thunderkiss '66 or Mary Jane's Last Dance.  Like I said, the game just giving me random bits and pieces pisses me off more than helps me out.  If its a freakin' power chord, give it to me; I can do power chords.  Don't make me prattle away.

What songs do I want to learn?  Well, I learned about a few Pentatonic based songs that I have played a long with in Youtube(without actually learning the correct sequence to the notes, but knowing they "fit" in with the music).  There are also a  lot of simple chord songs that would help me out on that end, and they just aren't in game.  I'll think over it tonight.

Today in lessons, I worked on the Hammer On/Pull Off practice track a little today.  The next lesson was Tremolo picking, and I found out that I could not care less about Tremolo picking.  I have always hated 50's surfer music and beach blanket bimbo style cultural stuff.  So yea, I'm not going back to tremolo picking any time soon.  I did, however, do the lesson on palm muting.

FINALLY.  A new breakthrough.  The first since day 01 I would say.  I always wondered how people like Rob Chapman, and every metal guitarist ever, got that "thud thud" thick sound.  The video showed me how I was supposed to be using my palm to still allow sound through, but make it sort of muffled.  I had always though "Palm muting" was just a regular mute technique, nothing really musical.  This lesson kind of made me feel dumb, but I am glad I finally know.  THIS I will have to practice, THIS I will be using in my own playing eventually.  THIS is what i have Rocksmith for.

TIP OF THE DAY
Listen to them when they tell you that tensing up actually works against Tremolo picking.  After giving up on the lesson, I did practice just relaxing my hand "just right" for the picking to work at all.  To my surprise the notes got faster, rang out clearer, and sounded more accurate.

Things Wot Go Wrong and Day 12

There are a few problems I've had with the game, and so far it seems to not only be me.

The Dux Redux is a problem for a lot of people.  I said in an earlier post that doing a very light touch to the fretting fixes that. I can confirm that it fixes it for me, though in the heat of the game I sometimes still fret too hard.  It is weird that during songs and lessons that I do not have a problem with the game detecting my fret usage, but this particular Guitarcade game some how does.  It is the E string that has the problem.

Bends.  Guys.  Please.  Do not tear your hair out over the Bends lesson.  Skip the lesson after learning what a bend is if it is acting up on you.  Bends just aren't handled well as of January 2014.  I am reading that the bending lesson in Rocksmith 2013 was bad also.  It might prevent you from getting 100% on lessons and songs, but its is NOT you.  It is Rocksmith.  This also means the string bending arcade game does not work very well, though I have not yet played it myself to confirm.

My suggestion is to set up riff repeater and be honest to yourself; get through the practice track a few times a day, memorizing it like any other lesson, but ignore the rating.  You know if you have it correct or not.  Why keep doing it?  Build those bending muscles, and figure out your technique.  Its important, especially if you want to play some Hendrix in your lifetime.

My USB cable does not like to connect well sometimes.  I switch USB ports and all that, and still, it is wonky.  It could just be a loose USB hub.  I have found that the last two times, which isn't a large enough sample to know it works, that if I take apart the USB cable at the breakaway connector, and plug that back together, that I get signal.  Yes, that's a breakaway connector.  It is meant to come undone instead of pulling your PS3/360 off on to the floor if you yank your instrument cable too hard.

I'll make any new "Things Wot Go Wrong" posts as I accumulate anymore.

Day 12

The Bends problem is back, so I looked it up online and.. well look above for what I found.

I'm steadily scoring much higher on String Skip Saloon, so it is doing what I need it to do.  Meaning I am getting used to seeing the strings from Low(thickest) to High(thinnest).  As for Scale Warriors... I get what its doing, and I want to like the game a lot, in fact I want it to be my favorite game, but I just do not think it is improving my guitar skill.  Loading up sessions and playing the scales listed there seems much easier to me, and much better at memorization.  It is too easy to get flustered and just start banging away at strings in Scale Warriors.

I have the hardest time going directly to the B or G string.  My fingers just aren't used to 6 strings, and its just taking more time than I thought to at least get them correct.  You'd think it wouldn't be all that bad because I have zero problems with a 5 string bass, but its like my fingers have blurry vision from D, G, B.

I started the Hamer Ons and Pull offs lesson for my last half or more of today's practice time.  This is a proper lesson.  I am good with this kind of stuff, but the practice track is a step up compared to other practice tracks.  This is going to take time to memorize and play smoothly.  I like it.  Its the kind of challenge that is challenging for my level of play without being screwed up by bad game detection(like the bends).

Tip of the Day:

Riff Repeater's sections are chosen by your L's and R's buttons and triggers.  When you get a new practice track, listen to the game play it, then load up your riff repeater, highlight the entire thing and start out at like 80% speed or whatever is good for you.  I personally keep the difficulty at 100%.  In fact, I am catching myself saying "don't F'ing patronize me, give me the whole song" when I screw up on ONE LITTLE PART and the game decides to make the entire rest of the song easier for me.  At the point of memorizing the song, that actually is not helpful at all.