What's up with this game
folko
✭✭✭
And it's exorbitant downtimes?
It's been like this for years, at some point you gotta ask what gives?
Like seriously, what's the deal? Why does it always take literally an entire day to patch this game?
You'd think by the year 2025, 11 years after release, ZOS woulda figured out a way to make this process more efficient, and maybe take like 3-4 hours TOPS on a BAD day.
Can't play this on a day off because of a whopping 6 HOUR long downtime.
Funnily enough they have such insane downtimes, yet they still cannot be arsed to fix the insane lagspikes. No other game I play has ever had such an egregious amount of lagspikes everyday.
It's like the servers are begging for a mercy that shall never come.
Edited by ZOS_Kevin on June 2, 2025 12:25PM It's been like this for years, at some point you gotta ask what gives?
Like seriously, what's the deal? Why does it always take literally an entire day to patch this game?
You'd think by the year 2025, 11 years after release, ZOS woulda figured out a way to make this process more efficient, and maybe take like 3-4 hours TOPS on a BAD day.
Can't play this on a day off because of a whopping 6 HOUR long downtime.
Funnily enough they have such insane downtimes, yet they still cannot be arsed to fix the insane lagspikes. No other game I play has ever had such an egregious amount of lagspikes everyday.
It's like the servers are begging for a mercy that shall never come.
6
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DrakeHellfire✭✭✭This is fairly quick considering this downtime is for the new content they are releasing for Solstice, 6 hours of downtime is nowhere near as bad as it could be.5 -
folko✭✭✭DrakeHellfire wrote: »This is fairly quick considering this downtime is for the new content they are releasing for Solstice, 6 hours of downtime is nowhere near as bad as it could be.
Yeah 6 hours of downtime is their standard, which is why it bothers me so much.
Like genuinely if it takes that long maybe there's something in the process that they need to look at to make it more efficient.2 -
bmnoble✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭Would rather they take the time to do it right than rush and screw something up.
You get advance notice, up to you to plan something else for your day off.4 -
Al_Ex_Andre✭✭✭Servers are not top notch. They are better now since they changed them, but zos still didn't paid for the best. Maybie ESO IS too niche for Microsoft.
(Blizzard have definitely a shorter maintenance, and it's the same company.) 2 -
licenturion✭✭✭✭✭
✭It makes sense today
1. Taking servers offline
2. Create a backup of databases
3. Deploy launcher update
4. Deploy client update
5. Update database with new tables, items and systems over 2 regions
6. Internal testing if everything works correctly
7. Bring servers back online
Quite the task. Other PvE games with PvP have the same issues. Division 2 is also offline usually half a day each week.5 -
Sylosi✭✭✭✭✭
✭licenturion wrote: »It makes sense today
1. Taking servers offline
2. Create a backup of databases
3. Deploy launcher update
4. Deploy client update
5. Update database with new tables, items and systems over 2 regions
6. Internal testing if everything works correctly
7. Bring servers back online
Quite the task. Other PvE games with PvP have the same issues. Division 2 is also offline usually half a day each week.
You've obviously never played GW2 which has had less downtime in 13 years than ESO gets in a couple of months.
It's quite possible to have little to no downtime, many online services achieve that, some games, telephone systems have done it for decades (and it was a lot more work back then, Ericsson invented an entire programming language called Erlang in part so they could easily hot-reload code into running telephone systems so as not to interrupt calls).
In GW2 on a basic level it works like this, you have a redundant set of servers, you put the new update on those, you then flash a message in game to the live servers that there has been update telling people to log out in the next 2 hours, thus giving people in dungeons, raids, etc, time to finish. People log out, restart the game, the client downloads any updates it needs and then when you log back in you are put on the newly updated servers. Over two hours everyone eventually is migrated to the newly updated servers. And of course actual maintenance where there are no updates to the game can be done transparently with zero downtime.
Which isn't only a much better service for the customers, it is more stress free for the devs, as if some update goes wrong or maintenance takes a long time, they can take their time, because they aren't working on live servers with players impatiently waiting.
Of course for that you need either the economic imperative for the company (Google would lose a lot of money from hours of downtime, hence no downtime) or a company that actually cares about the quality of its product / service enough to spend the extra money that no downtime entails, Zenimax is clearly all about the money.
Edited by Sylosi on June 2, 2025 9:38AM3 -
BlackAxiom✭✭✭And it's exorbitant downtimes?
It's been like this for years, at some point you gotta ask what gives?
Like seriously, what's the deal? Why does it always take literally an entire day to patch this game?
You'd think by the year 2025, 11 years after release, ZOS woulda figured out a way to make this process more efficient, and maybe take like 3-4 hours TOPS on a BAD day.
Can't play this on a day off because of a whopping 6 HOUR long downtime.
Funnily enough they have such insane downtimes, yet they still cannot be arsed to fix the insane lagspikes. No other game I play has ever had such an egregious amount of lagspikes everyday.
It's like the servers are begging for a mercy that shall never come.
you should be glad it is only 6hours... I have seen downtimes 8 to 12hours some cases even longer.2 -
Cardhwion✭✭✭And it's exorbitant downtimes?
It's been like this for years, at some point you gotta ask what gives?
Like seriously, what's the deal? Why does it always take literally an entire day to patch this game?
You'd think by the year 2025, 11 years after release, ZOS woulda figured out a way to make this process more efficient, and maybe take like 3-4 hours TOPS on a BAD day.
Can't play this on a day off because of a whopping 6 HOUR long downtime.
Funnily enough they have such insane downtimes, yet they still cannot be arsed to fix the insane lagspikes. No other game I play has ever had such an egregious amount of lagspikes everyday.
It's like the servers are begging for a mercy that shall never come.
It's the deployment of the new expansion, so 6 Hours is very reasonable, and I expect extensions. BUT you know what? Having played many MMOs and seen a lot of really bad Patch Days, I take them doing it slow and then it will be working over "Ouch" cannot play until 3 emergency patches."Why did I follow him...? I don't know. Why do things happen as they do in dreams? All I know is that, when he beckoned... I had to follow him. From that moment, we traveled together, East. Always... into the East."1 -
Cardhwion✭✭✭licenturion wrote: »It makes sense today
1. Taking servers offline
2. Create a backup of databases
3. Deploy launcher update
4. Deploy client update
5. Update database with new tables, items and systems over 2 regions
6. Internal testing if everything works correctly
7. Bring servers back online
Quite the task. Other PvE games with PvP have the same issues. Division 2 is also offline usually half a day each week.
You've obviously never played GW2 which has had less downtime in 13 years than ESO gets in a couple of months.
It's quite possible to have little to no downtime, many online services achieve that, some games, telephone systems have done it for decades (and it was a lot more work back then, Ericsson invented an entire programming language called Erlang in part so they could easily hot-reload code into running telephone systems so as not to interrupt calls).
In GW2 on a basic level it works like this, you have a redundant set of servers, you put the new update on those, you then flash a message in game to the live servers that there has been update telling people to log out in the next 2 hours, thus giving people in dungeons, raids, etc, time to finish. People log out, restart the game, the client downloads any updates it needs and then when you log back in you are put on the newly updated servers. Over two hours everyone eventually is migrated to the newly updated servers. And of course actual maintenance where there are no updates to the game can be done transparently with zero downtime.
Which isn't only a much better service for the customers, it is more stress free for the devs, as if some update goes wrong or maintenance takes a long time, they can take their time, because they aren't working on live servers with players impatiently waiting.
Of course for that you need either the economic imperative for the company (Google would lose a lot of money from hours of downtime, hence no downtime) or a company that actually cares about the quality of its product / service enough to spend the extra money that no downtime entails, Zenimax is clearly all about the money.
And you obviously never played WOW, SWTOR or a couple of others. Ever tried a D4 or POE Launch day?"Why did I follow him...? I don't know. Why do things happen as they do in dreams? All I know is that, when he beckoned... I had to follow him. From that moment, we traveled together, East. Always... into the East."4 -
RobZha✭✭✭I have "What's up with this game" too at some stage each day but it's lag/rubberbanding instead. I really hope they spend some time working on this soon so that it's sorted out. A company that has Microsoft as the parent now should have the resources to deal with this instead of making out like it's just the players who haven't got a good enough install or need to update their drivers or whatever.
The only thing that allows them to get away with this currently is that it affects some players more than others so there's not a huge uproar I guess. Maybe if it's not sorted out though it'll get worse and more people will have to see how bad it is.
One thing's for certain though : Microsoft have the resources to deal with it if need be but they're choosing not to. That's not really a good advertisement for how much they care about this game either. Some of us can play other online games with next to zero issues like this so it's no good carrying on blaming the players.1 -
folko✭✭✭sleepy_worm wrote: »"It could be worse," is not quite a glowing endorsement.
Yea when someone says "it could be worse" I just think "yeah but it could be better"0 -
SeaGtGruff✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭Why does it always take literally an entire day to patch this game?
The downtime is scheduled for 6 hours. That literally is not "literally an entire day," unless you consider one-fourth of a day to be an "entire" day. And if you literally consider one-fourth of something to be literally an entire thing, then I propose to buy a pizza, eat three-fourths of it, and then sell you the remaining one-fourth for the price of the entire pizza.
But seriously, this game is huge. I mean, it's so huge that I can't even install it on one of my computers because the hard drive literally isn't large enough for it. So I'm really not surprised that it takes several hours to copy all of the additional and updated files onto all of the servers.I've fought mudcrabs more fearsome than me!5 -
smallhammer✭✭✭Always someone who has to complain. Is it implied that you could've done it faster and better?
I say take the time needed. They are putting out lots of new stuff for us.
5 -
Vahndamme✭✭✭✭My wish is that they gave us patch notes now already. Like giving something to read already.6
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xXEliotXxSoul ShrivenI do somewhat agree with downtime being a bit long, however if they don't extend it then it already beats WoW in that regard. lol0 -
folko✭✭✭SeaGtGruff wrote: »Why does it always take literally an entire day to patch this game?
The downtime is scheduled for 6 hours. That literally is not "literally an entire day," unless you consider one-fourth of a day to be an "entire" day. And if you literally consider one-fourth of something to be literally an entire thing, then I propose to buy a pizza, eat three-fourths of it, and then sell you the remaining one-fourth for the price of the entire pizza.
But seriously, this game is huge. I mean, it's so huge that I can't even install it on one of my computers because the hard drive literally isn't large enough for it. So I'm really not surprised that it takes several hours to copy all of the additional and updated files onto all of the servers.
When I can't play from 11AM-5PM I would consider that to literally be the entire day, I reckon.
Because, quite literally, that's an entire DAY I can't play the game due to downtime.
If I didn't need to sleep, hell, I'd play through night and day whenever I don't gotta work.1 -
xXEliotXxSoul ShrivenSeaGtGruff wrote: »Why does it always take literally an entire day to patch this game?
The downtime is scheduled for 6 hours. That literally is not "literally an entire day," unless you consider one-fourth of a day to be an "entire" day. And if you literally consider one-fourth of something to be literally an entire thing, then I propose to buy a pizza, eat three-fourths of it, and then sell you the remaining one-fourth for the price of the entire pizza.
But seriously, this game is huge. I mean, it's so huge that I can't even install it on one of my computers because the hard drive literally isn't large enough for it. So I'm really not surprised that it takes several hours to copy all of the additional and updated files onto all of the servers.
When I can't play from 11AM-5PM I would consider that to literally be the entire day, I reckon.
Because, quite literally, that's an entire DAY I can't play the game due to downtime.
If I didn't need to sleep, hell, I'd play through night and day whenever I don't gotta work.
I just want to put this out there, YOU may not be able to play during that time period while someone else may ONLY be able to play during that time period.2 -
Sylosi✭✭✭✭✭
✭And you obviously never played WOW, SWTOR or a couple of others. Ever tried a D4 or POE Launch day?
Sure I've played some of those games and putting aside the downtime when I played POE for example was generally miniscule compared to ESO, they are irrelevant to the point.
That there are other games that also have long downtimes is neither here nor there, I don't care if SWTOR has long downtimes, I don't play it. What I do care about is the downtimes for games I play and more to the point that contrary to the ignorance of some when these threads come up, that it is perfectly possible to have games, even MMOs with minimal downtime. But it takes a bit of effort and costs a little more.
Edited by Sylosi on June 2, 2025 12:03PM1 -
Parrot1986✭✭✭✭✭
✭licenturion wrote: »It makes sense today
1. Taking servers offline
2. Create a backup of databases
3. Deploy launcher update
4. Deploy client update
5. Update database with new tables, items and systems over 2 regions
6. Internal testing if everything works correctly
7. Bring servers back online
Quite the task. Other PvE games with PvP have the same issues. Division 2 is also offline usually half a day each week.
You've obviously never played GW2 which has had less downtime in 13 years than ESO gets in a couple of months.
It's quite possible to have little to no downtime, many online services achieve that, some games, telephone systems have done it for decades (and it was a lot more work back then, Ericsson invented an entire programming language called Erlang in part so they could easily hot-reload code into running telephone systems so as not to interrupt calls).
In GW2 on a basic level it works like this, you have a redundant set of servers, you put the new update on those, you then flash a message in game to the live servers that there has been update telling people to log out in the next 2 hours, thus giving people in dungeons, raids, etc, time to finish. People log out, restart the game, the client downloads any updates it needs and then when you log back in you are put on the newly updated servers. Over two hours everyone eventually is migrated to the newly updated servers. And of course actual maintenance where there are no updates to the game can be done transparently with zero downtime.
Which isn't only a much better service for the customers, it is more stress free for the devs, as if some update goes wrong or maintenance takes a long time, they can take their time, because they aren't working on live servers with players impatiently waiting.
Of course for that you need either the economic imperative for the company (Google would lose a lot of money from hours of downtime, hence no downtime) or a company that actually cares about the quality of its product / service enough to spend the extra money that no downtime entails, Zenimax is clearly all about the money.
And you obviously never played WOW, SWTOR or a couple of others. Ever tried a D4 or POE Launch day?
I play WOW regularly and maybe back in the day launches were delayed and a nightmare but nowadays I am yet to ever try and play and conflict with a maintenance. It's done based on EU/NA best hours and takes an hour. Expansion launches take a bit longer but thats every couple years.
For downtime ESO is most aligned with LORTO which isn't a great look considering that games nowhere near as well funded as this one.
I agree downtime is needed but ESOs feels excessive.
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folko✭✭✭SeaGtGruff wrote: »Why does it always take literally an entire day to patch this game?
The downtime is scheduled for 6 hours. That literally is not "literally an entire day," unless you consider one-fourth of a day to be an "entire" day. And if you literally consider one-fourth of something to be literally an entire thing, then I propose to buy a pizza, eat three-fourths of it, and then sell you the remaining one-fourth for the price of the entire pizza.
But seriously, this game is huge. I mean, it's so huge that I can't even install it on one of my computers because the hard drive literally isn't large enough for it. So I'm really not surprised that it takes several hours to copy all of the additional and updated files onto all of the servers.
When I can't play from 11AM-5PM I would consider that to literally be the entire day, I reckon.
Because, quite literally, that's an entire DAY I can't play the game due to downtime.
If I didn't need to sleep, hell, I'd play through night and day whenever I don't gotta work.
I just want to put this out there, YOU may not be able to play during that time period while someone else may ONLY be able to play during that time period.
The amount of people who can play instead of sleeping at night is DRASTICALLY lower than the amount of people who play day to evening.
It is within the company's best interest to be able to serve as many of it's customers as it can. It's not just about when I can play, it's about when the entirety of the EU playerbase can play.
Why does the NA get a downtime from 4-10 AM when people are still asleep so they can't play anyway, while EU gets a downtime during the entire day when people are awake, coming home from work, or just on holiday/time off?
Why doesn't ZOS split the downtimes appropriately for EU and NA? Literally world's easiest solution right here.
Regardless of all that, 6 hours as the standard is absurd, and ZOS needs to step up their game.
If the process takes long because hardware can't keep up with the game's size, upgrade the hardware?
It's not like they can pretend they don't have the funding for that, because they do. Especially considering they basically have big daddy Microsoft being their parent company now, they REALLY do not lack in funding.
It's funny cuz we had a hardware upgrade in 2023 apparently, but EU servers still defecate their whole selves on a daily basis with lagspikes. And I as I have previously stated, I never experience any lag, let alone lagspikes in any other game that I play. And if I do it's very, very rarely, in games both big and small. I could be playing for months before experiencing any lag. In ESO I play daily and there's always at least a few lagspikes where actions don't register, resources don't deplete/regenerate, enemies don't move/take damage, etc.4 -
ZOS_KevinCommunity ManagerClosing this thread down. Ultimately, it's launch day of Update 46 and Seasons of the Worm Cult Part 1. We always have downtime for major updates like this. We have the timing available above, but we will note it here as well.
[IN PROGRESS] PC/Mac: NA and EU megaservers for patch maintenance – June 2, 4:00AM EDT (8:00 UTC) - 10:00AM EDT (14:00 UTC)
We appreciate everyone's patience as we continue maintenance for the new content!Edited by ZOS_Kevin on June 2, 2025 12:30PMCommunity Manager for ZeniMax Online Studio and Elder Scrolls OnlineDev Tracker | Service Alerts | ESO Twitter7
This discussion has been closed.