Elements in PS2 make the game more difficult and or frustrating and doesnt have to be

So, I've played for a fairly decent amount of time. By no means any kind of Vet but that shouldnt invalidate whats a pretty obvious and mechanical perspective. Actually, in this case I think it is matter of factly more valid, because it largely only affects newer players who havnt had to "grow into" these things.

And, to be up front, I'm not talking about anything game balance related, but how it's setup mechanically behind the scenes and presented.

Namely, what I'd like to talk about is the information the game gives you. A lot of people who are just starting (or starting again like myself) use this to determine what they're doing, how well they do, and what they did wrong. But theres some fundemental problems in PS2 that's existed for as long as I can remember that I feel like could be improved upon.

• Server Latency

The first thing I'd like to talk about is the inherent lag, and I think frustrates a lot of new players (at least it does to those I've tried to bring in). This is something that some one had to explain to me was *actually* happening, because I legitimately thought that people were cheating when I first started years ago. I know this is a difficult thing to really iron out, especially with such large scale battles. But still, the net code needs to be ironed out and updated.

The reason it's frustrating is because many, may times you'll die well after you've gone into cover, or get shredded for poking your head out for a fraction of a second. From my understanding, the games servers dialate time on their end by up to half a second, though I swear it feels like more at times.

While a vet player has had the time to learn and just adapt to it, for new players? It gives a lot of "feels bad" moments. Dying behind cover, unable to react to incoming fire, ect ect. This issue is compounded by the fact that a lot of weapons have a lower TTK than the servers base lag+local latency. If your not moving already (for any reason) and start to get hit, it's usually over because on their screen, you're stock still for another good quarter second at best.

The thing about it is that it's not really obvious this is whats going on, and it leads to a lot of bad and often wrong conclusions. While theres nothing that can be done player side for latency, I feel that the game would improve immensely and feel better if the Devs (which I hear are now refocused on PS2) spent some time and resources to optimize it. Even small improvements would lead to positive results I think.

• Information

Another big thing that acts like a roadblock for a lot of new people is what and how the game presents information. Namely, information that players are accustom to using to improve. Some how, PS2 has a combination of lack of information, too much information, and compounded by misinformation all at once.
Lets take kill screens for example. It just blaps you with a whole pile of information, some of it nice, but most of it not useful, and can often times actually be misleading and very frequently, unless the player is already indoctrinated into some of the less "common" mechanics (by which I mean things new players arnt properly introduced to, like implants) it often leads to wrong impressions. I found myself having to attempt to explain whats actually going on when presented by a frustrated friend because it's not obvious, and often times I'm still left more or less guessing.
Part of this is coupled with how the servers lag. I'm 100% convinced that kill screens are largely inaccurate, because more oft than not when I'm presented with one, the other player has taken little or (oftenly) no damage, despite knowing this to be untrue.
But it lacks any real information that could help determine what might of happened. Stuff like how much damage you did to them, what damage they did to you, accuracy info and the like. Things that might help a player analyze what they did right, what they did wrong, and help them improve. Right now it's largely just guessing which is double downed on because the system is actually lying to you, especially when what you saw happen probably isnt what actually happened. For this, a replay would actually be immensely helpful (though probably not realistic), instead of a useless death cam that indicates they shot you through a wall, and some limited statistics that mean nothing to some one who hasnt played for a few weeks and still isnt helpful. If nothing else, at least knowing where the shots went/landed on both you and them would be nice to help determine if your aiming high or low, or off all together.
On the topic of accuracy, this game has probably one of the most difficult learning curves for FPS combat I've ever seen. I've always maintained that PS2 in it's attempt for realistic combat, has settled itself into an uncanny valley. A huge problem with this though is that the tools the game gives you to determine how well your doing tend to be inaccurate at best, and blatantly misleading the rest of the time.
Hit confirmation in this instance is a HUGE offender here, and one that until recently I was hesitant to bring up because with all the other lack of information, it's hard to discern if what I suspect is going on, is really whats happening or not. But... After multiple years of playing, I'm convinced that it's utterly ********, and having multiple people experience the same thing has only further solidified that position. Fact is, it's wrong. Theres no other way to explain how you can regularly get 15+ hit confirms on a 6-8 shot kill weapon and not down somebody.
I'm 99% sure this is in part fault of the server lag as well. I sat down yesterday and made a concerted effort to try and determine this for certain before making this post. To be open and fair, I'm still not convinced, but will sit down with a friend tomorrow and see. However, I'm fairly confident that if your firing at some one, even if your rounds dont actually connect, you still get hit reports. I do know that in the early days there was a bug that could cause between frame shots to confirm but not be registered, but am 99% sure that was fixed.
If I'm right, this is extremely, extremely bad and poor design, because it's screwing with the players ability to gauge whether or not they're doing well or the right thing. Many things depend on this, because being a video game, PS2 lacks any real depth perception. Really, 3d games fake it. They have to, because they're projecting a 3d world on a 2d screen. Anyway, when combined with bullet travel/spray/ect, these hit confirms are extremely important in telling the player if their aim is correct.
As an example (and further support to my theory), when I was being mentored by a friend much better than I, they would watch me livestream in real time. I didnt even realize I was doing it, but I would hold down the trigger for too long and fire too quickly because I would get many more hit confirms much more quickly. They effectively told me to ignore the hit confirms and focus on the bullets and aim.
I think that this is something most Vets learn and begin to intuitively understand, but personally (and I know i'm not alone), this was mindboggling to me and I at least still struggle with it from years of habitual learning. I'm also pretty confident that the faster your weapon fires, the more pronounced the issue becomes.
Again, this could be due to server delay. What may end up be happening is that when your firing on them, they see and are reacting to something completely different. Thus, despite you dropping another 5-10 rounds in them, to them your already dead and thus those bullets "dont count".
If nothing else, this system needs to be refined as it's a large tool, especially for new players learning how to aim.

• VR Simulation

This is the last thing I'll talk about for now, as this threads already long, but the VR simulation is hugely lacking and even detrimental. Again, another resource of information, except this time it's woefully misleading for new players. Fact is, it *really* cant be used to gage a weapons performance. This was something that I didnt understand at first, and other friends also were under the same assumption.
The entire reason that the VR Sim can be toxic to new players is because of how unrealistic it is. Theres no lag, nothing moves, nothing shoots back. It gives a horribly unrealistic impression of whats going on. For an example, a player can take an SMG and be like "Wow, this kills so fast! And it can do it even out to 20 meters!" but when in reality, not really it kinda cant. I've had friends over the years dump certs and even real $$'s on weapons based on VR results, then be like "What the hell!" when it doesnt perform half as good in practice.
The VR sim frankly needs a massive overhaul. I dont have a perfect solution, but at least having moving targets would be a good start. Something that would move around randomly, or at least back and forth, and something that could tell you how much damage you'd do and how many shots hit would be an excellent start. At least then new players could get used to leading targets outside of PS2's extremely aggressive combat where they get maybe a couple attempts before being obliterated for not knowing how to aim yet.
In conclusion (for now), all I'm proposing is that the game desperately needs to implement and improve tools that players can use to better analyze their performance and more reliably root out faults and weaknesses. I know that many players might not take advantage of it, but at least having them present I feel would eliminate an issue where a lot of people see PS2 as buggy and unfair, when in reality it's not and is usually working as intended and the game is just lying to you.
The most impactful step I think would be first to reduce or effectively eliminate server lag. This might even resolve 2/3rds of the issues mentioned.
If though, for whatever reason, its unfeasible to do so (I'm not a software engineer I cant say, I can only report how the end result feels), the next best thing would be to improve how hit reporting is handled and making the kill screen more useful and informative. Damage numbers, accuracy, where your shots went would all be useful in determining what happened during a fight.
Lastly, the VR should be overhauled. Moving targets should be an absolute minimum. Theres a GIGANTIC area thats literally empty if another building would be required. Though, I dont think so. If the targets just had infinite HP and any score keeping was done and interacted with client side, then multiple people could shoot the same targets and only get to see their own results. Frankly, theres a lot of things that can be done, and a lot of potential solutions as well. If another building was used, I'd enjoy to see more firing lanes, and perhaps with some having max nanoweave and abilities turned on. This is a huge component that radically alters how a weapon actually performs in practice. A Heavy Assault does not die the same as an Engineer or Light Assault, let alone if both are moving.
I'm not proposing any balance or gameplay changes, merely additions and (imho fixes) changes to existing structure that would make PS2, an arguably difficult game to get a hang of, much more welcoming. A lot of the things I discussed do make the game more difficult and at times aggravating when I genuinely believe it doesnt have to be. I do love PS2 for what it is, and dont want to see it changed, merely improved upon.

had the most disgusting and hilarious example of this a few nights back,
i was setting up an AV turret on the side of a biolab when i saw an enemy come around the corner of the biolab in the distance,
so i pulled out my shotfun and hugged the wall, with the plan being to blast em when they turn the corner,
but...

they instead shot me THROUGH the corner and i was dead before they even came into sight.

all of this because on their screen i was further back than i actually was.
so they get an easy kill and i get what appears to be wallhacks,
welcome to planetside folks!

The latency is a difficult one. They need enough players per server to make it feel like a complete server, but doing so often requires too large a geographic area to not have latency. If they could come up with some way to get the populations up, then they could start to divide the servers up into smaller geographic areas.

Thing is, high latency has always been a problem with PS2, even all the way back to launch. Way back when that was totally understandable. But since, theres been a lot of progress in network infrastructure both on the hard and soft side. While I only have a passing familiarity with netcode and such, I know some one who is very involved with it, and they agree that it should be able to be optimized to be below triple digits at all times, even from more distant regions.

So, it should be possible, if perhaps a lot of work. Though I think that work would really be worth it. Heck, we'd probably be there if corporate didnt sheer off 95% of the dev team to work on that failure of a BR spin off. The fact that PS2 even survived that drought of progress and care is a testament to what they already have.

Lack of information - Ps4 just got the Escalation update, which adds a ton of things, But there's no information saying how things work or what all the new symbols mean.

Faction population. Tr has had more players/outfits playing then TR and NC combined on ceres. They have an easier time capturing bases so they get the constructions points quicker so they can use more facility modules, colossus tanks and bastions, which makes them stronger.

It keeps trying to update but I keep deleting it. . Today I'll delete the game since they brought that junk $hit over and put the PS4 away. Time for some RUST or ARMA on the PC. DBG can shove that gimmicky Zerg $hit up their jaxxy! I won't be Bantha Fodder for those gimmicky, flying brick $hit houses. meh...