How well do online games play on HughesNet?
Not very well. Satellite transmissions have an issue called “latency” , which greatly effects online real-time game play. The long and short of it is that you have to wait a much longer time (than your online opponent counterpart) for your data to get back to you , as it has to be transmitted (by Hughes) to a satellite into space … and then beamed back down to you on Earth. While all that happens pretty fast, it’s just not fast enough for inline real-time games. It’ll produce much higher ping times than is usually accepted for online games. You’ll find HughesNet Dial Return or Satellite Return totally unacceptable for real-time shoot-’em ups like Quake / Doom style games. It can however be acceptable for some games that aren’t quite as split-second fast-paced. Games like WarCraft, StarCraft, Diablo, etc.. can be ok , provided you’re only playing 1-on-1 .
