Reflex has been around for a few years and works well to help diagnose and reduce input delay in games
Input delay, rollback netcode and crossplay are the three terms buzzing the most in the fighting game community lately. For input delay, Nvidia has a very nice solution that’s proven to reduce response times in games like Destiny 2, Fortnite and Valorant, and this technology needs to be implemented in all future fighting games.
The fighting game genre is one that requires extremely fast reaction times and quick rendering of inputs for games to feel right. Nvidia Reflex is a suite of tools that specializes in doing exactly that, and has been implemented and numerous modern games and delivered on its promises to reduce response times. As such, it’s a marriage the fighting game community needs to make happen in all future titles.
Developers who have implemented Reflex into their games have been able to cut input delay in half, in some cases. Even though 360hz monitors and 3000 series Nvidia GPUs are not the norm in the fighting game community, this technology also works on older hardware.
In the examples shown, Reflex running on a GeForce 1660 Super was able to drop input delay by an entire frame, or more. Running a 3000 series card and 360hz display decreases the input delay even further.
Competitive fighting game players would love to see this reduction in place, as when Street Fighter 5 went from nearly 8 frames of delay, down to around 3 frames of delay on PC, the community collectively rejoiced.
Input delay has been such a notorious issue, especially on the PlayStation platform, that the creators of the Unreal Engine, Epic Games, has said they’re working with developers to find and mitigate these issues.
Getting fighting games to the peak levels of performance and having things feel fast and responsive is something the fighting game community has been rallying behind for years.
These options which are proven to reduce input delay in competitive games should become a standard in all future fighting games that are released.
You can find more information about Nvidia’s Reflex technology on the official site, and check out the video below for a quick overview.