How network innovation is shaping the future of virtual worlds (2024)

Guest blog from Sam Kemp at EE as part of our #UnleashInnovation campaign week 2024.

The gaming industry is flourishing. Worldwide, more people than ever are diving into virtual worlds across a variety of different platforms and devices. And gaming has become deeply entrenched in popular culture. From the CRT TVs of yesteryear to the silver screen, The Super Mario Bros. have now had their share of box office success. And the rich, original storytelling from the creators of The Last of Us and Fallout have inspired hit TV shows met with critical acclaim. People are gripped by adventures in unfamiliar worlds, captivated by opportunities to connect and share experiences with friends, and driven by competition in fierce online battlegrounds.

Valuations published by Uswitch in 2023, indicates that the UK gaming industry is worth £7 billion, with mobile gaming alone up 11% on 2022 with a valuation of £1.4 billion. Roughly 40 percent of the world’s population are now online gamers, and their needs are constantly evolving. More people are gaming on the go via mobile devices, accessing content using cloud subscription services, and using immersive technologies like Virtual Reality (VR) headsets. With 88% of young adults (aged 16-24) playing video games, there are few signs of the global gaming obsession slowing.

Ever-growing demand for connectivity

BT Group has an important relationship with gamers, who rely on our networks to download new games and content patches, as well as compete in environments where reliable, low-latency, jitter free connectivity provides a competitive advantage. Gaming now makes up nearly 10 percent of all our fixed network traffic, with peaks pushing this up close to 20 percent. Across our EE mobile network, 2 petabytes of data are being used every month for mobile gaming which is the equivalent to watching full-HD movies non-stop for three and a half years. Recent Call of Duty and Fortnite launches drove big spikes in network traffic – increases of 113% and 85%, respectively.

The focus for us as an operator is on ensuring our network continues to deliver reliable, high speed, uninterrupted connectivity that caters to the demands created by traffic surges, access to large content files and competing needs for bandwidth within the home. It’s not simply about our role in scaling up capacity, however. Instead, what we are committed to is more nuanced innovation, investing in R&D that unlocks new opportunities for gamers and immersive experiences, focusing on accelerating timelines to the commercialisation of new services that bring significant benefits to our customers, and ensuring gaming companies are working collaboratively with us to deliver their products.

A slice of the action

This year, we successfully demonstrated 5G network slicing capabilities for mobile gaming. The trial, which took place at our home of research and innovation, Adastral Park, was conducted using a device powered by a Qualcomm processor on an Ericsson-powered 5G Standalone (5G SA) network. The results showed how, by allocating a portion or slice of the 5G SA network to provide dynamic partitions for specific use cases, optimal performance can be maintained for bandwidth-heavy activities including mobile gaming and 4K video streaming, even during peak times on the network.

This is significant for the growth of mobile gaming and enhancing the availability of dedicated connectivity to support highly demanding use cases. Network slicing encompasses the capabilities and characteristics that are essential to delivering reduced ping, jitter-free and immersive experiences for gamers. As we begin to enter the 5G SA era, there is huge, future potential for slicing to enable high performance and growth in mobile gaming. Even more specifically, it promises new opportunities for gaming on the move, delivering potential breakthroughs for cloud gaming.

Quests in the cloud

Cloud gaming is still in its relative infancy, but many expect similar levels of disruptions that we’ve seen in other areas of entertainment such as music and film. The possibility of being able to stream any game to any device, regardless of whether that device meets with the necessary system requirements, is a really attractive offer.

The same network slicing trial that we conducted with Ericsson and Qualcomm, also demonstrated an optimal mobile cloud gaming experience on Nvidia’s GeForce Now, maintaining a throughput comfortably in excess of the recommended 25 Mbps at 1080p, even when a background load was generated. The experience was simultaneously compared to a non-optimised Enhanced Mobile Broadband RAN partition, which was congested by the background load, resulting in a less than optimal gaming experience. Clearly, 5G SA will be a key enabling technology that complements the rising popularity of cloud gaming.

The hub of the action

Another core area where BT Group is looking to differentiate the gaming experience is through home broadband hubs. We’re constantly innovating to improve our hub technologies. Game Mode, which recently launched on EE, allows customers to dimension their home network to prioritise gaming specific areas of the network. And we are innovating to go further, including exploring both software and hardware technology, and the causes of variability of in-home experiences by a range of factors.

Next generation needs

Our investment, in both network capacity and technology, will be instrumental to meet the dynamic connectivity needs of our customers. But the final piece of the jigsaw is meaningful and routine collaboration with all gaming companies. Some of the highest peaks in our network traffic are caused by poorly coordinated or unexpected data loads emanating from gaming companies. Better sight of when all these demands are due, together with better partnering at how and when they are delivered, will ensure we continued to maximise the unparalleled strengths of our network to unleash innovation for the UK economy and its people.

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techUK – Unleashing UK Tech and Innovation

The UK is home to emerging technologies that have the power to revolutionise entire industries.From quantum to semiconductors; from gaming to the New Space Economy, they all have the unique opportunity to help prepare for what comes next.

techUK members lead the development of these technologies. Together we are working with Government and other stakeholders to address tech innovation priorities and build an innovation ecosystem that will benefit people, society, economy and the planet - and unleash the UK as a global leader in tech and innovation.

For more information, or to get in touch, please visit ourInnovation Hub and click ‘contact us’.

Tech and Innovation Summit, 19 June

Emerging technologies will be debated and explored at our annual Tech andInnovation Summit, taking place on19 June. This campaign week will directly feed into the themes discussed at the Summit.

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