Originally authored by Daniel Jiménez Morales – Adapted for RisxnTweaks.com with additional insights for competitive players.
Hit registration is one of the most critical yet often misunderstood systems in competitive first-person shooters. If you’ve ever experienced a moment where your shot appeared accurate, yet failed to register, you’re not alone. In this detailed adaptation, we’ll explore the mechanics of hit detection, server latency, and rollback systems—providing the knowledge needed to optimize your performance.
Hitscan vs. Projectile: Two Weapon Types, Two Challenges
Most modern FPS games categorize weapons into two primary types:
- Hitscan: Bullets are registered instantly with no travel time. If your aim is accurate when the shot is fired, the game registers the hit immediately.
- Projectile: Bullets have travel time and are affected by physics. These are harder to predict and require more precise aiming, particularly at range.
What Happens When You Fire?
In a typical client-server architecture (as used in games like Valorant or Fortnite), every time you shoot, your client sends a signal to the server. The server is ultimately responsible for determining whether that shot hits or misses. With hitscan weapons, this is done using a raycast, which checks for intersections between your aim and enemy hitboxes in the game world.
However, the server’s version of the game world is always slightly behind yours.
Challenge 1: Delay and Missed Shots
Even with low ping, a slight delay exists between the moment you shoot and when the server processes the action. To mask this, developers use a technique known as latency concealment:
- You hear the gunfire
- You see the muzzle flash
- You see a blood effect
These effects are purely visual. The actual hit and corresponding damage are calculated by the server.
Challenge 2: Accuracy Errors Due to Interpolation
To smooth out network inconsistencies, the client uses interpolation, displaying enemy players in a past state to compensate for packet loss and latency spikes. While this creates a visually smooth experience, it introduces a delay between what the player sees and the actual server state.
The result: What appears to be a clean shot on your screen may be registered as a miss on the server.
Solution: Server-Side Rewind
To address this discrepancy, some games implement a server-side rewind system. When a shot is fired, the server "rewinds" time to compare the action with how the game world appeared to the shooter at that moment. This allows for more accurate hit validation across varying latency conditions.
Common implementations include:
- Storing past hitbox states (increased memory usage)
- Animation-based rollback (e.g., in Valorant)
- Bounding box history tracking (e.g., in Overwatch)
Challenge 3: Shot Behind Cover (SBC)
This issue arises when a high-latency player shoots a low-latency opponent who has already taken cover. Due to server-side rewind favoring the attacker’s view, the system may register the hit, even though the target had already moved out of the line of fire on their screen.
The consequence: Perceived unfair deaths and player frustration.
Solution: Conditional Lag Compensation
Games such as Overwatch and Battlefield 4 mitigate this by limiting how far back in time the server can rewind. Players with excessive latency will find that their hits are no longer guaranteed and must adjust by leading shots more deliberately, similar to traditional LAN play.
Other Experimental Solutions
Some developers have experimented with allowing the victim to confirm the hit. While this reduces server-side pressure, it introduces more input lag and negatively impacts combat responsiveness. Competitive consensus generally supports server-side authority over client-side validation.
Key Takeaway
The hit registration pipeline is a constant balancing act between fairness, performance, and responsiveness. While developers continue to refine netcode systems, players can still gain a competitive advantage by optimizing their setups for improved synchronization and reduced delay.
Looking to Improve Hit Registration?
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This article is a republished and adapted version of Daniel Jiménez Morales’ original post. All technical credit is attributed to the original author. Adapted for the RisxnTweaks audience.