Impact of Frametime Spikes on Performance and Quality of Experience in Platformer Games

Samin Shahriar Tokey, Ben Boudaoud, Josef Spjut, and Mark Claypool

In Proceedings of the ACM International Conference on the Foundations of Digital Games (FDG)

Copenhagen, Denmark

August 10-13, 2026

Frametime spikes can disrupt gameplay in games, affecting both player performance and experience, but the effects of these spikes on navigation based tasks is not well-studied. This work investigates how frametime spikes impact players performing navigation-focused tasks in a platformer game. An open-source platformer game, SuperTux Classic, was modified to deliberately create spikes in frametimes when players performed certain actions, while recording performance and assessing quality of experience (QoE). Thirty-one participants completed eight distinct navigation-based tasks, each with predetermined spike durations. Analysis of the data shows that the effects of frametime spikes on player performance depends on the task, but the effects on QoE are largely independent of task.

Materials:

Paper: pdf
Slides: (pending)