Why is UDP + a software reliable ordering system faster than TCP?
- by Ricket
Some games today use a network system that transmits messages over UDP, and ensures that the messages are reliable and ordered.
For example, RakNet is a popular game network engine. It uses only UDP for its connections, and has a whole system to ensure that packets can be reliable and ordered if you so choose.
My basic question is, what's up with that? Isn't TCP the same thing as ordered, reliable UDP? What makes it so much slower that people have to basically reinvent the wheel?