We've had a few PlayStation 3 users get in touch recently to let us know they're having problems with Battlefield 3 online. Apparently since late January, network performance has been close to unplayable for many users, with servers only showing one ping bar in the in-game browser (putting it at the low end of the server quality spectrum).

There's a 40 page thread on the official forums where Australian gamers are discussing the issue, including their fruitless chat logs with EA support on the issue.

Unfortunately due to the closed nature of console multiplayer, the network side of gaming is far less transparent than it is on PC. This makes commonplace diagnostics a little bit trickier - for example, you can't do a quick traceroute of a known server's IP address to see if there are network problems.

At the moment (working under the assumption that the PS3 version also runs on a client/server mode like the PC version), my first guess is the problem might just be a network routing issue that they're (somehow) still unaware of. There is also the (hopefully very unlikely) possibility that the servers have simply been shifted from Australia to another physical location (like the USA) to cut costs - but again, the lack of transparency makes it hard to confirm.

We're currently communicating with a couple of people about this issue to try and diagnose (unfortunately, we don't have a PS3 in the office at the moment) - if there's anyone out there with a PS3, a copy of the game, and a network router that lets them look at traffic, please get in touch!

We've emailed contacts at DICE and Sony for comment to see if they have any information as well. If you are a PS3 gamer and struggling to enjoy Battlefield 3 at the moment, please let us know in the comments - if you can include your ISP and geographical location that would be helpful as well.