can a virus cause online games to freeze and time out?

Answer 1

Increasing your memory.helps with the freezing/getting booted problem.You can increase your memory by.. going to start button, settings, control panel, system, advance tab, performance, advance tab, virtual memory, change it,make it 526kb or higher, click set then ok .If it’s not listed as Kb,” Some are not.” Just double the number listed.

Answer 2

That depends on the type of virus. A "trojan horse" virus may locate itself in the game or one of its related files and cause it to do something malicious, such as deleting files or freezing a game. A worm may also do similar things, such as deleting your files to cause this. Though other types of viruses, such as adware can also clog your computer, causing it to slow down quite a lot. However, it may not be a virus doing it.
1. A hacker in the game could have done something.
2. Your files simply could have been corrupted because of other unknown reasons.
3. Your computer itself is having its own problems, with files, age, and the such.
4. The game could just be wither unreliable, or too much for your computer.
5. If it's an online game, there could simply be something wrong with the server, temporary or permenant.
6. Disc problems. scratches, marks, etc.
7.The game is simply massive.

I personally suggest that you check your computer up with a virus scan, then check on all the running processes and make sure there are no strange ones, check your computer up, clean the disc if there is one, observe computer behavior, think about previous computer downloads/activity, and if all else fails then contact the game maker/computer company/a professional.

Answer 3

If that's the only symptom, then I'd say the reason has to do with network traffic, most likely. However, most viruses now days are spam engines, used to send out spam from an innocent machine. Having your machine infected from one of these would cause serious network congestion similar to what you describe.

Other things to consider are other viruses, problems with your connection, adware, or a faulty modem (dialup, DSL, or Broadband).