Darthater asks BW about engine optimization.

[HybridTiger]

Honestly, my rig cost be about $800 and I run 40-60fps at all times on Max settings and here are some of my specs

 

Windows 7 Home Edition 64-bit

Radeon HD 6770

8GB Ram

AMD Phenom II X4 955 Processor 3.20 GHz

550 Watt Power Supply

 

So unless he's playing on a terrible computer he shouldn't be getting 20fps on Alderaan

[Lumocolor]

The game has been out 3 months and these problems aren't getting fixed. Cancel your subscription, thats what i did and now i don't have to worry or care about crappy performance. In a month or 2 when they start sending out free weeks to everyone that quit you can come back and check out the game and see if things are better.

 

There are plenty of other games out there that run fine and tons more on the horizon.

[cashogy]

um, his response to that particular question is actually really good. theyve clearly made progress on their rendering ability, which will make the game smoother for everyone.

 

the addition of high res textures (FINALLY!) is a great step, especially in conjunction with a more optimized rendering system. the ability to scale particle effects would round out the graphics settings quite well, and it seems from DEs response that they are working towards that

[ROSS-]

You don't get a hang when you open your inventory? As in, what happens in that video I linked? (There's a better one but that is it). Or when you get ilum quest updates? So ilum is hunky dory for you then?

 

I don't believe it.

 

hmm, i hadn't really noticed before, but after reading this i went and checked just to see what you were talking about. If you pay attention, there appears to be a half sec (or maybe even less than half sec) pause from when you push the inventory button and the inventory box appears. Is this meant as proof that the engine is trash? just curious.

[Aeneus]

When I first got this game, I was running on a Core 2 Duo E8400 and a GTS250 with 4GB of RAM and the game was a slideshow on the fleet. Upgraded to an i5 2400, GTX 560, and 8GB of RAM, which I wouldn't really call a monster machine, and I haven't dipped below 40 FPS on fleet or in warzones, usually running above 70 in most areas with everything cranked to high. Really not sure what some people are having problems with.

[Danakar]

Let's say i believe you ( im on the fence ).

 

Do you find it acceptable that a machine has to be running at those specs in order to play this MMO at an acceptable frame rate?

 

Uhm, actually I bought this machine to play Skyrim (and it plays very well at that).

 

I had it built by a group of people that seemed to know their stuff in finding a good combination of components that work well together.

 

Also, my system was delivered with a clean Win7 install and I updated all drivers manually before installing Skyrim and later SW:TOR. Next to a McAfee antivirus/firewall package, Steam and Mumble that's probably all the system has on.

 

I run both Skyrim and SW:TOR perfectly at 1920x1080 resolution.

 

So from my perspective, the people that do have problems may need to check if it's not another installed program that's making a mess of things. DXDiag would be a good first step in order to check for anomalies in trying to trace the problem.

Edited March 15, 2012 by Danakar

[Tool_of_Society]

Uhm, actually I bought this machine to play Skyrim (and it plays very well at that).

 

I had it built by a group of people that seemed to know their stuff in finding a good combination of components that work well together.

 

Also, my system was delivered with a clean Win7 install and I updated all drivers manually before installing Skyrim and later SW:TOR. Next to a McAfee antivirus/firewall package, Steam and Mumble that's probably all the system has on.

 

So from my perspective, the people that do have problems may need to check if it's not another installed program that's making a mess of things. DXDiag would be a good first step in order to check for anomalies in trying to trace the problem.

I've seen quite a few systems with mcafee this year and every single one of them had at least one major virus on it. Couple of the machines just ran like crap with Mcafee active even after complete re-installs (large memory/CPU footprint). Obviously my sample size is small but I do wonder about your choice of virus protection.

[Ziljin]

After reading every single post here, I've come to the conclusion that there's a lack of understanding from those that say their computer is running it "fine". They are happy with the way it's run so they think it's fine just the way it is. They don't care if there's a little stutter here or there or that they are playing in low-med settings.

 

For those that think it's fine, that's really great for you but please understand that has nothing to do with the issues presented here. The people complaining are those that like to max out every setting to it's fullest with their machines, which should easily handle a game like this, but it's not. So it's not fine for them and they are frustrated.

 

Here's an example:

You both have a Ferrari. You may not care about how great the engine can perform. You get it to go 130 mph and you are ecstatic.

 

The other guy with the Ferrari knows how awesome the engine is and wants to take advantage of the full power but when it goes only 130 mph instead of 200 mph, they are upset. That means something is wrong somewhere with the car. Same thing is happening here in SWTOR.

 

You're fine with what you have but your game can play a lot smoother and better if it were optimized better. Just because you think it's fine doesn't mean it's not broken. You are more tolerant of the glitches or playing sub-optimal graphics.

[Danakar]

I've seen quite a few systems with mcafee this year and every single one of them had at least one major virus on it. Couple of the machines just ran like crap with Mcafee active even after complete re-installs (large memory/CPU footprint). Obviously my sample size is small but I do wonder about your choice of virus protection.

 

A virus has to be identified first before countermeasures can be built to disable it. Same thing happening in the human body all the time.

 

I have 3 systems running on my purchased McAfee package and so far there have been no notable anomalies for me personally. But thanks for voicing your concerns. I'll run some additional checks tomorrow.

[JuicyFruits]

I also think there is something wrong with the engine. The game runs fine in PVE but in warzones when there is lots of action my FPS is dropping all the time.

 

I tried using the LOWEST possible setting, didnt do anything. Big joke.

[Asavar]

Even on my wife's laptop that uses onboard video processing, I manage to get 30 FPS at all times, and never have hiccups when opening inventory.

 

******** you don't.

 

I've never, ever complained about anything in this game's engine, and get perfectly fine (100+) FPS in most instances (even ~60+ on fleet, except in small cases where it'll dip around 35-40), but whenever I open any UI component (e.g. Inventory) the game freezes for a split second before continuing.

 

You're lying if you don't.

[Dego_Locc]

******** you don't.

 

I've never, ever complained about anything in this game's engine, and get perfectly fine (100+) FPS in most instances (even ~60+ on fleet, except in small cases where it'll dip around 35-40), but whenever I open any UI component (e.g. Inventory) the game freezes for a split second before continuing.

 

You're lying if you don't.

 

I want him to make a video of him not having the 1 second inventory window lag that everyone else with i7's / 560's and better have. Or I call lies...

 

I know like a dozen ppl with beast rigs for gaming and they all have the inventory window stutter issue.

Edited March 15, 2012 by Dego_Locc

[Kaphik]

After reading every single post here, I've come to the conclusion that there's a lack of understanding from those that say their computer is running it "fine". They are happy with the way it's run so they think it's fine just the way it is. They don't care if there's a little stutter here or there or that they are playing in low-med settings.

 

For those that think it's fine, that's really great for you but please understand that has nothing to do with the issues presented here. The people complaining are those that like to max out every setting to it's fullest with their machines, which should easily handle a game like this, but it's not. So it's not fine for them and they are frustrated.

 

Here's an example:

You both have a Ferrari. You may not care about how great the engine can perform. You get it to go 130 mph and you are ecstatic.

 

The other guy with the Ferrari knows how awesome the engine is and wants to take advantage of the full power but when it goes only 130 mph instead of 200 mph, they are upset. That means something is wrong somewhere with the car. Same thing is happening here in SWTOR.

 

You're fine with what you have but your game can play a lot smoother and better if it were optimized better. Just because you think it's fine doesn't mean it's not broken. You are more tolerant of the glitches or playing sub-optimal graphics.

 

I think you're overstating your own opinion and understating others'.

[Lheim]

After reading every single post here, I've come to the conclusion that there's a lack of understanding from those that say their computer is running it "fine". They are happy with the way it's run so they think it's fine just the way it is. They don't care if there's a little stutter here or there or that they are playing in low-med settings.

 

For those that think it's fine, that's really great for you but please understand that has nothing to do with the issues presented here. The people complaining are those that like to max out every setting to it's fullest with their machines, which should easily handle a game like this, but it's not. So it's not fine for them and they are frustrated.

 

Here's an example:

You both have a Ferrari. You may not care about how great the engine can perform. You get it to go 130 mph and you are ecstatic.

 

The other guy with the Ferrari knows how awesome the engine is and wants to take advantage of the full power but when it goes only 130 mph instead of 200 mph, they are upset. That means something is wrong somewhere with the car. Same thing is happening here in SWTOR.

 

You're fine with what you have but your game can play a lot smoother and better if it were optimized better. Just because you think it's fine doesn't mean it's not broken. You are more tolerant of the glitches or playing sub-optimal graphics.

 

You're really presuming a great deal, and somewhat insultingly, that the other people in this thread that don't have issues don't actually know what their computers are capable of. That's a pretty dangerous kind of assumption to make, and it's the kind of assumption that's made all the time, sadly, on internet forums - that is, that 'Hey, he doesn't agree with me. He knows jack squat.'.

[Rasstavad]

You're really presuming a great deal, and somewhat insultingly, that the other people in this thread that don't have issues don't actually know what their computers are capable of. That's a pretty dangerous kind of assumption to make, and it's the kind of assumption that's made all the time, sadly, on internet forums - that is, that 'Hey, he doesn't agree with me. He knows jack squat.'.

 

But it's true.... most of the people here know jack squat about computers. Look at all the crap specs people are posting. Do you think any real computer nerd or gamer has the K-Mart rigs that people on this forum seem to be so proud of? Really?

Edited March 15, 2012 by Rasstavad

[justduet]

When I first played this game back in Dec I had terrible fps issues, I could not get above 10 fps in warzones no matter how many different fixes I've tried. I was frustrated enough that I stopped playing for a month (and played bf3 instead, which ran smooth as butter)... Fast forward to now and I get average of 40 fps with med/high settings (laptop user here) and warzones are pretty smooth.

 

So imo they are still working on optimizing the game because everyone has different systems and its probably hard for them to pinpoint what exactly causes problems. Won't deny there is something weird about the engine though.

[Bobinator]

Bioware: "Investigate the engine because **** we dont want to anymore its awful."

[Shiningriver]

I do not know much about hardware, but I have no complaints since I'm able to play fine. The only time I'm not able to play fine is when my internet connections suddenly plummets to Bikini Bottom.

[Zetaking]

I don't understand why those who doesn't have any performance issues try to make those who have issues believe that there are no issues therefore the dev shouldn't fix the problem.

[Rogoo]

I don't understand why those who doesn't have any performance issues try to make those who have issues believe that there are no issues therefore the dev shouldn't fix the problem.

 

Good point.

[Relith]

Have only read the first 4 pages, but I coudn't take it any longer. I dunno how the fanboys can pretend the inventory opening issue isn't occurring "with anyone they know".

 

Btw, the part about the interview that was most jarring to me was the question about space. In 6 months, we might see new missions, woohoo. Another level of starfox. I had kind of hoped this was going to be a quick stopgap thing, and one day we would have real XvT style space combat.

 

I admit they are really busy at the moment and space should clearly be backburner, but I wish they would at least surrender the fact that space combat is pretty lame after the first couple missions you do. If they put in XvT style space pvp, I don't think i'd ever leave my ship.

[BurningDT]

My specs: AMD Radeon 6970, 2gigs. Quad core 2.1 Processor, and 8 gigs of ram, freshly formatted.

 

When I enter alderaan I put it on the absolute lowest settings and I still drop below 10 fps in fights. I manage to play LOTRO, Rift and many other games on absolute max or near max and maintain 30 fps, here I cannot handle the lowest settings in PvP.

 

Since many of you're saying it is not bioware's fault and it is my computer, please tell me what am I doing wrong so I can fix it? I seem to run every other game fine.

 

I also experience the inventory hiccups, opening my bag etc has delay/framing.

 

 

Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

 

Thanks

Edited March 15, 2012 by BurningDT

[Thaed]

Where are you on game engine optimizations? Because I currently get about 5 to 10 frames per second on Alderaan and about 20 in Huttball and I have a PC that can run Crysis 2 at ultra. With no real explanation on what is going on.

 

Wow. You should do some investigation, because that is not typical. Where we are on game optimization in general is we’ve got some crazy, crazy options that you can turn on in 1.2. I played running around on several of the planets at fully acceptable wonderful running framerates on min spec machines now, which was the thing I wanted to see.

 

What we got right now is a big texture package pass, and we did it in both directions. So we can say, “Hey, you can take the textures way down, run around, the game works.” We’ve also said, “Hey, you know those textures people keep saying they like so much in the promotional videos? You can turn those on too now.” Because now we figured out how to do it in a small area so it doesn’t try to do it everywhere.

The next big thing we have to hit is effects, and that’s just a standard of what games do is say, “Hey, you know all those crazy crazy effects that everybody else is drawing? Yeah, maybe I don’t want to see all of your lightning storms all at once.” We have a programming team now that literally that’s their only mandate is game run better. Long term target is you should be able to play on your laptop, you should be able to play on your second and third machine in the house. And we are fiercely dedicated to that goal.

 

The full quote.

 

But by all means guys, keep taking one quote out of context and shouting doom and gloom.

[Darth_Sookie]

It's the xbox players who are used to games running poorly who things swtor "runs just fine".

 

Funny how it runs VERY poorly in some areas for me on both my computers and i see the same thing over at my friend. The game stutters for no reason etc.

 

Yeah my computer is the best money can buy and i can afford to buy whatever new upgrades i please so that's not the problem. I've also been doing this for 20 years.

[Mallegant]

How little I know is that I have yet to encounter a single problem presented aside from installation of the game, which I rectified on my end, not theirs.

 

If that's the case then WHY ARE YOU POSTING IN HERE?????

 

If you aren't experiencing these problems then stop trolling and go play an otherwise playable (to you at least) game....