Developer Update: Shadow Optimizations in Game Update 1.4

[WarbNull]

I like how people who are experiencing 20 FPS are complain about awful performance. I'm experiencing 1-5 FPS...this game is basically unplayable...and in my opinion, if I can't PLAY, I can't PAY. Fix it Bioware. I'm sure many other users will agree with me.

That is pretty bad. What was your FPS before the patch?

 

I personally have not notice FPS issues as I have not looked at my FPS for a long time. But when I was ABLE to get the 1.4 patch updated and play for the first time since 1.4 was installed I noticed lagging. Of coarse I had a lot of Graphical issues as well. I had to turn off my Crossfire just to make the game playable. I still see a few artifacts but the game plays a lot better and last night I didn't see much lag. There was only one mission last night which had a stutter but that was an instance with hardly any other players in that area at the time, so I am not sure what that was all about. Especially since being around other areas with a lot of other players was not lagging me last night. I did see others complaining about lag last night though.

Thankfully my specs are enough to still play the game even with not using all my GPU power and settings. Not everyone has that though. They were able to play the game before the patch and now they can not. It is not good.

 

I really do not like turning off my Crossfire just to play the game. Or for that matter being told to turn down our graphics to get by the issues. Would be nice to have this fixed soon so we can play the game with out having all these performance issues.

[Joesixxpack]

Sounds nice, can't use it though since shadows are one of the options I have to keep turned off or low since this game doesn't get along consistently with gpu drivers. Ran fine at game start, doesn't now after all the patches, merges, etc since.

[Glzmo]

I think they used an old beta code to add shadows to nameplates, loot visual clue light columns ect. The unoptimized code is causing stuttering.

I think you may just be onto something here.

 

Rolling back to some old, unoptimized beta code is never a good idea, especially if you forget to re-apply all the optimizations, fixes and additions you have added to the game since that codebase was last used.

 

For those running multiple Nvidia GPUs in SLI, the 306.63 drivers help with performance a little, especially when you combine it with setting the DX9 SLI compatibility bits to 0x42C00005 in the Star Wars: The Old Republic profile using Nvidia Inspector or similar tweaking programs.

Edited September 28, 2012 by Glzmo

[BadOrb]

The stuttering seems to happen in waves , like for instance going towards the sarlacc pit from the republic outpost in the dune sea , going up the first dune on my speeder was basically unplayable and then suddenly over the dune every thing was then great all the way to the sarlacc pit and back.

 

Me and my friend tried the various quick fixes mentioned and they don't work , so it's not totally just crossfire and SLI cards that are affected. Weirdly though whilst on my speeder going from one end of a space port to another I witnessed no stuttering or lag , in the past before 1.4 I would at least stutter once. So not really sure what to say as my friend can't actually play really as it is in this state , you best revert to 1.3 and just add the new shadders part to that. My friends PC is a chillblast overclocked I5 pc 4.6 gig and he has never had stuttering issues ever but has now , just change the way you added these graphical improvements. Try do it sooner rather than later or you will lose more subs. Sorry to say that but it's pretty horrific. O and Ord mantel has still not been fixed , stuttering even worse now , unless on a speeder ( weirdly ) , but yeah you have to buy the legacy speeder at 10 to avoid lag/stuttering not a good way of fixing it really , your F2P people ( smugglers and troopers ) wont stay very long in the state it's in.

 

Cheers,

 

BadOrb.

Edited September 28, 2012 by BadOrb

[Bleakmage]

The stuttering seems to happen in waves , like for instance going towards the sarlacc pit from the republic outpost in the dune sea , going up the first dune on my speeder was basically unplayable and then suddenly over the dune every thing was then great all the way to the sarlacc pit and back.

 

Me and my friend tried the various quick fixes mentioned and they don't work , so it's not totally just crossfire and SLI cards that are affected. Weirdly though whilst on my speeder going from one end of a space port to another I witnessed no stuttering or lag , in the past before 1.4 I would at least stutter once. So not really sure what to say as my friend can't actually play really as it is in this state , you best revert to 1.3 and just add the new shadders part to that. My friends PC is a chillblast overclocked I5 pc 4.6 gig and he has never had stuttering issues ever but has now , just change the way you added these graphical improvements. Try do it sooner rather than later or you will lose more subs. Sorry to say that but it's pretty horrific. O and Ord mantel has still not been fixed , stuttering even worse now , unless on a speeder ( weirdly ) , but yeah you have to buy the legacy speeder at 10 to avoid lag/stuttering not a good way of fixing it really , your F2P people ( smugglers and troopers ) wont stay very long in the state it's in.

 

Cheers,

 

BadOrb.

 

I do occasionally run into stuttering here and there on Hoth, with no rhyme or reason. It comes and goes, but it comes rarely.

[HelinCarnate]

Single GTX 560ti card with same issues.

• No drop in framerate but studders when you turn.

• Turning off shaddows does nothing.

• Removing nameplates or turning off the scaling makes it less bad.

• Zooming all the way out helps as well but again, only makes it less bad and you cannot be zoomed out all the time (I think this is why it looks better on speeders).

• Removing vertical sync helps but causes the temp to get close to 80c. My monitor only displays 60fps so there is no reason that I should push my card to create 100fps.

 

Update

• I went into the Nvidia control, 3D settings, Adjust image settings w/ priview and clicking Used advanced 3D image settings. Then under Manage 3D settings turned up the Maximum prerendered frames to the highest number (in my case 4 with non SLI) This made it playable if I don't have to turn slowly. This is the only temp fix I have found that does not cause my card to get hotter than I would like or removes the tools that I like to use (nameplates). Although it still has the studder issue indoors, just not as bad as it used to be but still quite annoying.

Edited September 28, 2012 by HelinCarnate

[Darthgwar]

I am running an NVIDIA 560M with 301.42 drivers. I turned off Nameplate scaling and it resolved most of the stuttering, however the stuttering shows up again if I target a mob and move, or if I target my companion and move, or right after I have targeted a mob but no longer are targeting it but have not un-targeted it, (for instance after a fight ends) even though there is nothing shown in the target portrate pain. (in the last case, the stuttering stops imediately if I click on the environment, effectivly un-targeting what ever I had targeted.)

 

Why isn't this issue on the list of known issues for 1.4?

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=403398

 

Please acknowledge this issue. I hope a fix comes soon.

[WRP_Jammer]

I'm also have VERY noticeable lag since the 1.4. I'm running AMD 975blk with 5770 crossfire and 8gb mem. I've ran medium settings and was getting 100fps regular. After patch I get alot of 10-30 fps drags. Is almost unplayable, and I have shadows turned off. Shadows mean nothing to me, 10-30 fps means almost unplayable.

[PreacherWitt]

I never ran the game with shadows because of the hit to fps. Before update 1.4, I could run the game on highest settings with shadows off and have smooth gameplay performance. Since update 1.4, under the same settings with shadows off, the fps is lower and the video is jerky and laggy in gameplay, conversations, etc. It's even laggy on my personal ship when there are no other characters around. This is NOT just a shadow issue. By the way, I am running an ATI Radeon HD 4650. Update 1.4 had not improved things for lower end machines like mine.

[EnkiduNineEight]

I disabled the shadows and it is _somewhat_ better. I had just finished my 4th 50 on the Empire Side so started my Republic Characters and even with these settings Tython was painful (Literally.. headaches are now induced by SWTOR where prior to 1.4 I had no issues, eyestrain or headaches)

 

Quite Honestly, you were _warned_ about this on the public test server. People provided you feedback and you went forward with this part of the code and you should not have. It is creating a significant customer service issue for you. If I continue to get migraine level headaches induced by eyestrain when playing your new game engine where before I could play an occasional 6 hour stint with no fatigue/problems at all.. then I will have to stop playing.

 

I DO NOT WANT TO STOP PLAYING.

 

If I quit I will end up leaving 4-5 months of subscription unused because I pay 6 months at a chunk. You'll lose me and it appears multiple others in a time when you are already bleeding users but in this case its people who DO NOT WANT TO QUIT. We're likely going to have to though because what you did to the engine creates a PHYSICAL DISCOMFORT.

 

No other game on my system causes this. No other activity spent on my computer causes this. My job keeps me staring at a computer 8 hours a day and then my 'hobby' activities have me looking at an even better computer/screen for even more hours in a day and this is absolutely new for me and it coincides _precisely_ with your changes to the engine.

 

Now, I know I am presuming a lot, but I am fairly confident your programmers are proficient enough that the code rendering the game is NOT explicitly tied to the various other code that was included in 1.4. So the new zones, new content, etc is not relying on your changes to the graphics engine to function.

 

You would be well advised to ROLL BACK all the graphics engine changes to pre 1.4 and begin work on them again outside of your live game. This time, when people tell you in the public testing that there are problems.. _listen to them_. The very last thing you need is to bleed users who are advocates of your game and who do not want to quit playing but are being forced to because of an ill-implemented engine update that causes MANY physical pain in the form of migraine level headaches and eye strain. If I can play every other game on my system without pain, i will. And I am going to be quite upset with EA/BioWare for making a game I love one I just can't play because it HURTS.

Edited September 29, 2012 by EnkiduNineEight

[EnkiduNineEight]

PS - My rig is running an nVidia 670GTX, single card solution, not SLI. Runs every other game on my system without issues. I've also gone through and attempted all your supposed fixes. Clean install of older drivers, deleting a cache file and a client ini. Doing it each time as a set of steps, and the game is only barely playable without shadows turned on now where before everything was cranked as high as it could go and was silky smoth and... didn't cause migraines... which is a huge plus.

 

Performance hit after 1.4 is massive (and did I mention MIGRAINE INDUCING).

 

Also, why have dynamic shadows at all. Your trees are mostly static. There is no reason for the shadow to sway when the tree isnt.

 

You've introduced a headache inducing strobe effect, you've cripple performance from high end machines, this was a really bad move and it was reported to you prior to public release.

[Bloodstealer]

That is pretty bad. What was your FPS before the patch?

 

I personally have not notice FPS issues as I have not looked at my FPS for a long time. But when I was ABLE to get the 1.4 patch updated and play for the first time since 1.4 was installed I noticed lagging. Of coarse I had a lot of Graphical issues as well. I had to turn off my Crossfire just to make the game playable. I still see a few artifacts but the game plays a lot better and last night I didn't see much lag. There was only one mission last night which had a stutter but that was an instance with hardly any other players in that area at the time, so I am not sure what that was all about. Especially since being around other areas with a lot of other players was not lagging me last night. I did see others complaining about lag last night though.

Thankfully my specs are enough to still play the game even with not using all my GPU power and settings. Not everyone has that though. They were able to play the game before the patch and now they can not. It is not good.

 

I really do not like turning off my Crossfire just to play the game. Or for that matter being told to turn down our graphics to get by the issues. Would be nice to have this fixed soon so we can play the game with out having all these performance issues.

 

Was in 2 separte HM's last night - Taral V and FE and in both the gameplay was awful... stuttering, juddery movement, ability dealys, and many slideshow moments. all with a nice stable 22-30ms ping and a rig that runs pretty much anything out there to the max...but now even my patience is beginning to wear thin so and I and a few mates are now looking at alternatives that offer more enjoyment.. otherwise its back to full time DDO for me

Edited September 29, 2012 by Bloodstealer

[PreacherWitt]

Is there any evidence that Bioware is paying attention to this problem? I have seen nothing about a promise to fix it in a patch or even an apology for the issues. It is really annoying that this game has become a slide show for me since update 1.4. I'm going to keep playing and paying, but that will have limits if the gameplay doesn't improve.

[Prince_Slaney]

I suggest people call them on 00800 0246 9273 (from the UK), as the more people complain about this, the sooner it will get sorted.

[Glower]

Developer Update: Shadow Optimizations in Game Update 1.4

And overall performance degradation. Yeah, nice patch!

[Glzmo]

I just got the chance to test it on my gaming laptop with 2x ATi Radeon HD4870 1GB cards in CrossfireX mode. The game is unplayable now, even at lowest settings. In 1.3, I could run the highest settings without problems and get 50-90FPS. With 1.4 the FPS go from 2-30FPS and the game stutters badly to boot. TOR is completely unplayable on my laptop, which isn't exactly low-end.

 

System Specs:

 

Alienware M17x-R2 Space Black

Intel Core i7 Extreme Edition 920XM @ 3.6GHz Turbo Boost

8GB DDR3-1333 RAM (2x4GB)

2x ATi Radeon 4870 1GB CrossFireX

17" WUXGA TFT @ 1920x1200

Bigfoot Networks Killer™ Wireless-N 1103 WLAN card

Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Notebook

IDT 92HD73C1 Audio

1x 120GB OCZ Vertex 2 SATAII Solid State Disk

1x 500GB Seagate Momentus 7200RPM SATA HDD

DVD-RW Drive

CoolerMaster NotePal U3 Black Notebook cooler

Logitech G700 Wireless Laser Gaming Mouse

Microsoft Sidewinder Precision 2 USB Joystick

Microsoft Xbox 360 Controller for Windows

Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit (Service Pack 1, Windows Performance Index: 7.7)

Edited September 30, 2012 by Glzmo

[FreePrometheus]

I came online a day after the update had been released. And i sat and waited for it to donwload and patch. The the game started...

 

So i sort of noticed a few changes to the shadows on my characters faces on the select screen. Then i chose a character... I remember just sitting there gobsmacked! I could not believe how something as simple as shadow optimization could make everything that much more beautiful (there is no other word for it) I looked at all the worlds my characters were on and more. Coruscant had a new level of beauty to it, even though i considered it amazing before. Drommund Kaas looked perfect. It was no as dark as it should be.

 

Great job guys. I salute you /salute

[Caloss]

System specs as follows:

Asus P9X79 PRO M/B

i7 3820

32GB CORSAIR VENGEANCE

ASUS GTX 680 (2GB)

OZ Agility 3 240GB main drive

Creative titanium sound card

Since 1.4 choppy with shadows on or off fps down from 54-120 to 32-66 @2560x1440

 

It's not my system, I Tried the patch on test and it felt like my neck was going to break, back to live and no problem, after patch implemented.. performance hit.

 

[img=]http://i800.photobucket.com/albums/yy281/Caloss/DSCF0222.jpg[/img]

 

Some screen shots from Thursdays last weeks raiding:

Running in very high mode @2560 x 1440 oO

 

[img=]http://i800.photobucket.com/albums/yy281/Caloss/SWTOR/Screenshot_2012-08-28_21_13_29_864782.jpg[/img]

[img=]http://i800.photobucket.com/albums/yy281/Caloss/SWTOR/Screenshot_2012-08-28_21_14_48_353271.jpg[/img]

[img=]http://i800.photobucket.com/albums/yy281/Caloss/SWTOR/Screenshot_2012-08-28_21_15_27_779526.jpg[/img]

[img=]http://i800.photobucket.com/albums/yy281/Caloss/SWTOR/Screenshot_2012-08-28_21_43_52_922055.jpg[/img]

[img=]http://i800.photobucket.com/albums/yy281/Caloss/SWTOR/Screenshot_2012-08-29_21_38_21_003630.jpg[/img]

[img=]http://i800.photobucket.com/albums/yy281/Caloss/SWTOR/Screenshot_2012-08-30_20_36_32_260251.jpg[/img]

[img=]http://i800.photobucket.com/albums/yy281/Caloss/SWTOR/Screenshot_2012-09-02_20_07_08_127215.jpg[/img]

[img=]http://i800.photobucket.com/albums/yy281/Caloss/SWTOR/Screenshot_2012-09-02_20_07_25_248194.jpg[/img]

[img=]http://i800.photobucket.com/albums/yy281/Caloss/SWTOR/Screenshot_2012-09-02_20_07_52_299741.jpg[/img

Edited September 30, 2012 by Caloss

[PreacherWitt]

No question that it looks great with the new shadows and I would enjoy the change if I had a faster computer. The issue is that a lot of us cannot run the game without video glitches and stuttering even with the shadows turned completely off. There is something else going on here that update 1.4 introduced. I sure hope Bioware is actually listening and will correct the problem in a patch.

[KainAzeoth]

Come on Devs. I've been unable to play this game since 1.4. I've lost days of game play including a weekend. This should have been a top priority. Are you ever going to fix it? Maybe you should give the people with subscriptions a refund for our wasted time.

[Darth_Victus]

I don't know if I should be happy or sad that I am not the only one having these issues.

[Eillack]

Nvidia card users need a ligit fix soon please.....

 

Geforce GTX 540 ...yes, I have ALL the latest updates, no I'm not overheating and it's not dust.

Edited September 30, 2012 by Eillack

[Jearry]

NVIDIA GeForce 550 TX here - Sandy Bridge processor - no dust - all latest updates - worked perfectly before the update. Now it is so lagged, even at the selection screen, that I can't even log on. I can't control any player movement if I do manage to get logged on. Really need a fix on this pretty soon, I am limited on my play time anyway and I don't want to pay for something I cannot use. Please /fix!

 

Edited to add that I did turn shadows off, made no difference at all.

 

Went back and attempted every fix suggested, no dice here.

Edited October 1, 2012 by Jearry

[darrensimmons]

Ok, this is really strange. I too had the hit, alt tabbing out would usually fix the frame rate issue most of the time.

However, all of a sudden I don't get the hit anymore. Has something been uploaded to fix this, does anyone else not get the problem they had before?

[Prince_Slaney]

Just been the phone to Bioware for almost an hour, to a nice guy called John. I’ve advised him that a lot of us feel as though nothing is being done to resolve this issue, and that Bioware aren’t even acknowledging the issue. He had promised to address this issue, and was, as we spoke, moving my case to the highest level. I told him that all ‘solutions’ on the forums do not work (for the most part). But rest assured, Bioware ARE aware of the fault, and John tells me that they are working on it. I hope this eases some of my fellow players concerns.