UI killing FPS: This should be priority #1 to fix

[LazyFaux]

Been having the same problem. My laptop is a piece of poop, but I can get it at 90 fps on high/low settings 1920x1080 but in combat it goes to like 20-30.. |;

 

I wish they'd fix it, considering it didn't do this as bad Pre-Revan...

[dbears]

It's obvious this isn't a priority. I feel like we would have had a "we're looking in to it but I don't have any information for you" response by now.

[Amorianallund]

It's obvious this isn't a priority. I feel like we would have had a "we're looking in to it but I don't have any information for you" response by now.

 

They just don't care. It's been three months and they haven't acknowledged the issue.

[huorianlupalien]

*** !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Ragequit

[huorianlupalien]

I think bioware dont need my money . Blizzard got it again

[BaronV]

Truth be told I think they simply dont know how to fix the performance problems. The engine is so borked up and is probably pushed to its limit. The main focus now is on keeping the game on life support simply to grab as much cash from gullible player's pockets for as possible. Thats it. Edited March 18, 2015 by BaronV

[arunav]

Truth be told I think they simply dont know how to fix the performance problems. The engine is so borked up and is probably pushed to its limit. The main focus now is on keeping the game on life support simply to grab as much cash from gullible player's pockets for as possible. Thats it.

 

You might be right about "they don't know," but it may also be an issue of "if we make these changes, it might fix these problems, but it may also make playability worse than it is currently, and we can't risk that." In other words, in rushing the expansion out by the end of last year, BW made coding errors that can't reasonably be addressed now that it's on live servers.

 

This is why I was actually HOPING for a delay to the expansion - it was clear to anyone following the game BW was stretched so thin on keeping up with SWTOR last year. People would have complained if it was delayed until February or March, but most anyone who left would have come back all the same once the expansion launched.

 

In any case, if there isn't a significant improvement included with 3.2, I'm just guessing they will not acknowledge the issues that still persist since 3.0 launched, and, agree, will simply let them be. Maybe 4.0 will change what's wrong.

 

No matter how you look at it, it's ridiculous that more than 3 months after the problems started, they still aren't even close to resolved.

 

We all know SWTOR's profits don't really go back into the game, but letting customers spend plenty of money on a broken product is really low. We pay our subs and plenty of people buy CM items by the $100s of dollars - at least make it so everyone can play what real content you do release properly.

Edited March 18, 2015 by arunav

[dbears]

Truth be told I think they simply dont know how to fix the performance problems.

 

This. Or they've already deemed it fixed and whenever it's brought up they stick their fingers in their ears and go LALALALALAAALALALAA until it goes away.

 

Well we got news for you, Bioware. This issue isn't going away. People would like to do 16m operations at more than 10 FPS. Other people would like to do warzones at more than 10 FPS.

 

I personally would love to get rid of the delays in things like

• converting a party to an ops group
  
• opening your inventory
  
• talking to vendors (especially crew skills trainers)
  

 

Like BaronV said, it's a good possibility that they just don't know how. But here's to hoping.

Edited March 18, 2015 by dbears

[Rithoma]

You might be right about "they don't know," but it may also be an issue of "if we make these changes, it might fix these problems, but it may also make playability worse than it is currently, and we can't risk that." In other words, in rushing the expansion out by the end of last year, BW made coding errors that can't reasonably be addressed now that it's on live servers.

 

This is why I was actually HOPING for a delay to the expansion - it was clear to anyone following the game BW was stretched so thin on keeping up with SWTOR last year. People would have complained if it was delayed until February or March, but most anyone who left would have come back all the same once the expansion launched.

 

In any case, if there isn't a significant improvement included with 3.2, I'm just guessing they will not acknowledge the issues that still persist since 3.0 launched, and, agree, will simply let them be. Maybe 4.0 will change what's wrong.

 

No matter how you look at it, it's ridiculous that more than 3 months after the problems started, they still aren't even close to resolved.

 

We all know SWTOR's profits don't really go back into the game, but letting customers spend plenty of money on a broken product is really low. We pay our subs and plenty of people buy CM items by the $100s of dollars - at least make it so everyone can play what real content you do release properly.

 

I totally agree with what you wrote.

 

But I think they are already beyond this point where they just focus on 4.0 to fix things up. The unusually early announcment of 4.0 and the complete lack of information on the issues from the so called community team hint to this.

 

Let's just hope the population numbers won't be damaged too much until 4.0 hits.

[dbears]

I totally agree with what you wrote.

 

But I think they are already beyond this point where they just focus on 4.0 to fix things up. The unusually early announcment of 4.0 and the complete lack of information on the issues from the so called community team hint to this.

 

Let's just hope the population numbers won't be damaged too much until 4.0 hits.

 

In no way meant to be confronting.. but where and when did they announce 4.0?

[Virus_Bot]

haha i like how some of you guys are going "oh well.. maybe in 4.0 they'll fix it.. "

 

oh the despair.

[arunav]

haha i like how some of you guys are going "oh well.. maybe in 4.0 they'll fix it.. "

 

oh the despair.

 

The way the game is run nowadays, can you really blame us?

 

Also, as another post mentioned above, where was 4.0 information already announced? I wasn't aware of anything indicating the "big" updates this year would be anything but regular game updates.

[dbears]

Sad times.

[Cupelixx]

Sad times.

 

Well I'm not giving up yet. It's pathetic that they don't address this. At least we can embarrass them over their shoddy work by keeping this thread visible.

[Liquor]

low res or low texture UI would help with the performance drop of the UI.

 

too bad we cant do UI mods and solve it ourselves...

[OwenBrooks]

I wonder if it is specifically the UI or a combination of factors

old thread now - http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=317352

Anyone willing to test a warzone with swtor_main_art_fx_1.tor renamed to.old and see if FPS is still the same with the UI enabled

Edited March 22, 2015 by OwenBrooks

[Kyuuu]

I wonder if it is specifically the UI or a combination of factors

old thread now - http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=317352

Anyone willing to test a warzone with swtor_main_art_fx_1.tor renamed to.old and see if FPS is still the same with the UI enabled

 

That disable effect to skills last time i checked as result one get better fps its just 1 less thing to choke on for the engine that broke and fragmented. which just get compound with every update.

 

I with the others that BW/EA dont care and are just trying to push out content as fast as possible to keep the money train going before they destroy what is left of the game performance.

 

Months ago in interview with one of podcasters for SWTOR, BW/EA all but admitted the engine is broke and pretty much said "its what we have and have to deal with it"

Edited March 22, 2015 by Kyuuu

[Cupelixx]

I wonder if it is specifically the UI or a combination of factors

old thread now - http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=317352

Anyone willing to test a warzone with swtor_main_art_fx_1.tor renamed to.old and see if FPS is still the same with the UI enabled

 

I remember that thread

 

This is an interesting idea. Makes for an experience that's far from ideal but I'm game to try it.

[Liquor]

...

 

Months ago in interview with one of podcasters for SWTOR, BW/EA all but admitted the engine is broke and pretty much said "its what we have and have to deal with it"

 

if that employee worked for me, I would let him go. that mentality is a cancer in a work environment. its software and can be corrected with the right experience and dedication.

 

sounds like they gave up on it and I call ********. such a lazy excuse

[SammuelSK]

if that employee worked for me, I would let him go. that mentality is a cancer in a work environment. its software and can be corrected with the right experience and dedication.

 

sounds like they gave up on it and I call ********. such a lazy excuse

 

Yeah, honesty is cancer in a work place for sure. Can't have any of that around. They fired the guys who were working on the engine a very long time ago, and then they fired the next set of guys too. And who knows how many more have gone thru that office since. By now, any shred of documentation is probably long gone, and digging thru code you yourself didn't write is a nightmare in of itself, let along something as big and complex as an MMO.

 

So yeah, they really CAN'T do anything with the engine, because anything they would touch could break the game entirely.

[emeraldon]

From that link above talking about the fx-file:

Same here.

 

With this file active, my fps never really goes above 20 fps in warzones, and never much above 10 in combat. When I rename this file, I get perfect "wow-like" smoothness.

 

I believe the 'stutter' when other players arrive in your vicinity is a different but equally annoying issue. I'm not sure if they are related.

 

Can this still be done? At work now, can't test.. Has anyone done any testing on that lately? Sounds like a ridiculous improvement. (20 fps increased to 80)

[FalmeseReb]

The way the game is run nowadays, can you really blame us?

 

Also, as another post mentioned above, where was 4.0 information already announced? I wasn't aware of anything indicating the "big" updates this year would be anything but regular game updates.

 

I get the impression that 4.0 is going to drop this winter. especially considering that BW Austin's other project was killed and this year is going to be huge for star wars.

[Cupelixx]

From that link above talking about the fx-file:

 

 

Can this still be done? At work now, can't test.. Has anyone done any testing on that lately? Sounds like a ridiculous improvement. (20 fps increased to 80)

 

As the community found in my original thread years back, renaming this file does give a performance increase at the cost of many things breaking. It's still true today. However you are unable to see lightsaber blades, most spell effects, AoE indicators, most in-game SFX (the entry barrier in WZ, mount exhaust, elevator buttons, pieces of holoterminals in some cases), the galaxy map becomes completely unusable, possibly more that I don't know about yet.

 

This does provide some interesting comparison data on my system.

 

Default game (UI + FX file intact) average WZ FPS: 20-25

UI enabled, FX file renamed: 55-60 FPS

UI off (ctrl-U), FX file renamed: 119 FPS

UI off (ctrl-U), FX file intact: 105 FPS

 

It's been known for a long time that the main_art_fx file is s***** and has a huge effect on FPS. What's more interesting is that I can maintain over 100 FPS in an 8v8 warzone by hitting ctrl-U to disable the UI. The fact that my FPS counter goes from red to green while doing this says that the UI is even more of a performance killer than the FX file.

 

Extremely shoddy coding. I would be embarrassed to the point of hiding if my game was unplayable because of a f****** UI. What an utter joke.

[Hockaday]

Renaming the file just makes SW:TOR patch again.

 

Edit: I did it wrong, I'll try it later. But I'm not entirely impressed by the fact that when you turn things off...fps gets better. Of course it does. Who knew graphical fx takes cpu and gpu power...

 

The UI bit though, now that's interesting.

Edited March 24, 2015 by Hockaday

[Kyuuu]

I gona say this

 

Requiem memento morie mmo from gravity inc has 60vs60 server vs server pvp. and my system can hold 30fps in this 8vs8 pvp in SWtor i lucky if i can keep above 15fps

 

That use Gamebryo engine which is just as old if not more, the game might not look as nice as this game on ultra/high but it certainly look better then this game on low, and even on low this game engine cant handle 8vs8 properly.

 

If it wasnt for the simple fact this was the closest i getting to KOTOR 3 i would never got this even if it f2p, simple cause EA dont give **** and has been release shotty broke bugged game for years. cause they dont let the developers finish the product before they say it will be release, then EA goes and throws away the original team.

 

If these issue with the engine arnt shorted out by time i actual rebuild me pc and find out even that isnt cappable to play pvp right or ops with exceptable frame rates. i will just move on

Edited March 24, 2015 by Kyuuu