Maaku Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 Four years after this thread: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=37227&highlight=foliage Grass is still growing around me when i drive around on my speeder. Seriously bioware, this is 2015, our pc's can handle it. At least give us the option to increase draw distance. Pretty please? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MadDutchman Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 It's not the hardware, it's the engine that can't handle it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OddballEasyEight Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 If that's your biggest problem... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maaku Posted July 29, 2015 Author Share Posted July 29, 2015 It's not the hardware, it's the engine that can't handle it. So you think this can't be fixed at all? If that's your biggest problem... Big enough to be annoying Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darth_Wicked Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 (edited) Exceptionally noticeable on planets such as Balmorra or Alderaan. I've gotten used to it, but some improvements would be nice. EDIT: Edited July 29, 2015 by Darth_Wicked Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andryah Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 (edited) Four years after this thread: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=37227&highlight=foliage Grass is still growing around me when i drive around on my speeder. Seriously bioware, this is 2015, our pc's can handle it. At least give us the option to increase draw distance. Pretty please? Some PCs could handle more rendering.... many could not. They won't put chat bubbles in the game (in much more demand then grass draw distance IMO), because of performance concerns. Grass draw.. pretty much the same thing. If you are asking Bioware with that "pretty please" -----> suggestion forum. But don't hold your breath for an answer. It is afterall a 4 year old issue. In MMOs... multi-year old issues typically are never addressed. If you really just wanted to complain....... then after 4 years .... get over it.. adjust to the phenomena.. or move on if you are unable to adjust IMO. Personally, I stopped paying attention to grass rendering about 2 weeks after launch. Edited July 29, 2015 by Andryah Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maaku Posted July 29, 2015 Author Share Posted July 29, 2015 Exceptionally noticeable on planets such as Balmorra or Alderaan. I've gotten used to it, but some improvements would be nice. EDIT: I'm on Belsavis right now and it's just GRRRR Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maaku Posted July 29, 2015 Author Share Posted July 29, 2015 Some PCs could handle more rendering.... many could not. They won't put chat bubbles in the game (in much more demand then grass draw distance IMO), because of performance concerns. Grass draw.. pretty much the same thing. If you are asking Bioware with that "pretty please" -----> suggestion forum. But don't hold your breath for an answer. It is afterall a 4 year old issue. In MMOs... multi-year old issues typically are never addressed. If you really just wanted to complain....... then after 4 years .... get over it.. adjust to the phenomena.. or move on if you are unable to adjust IMO. Personally, I stopped paying attention to grass rendering about 2 weeks after launch. It's okay, don't worry about me. I just thought it's about time to bring it up again. I mean i got used to the "stick in the butt" running animation. I'm still playing and i still enjoy it, anyways, there is always room for improvement. And you are right, the suggestion forum would propably have been the better place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darth_Wicked Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 I'm on Belsavis right now and it's just GRRRR Voss can be worse -- much worse, especially in Gorma-Koss. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdi_knght Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 (edited) So you think this can't be fixed at all? Anything can be fixed. And if the engine is like most other engines (or done via code the common way), just increasing the draw distance is a simple change. A few of the things that could happen if they just upped the value: It could work fine.Draw calls could go up way too much and FPS would plummet.They could hit some sort of vertex limit. Depending on how this is handled, either stuff doesn't draw, or game crashes.The extra meshes could push them past the 2GB barrier on a process. Crash (or the necessity for yet a 3rd process, assuming 32-bit OS limits aren't coming into play).Distance might be intentionally set low due to odd things like render order issues (which can happen if they're combining meshes at runtime for example to reduce the above mentioned draw call issue). Graphical anomalies here, or a bunch of extra code needed to work around it.Many other things that could go wrong or become an issue. Even in a best-case scenario (#1), they've reduced a CPU/GPU/memory "budget" that could potentially go towards something else. And there have been a lot of requests for stuff, and they need to leave some room for future growth. Like MadDutchman said, the engine just can't handle it. And as Andryah noted, chat bubbles didn't make it into the game because of a massive performance issue. Chat bubbles of all things! They're generally not that hard to implement in a performance-friendly fashion (it's a bloody plane that just has to rotate to face the camera!), which just further showcases how deep-rooted some of the problems in the engine must be. If they were to do it all over again, I'm virtually certain they wouldn't have gone with the Hero Engine. Sure, it allows for fast iteration during development. But it's been a massive thorn in their side from the get go. Edited July 29, 2015 by jdi_knght Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AshlaBoga Posted July 30, 2015 Share Posted July 30, 2015 snip Welcome back, wasn't the same without you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andryah Posted July 30, 2015 Share Posted July 30, 2015 (edited) Welcome back, wasn't the same without you. Yeah... I missed my time away from SWTOR, but I was so pissed at how poorly Bioware handled SoR release and follow-up patches that I simply needed to take a break for a while... lest I become yet another stereotypical flaming rager in the forums.... to no constructive purpose whatsoever other then to /share_spleen_with_forum. Edited July 30, 2015 by Andryah Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Malastare Posted July 30, 2015 Share Posted July 30, 2015 (edited) It's not the hardware, it's the engine that can't handle it. Do you have evidence for that nebulous statement, or are you just quoting the old "the engine can't do it" argument because you saw others do it and it sorta sounded smart? The issues with engine structure and performance that limit actual gameplay are related to client-server interactions and the workload split between the client and the server. Draw distances are not involved in such things. There are plenty of performance tradeoffs in the engine that are true development obstacles. This isn't one of them. There certainly are performance issues to consider with draw distances, but we can't say for certain that "the engine" (whatever people define that to be today) is the problem. It's more likely a combo of target system requirements, development resources, code complexity, and the wide range of graphical intensity from planet to planet making it hard to set a single value that will please even the majority of gamers. Why say something like this if you don't understand what you're blaming? Edited July 30, 2015 by Malastare Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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