Work
More stuff goes into the engine today including full screen mode for standalone executables and further improving tweaks. I also managed to reproduce the stutter and then exaggerate it to see it in all it's ugliness. It turns out that the physics module is NOT to blame for this, and is more to do with the something around the SYNC command. I am currently researching the improvements DirectX made to the 'Present' command as we currently use the antiquated COPY method, and it sounds like the better system is FLIP and FLIPEX which apparently uses less memory and is much more efficient. The potential gain is zero stutter and slightly faster performance all round so wish me luck as I go back to school with DirectX :)
great to hear you've tracked it down lee :)
ReplyDeletegood luck going back to school with the fix idea :D look forwards to reading it worked
Nice one Lee.
ReplyDeleteSounds great! Also really hoping all these improvements to DBPro filter down to us as updates! ;D
ReplyDeletethe stutter is because of the reflection shader. turn that shader off before you do anything new and you will get 60fps smooth..
ReplyDeleteThat fits with what Lee has discovered so far. Probably something to do with rendering twice per frame.
DeleteI get stutter without reflection shaders on. Even at 60fps.. and even at 80 to 90 fps with vsync off.
Deletewith or without.
DeleteI think it would be wiser to say the reflection exasperates the stutter if anything, not the sole root cause. A few of us have been saying shaders performance is a big thing here, not polygon count. You only have to play around with them for a few mins to see the big difference in speed when going from lowest to highest.
ReplyDeleteFrom reports so far this is going well, but we will have to wait and see. For instance, I have had 170+ FPS in prior releases on lowest settings. I seriously doubt I am going to get the same with this, although the low settings should look better, which is the main thing.
Still, wouldn't it be nice to have some speed and not worry about the game crawling because you added a few too many trees!
Oops forgot to say, Clonkex, I have a feeling that it may filter down, as a new improved version ;) I doubt the original version will get this stuff. I could be wrong of course!
ReplyDeleteDBE, you mean? Let's hope so!
DeleteYeah. it makes sense for TGC to work on an enhanced version of DB while working on Reloaded. That way, they get another shiny product to sell! Win, win. Of course with AGK V2 being worked on, I'm not sure how relevant it would be.
DeleteVery, I would think. DBPro can do LOTS of stuff that AGK can't, and is far better for Windows development than AGK.
DeleteWhen will performance work be enough ? This is starting to be a disappointment., I'd like to see some other features be implemented right now.. Just wondering when enough is enough with performance ?
ReplyDeleteI would say when it runs without feeling like it is on the ragged edge for most people with a reasonably specced machine, and also looks suitably next gen (we can hope). From all reports the engine is on track to meet most these goals at the moment. The fact that one house object and one person running around trying to shoot me causes issues in framerate in 1.5, is an indication something needs vastly improving, or is very broken. From the sounds of the Newsletter the new update will be in a matter of weeks, maybe less, if nothing changes. I think we may see a new main focus after it. However, if there are more gains to be made, it would be nice to have those added in now and again also!
DeleteI see many posts comparing Reloaded to Unity, Crisis, Unreal etc. Complaining it doesn't run as well. The only way Reloaded has a chance of comparing with any of those, is to get performance up first!
have to agree with you glenn, the engine is new only 5-6months old and will of course need a lot of fine tuning to get the most users running smoothly.. no point adding features that wont allow the engine to run like this till it can.
DeleteEnough is enough when Reloaded runs at the same pace as any other game engine. Currently (beta 5) it horrifically slow and horrible to use, so there's no point having new features. All the awesome features we want need a solid base to stand on; hopefully because of all the performance work, beta 6 will be that solid platform.
DeleteCurrently Reloaded runs about 6 times faster than Unreal Engine 4 ;) As stated, we will stop on performance work when we get a general nod from the majority of the community that we've achieved a frame rate everyone can use with their projects.
ReplyDelete