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Performance Issue - Help Please.

Started by Battagline May 22, 2005 at 11:21 PM 32 replies 6.1k views

Original Post

May 22, 2005 at 11:21 PM

I'm currently developing a Space adventure game called Epoch Star. It is available for download at www.epochstar.com. I just released a new version that has a glow effect, that uses pixel shaders if available, and an alternative method if not. My frame rate dropped from 60 FPS to 30 when I added the glowing effect. Would anyone be willing to try my game, and let me know the hardware your running and the frame rate your getting? Here's a screen shot with an arrow pointing to where you can see the frame rate while playing the game:

Here are a few screen shots demonstrating the glow effect:

Thanks

jbadams

May 23, 2005 at 2:16 AM

You put a shortcut on my desktop without asking me... that annoys me slightly.

In any case, pretty cool little game there, I'm gonna have to play with this some more I think. I got constant fluctuation between 10 and 37 FPS.

Intel Pentium 4 3.4Ghz
1024MB RAM
ATI Radeon X300 Series

Mastertronic

May 23, 2005 at 6:26 AM

i would be glad to play it. 15megs!

Mastertronic

May 23, 2005 at 6:53 AM

I dont know what happen,

1 I installed the file,
2 then restarted my computer
3 Execute the Game - The game jumped to DirectX mode then jumped back out?

I cannot play your game?

I have a 16bit Video Card with latest DirectX and video drivers.

just letting you know

Battagline

May 23, 2005 at 8:16 AM

Quote:
Original post by Mastertronic
I dont know what happen,

1 I installed the file,
2 then restarted my computer
3 Execute the Game - The game jumped to DirectX mode then jumped back out?

I cannot play your game?

I have a 16bit Video Card with latest DirectX and video drivers.

just letting you know

Sorry, the Alpha Blending requires 32 bit colors. Also, I apologize about the desktop icon. I'll have to change my installer to prompt for that.

jbadams

May 23, 2005 at 8:21 AM

Quote:
Original post by Battagline
Also, I apologize about the desktop icon. I'll have to change my installer to prompt for that.

Heh, thanks. Not really an issue and I doubt most people would care, I just happen to keep my desktop particularly clean. [smile] I like the game, I've been playing it a bit more. I think I'll write up some proper feedback for you after I've played it a bit more.

Mastertronic

May 23, 2005 at 8:58 AM

that was me that posted the last message i cleared my cookies and forgot to login

Excuse me for saying i am wrong in a way. becouse you are not a software developer
you are a Game Designer. Most likely a software developer will go threw all the check-ups on your game before it is released. there many things to do before a good game likes yours is ready to be sold on the market etc,

jbadams

May 23, 2005 at 9:22 AM

Quote:
Original post by Mastertronic
Excuse me for saying i am wrong in a way. becouse you are not a software developer
you are a Game Designer. Most likely a software developer will go threw all the check-ups on your game before it is released. there many things to do before a good game likes yours is ready to be sold on the market etc,

His game isn't finished yet, it's going through those checks now. [wink]

I don't believe your 16bit video card is capable of running his game at least at the present time.

Battagline

May 23, 2005 at 9:59 AM

Quote:
Original post by Anonymous Poster
Alpha Blending requires what is this?

is that something to do with adjusting from 16bit to 32bit desktop colors
it still doesnt work.

Dont feel annoyed im teaching how to work proffesional.
People in this world dont know what you mean. maybe you should right it out on instructions.. Your games and who makes games hould go threw a
test on computers if they work. or not. what does your game require etc

Or is your game designed something everyone in this forum knows how to use it?
i dont know im interested.

I think I misunderstood you. I thought you said you were using a 16bit graphics card. If that were the case, your card would be close to 10 years old. It doesn't sound like that is the case. Please let me know the following system hardware information so I can diagnose:

1. Graphics card type and memory
2. CPU
3. System memory amount.

sorry for the misunderstanding.

Mastertronic

May 23, 2005 at 10:57 AM

1. Graphics card type and memory
Video Card - NVIDIA RIVA TNT2/TNT PRO ,16MB

2. CPU
750 Mhz AMD-K7 Processor

3. System memory amount
396MB

I dont understand, this computer im using can run very big games for example
that can take up to 1 gig of installing, consider an example
Microsofts newest or Sierra's newest games

Do you think you know what the problem is?

Battagline

May 23, 2005 at 11:27 AM

Quote:
Original post by Mastertronic
1. Graphics card type and memory
Video Card - NVIDIA RIVA TNT2/TNT PRO ,16MB

2. CPU
750 Mhz AMD-K7 Processor

3. System memory amount
396MB

I dont understand, this computer im using can run very big games for example
that can take up to 1 gig of installing, consider an example
Microsofts newest or Sierra's newest games

Do you think you know what the problem is?

It's most likely a problem with my code. I've never tested it with a TNT Card. I believe DirectX 9 comes with a device caps utility. I'll play around with it tonight. Maybe I could get you to check your device caps so I could tell what I'm missing in my caps check. I may have a feature I could turn off to get it to work on your machine.

Thanks for bearing with me.

MickePicke

May 23, 2005 at 11:53 AM

You have vsync on by default. That means that as soon your under 60 fps or so it drops to 30 to be in sync with the monitor.

On my computer it ran in 60 fps and sometimes dropped to 30. I disabled the vsync and it ran constantly at about 62 fps. Have you limited the fps to 62?

My specs:

AMD64 3500, 1 GB RAM, ATI X800XL 256 MB

Battagline

May 23, 2005 at 12:12 PM

Quote:
Original post by MickePicke
You have vsync on by default. That means that as soon your under 60 fps or so it drops to 30 to be in sync with the monitor.

On my computer it ran in 60 fps and sometimes dropped to 30. I disabled the vsync and it ran constantly at about 62 fps. Have you limited the fps to 62?

My specs:

AMD64 3500, 1 GB RAM, ATI X800XL 256 MB

Thanks.

I don't have any limit on the frame rate. Is this something I can disable programatically?

When I comment out my glow code it runs at about 60 FPS or so. This code renders my glow surface to a reduced off screen surface. As soon as I put that reduced render in, my frame rate drops. Even if I don't run the pixel shader at all. Could this have something to do with the VSync?

Thanks

MickePicke

May 23, 2005 at 12:23 PM

VSync limits the fps, and there is a way to disable it. But I don't know how, I use OpenGL :)

Maybe something with D3DSWAPEFFECT or the device::Present function? Only guessing though...

Battagline

May 23, 2005 at 9:30 PM

Quote:
Original post by MickePicke
VSync limits the fps, and there is a way to disable it. But I don't know how, I use OpenGL :)

Maybe something with D3DSWAPEFFECT or the device::Present function? Only guessing though...

I'll have to look into that. I hope your right. So far everyone who's told me their frame rate has either reported 30 or 60 FPS, so it makes sense.

Mastertronic

May 27, 2005 at 9:26 PM

have you found out the problem yet.

your game is still on my computer.

nife

May 28, 2005 at 8:05 AM

If the driver settings are overriding the applications ability to enable/disable V-Sync, nothing override that except the driver itself. Here's a way to disable V-Sync with the Win32 API with the driver settings set to "Application Controlled" (NVIDIA drivers):

// Turns V-Sync on (sync = 1) or off (sync = 0).void SetVSync(int sync){	typedef bool (APIENTRY *PFNWGLSWAPINTERVALFARPROC)(int);	PFNWGLSWAPINTERVALFARPROC wglSwapIntervalEXT = 0;	wglSwapIntervalEXT = (PFNWGLSWAPINTERVALFARPROC)wglGetProcAddress("wglSwapIntervalEXT");	if (wglSwapIntervalEXT)	wglSwapIntervalEXT(sync);}

Of course it can be optimzed (finding the proc adress in the initializing code and so on), but that piece of code will work if the driver settings are set correctly.

DrGUI

May 28, 2005 at 8:22 AM

For DirectX, yes, look at the Presentation Interval in your PresentParams.

Mastertronic, I don't think the game would be playable on your computer anyway - it was unplayably slow on mine (7 fps rings a bell). The old version, that is, before the glow effect!

I have a rubbish ancient computer too! [sad]:
Pentium 800MHz, 256MB RAM
new NV Geforce FX 5200 128MB

Battagline

May 28, 2005 at 8:40 AM

Quote:
Original post by DrGUI
For DirectX, yes, look at the Presentation Interval in your PresentParams.

Mastertronic, I don't think the game would be playable on your computer anyway - it was unplayably slow on mine (7 fps rings a bell). The old version, that is, before the glow effect!

I have a rubbish ancient computer too! [sad]:
Pentium 800MHz, 256MB RAM
new NV Geforce FX 5200 128MB

I'm really not sure why it was that slow on your machine. I have a machine with almost identical hardware and I get about 25FPS on it (not great but certainly tolerable). Anyway, I fixed the glow effect (I think) so that if you don't support pixel shaders it's not such a hog. If your card does support pixel shaders it's still a hog, but my hope is that if your card supports shaders, you have a pretty decent system.

CRACK123

May 28, 2005 at 9:08 AM

Maybe you could give them profiled version and let them post the profile log. I know gcc profiled version throws out a gmon.out file. Not sure if this will help but I think worth a shot.

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