What do you do when your FPS is low?

[VladG]

So fellow Escapists, what do you do when your game doesn't run as smooth as it should? What settings do you tinker with to squeeze a few more frames per second out of your machine? (obviously this thread is kinda aimed at PC users)

Idle curiosity mostly, I'm not looking for tips on how to improve game performance, but I'd like to know how you guys do it.

For example I always go straight for the motion blur and shadows. Motion blur I disable in most games anyway, even if there's no performance issue because I just hate it in most games, I feel it's very poorly implemented and can really think of one example where I actually thought it looked good.

Similar for shadows, though I must say they are getting MUCH better, and it's something I generally don't like to give up in most modern games.

If it's really ugly I'll go for post-processing next and maybe particle effects and such.

I generally resort to lowering texture resolution last and NEVER screen resolution. No point in playing a pretty game if it looks like my screen is fogged up.

Oh, and I'm not particularly interested in "my PC is uber-strong, I always run max detail" style responses as they really add nothing to the discussion. If that's the case, tell us what you would reduce.

 

[MrTub]

I hate motion blur

Only time I need to turn down settings is when I'm playing with 5760x1080 resolution and then I usually lower graphic settings and keep AA high

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

Motion blur is actually the first thing I turn on when I'm getting a low frame rate. It's supposed to simulate the same kind of motion blur that makes 24 FPS film not look like crap; if it's turned on, the game looks smooth at much lower frame rates. Shadows, shaders, and anything to do with lighting are the first things I turn down, usually in that order -- although it depends on the engine. In F.E.A.R., for example, turning down the resolution has a huge effect, to the point that the other settings are almost pointless. Source and Unreal engine 3 games tend to be less resolution dependent, to the point that you really have to tweak the settings to get something approaching a decent framerate (assuming hardware that has trouble with the respective engines.) And even then, which settings give you the biggest framerate boosts vary by engine, although as I said earlier, shadows, shaders, and lighting are usually the biggest offenders.

Edit: I should note here that motion blur almost always has a negligable impact on performance; if you turn it off, it should be for aesthetic reasons, not performance reasons.

Edit Edit: Forgot to mention, AA and V-sync are always off on my computer, unless I'm playing something like an Unreal engine 1 game; those things give a /huge/ performance hit, and are only worth using if your comp is way more powerful than you need to play the game.

 

[Tharwen]

I hide in the corner and cry.

Then I turn off anti-aliasing.

 

[x EvilErmine x]

Turn everything to the lowest settings then slowly one by one start bumping stuff back up again until I get a decent fps/graphics quality balance. Generally the first to go is AA.

 

[GigaHz]

Shadows have never "wowed" me and yet they are one of the most graphically intensive processes. Sometimes I disable them outright if the medium or low shadows look like pixelated puddles of crap.

Then I disable or reduce post processing effects, followed by anti-aliasing, then reduce textures and in extremely poor performance situations, I may reduce the resolution.

But if it is barely playable after that point, somehow, I wont waste my time playing it. I could do it in the late90s/early00s when I knew nothing about building computers, but now I get twitches during 60 to 59fps dips. Chugging will probably make me rip my hair out.

 

[DoPo]

First - shadows. In fact I almost always turn them off, because most often they do have a big impact on framerate but can still buggy and bad. It's personal preference. Overall, that would be position zero, I suppose.

So if that is the case, then the true first thing to turn down/off is AA. Huge resource hog and I don't really care about it.

Afterwards, I'll move on to whatever else the game provides. If possible, I'll go for DirectX 9 (that's how I played AC1). I can turn down Antiisotropic filtering a bit but I'll turn it really down if absolutely necessary. Then comes the resolution and finally a sacrifice to the graphics gods.

EDIT: I forgot, I'll look if there is any way to increase the performance by tweaking some config files or such. And TwakGuides [http://www.tweakguides.com/] is good for that.

 

[MASTACHIEFPWN]

It usually goes back up, but if it's persistant I usually top playing. The one thing I like about console gaming is that framerates are usually constant, but I still prefer PC.

 

[Soviet Heavy]

Whenever I'm faced with a game where I'm unsure of how well my specs will hold up, I push everything to the max, and then work my way down to a comfortable compromise.

 

[Comando96]

Shadows off.
Any water effects, off.
Any Über, uncessary settings off.

Still slow? Shout: "Why aren't you working to your full potential you damn Radeon HD 9650."

Ctrl + Alt + Delete

Turn off all background programs that could be eating up power.
Also check that the Ram hasn't broken all of a sudden.

Turn off Anti-A.
Turn down effects that I think are petty or if there is an option to not load a graphic for example no grass, only a ground texture.

If I need to go further then its the fucking Witcher 2... thats an exception.

 

[JaceArveduin]

Since I'm running basically on super low anyway, I start killing background processes. It helps a little, and a little more if I chop off skype or steam.

 

[Kae]

I turn everything to minimum or off, and then as I play I start to tinker around with it, until I find out what exact setting looks best without giving up performance, but then again my PC can barely run anything so most games I play on minimum and still get lag, I mean my PC lags with Fallout 1 so yeah.
But when I had a better PC I did that.

 

[evilneko]

I usually go through settings and turn off shit I don't like (grass, weather if possible, I hate both of these in games) but otherwise leave whatever defaults are there unless they're absurdly low. Most times this results in satisfactory performance.

When that isn't sufficient HDR/Bloom/shadows are the first to go (although HDR is a candidate for pre-emptive elimination, since sometimes it sucks like in Fallout 3/NV), followed by Anti-Aliasing, then draw distance if it's tweakable, then resolution. Anisotropic I save for last.

 

[wintercoat]

I turn everything but view distance off. I never touch view distance. I hate when things just suddenly appear 2 feet in front of me. If my framerate is at a good level, I'll turn aesthetic things like ground clutter up. I've never really had a problem with rough edges so anti-aliasing isn't a priority for me like it is for others.

 

[broadbandaddict]

I hide in the corner and cry.

Then I turn off anti-aliasing.

Pretty much this. I hate when I get less than 60 fps. Usually I don't have to worry about it but my 570 started to hate AA when I upped my resolution. Looking forward to my 680.

 

[Launcelot111]

My computer lags like mad when playing flash games. Dead serious. Is there anything I can do to make it not do that?

 

[Chunga the Great]

I have checklist of sorts that I use when getting the settings right for a game.(this is going in the order that I lower them)

1. anti-aliasing
2. anistropic filtering
3. shadows
4. lighting effects
5. water detail & textures
6. model detail & textures
7. world detail & textures
8. resolution (if I adjust this then I recalibrate everything else as well)

 

[madster11]

Put my i5 up from 4.2ghz to 4.6ghz, overclock GPU core from 980 to 1013 and then set the fans to a higher setting.

This should net me another 5FPS or so, depending on the game.

If it's still not smooth enough, i see if i can mess with the ini to net a few more FPS before i start dropping major settings. AA is the first to go because it's the most demanding.