Darryl M R
Member
My girlfriend was playing last night and she ran into a game breaking glitch where she is stuck up on some mountain. Nice view, but we have to start a new game.
Firewatch's PS4 performance is terrible
- Thread starter Diprosalic
- Start date
Alkastelca
Member
I consider this spolers, this isn't a review, you should've gave us a warning...
GinoFelino
Member
0:33-0:39 nicely sums up my experience with the game.
blastprocessor
The Amiga Brotherhood
....blows.
gutterboy44
Member
The constant frame hitches are really breaking my immersion. There is significant slow down, like a new level is loading every 30-45 seconds. I am not a fps stickler for things other than multiplayer FPS or racing sims, so a story driven walking game gets a pretty big margin in my book but this has stepped over the line. It is by no means "unplayable", but the perforamce is significantly detracting from my enjoyment of the game. I am trying to immerse myself in the setting, and look around my surroundings as I slowly pace through the environments, but the tearing and frame drops are so bad, I find myself not wanting to turn my head and or explore. I walk forward and move the camera in slow increments to try to make it seem more smooth, but as a result, I am playing the game in a less satisfying and natural way. I am sacrificing gameplay because of performance issues. This is not good and I think this game should not have been released on PS4 in this state. It absolutely pains me to say that as a diehard Thumbs fan and someone who enjoys this type of game. My PS4 is adorned in Idle Thumbs stickers and I was so happy to see them launch a great game on PC and PS4, but this should only be on PC as it stands. Well I guess I can really show my support for Campo Santo and double dip on Steam.
I went in to my time with PS4 Firewatch with about as large a margin of forgiveness for any shorcomings the game may have due to my admitted personal bias for loving the dev team, but the PS4 version is unnaceptable right now. This game deserves a better showing. Otherwise I loved my time with the game, which makes these performance issues all the more frustrating. My playtime did end with a lock up during the loading of the next day though
I went in to my time with PS4 Firewatch with about as large a margin of forgiveness for any shorcomings the game may have due to my admitted personal bias for loving the dev team, but the PS4 version is unnaceptable right now. This game deserves a better showing. Otherwise I loved my time with the game, which makes these performance issues all the more frustrating. My playtime did end with a lock up during the loading of the next day though
Lister
Banned
Possibly stupid questions:
I know that you usually don't have a way to lock down frame rates on consoles, but, is it possible to trick the console into thinking the display only supports a 30Hz refresh rate, and cap the game that way? Maybe changing the output settings in the console itself?
I know that you usually don't have a way to lock down frame rates on consoles, but, is it possible to trick the console into thinking the display only supports a 30Hz refresh rate, and cap the game that way? Maybe changing the output settings in the console itself?
Melchiah
Member
That was what I was originally commenting on, not the other kind of posts. So, I guess there was some kind of misunderstanding, that I was saying it's all exaggeration.
The experience would definitely be better without these issues, that goes without saying, but I don't think they make it a bad experience either. I do hope it won't crash again on me tonight, and that there isn't any progress lost after the last night's crash.
damn son..
That is what hype does to you.
kriskrosbbk
Member
There are some dev posts here ,arent they?
Can we expect a patch anytime soon? I want to play the game badly but won't touch it like this.
On day 2 atm.
Can we expect a patch anytime soon? I want to play the game badly but won't touch it like this.
On day 2 atm.
gutterboy44
Member
I believe remote play on Vita locks things at 30 fps. I saw people talking about that in the Witness thread to help with their motion sickness. I might give that a try tonight.
Realistically? Even if the patch is already created and tested (unlikely) it'll take at least a week for it to go live on PS4.
No, there is no way to do this and it won't work.
The way Vita works is just like, say, a capture card set to 30fps.
I tried it with Knack (which is unlocked and juddery) and, yeah, it does drop to 30fps over remote play but the frame pacing is even more messed up and it winds up looking significantly choppier.
Jacksinthe
Banned
I agree with this. As someone who uses Unity without issues (unless we update and some systems move or are deprecated) - its a very GOOD engine if you use it within its means. Garbage collection is my biggest beef but you can work with it with some optimization.
Now - to the issues.
-Its an all-in-one type of solution. Its not amazing at any one thing, rather, good at a whole bunch of stuff. Devs need to keep this in mind. It can't do everything and is poorly suited for several jobs.
-Extensibility through asset packages sounds good on paper, but again they are developed by third parties with the constraints of Unity and live in the same box. If the engine isn't capable of doing X - creating an extension or asset that tries to do X isn't going to be 100% flawless because that asset lives inside of Unity's constraints.
-Updating extensions sucks - you are at the discretion of the developer of "SUPER AWESOME CONTROLLER INPUT ASSET" or "STREAM ANYTHING ANYTIME FOEVER AND EVER ASSET" to update their software to work for whatever hardware you need. There is no guarantee that the developer of the extension will be around, will ever update, etc
-Garbage collection is very much so abused due to it being automatic. When you make a big game damn near everything should be pooled. Design the nuances of your game with this in mind and you will be one step ahead. Don't and you will have hiccups as memory is freed to make room for more streaming.
-Manually calling that garbage collection is typical of streaming extensions and assets. Its what causes the most stutters, quick pauses, hiccups, etc.
It's a very workable engine if you use it within its constraints and then some. The minute you try to push against its walls it begins to shake a bit. You CAN and you can do it without issues but it usually requires you to roll your own middleware for what YOU need, not something else that was designed as a "catch all" solution. Case in point: I don't like Unity's particle system so I wrote my own that works the way I need it to without bloat and is built with Unity's constraints. Do I have issues? Nope. Did it take time? Yep.
Its very easy to try and take things beyond what an engine can do. Its very capable when working within its constraints and becomes unruly when you try to move past them.
shinobi602
Member
I'm not unreasonable, I just haven't experienced any crashes yet. Granted I've only played about an hour+ last night so far but if I started getting multiple hard locks, it'd definitely change my attitude. My only thing is the framerate, stuttering, etc. Even those aren't 'fine' to me in a sense. I wish it didn't perform like that, but there are cases when a game's so good and has its hooks in you that you can overlook them. That's just the case for me here.
BLUElightCory
Member
I thought this happened to me at one point but there was a rope attachment post that I didn't see.
Protocol7
Member
Shame they didn't use Unreal 4...
But yeah if they knew it was performing badly on PS4 they should've done something... maybe work with Unity, don't they provide that kind of Customer Service?
Haven't read all the pages yet, but I'm curious as to why a dev would choose Unity over Unreal... I mean when you know Unity is going to perfom really badly... why still go that road...? Bad early choice you can't step back from or just bad dev team (not trying to be mean or anything, just an honest question)?
But yeah if they knew it was performing badly on PS4 they should've done something... maybe work with Unity, don't they provide that kind of Customer Service?
Haven't read all the pages yet, but I'm curious as to why a dev would choose Unity over Unreal... I mean when you know Unity is going to perfom really badly... why still go that road...? Bad early choice you can't step back from or just bad dev team (not trying to be mean or anything, just an honest question)?
Melchiah
Member
Agreed. If the game refuses to load my save, or starts crashing tonight, then my tone definitely changes as well. I had one crash last night, and by itself it isn't a catastrophe, but it's a different story if the save file has been corrupted.
yes.. both here and on Redit.
Mathiassen
Member
It jumps from locked 60 when you look at the sky, to locked 30, then straight down to 15, and just varies between 30-15 throughout. The game crashed twice on me, once when i was loading in a new day, and once when i was just walking around.
OrbitalBeard
Member
That's fair, as long as you can understand why others, who are also being reasonable, aren't able to deal with some of these issues.
To be clear, I've forgiven plenty of games' technical problems in the past, if the rest of the experience is top-notch, so I get where you're coming from. Firewatch seems to go over the line for me personally though.
For example, this:
All of these issues combined makes this game something I can't support in its current state.
InsaneTiger
Member
I thought GAF's mission was to always blow things way out of proportion?
GinoFelino
Member
Scroll to the top of the page. Read the words. Edit your comment.
Spring-Loaded
Member
If it's bad, it's bad. Whether you're annoyed by people pointing out the problems doesn't have any bearing on that. Just because you don't care about how games run as much as others, it doesn't change that this game is crashing for people. Why complain about people making observations? And not just this game, but the others you whined about seeing people say were unplayable for them.
Man-is-Obsolete
Member
This is why I am waiting. If there is any hope it gets better, especially the hard locks, then I will wait it out.
Diprosalic
Banned
i wonder how many more of these posts we need before the "you guys are just overreacting" crowd disappears.
the video is just one things of many and not a lot of people in here call it unplayable. for many it's just not a good experience atm.
it feels like streaming an oscar flick as a camrip from a shady russian site.
also a good chunk of people lost some or all of their progress on crashes.
Not texture, but an object culling problem.
PLayed through the ending yesterday and the performance is bad but not gamebreaking. It does detract from the whole experience, hard to get lost in the world when it runs this bad. I did have a bug where i started falling permanently but never crashed my system that i had to reboot or anything.
boredJonathan
Member
Kinda surprised that we've not seen any reports about this on Kotaku or Polygon... I mean we've got a multipage thread here with easily documented examples. Feel like some of the larger news sites should have jumped on this by now...
Ah, just like Dying Light on PS4
yeah just a friendly article/news piece with something like "Heads up, there might be some technical problems with Firewatch on PS4".. so that buyers are aware that there is a problem, but the devs are working on a quick fix.
dark10x said:
do you happen to know if DF is working on an atricle about this game?
Did a complete play-through last night. Yeah the hitching is there, felt like bad loads/streaming vs. outright FPS drops due to the engine buckling under stress (until the very very end, won't spoil it).
Either I have lower standards than a lot of you or this is a case of YMMV because I felt the issues were minor overall. For those who are on the fence there's no need to worry about it being unplayable.
Also didn't run into any glitches with half of the forest vanishing or anything crazy like that and luckily no crashes.
Loved the game, well worth the $17.99.
Edit: I run off of a 7200RPM drive... is it possible faster HDD's reduce the FPS issues? Anyone play on an SSD or Hybrid SSD and see better performance?
Either I have lower standards than a lot of you or this is a case of YMMV because I felt the issues were minor overall. For those who are on the fence there's no need to worry about it being unplayable.
Also didn't run into any glitches with half of the forest vanishing or anything crazy like that and luckily no crashes.
Loved the game, well worth the $17.99.
Edit: I run off of a 7200RPM drive... is it possible faster HDD's reduce the FPS issues? Anyone play on an SSD or Hybrid SSD and see better performance?
shinobi602
Member
I'm not annoyed at all...only expressing that I don't feel the same way. I'm not sure if you're referring to me or someone else, but I haven't complained about anyone in this thread, only stated my experience. I think everyone has all the right in the world to feel the way they do while playing a game, they're not wrong.
Saying that it's hard for me to take impressions seriously considering those other games isn't whining, it's a view that after experiencing those games myself, I can't rely on user feedback here overall.
Alkastelca
Member
Can't wait for Jim Sterling to bitch about yet another shit port... oh wait it's a console version carry on then.
I hate double standards when it comes to PC port issues or console port issues.
Bad port is a problem and should be talked about no matter the platform.
I hate double standards when it comes to PC port issues or console port issues.
Bad port is a problem and should be talked about no matter the platform.
GinoFelino
Member
The only people using 'unplayable' in this thread are the ones coming in here stating it's not unplayable.
It's getting old.
Absolutely! In fact, we've had multiple people with faster HDD's coming in here to downplay the performance issues.
InsaneTiger
Member
This is fair. There are plenty of games that despite all the bitching and moaning about a games performance or graphics. When a game hooks you in with its story and characters, everything just melts away...
Unless while it's melting away the game crashes.
BiGBoSSMk23
A company being excited for their new game is a huge slap in the face to all the fans that liked their old games.
... lol, these threads always bring the laughs.
OT:
I haven't bitten yet.
Is there a list anywhere breaking down all the performance issues?
NotTheGuyYouKill
Member
I'll buy it when the patch is out. Been looking forward to this game a long time, so I want the best experience.
I didn't quote anyone or call anyone out or infer that people are saying its unplayable... I'm simply adding my own experience and reassuring people who might be on the fence... How else would you describe it in one word? Maybe I just haven't had enough caffeine yet.
:|
Edit: Changed the phrasing a bit... hope that helps!
Teletraan1
Banned
My perspective is that If a game is really good then why don't you go play something else until it is fixed and not risk it. I am sure people have something else they could play in the meantime and this isn't their only game purchase of the year or something. I have such a huge backlog that is seems foolish to me to play something just because it is the new thing but potentially busted and possibly souring you on the whole experience.
I try and sit this shit out until it is fixed and have a better experience overall. I am dying to play XCOM 2 for instance but I will wait until it is in a better state and less buggy as well. The result will be a better experience in exchange for patience. Not saying everyone should do this or has to. It is your money, your time but I never understand the need to play a potentially poorer experience for no reason other than NEW SHINEY.
GinoFelino
Member
Haha, many people before you have done so, I'm sorry to have assumed you were doing the same.
*high five*
boredJonathan
Member
That's exactly what I am looking for. Not a piece trashing it, but at least letting people know that there might be some issues. Note the developers comments on reddit as fixed being worked on - but something alerting people to the fact that performance is so poor on PS4 (and apparently some PC wonkiness as well).
Yep, same thing happened to me. I just didn't the rope attachment point and kind of didn't look for one since it was right after climbing down from one.