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[nOoblet16]

That would mean the setting is for internal rendering, which I highly doubt. Its just the resolution you want to put out, game will still render 900p.

Not exactly the setting can be for external resolution however the game will detect it and as such internally rendering at a lower resolution. Considering this game has a 720P mode (when undocked) it could start rendering at 720O if it detects a 720P output.

Remember how GT5 worked on PS4? Eventhough the output in console setting was for external resolution the game would change its internal resolution depending on what the setting was set to.

 

[Flintty]

Just out of curiosity, have you played much open world games ? Cloud shadows were a thing even back in AC1 days so it's not really mind blowing by today's standards and are quite common actually.

I've not played many. This was the first time I've noticed it so clearly and obviously. Combined with the atmosphere, birds singing and stuff it just stunned me.

 

[eyeball_kid]

Just got to the first village in the game on WiiU and God the framerate tanks HARD !! I'm talking 15-20FPS of persistent performance while you are in village.

And the funny thing is there isn't even much in the village, 3-4 NPCs, 4-5 buildings and that's about it. No wonder the world and environment in this game is so....empty ! The game simply can't manage to do anything more it unless it's a small enclosed place like a shrine.

Yikes. How did Nintendo ever think they could target the Wii U with this game without serious compromises? Or feel comfortable releasing a game with such sustained framerate issues? That's not usually Nintendo's style.

And as someone who wants to play Zelda docked most of the time, I feel a bit irked by docked differences. Especially since I have a 720p set, but they're rendering at 900p regardless.

 

[Dizzy]

Thing is, I'll be playing this on wiiU; which will have worst framerates.

The framerate is balls on Wii U. Drops seemingly randomly too.

To be honest I'm not that blown away by the game technically to be able to explain these drops. Surely Wii U can do better than this.

 

[MrPanic]

Apparently it does, someone here said that in his experience it seems the game starts rendering at 720P leading to better performance rather than internally rendering to 900P and then outputting at 720P.

But obviously, this needs to be checked and confirmed by other people.

Ok, I tested that framerate drop hill at the start of the game at 720p at 1080p tv output modes, as well as handheld mode, and can say that the framerate drop seem pretty much identical on both 720p and 1080p, while not dropping at all in handheld mode. I think it's pretty safe to say this is a pure docked vs undocked problem, 720p tv mode sadly doesn't help.

 

[Rodin]

Play the game people. I agree that it shouldn't be happening at all, but you'll realize that the drops are the exception. There's some severe shit that i didn't want to see in the Plateau, but even those 2-3 prolonged drops don't suddendly make the game shit, and outside of it i've been running around on foot and with my horse and it never dropped in that area. This is from around 4 hours of gameplay.

 

[Durrzerker]

Does switch run at 60 fps with drops or 30? Same question for wii u

 

[cheesekao]

Does switch run at 60 fps with drops or 30? Same question for wii u

30 with drops

 

[cleveridea]

Ok, I tested that framerate drop hill at the start of the game at 720p at 1080p tv output modes, as well as handheld mode, and can say that the framerate drop seem pretty much identical on both 720p and 1080p, while not dropping at all in handheld mode. I think it's pretty safe to say this is a pure docked vs undocked problem, 720p tv mode sadly doesn't help.

weird, maybe a patch fixes it then?

I did try 720p mode on TV and wondered why it didnt seem to run better...

 

[Durrzerker]

30 with drops

Ok cool I think I will go with the Wii U version then if it's that close

 

[Polygonal_Sprite]

How did the performance in first village fare ?

A few drops here and there but nothing like the first slope.

I just tested the first slope docked with the console set to 720p as the output resolution. Absolutely no change. The big group of tree shadows to the left of the campfire absolutely tanks the framerate just the same as when the consoles output resolution is set to 900p.

The performance in most of the Great Plateau is fine imo, like I said 90% of the time it's 30fps. It seems to be shadow maps that are causing the large framerate drops which could be linked to memory bandwidth? If so I don't know how it can be fixed unless the build was based on an old dev kit but I think that's extremely unlikely.

I play most of my games on PC and PS4 Pro so I do value image quality and consistent framerate I just think the game isn't as bad as the first half of that video suggests. Hopefully DF release more videos on the game focusing on other areas of the game.

I also like the stats NX Gamer shows at the end of his videos, particularly the stats on average frames. It really does paint a much more accurate representation of a games overall performance rather than going to specific problem areas and trying to make the framerate tank as much as possible which is what DF seem to have done with this particular video.

 

[RAWRferal]

Ok cool I think I will go with the Wii U version then if it's that close

From what I've been seeing here on GAF the drops are way more severe on Wii U, people talking about sub 20fps in some areas (villages,

Spoiler

wetlands

etc.)

 

[Gitaroo]

Does handheld mode runs at rock solid 30fps?

 

[Durrzerker]

From what I've been seeing here on GAF the drops are way more severe on Wii U, people talking about sub 20fps in some areas (villages,

Spoiler

wetlands

etc.)

Yeah but thats not a $300 difference to me and I can't see anything else hitting Switch I want

 

[Polygonal_Sprite]

Does handheld mode runs at rock solid 30fps?

Looks like it to me. The first slope which should now be the benchmark for further patches (if there is one) runs much, much smoother in handheld mode (720p).

 

[Rodin]

Does handheld mode runs at rock solid 30fps?

Yeah, i went through all the (3-4) places where i ran into dips in docked mode and it's rock solid when undocked. It's pretty impressive.

 

[Zombegoast]

Two hours in and the only time the fps drops when setting grass on fire. Other then that, I only notice drops 3 times exploring the plateau

 

[R_thanatos]

Cemu save us

i want to have faith , but if cemu manages to make this game work properly day one , it'll be the achievement of the decade for them. i Can't even recall if wind waker HD is fixed ( since the time it was crashing in the forest )

 

[ec0ec0]

Yeah, i went through all the (3-4) places where i ran into dips in docked mode and it's rock solid when undocked. It's pretty impressive.

does the docked version running subpar in those places really make the handheld version "impressive"?

Not trying to be overly negative or anything, is just that, considering the hybrid nature of the console, you would expect nintendo to design the hardware so that the game also runs smoothly in docked mode.

Anyway, you propably simply mean that a game like breath of the wild running smoothly undocked (in a portable, basically) is impressive, regardless of how it runs when docked.

 

[MemoryHumanity]

You really gonma let framerate put you off a 98 game? Be my guest lol.

 

[mcfrank]

Does handheld mode runs at rock solid 30fps?

I had one issue where the game kinda paused the first time i encountered a new enemy for a 1/2 second, but the frame rate has been buttery smooth on tablet.

 

[Fireflu]

Didn't the Xenoblade Chronicles X guys help out with this game? That game had absolutely rock solid performance and featured a colossal world with tons of detail (on the Wii U hardware no less). I know Zelda has more complicated systems such as dynamic fire, physics, etc, but this still seems super odd.

Really disappointed to see how bad the performance is when docked and even more disappointed at the reviewers that failed to mention these issues. The game could be a literal masterpiece but it should never be given a perfect 10/10 if such issues exist...

 

[ec0ec0]

The game could be a literal masterpiece but it should never be given a perfect 10/10 if such issues exist...

people already went over this for long enough, even though this is a technical thread, and the thread tittle was updated because of it:

the tittle now:

DF on Zelda Switch: Docked has major frame drops, portable doesn't (no score talk)

scores should be discussed in the review thread

 

[Rodin]

Anyway, you propably simply mean that a game like breath of the wild running smoothly undocked (in a portable, basically) is impressive, regardless of how it runs when docked.

Yep. Docked performances were completely unrelated.


By the way, i was thinking about RAM configurations.

Wii U has a main pool of 12.8GB/s
Switch is 25.6

Wii U has 32MB eDRAM, we don't know the bandwidth but it's rumored to be around 70GB/s
Switch should have SRAM on die, which thanks to Nvidia's TBR can do a similar job to eDRAM, but we don't know the amount (maybe around 4MB) and the speed, but it's likely faster or at the very least as fast as Wii U's eDRAM.

Now, let's focus for a second on the main RAM. Switch has 2x the bandwidth and a vastly better color compression that reduces even more the bandwidth requirements compared to the old VLIW5 architecture. This to me not only explains why the game is showing such solid performances when undocked, but it's even kind of confirming that the dips in docked mode are bandwidth related. The GPU clocks 2.5x faster when docked so it shouldn't be a problem to handle even 1080p with the handheld frame rate, but the difference in RAM subsystem (especially the amount of eDRAM vs SRAM this time, and the fact that there's stuff that can't be tiled) imho can create some issues in some situations if a higher res is in place and the devs don't find the proper workarounds.

Now, we know that the team started working on this port last spring. It's reasonable in my opinion to assume that they didn't manage to find these workarounds in time, which is why sometimes the frame rate tanks in docked mode while it's solid in portable mode. Now regardless of the fact that it's nothing that ruins the enjoyment of the game (some reactions are a bit extreme), i still think it shouldn't happen because on paper the console should be able to do much more. I can see why it does considering how clearly rushed the Switch launch was, and in fact i'm still wondering if the OS is contributing to the problem to some extent (don't know if you read this but the console kept giving me an error the first 10 times i tried to boot the game, so there's definitely something going on with the software... which is what happens when you basically release a beta) so my hope here is that they acknowledge the issue and keep working on it to fix it in another patch (and a new fw update), because i'm confident that it can be done.

 

[Bluth54]

Didn't the Xenoblade Chronicles X guys help out with this game? That game had absolutely rock solid performance and featured a colossal world with tons of detail (on the Wii U hardware no less). I know Zelda has more complicated systems such as dynamic fire, physics, etc, but this still seems super odd.

Monolith soft has 2 studios, one is the game studio and another that helps create art assets for other games. I'm not sure how much work the game studio did on Zelda or if it was all just the art asset studio.

 

[Alienous]

The forest part of the plateau has a really shitty framerate for me, at least in TV mode. Seems like object density has an impact.

The dips outside of that seem to have been areas with a lot of grass.

 

[Khalifa Jayy]

Yeah but thats not a $300 difference to me and I can't see anything else hitting Switch I want

Mario Kart and Splatoon ports with enhancements.

+ all the indies you can currently play elsewhere.

Come on, you don't see the VALUE you're getting?

 

[MTC100]

I somehow have the feeling this doesn't have much to do with the game but rather the way the switch is streaming the data to the TV, perhaps USB 3.0 isn't fast enough in the end or just not capable of decent video streaming? Who knows... -Then again, Mario Kart 8 runs at 60FPS and I don't think there were any framedrops.

 

[Im_So_Pringles]

Been playing mostly docked. I'm also pretty sensitive to changes in performance. Pretty much every drop I experience is when you view villages or long stretches of grass at certain angles; some battles get a little rough in patches. But I've personally never experienced an extended performance drop; it usually only struggles for 2-3 seconds Max and then smoothing out once again. Definitely not game breaking. I would say that 90% of gameplay is a rock solid and smooth 30 fps that is not stuttery. Very, very playable.

 

[Okada]

I somehow have the feeling this doesn't have much to do with the game but rather the way the switch is streaming the data to the TV, perhaps USB 3.0 isn't fast enough in the end or just not capable of decent video streaming? Who knows... -Then again, Mario Kart 8 runs at 60FPS and I don't think there were any framedrops.

Fast RMX runs at a perfect 1080p 60fps.

It's the game, not the dock.

Putting the docked mode issues aside, the handheld mode is really breathtaking at times.

 

[Undead Fantasy]

Thank god I never planned to play the game docked.

Switch is a full portable to me.

 

[eyeball_kid]

Play the game people. I agree that it shouldn't be happening at all, but you'll realize that the drops are the exception. There's some severe shit that i didn't want to see in the Plateau, but even those 2-3 prolonged drops don't suddendly make the game shit, and outside of it i've been running around on foot and with my horse and it never dropped in that area. This is from around 4 hours of gameplay.

Well, sirap has played 40 hours on the Wii U version and says it gets worse later in the game:

once you get into the more densely populated areas performance takes an even bigger hit than what you'd experience at the beginning of the game. Idk, it might just be me but other gaffers playing the Switch version have also reported the same thing.

Also please avoid hyperbole like "doesn't make the game shit", I don't think most people are saying that, but sustained drops of 15-20fps and reported drops as low as 8fps on Wii U are not acceptable for a AAA game, let alone Zelda.

 

[leng jai]

The thing is is that this game deserves so much more than sub 30fps - it's a flagship Zelda title in 2017 made by Nintendo for crying out loud. It's not like the game looks like it's taxing at all. It fails to even run at 1080p and has no AA whatsoever.

Honestly it's hard for me to believe Nintendo let such an important title come out in such a state after all this time. The fact that the 720p handheld mode is so much more competent just makes it even more baffling. It's not a great first impression for people who bought a Switch to primarily play on their TV.

 

[Nilaul]

So the framerate falls randomly, in a spike. Then the game is programmed in such a way that it tries to vsync the framerate which causes even more problems?

 

[TheExodu5]

The 20 fps looks fine compared to what GameXplain highlighted in their review.

https://youtu.be/sAGzQPNlle4?t=789

Seriously looks like a bug.

 

[Nilaul]

Fast RMX runs at a perfect 1080p 60fps.

It's the game, not the dock.

Putting the docked mode issues aside, the handheld mode is really breathtaking at times.

Doesn't RMX have an accidental SNES mode due to dynamic scaling bug?

It is definitely the game though.

 

[teh_pwn]

Makes my decision to get Wii U better in retrospect. And Mario Kart is just 8 with dlc and a few new characters. I'm good until mario comes out.

 

[UrbanRats]

Any in depth analysis for the WiiU version yet?

 

[teh_pwn]

Any in depth analysis for the WiiU version yet?

It's definitely choppy but I didn't expect much. The game needs faster hardware to shine.

 

[Rodin]

Just played a bit more undocked, started raining twice and it didn't drop one frame.

It's almost 4am here though so i think i'm gonna go to sleep lol

 

[CoolNumber9]

lol, people will never tire of trotting this out will they?

Because I think it's true too! Needs to be trotted.

 

[slightconfuse]

Kind of glad I held off onto this.

Hope Nintendo sorts it out

 

[LowParry]

I guess the question comes down to, if there is a fix, how quick is Nintendo in implementing it.

 

[Dremorak]

The people saying it doesn't look taxing have either not played it themselves or have no idea what they are talking about

 

[RobRSG]

I'm playing on the WiiU, framerate is breathing like wild in my face.

#teamoverrated

 

[Madao]

if the game can do 720p in handheld mode, they should have let it run like that when you play with 720p output docked. why wouldn't they let that be possible? what advantage is there to run at 900p when outputting 720p?

 

[Tain]

if the game can do 720p in handheld mode, they should have let it run like that when you play with 720p output docked. why wouldn't they let that be possible? what advantage is there to run at 900p when outputting 720p?

Supersampling I guess.

 

[Tchu-Espresso]

It being a streaming issue doesn't make sense to me. It's the same hardware docked vs undocked other than GPU clock speed.

If anything it should run better docked. 900p should be possible on a 2-2.5x increase in clocks.

What I don't understand is why Nintendo don't allow the clocks to increase further in docked mode? Battery life isn't an issue and surely the thing doesn't seem very hot when running docked as it is...

Nintendo must fix this. The system seems artificially gimped.

 

[televator]

What a weird and disappointing outcome. As someone who makes a habit of playing handheld games on my TV, this makes the Switch all the less attractive. They really should patch this. Either by letting the game run natively in 720p mode when docked or optimizing the 900p native render if possible.

 

[b00_thegh0st]

Bandwidth bottleneck prevents the console to be able to handle the game's physics @900p while maintaining 30fps. Combine that with the double buffer v-sync and you get those infamous 20fps prolonged drops. A 720p option would be nice if Nintendo doesn't have any other solution to offer.

I suspect the issue will arise with each game featuring taxing physic models.