Dragon Age: Inquisition PC performance thread

Does upgrading your ram speed on your motherboard really boosts performance though. 16 gbs of 1600mhz in my rig.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/7364/memory-scaling-on-haswell

You'll see very little benefit from faster RAM. Main memory bandwidth has never really been a bottleneck for gaming for the last decade.

VRAM bandwidth is a different story, which is why video cards come with their own supply of really fast RAM on a fat memory bus :)
 
Thanks a ton for doing these pics, appreciate it!

Although I come to a different conclusion than you... I don't consider it much visible difference between Ultra & High, especially when moving around normally. I guess I just don't care that much.

However, on my system there seems to be more than a 1 fps difference. I would guess on average maybe 5 to 8 fps for me. If it truly was only 1 fps difference, then I would set it to Ultra

Oh also --

Do you find Shadows and Tesselation on Ultra to be too much a fps hit?

What would you estimate for each?
I went back and checked the fps and here's what I've come to understand. Bear in mind that none of this is conclusive as it really only applies to the two scenes I'm testing in the Hinterlands and my PC setup. I'm not a professional, I'm just changing settings and observing an fps counter. I haven't gotten very far so I can't test other areas like Redcliffe, since I have other games I'm playing right now, but I enjoy tinkering and figuring out what settings I will be playing at when I come back to DAI.

My PC specs:
i5 2550k @ 4.5 GHz
GTX 770 4GB - I believe it is the Windforce 3x OC model by Gigabyte and has a slight factory overclock.
8 GB Ram

Baseline settings for both test areas is the same as before, everything at Ultra/Maxed except Tesselation High and Shadows High. Oh, also textures are just on Ultra, not Fade-touched.

Test scene 1:
ultra-ultra1omf0r.png

Baseline Settings: 40 fps
Shadows Ultra: 36 fps
Terrain High: 42
Vegetation High: 41
Tesselation Ultra: 39

Test scene 2:

Baseline settings: 42 fps
Shadows Ultra: 38
Terrain High: 47
Vegetation High: 44
Tesselation Ultra: 41


As we can see, settings Shadows to Ultra loses 4 fps in both scenes. You can actually change Shadows without restarting your game, despite it telling you that so it's easy enough to see the difference for yourself. In my opinion, the difference between High and Ultra is not worth that performance hit.

Terrain quality was a bit surprising since the hit was very small in the first scene, but quite large in the second. I jumped to conclusions a bit too quickly before, clearly it will depend on the scene. I personally notice the drop off in foliage right away when switching to High, and since I'm targeting a locked 30fps for myself I'll be keeping this on Ultra.

Vegetation quality hit is small, 1-2 fps in each scene. My previous post has a shot with both settings on High so if you're looking to boost performance and you don't mind less vegetation then it might be worth it for you.

Tesselation quality hit was only about 1 fps in each scene. I always just assumed that Tesselation was expensive like it has been in most games which is why I left it on high without second guessing. That said, I couldn't tell any discernible difference between High and Ultra. I took screens of both scenes with Tesselation Ultra, maybe you can spot a difference.


One thing I didn't take screenshots of but tested out of curiosity is AO. Each step of AO quality comes with about a 2 fps performance cost. From SSAO to HBAO Full is about a 4 fps difference. Normally Shadows and AO are the first settings to get bumped down for me, but HBAO Full looks great and a lot cleaner to me in grass and foliage than regular HBAO. You can also change AO without resetting your game and observe the changes yourself.

I hate unlocked wildly variable framerates, so I'm locking it down to 30 fps and maxing out the visuals. I'd prefer 60, but this thread has shown that even 970s are struggling in certain areas. Coupled with the 30 fps cutscenes and the mouse and keyboard controls being not so great, it's clear that the game was optimized for 30 fps performance on consoles. As long as it's a locked 30 fps, even in those performance sapping moments like the Hinterlands base camp, then I can live with it. This meant Shadows got cut down to High, and I can't tell any difference between the Tesselation settings so why lose performance with it on Ultra?

Edit: Lol, I can't even see a difference between Medium and High Tesselation. Would be nice to know what exactly the setting is affecting.
 
I kind of feel like waiting for a patch before I continue playing but the fact that Bioware haven't even mentioned one coming is worrisome.
 
I hate unlocked wildly variable framerates, so I'm locking it down to 30 fps and maxing out the visuals. I'd prefer 60, but this thread has shown that even 970s are struggling in certain areas. Coupled with the 30 fps cutscenes and the mouse and keyboard controls being not so great, it's clear that the game was optimized for 30 fps performance on consoles. As long as it's a locked 30 fps, even in those performance sapping moments like the Hinterlands base camp, then I can live with it. This meant Shadows got cut down to High, and I can't tell any difference between the Tesselation settings so why lose performance with it on Ultra?

Edit: Lol, I can't even see a difference between Medium and High Tesselation. Would be nice to know what exactly the setting is affecting.

Which method are you using to lock at 30fps, and is it smooth (no stuttering)?
 
Which method are you using to lock at 30fps, and is it smooth (no stuttering)?
Right-click game>Game properties>Command Line Arguments>Paste this code:

-GameTime.MaxVariableFPS 30

Vsync on in-game. Vsync set to application controlled in Nvidia Control Panel (globally for me). I believe this is the smoothest method for locked 30 fps in this game. Spinning the camera around feels stutter free to me.
 
Bioware plz. Hopefully they fix these stuttering issues and make decent PC control schemes/more configuration options cause goddamnit...Having exams during this time is a blessing and a curse. Ideally the patches would be released by mid-December... maybe.
 
Should I finally implement a mild OC on my 2500k? Would that make a significant FPS difference?.

Currently getting around 30 average with a 6970 2GB and 8gbs of ram.
 
It's really odd, in the 34 hours I have in this game so far I have only encountered maybe a couple of cutscenes which stuttered and one cutscene which made it look like the characters forgot their lines and stood around awkwardly and the camera man kept dropping his camera and spinning it around on his tripod (the former was a bit funny).

The main issues I have are the SLI related ones, sometimes you see a flickering texture (not so prevalent in the areas I am mostly playing in at the moment, but you still come across it every now and again) and the weird fog, but I've largely put those to the back of my mind.
 
Right-click game>Game properties>Command Line Arguments>Paste this code:

-GameTime.MaxVariableFPS 30

Vsync on in-game. Vsync set to application controlled in Nvidia Control Panel (globally for me). I believe this is the smoothest method for locked 30 fps in this game. Spinning the camera around feels stutter free to me.

I really wish the load times weren't doubled when doing this. Its the only reason I keep turning a 30fps cap off. I moved Origin back to a 7200 HDD so its much more noticeable with any kind of cap.


EDIT: just tried your method and its stuttering like hell when moving the camera. Both fullscreen and borderless window, v-sync both on and off. Damn this game.
 
Edit: Lol, I can't even see a difference between Medium and High Tesselation. Would be nice to know what exactly the setting is affecting.

thanks again for all the detailed info + pics!

Tesselation setting strictly affects the distance. You can tell this in Haven outside around where Cassandra is standing around, on the pathways
 
Right-click game>Game properties>Command Line Arguments>Paste this code:

-GameTime.MaxVariableFPS 30

Vsync on in-game. Vsync set to application controlled in Nvidia Control Panel (globally for me). I believe this is the smoothest method for locked 30 fps in this game. Spinning the camera around feels stutter free to me.

Yeah I did this a while back and the game is ten times more enjoyable,I can run this game easy 60FPS however having the cut-scenes not run like a stuttering mess is worth havinging this game run at 30FPS.
 
Out of curiosity what sort of system ram usage are folks getting? I notice mine seems to top out at 4gb and I was wondering if that's just the games limit or if I've got a configuration issue going on someplace.
 
thanks again for all the detailed info + pics!

Tesselation setting strictly affects the distance. You can tell this in Haven outside around where Cassandra is standing around, on the pathways
Ah, good to know. In that case I might switch it to Ultra and turn HBAO Full down just to HBAO.
 
Apparently, the game runs better on windows 8 than 7.
General Game and Visual Performance Explanation

Windows 7
  • Camera Movement is laggy and game overall has a faint stutter to it.. combination of lower framerate and just general hitching effect.
  • Cutscenes lag and hitch, audio also hitches slightly during scenes and also when entering and leaving a cutscene.
  • Textures "shimmer" when using SLI, Do not when not using SLI
  • Framerate can vary wildly between 40-90 FPS.. could also be the reason for laggy visual experience.

Windows 8
  • Camera Movement much smoother, most likely due to higher framerate, but less hitching also
  • Cutscenes are FAR less laggy and hitchy.. audio does not hitch and overall is much smoother.. still not perfect, but best I have yet seen.
  • Textures "shimmer" when using SLI, Do not when not using SLI
  • Framerate is far more stable - varies between 75-85 usually.. makes for much smoother overall visual experience.
I don't really believe it yet, though.
 
So has it been confirmed that playing while the gender referral bug is active, actually alters in game choices/dialog/romances, aside from random npcs referring to you as madam or sir?

EDIT: Hmm...now the game stops responding if I let it sit at the main screen / options for too long.
 
Guess what's wrong with this screenshot:


FPS counter at top right is showing 60+!!

I just installed windows 8 to see if the claim is right. Prior to this, I was averaging at about 30-40 fps in Redcliffe.

All settings are at ultra with 2xMSAA.

I don't have the game but could it be due to DX11.1 ? That's the only explanation I can think of.
Battlefield 4 also makes use of DX11.1 (not available on W7) and there are cases where it performs a bit better than on W7.
 
It's really odd, in the 34 hours I have in this game so far I have only encountered maybe a couple of cutscenes which stuttered and one cutscene which made it look like the characters forgot their lines and stood around awkwardly and the camera man kept dropping his camera and spinning it around on his tripod (the former was a bit funny).

The main issues I have are the SLI related ones, sometimes you see a flickering texture (not so prevalent in the areas I am mostly playing in at the moment, but you still come across it every now and again) and the weird fog, but I've largely put those to the back of my mind.

If not already, try the 344.80 beta drivers. It should help with flickering textures.
 
I don't have the game but could it be due to DX11.1 ? That's the only explanation I can think of.
Battlefield 4 also makes use of DX11.1 (not available on W7) and there are cases where it performs a bit better than on W7.

Possibly... But a 30 fps increase is quite drastic so 11.1 may not be the only reason.
 
Possibly... But a 30 fps increase is quite drastic so 11.1 may not be the only reason.

BF4 can perform up to 50% better under Win 8, so it's possible for DAI because it's also the frostbite engine.

It also depends on the cpu and resolution if you really get a huge fps increase.
 
It is indeed worrying because the game benefit from a few fixes here and there and maybe, just maybe a little fps improvement ?

There's A LOT of testing to be done for every change they make. And I believe most of the performance issues are related to the engine, not game code. Which makes it even more difficult. Hopefully we will have news soon.
 
So yesterday I couldn't play the game for more than 10 minutes before getting the directx crash during cutscenes. I tried a myriad of different things to no avail. Eventually I got it to work without crashing, and here is what I did.

Set it to run in windowed mode, then scaled it down a bit so that it fit inside my desktop. Also turned of ambient occulsion. No crashes after a few hours of play.

3570k, 760 4GB, 8gb RAM all stock.
 
So yesterday I couldn't play the game for more than 10 minutes before getting the directx crash during cutscenes. I tried a myriad of different things to no avail. Eventually I got it to work without crashing, and here is what I did.

Set it to run in windowed mode, then scaled it down a bit so that it fit inside my desktop. Also turned of ambient occulsion. No crashes after a few hours of play.

3570k, 760 4GB, 8gb RAM all stock.

I've been playing this for almost 2 weeks now and I have not encountered a single problem related to stability, make sure you have all C++ Redistributables installed and also the latest version of DX from the Microsoft website
 
I've been playing this for almost 2 weeks now and I have not encountered a single problem related to stability, make sure you have all C++ Redistributables installed and also the latest version of DX from the Microsoft website

I did all that when it first started crashing and thought it would help, but it didn't. Maybe it's my GPU overclock or something.
 
I've been playing this for almost 2 weeks now and I have not encountered a single problem related to stability, make sure you have all C++ Redistributables installed and also the latest version of DX from the Microsoft website

Latest drivers, vcredist_x64, DX, all installed. I even tried reinstalling both the game and drivers to no avail. Windowed mode is the only thing that has worked.

One thing I did notice was at first the directx error would be "GetDeviceRemoveReason" and now it's "Device_Hung" or something like that.
 
Anyone having 360 controller support issues on PC with DAI? I've been playing it with a controller but today for some reason when I start the game up no inputs work. It has "press start" at the title screen so I know it's set right in settings. I cleared the controller setting in the settings file and tried to re-enable in game, but then same thing.

I know there was an issue if you turned on the controller while in game, but my controller is on before I launch it.
 
I would love for this to not be true, upgrading to Win8 would be a huge pain in the arse...
It's better than 7 under pretty much every single objective metric.
The only questionable side of it is subjective (some changes to the interface, which can mostly be ignored honestly) and what they attempted with Windows Store... which apparently didn't lead anywhere since no one seems to care about it and developers know.
 
Apparently, the game runs better on windows 8 than 7.

I don't really believe it yet, though.

This intruiged me so I bought a cheap Windows 8.1 key from reddit and finally upgraded from Windows 7. Did a fresh install on everything except the game which was already installed on a separate HDD. First off, I really like Windows 8 and should have made this upgrade a long time ago. If you use your PC primarily for gaming and you're considering upgrading, just do it.

I tested the game and it does appear more stable and definitely less stuttery overall. I wasn't able to test cutscenes yet. Unfortunately, because I'm on a 2GB GTX770 (Everything at High settings/no MSAA/regular HBAO) the frame rate is still all over the place. Spinning the camera in The Crossroads gives me that magical 60->38->60 with everything in between divebomb effect. However, Redcliffe seemed to run at a much higher average and wasn't nearly as bad as I remember it. This was surprising.

Long story short there is a noticeable improvement on Windows 8.1 but nothing like a 30 frame increase, at least not on my system (i7 4770k not currently OC'd, GTX770 2GB). Definitely not anywhere near a solid or steady 60fps. The real test isn't in sitting still and measuring frames but in swinging the camera like you would in normal gameplay. Everyone has different ideas of whats acceptable or what's an improvement, but I get headaches from schizo framerates so I'm a bit let down. I'm glad I upgraded to Windows 8.1 though. Maybe a 980 will improve things because I was planning on upgrading anyway.

If the loading times weren't doubled I would cap it at 30fps and leave it at that but there's no way in hell.
 
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