are features expensive now?

[smoth]

I am getting notable fps loss from many features. Would like to know if others are noticing this as well.

[Forboding Angel]

No more than usual. I have a few (older, non-ssmf) maps with over 9000 (literally) features on them and those I take a performance hit. But on normal feature range (1k - 5k) I haven't noticed any dip in performance.

[Beherith]

I have also noticed this, having high quality shadows and AA on will compound the effect. Forb could you please zoom in on a map (just enough to have the view full of trees) like the new Altored divide or Blindside? The maps use pretty low poly trees, yet cause a disproportionately large FPS drop (altored is nigh unplayable for me).

[Forboding Angel]

O_O, no that doesn't happen to me at all. For posterity I'll check again...

Well I'll be damned... there is an fps drop. I'm still getting 70 fps (which is why I didn't notice before) but normally I would have 120 - 200ish. O_o, that's no bueno.

[Beherith]

I drop from 100+ to low 20s on altored. Which gpu do you use and do you have shadows/AA on? ( i use 8800gt with 4x AA and 4096 shadows)

[jK]

One problem is the `fading features` feature, it's bad implemented and makes feature rendering ~3x as slow as without it (16% cpu time versus 6-8%) . Also it isn't customizable anymore (iirc it was once) and it uses a fixed distance, so conflicts with fartextures.
But I don't got the time to fix it, I would disable it as a whole, but better ask zerver what to do with it.

[FLOZi]

it's ugly as hell, bin it

[Forboding Angel]

I agree with Flozi. At this point it does more harm than good. Also, tbh I really dislike it when I zoom out and features disappear entirely.

[Beherith]

Nothing is free. I'm of the opinion that features popping out with zoom (without fade) would be horrible. But the point of the OP is that features, when zoomed in cause a very large FPS drop.

[FLOZi]

Just have them change to imposters like units do

[Beherith]

They do change to billboards.

[smoth]

billboard looks terrible for many features.

The main thing is that I am running:
16 gb of ram
280 nvidia(next thing that is getting replaced)
3.5ghz octacore(not that it matters)

and still struggle to keep higher than 45 fps with features displayed. If I am having THIS much trouble, I hate to imagine the goobers who are trying to run spring on 4 year old hardware.

[zwzsg]

Last time I tried (may 2009) covering the whole map with feature was expensive. I ended up drawing cubes with Spring OpenGL Lua, since anyway I needed them only for visual.

[SpliFF]

My own experiments (http://springrts.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=27938) lead me to believe features have an unusually high impact on the pathfinder. If you look at the debug screen (alt-b) and notice a high CPU usage on movetype::update you may be seeing this as well.

When I disabled the check for feature collisions in the source code the CPU usage dropped by about 80% for the same number of units and features. Note that this appears to be an issue whether your units are actually moving or not and strangely enough it doesn't seem to matter whether you reclaim all the features.

[PicassoCT]

Could we replace features on a certain zoom-level with 2 d planes? That way, even shadow could be still calced and stuff like forrests or stones could remain on the map.


Also its not a bug.. its a feature

[AF]

Picasso that already happens, it's what was being referred to when billboarding was mentioned

[Jools]

I hate to imagine the goobers who are trying to run spring on 4 year old hardware.

I think 4 years is a bad estimate for the mean hardware age. I would think 8 years is closer.

[zerver]

Do you have performance issues always with these maps, or only when many features are in view?

Could we replace features on a certain zoom-level with 2 d planes?

FFS NO :), and the far-textures should be removed as well IMO. It is better to make a fully 2D minimap-like version of Spring instead for ultra-low-end systems.

[smoth]

I don't understand your post zerver or what you are suggesting.

Jools:
so the engine should have features, which hurt higher end systems THIS greatly so older computers can run spring? It puts projects like mine in a hard spot. because either you run spring in really low settings OR you have to have a computer MORE powerful than mine? no, anything older than 4 years can gtfo.

[Beherith]

The billboards are a negligible drop. Look at Altored divide remake:

26 fps:



250+ fps:



17 fps!:


FSAA = 1
FSAALevel = 4

ShadowMapSize = 4096
Shadows = 1

On an 8800 GT.