Map size and game performance

[Jann5s]

6 hours ago, ALCRD said:

I will keep tracking the Fast Track mod it looks promising. 

From what I understand, most of the mod has been ported to the game already.

[ALCRD]

56 minutes ago, Jann5s said:

From what I understand, most of the mod has been ported to the game already.

Not entirely sure what you mean by that.

Like officially ported by the devs into the vanilla game?

[gabberworld]

7 hours ago, ALCRD said:

I mean i can have full ONI experience

 

ok, but what about if you want play map size with 960x822

i tested that, i to can play this with 1x and 2x speed , but 3x speed fps drops too low

 

[ALCRD]

45 minutes ago, gabberworld said:

ok, but what about if you want play map size with 960x822

I won't.

Vanilla map sizes are fine as they are. 

960x822 seems like an overkill.

[Jann5s]

22 hours ago, ALCRD said:

Not entirely sure what you mean by that.

Like officially ported by the devs into the vanilla game?

Yes,

[SharraShimada]

7 hours ago, Jann5s said:

Yes,

Then you are misinformed. The devs build SOME of the features into the game. But they will not implement every feature, because some are not as stable as they want them to be, and some features are too much of a change in gameplay and visuals. 

The mod will always do way more to performance.

[Jorge Junior]

You didn't take ram speed into account. Not everything is CPU.

[ISAWHIM]

Major contributing factors to slowness...

1: The biggest is "random numbers generation", used to calculate the "dance" that gasses and liquids do. (They randomly "dance" around the screen, irrelevant to the quantity or logic of "pressure", which is the other contributing factor in slowness.) Random numbers use a complex formula that is HIGHLY CPU-intensive, as they ALL use division, which is "compound inverse multiplication".

2: Pressure and heat distribution, between gasses and solids and liquids. I am unsure if random numbers are used here, but it's NOT always a logical, mathematical solution. I have watched 100F temps distribute to two adjacent blocks as 35F left, 28F (origin), 37F Right. (As opposed to "logical math", which would have resulted in 33F, 34F, 33F.) Heat and pressure are also done as two individual calculations, for some stupid reason. (More of an issue if they are using random numbers for both calculations, which is now three total random numbers per block, for gasses and liquids, but only two for solids.)

3: Tasks potential. (Not an issue until you get more dupes and expose the "reach" of a dupe.) Tasks can actually saturate the list, for each dupe, and each objective. Each objective is tested against EACH dupe, even if they CAN'T do it, or they are TOO FAR, or if they are ISOLATED from a task. (Bad programming) This is done, multiple times, per dupe. (You can see the SAME objective checked, multiple times, saying a dupe is unable to do it. If they are unable, that dupe should just be skipped, or not even "checked", in the objectives. Same if they are isolated from an objective.)

4: Pathing of everything that can move. Each creature and dupe is "checked" to see ALL possible places it can go, before it attempts to move anywhere. Another dumb aspect. It should only be looking UNTIL it finds a POSSIBLE place to move, then just move there. (With the exception of dupes, which usually only move to do a task, or they idle.) The more mobile a creature, the more "potential paths" it can have. Then there is the, again, random number generation to "pick a path" or "build a path" from those available "reachable blocks". The more creatures, with the more reach they can move, the more the game slows-down. (The typical ranching-slowness issue that causes everyone to make confined spaces for high-volume ranches.)

5: Overlays, which spew almost every dupes interaction with the world. "Picked-up 100kg gold", "Soggy feet", "Sneezed", "Ate frost-bun", "Food decayed", "Stone fell", "Air moved", "Dupe yodeled", "Thought about moving, but didn't, then did, now is stuck and needs to pee", "Peeing himself", "Soggy feet again".

6: Full-screen animations and "full-camera-views" beyond what the devs, "forced as the maximum", unless in "picture mode" (not intended to play in that zoomed-out view) As if "drawing" was an actual burden here. Only the five full-screen overlays are a "burden". 2x for gasses "flow", 2x for "fake ambience flow" and the one for the static "sky background". Being full-screen and up to resolutions of 4K, it's a LARGE detailed set of images and 2 of them use, you guessed it, random numbers, in a formula that bends and twists the images to simulate "flow" of gasses. It's a simulation because it's just a repeating tiled image that is distorted more or less, based on the "pressure direction" of gasses differences of various blocks. Cool trick, but it is only to make it look like gasses are "flowing", when they actually are not flowing at all. A graphical illusion that is a bit CPU intensive, and only a little GPU intensive.

7: Overlays calculations and the various underlying calculations used to portray them, which the game also uses to function. (Like having to "recalculate rooms" every time a block is built or destroyed. Calculating "reachable" tasks, every time a block or structure is created or destroyed. Calculating the temps or gasses, liquids locations after each movement. Calculating the flow of gasses or liquids and "directions", after each new pipe segment is built or an old one is destroyed. Calculating each new power-load, after a wire is built or destroyed. Calculating the "beauty" as each dupe runs through the map, as they, themselves, can alter the beauty of an area with the suits they wear. Etc...)

8: Less of a CPU burden, state-changes... Gas to liquid, seed to plant, foods to rot, etc... Including doors and vents and sensors changing states from open to closed or red to green, etc...

9: Database saving, cleaning and state-reloading. (Which happens every time in the morning. That's when the whole game freezes to create a "save state", by default. All the info for every block, every action, etc, has to be saved. The more spaces and places, the longer it takes to save. Since days are rather short, this is quite often.

[evilcat19xx]

@ISAWHIM This is very interesting to read. How do you know/learn this information?

I need to be better informed to know whether all these items are accurate. Assuming these are right, I don't see what prevents devs from improving them.
Another question: what makes the game slower as we progress, and is there any remedy for that? I started a large base with around 100 FPS recently, and now at cycle 200, it is about 50 FPS. Traditionally I try to keep fewer critters/dupes and have less accessible paths. But is there any other way to improve the performance? 

One of the reasons I generally stop playing the end game is when dupes pause for a few seconds like a robot to get the following command to do their next task. It breaks the immersion, like they are not alive anymore. Do you think it due to large calculations?

I wish that devs were more open and communicative about these optimization issues. Btw here are few point about your list:

On 11/5/2022 at 3:09 PM, ISAWHIM said:

The biggest is "random numbers generation"

I am not an expert on random number generation, but if that is one of the main contributors to performance issues, should it be easy to alleviate it with a better and simpler pseudo-random number generator function?

On 11/5/2022 at 3:09 PM, ISAWHIM said:

I am unsure if random numbers are used here, but it's NOT always a logical,

It shows some randomness. I would have been fine with a bit of approximation as long as it made the game smoother.

On 11/5/2022 at 3:09 PM, ISAWHIM said:

Tasks potential. (Not an issue until you get more dupes and expose the "reach" of a dupe.) Tasks can actually saturate the list, for each dupe, and each objective. Each objective is tested against EACH dupe, even if they CAN'T do it, or they are TOO FAR, or if they are ISOLATED from a task. (Bad programming) This is done, multiple times, per dupe.

If it is the case, it has been more fast programming than bad programming to meet the deadlines. It should not be hard to fix that. You could work with a bunch of Dictionaries in Python to make it work. Not sure how it is in UNITY, or what are the other complications and dependencies.

On 11/5/2022 at 3:09 PM, ISAWHIM said:

Pathing of everything that can move. Each creature and dupe is "checked" to see ALL possible places it can go, before it attempts to move anywhere. Another dumb aspect. It should only be looking UNTIL it finds a POSSIBLE place to move, then just move there. (With the exception of dupes, which usually only move to do a task, or they idle.) The more mobile a creature, the more "potential paths" it can have

I guess it looks a bit more natural, but it has a high CPU cost.

On 11/5/2022 at 3:09 PM, ISAWHIM said:

Overlays, which spew almost every dupes interaction with the world. "Picked-up 100kg gold", "Soggy feet", "Sneezed", "Ate frost-bun", "Food decayed", "Stone fell", "Air moved", "Dupe yodeled", "Thought about moving, but didn't, then did, now is stuck and needs to pee", "Peeing himself", "Soggy feet again".

Would tracking 50 dupes be that much of the burden?

On 11/5/2022 at 3:09 PM, ISAWHIM said:

7: Overlays calculations and the various underlying calculations used to portray them, which the game also uses to function. (Like having to "recalculate rooms" every time a block is built or destroyed. Calculating "reachable" tasks, every time a block or structure is created or destroyed. Calculating the temps or gasses, liquids locations after each movement. Calculating the flow of gasses or liquids and "directions", after each new pipe segment is built or an old one is destroyed. Calculating each new power-load, after a wire is built or destroyed. Calculating the "beauty" as each dupe runs through the map, as they, themselves, can alter the beauty of an area with the suits they wear. Etc...)

Again, devs were not thinking about these super large colonies we have now when they designed these features like this. 

 

 

[gabberworld]

On 11/7/2022 at 7:20 PM, evilcat19xx said:

@ISAWHIM

One of the reasons I generally stop playing the end game is when dupes pause for a few seconds like a robot to get the following command to do their next task. It breaks the immersion, like they are not alive anymore. 

Worst part is even when game self looks butter smooth example with 12-900k , that issue still happens. And im agree its kind off kills fun self.