Rime Dev Discusses Performance Issues on Switch - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 15 November 2017 / 2,710 Views
Tequila Works and Grey Box held a Reddit AMA and discussed the performance of the Nintendo Switch version of Rime.
"RiME runs at 30 FPS in 720p throughout most of the game while docked," said the developer. "This is a considerable improvement from where the game was at earlier this year when we announced the first delay.
"While we have done an excellent job at bringing the standard frame rate up, the one problem we were unable to address completely were loading hitches. RiME uses a technique called streaming which allows us to have portions of the level loaded and unloaded in order to save on memory utilization.
"With RiME being very open in many locations, it’s incredibly difficult to get these level segments small enough to not cause a hiccup in performance. We were faced with the choice of adding loading screens throughout the stages, rebuilding the game completely to be more closed in (undermining the product vision in the process), or living with these small hiccups to preserve what the game was intended to be. We chose the latter.
"It’s worth noting that these hiccups do occur on the other platforms as well, though slightly less pronounced."
Rime launches today, November 14 in North America and November 17 in Europe.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel dedicated to gaming Let's Plays and tutorials. You can contact the author at wdangelo@vgchartz.com or on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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7 Comments
If you guys see performance video it struggles on vastly superior specs of PS4. It struggles a bit to stay above 30 fps and the PS4 Pro isn't much better which shows its CPU heavy. Its not a well optimized game and it wasn't built for a low specs of Switch. The only problem is the studio isn't being honest, the game is not well optimized.
It is not necessarily the CPU that is causing the streaming issues.
From what I am hearing it is entirely possible that it could be due to storage limitations.
That is not to say CPUs inside consoles (all consoles on the market) being weak, are not an issue.
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CPU limitations in X1 and PS4 can certainly be an issue but well optimized games have done great things with those specs. However lets bear in mind the Switch working with a even less capable CPU. Rime cant even hit 60 fps on a PS4 Pro which is 1080p. So I still think there is a CPU issue why this runs poorly on Switch.
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I mean okay? Not my problem. My job is to give you the 40 dollars, and in exchange receive a game that runs well. I don't care if you had problems getting it to run, fix it. The consumer isn't a charity, we're giving you the money in order to get entertainment. A developer struggling isn't an excuse for a crappy product imo. BOTW, Doom, Rocket League, Splatoon ,xenoverse 2, are all great examples of the switch being able to run these games. This is just developers either being lazy or inexperienced.
Hah, just because you give them money doesn't guarantee you a game with perfect performance. Doom is perfect example of a game developed for superior specs. Its capped at 30 fps, still has frame dips, and still sub 720p.
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DOOM runs smooth with occasional dips, that do not break the gameplay. It is also much more technical than RIME and looks great on Switch, proving that it can get the job done if optimized properly.
So it is the opposite of what Puvvsly is saying, DOOM is a perfect example of why the Switch CAN handle it.
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I'm with Greencactaur on this one, Dooms massive levels and the speed you move through them without loading on the Switch amazed me... but that said... if a company can do that without "loading hiccups" then it's not the hardware which is at fault it is the company who cannot achieve the same results as the other.
It's like if a bunch of workers at a building site can all use the tools there to do their job... but one worker claims that they'll do a poor job because the tools are a problem.... then you look at the work of the other builders and you don't give the shit one his wages, it's that easy.
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Doom is evidently better designed for modest CPUs given it hits 60 fps on PS4 and X1. But Rime doesent achieve 60 fps on PS4 or X1. Rime is not a well optimized game, meant for superior specs, and scaling back for Switch is obviously a struggle.
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Puggsly
Rime was not made for "superior" specs. It was poorly optimized for all platforms. Switch being less powerful means it got the blunt of it due to the fact that they straight ported a game that was gimped to begin with. It is bad coding, pain and simple.
So while you are half right, it certainly was not meant for a more powerful system. The coding is just so bad that it takes a more powerful system to run it even semi smoothly.
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Im right, period. If the game was designed for Wii U or Switch as the lead platform then it would be optimized for inferior specs and probably would have probably used a different engine. UE4 works on Switch not great. Kinda like the engine running Doom, its not great for Switch.
The game runs better on other platforms because thats what it was being designed for, hardware in the ballpark of PS4.
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Puggsly
Whatever helps you sleep at night man. Bottom line, Rime is not a demanding game. It is bad coding, period. Believe what you want, it does not change the fact that more demanding games run much better on all platforms, including Switch. It is common sense that had the game been coded better, it would run smooth on all platforms and even lower range PCs.
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Man, you guys just don't listen or just feel like arguing. RIME WAS OPTIMIZED TO WORK WELL ON PS4, THE SWITCH VERSION WAS A CHEAP/LAZY PORT. It doesn't matter how well other games run on Switch, this was not a game designed for Switch or scaled to Switch easily. I already said the developer simply isn't being honest.
- -1
Bullcrap. If a game like Breath of the Wild can stream its data (almost) delay free, a game like Rime ought to be able to do so as well.
That game was designed for the specs of Wii U and Switch, more importantly its a big budget Nintendo game. Rime is a small project in comparison with PS4 as the lead platform.
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Right, I expect a whole generation of a particular group of Nintendo fans whining about third parties not nearing the level of Nintendo optimization. Nevermind financial viability, experience and familiarity with the console, or a first party's drive to push the hardware to its limits.
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'hiccups'? The game runs terribly and I'm not even particularily sesitive to frame drops, so for me to notice it must be bad. To downplay massive performance issues to 'hiccups' as if it is just the occasional 1-2 frames dropped is a bit rich. They're basically saying 'get used to it, 'cause we aint doing shit to improve performance with a patch'. Good to know, I'll skip your game then.
Well I'm sure they have done what they could, which has probably had mediocre results. At this point they have come to the realization that to fix their game it would require a massive amount of dev time, and yeah, they probably can't afford to do that, so they play it off as "preserving what the game was intended to be". It's a shame because from what I've heard, this game could have been something special.
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That game once was planned for PSVita and now it has performance problems on Switch, Xbox One and PS4?
That's really unfortunate. From early trailers, this appeared to be a fantastic game to fit the platform and the Nintendo fanbase. It was a game that had my interest from the start. Hate to say it, but with so many other games releasing and a limited budget, I'm going to have to pass this one by.
The game is just not very well optimized. I watched some footage of this game on the Switch and it looks so blurry. The article states 720p while docked... undocked must be 600p or worse.
