I know that Elite Dangerous is no longer a priority for FDEV. Pity, because it's the flagship product that put FDEV on the map. There is still so much potential for this game, for new ships, for new weapons, for new enemies, for new game mechanics.
But that aside, ED as a game seems to have terrible performance. I just wanted (as a published indie game programmer myself) some thoughts about some things that could really streamline the performance side of things if they haven't been implemented already.
- Are draw passes being performed for things that are not even visible on the screen? This is one of the first things I check in my own code but I know that many big game developers get sloppy with simple things like this and just assume everyone is running their game on a solid rig that can handle unnecessary work. For planetary approach especially (is the "dark side" of the planet that the player can't even see being rendered?) but also just for ships/planets/stations in general, if the player ship isn't pointed at it and it's not visible, draw code should be bypassed.
- Please give us options to turn off shadows entirely. At lower levels, shadows don't look great and from a performance perspective it would be nice to just be able to turn them completely off even for a tiny bit better performance.
- Does ED adjust model/texture detail based on view distance/distance from object? I have to wonder, because just being in an area with a starport tanks FPS sometimes even if I'm 20km away and the station is tiny on my screen.
- How optimized are ED's meshes? Resource optimization can make a huge difference in game performance for very little effort expended on the part of devs. It's amazing how many software developers just don't even bother with steps like this though.
- It would be nice to have an absolute draw cutoff feature in the graphics settings. For example, never draw ships that are farther away than 10km even if they are onscreen, and never draw stations farther away than 30 km even if they are onscreen. I don't know how much impact this could have performance wise but in absence of other basic performance features like downscaling textures at distance, something like this could help.
- Are there code structuring issues or API calls that always add in a bit of processing time overhead? Streamlining code flow can make a huge difference in game performance. I have a graphics library with certain functions that I have found tank my games' performance if I'm calling them regularly, so I write my own code to do those things more efficiently or use other methods of achieving the desired outcome.
I've just noticed that ED has become a bit rough around the edges with some of the last updates. Issues with the interface not updating information, noticeably worse performance than I had years ago when I played regularly, etc.
I'd really like to see this title shine, and it can with just a little more effort, I believe.
But that aside, ED as a game seems to have terrible performance. I just wanted (as a published indie game programmer myself) some thoughts about some things that could really streamline the performance side of things if they haven't been implemented already.
- Are draw passes being performed for things that are not even visible on the screen? This is one of the first things I check in my own code but I know that many big game developers get sloppy with simple things like this and just assume everyone is running their game on a solid rig that can handle unnecessary work. For planetary approach especially (is the "dark side" of the planet that the player can't even see being rendered?) but also just for ships/planets/stations in general, if the player ship isn't pointed at it and it's not visible, draw code should be bypassed.
- Please give us options to turn off shadows entirely. At lower levels, shadows don't look great and from a performance perspective it would be nice to just be able to turn them completely off even for a tiny bit better performance.
- Does ED adjust model/texture detail based on view distance/distance from object? I have to wonder, because just being in an area with a starport tanks FPS sometimes even if I'm 20km away and the station is tiny on my screen.
- How optimized are ED's meshes? Resource optimization can make a huge difference in game performance for very little effort expended on the part of devs. It's amazing how many software developers just don't even bother with steps like this though.
- It would be nice to have an absolute draw cutoff feature in the graphics settings. For example, never draw ships that are farther away than 10km even if they are onscreen, and never draw stations farther away than 30 km even if they are onscreen. I don't know how much impact this could have performance wise but in absence of other basic performance features like downscaling textures at distance, something like this could help.
- Are there code structuring issues or API calls that always add in a bit of processing time overhead? Streamlining code flow can make a huge difference in game performance. I have a graphics library with certain functions that I have found tank my games' performance if I'm calling them regularly, so I write my own code to do those things more efficiently or use other methods of achieving the desired outcome.
I've just noticed that ED has become a bit rough around the edges with some of the last updates. Issues with the interface not updating information, noticeably worse performance than I had years ago when I played regularly, etc.
I'd really like to see this title shine, and it can with just a little more effort, I believe.
)...
