Planetside 2 Dev Confirms PS4 CPU Is A Bottleneck

[BiG StroOnZ]

The developers have now confirmed- that the PS4 is proving to be harder to work with, mostly because the CPU, which is fairly weak, is a bottleneck.

 

“Our real bottlenecks are on the CPU side. From a graphical fidelity perspective, people will be impressed with what they see on the PS4. That’s always one of those things people are skeptical about. I see every time we post an article like this I always get called out: ‘haha, it’s bullshit he’s saying it’s going to look as good.’ It really does,” said creative director of Planetside 2, Matt Higby in an interview with Eurogamer.

 

Again, the graphical fidelity is every bit as high. The slowdowns we have are on the CPU side more than the GPU side. It’s because we’re tracking and updating so many different players moving on your screen and moving around at once. All that animation and all the audio that’s associated with all those characters running around, all of their projectiles being simulated in their client, all those things end up hitting the CPU, not the GPU.

 

“So, generally when our frame-rates are low, it’s a CPU problem, not a GPU problem. And that’s where we’re optimzing right now, to get our CPU running faster so the game is running at a more consistent frame-rate on the PS4,” he concluded.

 

“Right now we’re running for 1080p. We’re still trying to shoot for 60fps. We’re trying to get a solid frame-rate. So if we go to 30 it’ll be because we want to maintain a completely solid 30fps. But that’s the optimisation we’re working on right now. And we’re still grinding on it,” he said.

 

 

Source: http://gamingbolt.com/planetside-2-dev-confirms-ps4-cpu-is-a-bottleneck

 

That would really suck for a game like this to have to settle on a locked 30fps framerate. It's funny to see devs starting to admit the problems these new consoles have though. If they are running into problems like this now, because of hardware limitations, what's going to happen a few years from now?

[Nineshadow]

Planetside 2 still has problems on i7-s so yeah...obviously.

[NeatSquidYT]

I just want it out.

[Kevinkt]

ugh. bottleneck. it's can run the game. just not very well.

[Rheinwasser]

what a surprise.

next-gen consoles don't have next-gen hardware? noooooooooooo.

[Lotus]

PS2 has always been a CPU intensive game. Also the framerate thing is understandable due to the way televisions work at basically a fixed 60hz refresh rate. At least they aren't lying and packaging it as "because it's more cinematic." They admit it's because the hardware isn't up to snuff, though honestly I'd prefer 60 fps and less graphical fidelity but its their call.

[Lepp]

Planetside 2 gets bottlenecked by my CPU in larger fights (haven't tried it again since I overclocked it though), so I have no idea how they're going to get it working for the PS4 in the 200+ battles, other than dropping framerate.

 

Definitely nice to see some admission of issues and good to hear they are at least trying to make an acceptably fast game.

[Dietrichw]

meh, devs are still adjusting to the new hardware. Once they get more experience with this hardware they should be able to plan around the CPU. 

[SkilledRebuilds]

Wouldn't both consoles have the same issue?, it's not like the XB1 has such a great CPU advantage over the PS4's, regardless of that tiny firmware OC they did to the XB1..

[AHaskin14]

The sad part is that its Sony's own game.

[qwertywarrior]

planetside's 2 engine is horribly unoptimized to begin with

[landon418]

Yea their game is very CPU intensive.  My 4770K clocked at 4.6GHz struggles at enormous zerg rushes.  Drops to 30ish fps

[Guest]

If they do manage to optimize the game for the CPUs in the consoles, then maybe... just maybe us pc master race players might get an optimization update which greatly reduces the cpu bottleneck. I'm running this game on an i7 3770k and the cpu is always a bottleneck.

[bcredeur97]

planetside 2 has ALWAYS had problems with CPU's.

 

they really need to give up the engine in planetside 2 and make a planetside 3 or something with a completely new engine, as planetside 2's is terribly performing.

 

 

which also brings the question -- people still play planetside 2??

[-TesseracT-]

They better start optimising the games for many cores.

[StingBull]

Whenever a developer comes out saying a certain feature of the consoles is a bottleneck, it just shows their inexperience.

[AlexGoesHigh]

no shit its hard, when i played it, i got perfect 60+ fps on the home base, go to any place with 20 + people around and the game tanks to 30, go to the mega battles, its a miracle if i'm above 20, i have middle end hardware but ps2 is a hard game to run

[DaRk0]

meh, devs are still adjusting to the new hardware. Once they get more experience with this hardware they should be able to plan around the CPU.

I wouldn't call it new, since it's x86 hardware.

[-TesseracT-]

meh, devs are still adjusting to the new hardware. Once they get more experience with this hardware they should be able to plan around the CPU. 

This is true, they do need to start using more cores.

[-TesseracT-]

Double post sorry

[Humbug]

In this case since even on pc at 1200p on a 4770K this thing is CPU limited. Not just a ps4 issue...

 

[GM_Peka]

PS2 has always been a CPU intensive game. Also the framerate thing is understandable due to the way televisions work at basically a fixed 60hz refresh rate. At least they aren't lying and packaging it as "because it's more cinematic." They admit it's because the hardware isn't up to snuff, though honestly I'd prefer 60 fps and less graphical fidelity but its their call.

Well the thing is with CPU bottlenecks, you can reduce graphical fidelity, and the frame rate will not change much, I think that's how it is anyway.

 

Edit: Although, I guess worse shading/shadows and less shrubbery will reduce CPU load.

[rashdanml]

It's an MMOFPS. All MMOs, including RPGs, suffer from CPU bottlenecks in environments with large number of players active. 

[topsu]

Planetside 2 still has problems on i7-s so yeah...obviously.

 

My fps is always +60 with my i5 though.

[SkilledRebuilds]

It's an MMOFPS. All MMOs, including RPGs, suffer from CPU bottlenecks in environments with large number of players active. 

With this FULLY in MIND.

Would then a better API be of more use in such a situation...?

The Equivalent to DX12/Mantle for less burden on the CPU-time needed.

Few months worth of coding to get results, less than 12 months to port code into a better API.