Another day, another awful console to PC port release (The last of us: Part 1)

[hysel]

Summary

After 10 years, Sony and Naughty Dog, using the momentum of the HBO successful TV show,  launched the long awaited port of the game "The last of us: Part 1". The game, which is also was certified for the Steam Deck, is running poorly on high end machines including up to 30 minutes for the game to build its shader cache. 

 

Quotes

Quote

 "Released earlier today, The Last Of Us: Part 1's long-awaited PC port is being torn apart in Steam reviews. It currently sits at a "Mostly Negative" rating after nearly 3000 reviews, with players reporting regular crashes and plentiful performance issues.
 

"The single worst PC port I have ever seen," reads one review. "Waited 10 years for the game, avoiding any and all walkthrough videos, reviews, spoilers and etc. and this disgusting excuse of a port ruined every single ounce of excitement I had for the game."

"Crash counter: 12," reads another by a player with four and a half hours of playtime.

Several players in the Steam reviews and in the The Last Of Us Reddit community are reporting issues with shaders specifically, with the game taking a long time to build them at launch and crashing during the process.

The Last Of Us: Part One was delayed by a few weeks back in February, with Naughty Dog saying the extra time would allow them to make sure the "PC debut is in the best shape possible" and "lives up to your, and our, standards." Sony did not provide us with review code for the port in advance.

Sony have released several PC ports over the past two years, including Horizon: Zero Dawn, Days Gone, God Of War and Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered, with most of them launching in good condition.

The Last Of Us has a lot of new fans after the huge success of HBO's television adaptation. Season one just wrapped up and it's getting a second season."

 

 

My thoughts

 I work in the enterprise world, where software testing is paramount for a successful product release. Any feature limitation is communicated upfront. In this retail scenario, companies often outsource the development of these ports to an external company that may or may not invest in testing or is limited to an arbitrary release date. I don't believe that while certifying this game on the Steam Deck, the development team didn't encounter this long loading time and shader building being that slow. 

Another problem is that, based on the Steam return policy, you can get a full refund if you didn't play for 2 hours. The problem is that it takes almost 2 hours to get the game going…

Running (or at least trying) to run this game on the Steam Deck is a terrible experience, and one would expect that Naughty Dog, already successfully porting "Uncharted 4" to PC, including running smoothly on the Steam Deck, will release a game that will not have these types of problems. To their credit, in the two days the game was released, the development team released multiple patches to address this issue, but I feel it is already too late that people may not be buying this game. 

 

 

Sources

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/the-last-of-us-part-1s-pc-port-is-being-ripped-apart-by-steam-reviewers
https://www.theverge.com/2023/3/29/23661352/last-of-us-part-i-pc-launch-bugs-issues 

[hysel]

Update, after 40 minutes, my shader cache is at 30%  

 

 

[Alex Atkin UK]

I was absolutely shocked that this game took about 30 minutes to compile shaders on a 5950X and then the load time to get into game was insane.  Granted I only have it on a SATA SSD as I was short of space, but that's never been a problem with any other game.

There's also something very odd with the frame rate, I seem to be capping at 80fps at 4K on a 4090.  Now in itself is not a big deal, but its the way it changes from perfectly smooth to a stuttery mess at random, especially when panning the camera, yet the frame rate barely moves.  You'd think it would shoot up to 120fps in less taxing scenes, but something is bottlenecking this game badly causing poor frame pacing.

I've only played through Left Behind so far and had no crashes, but it definitely doesn't feel great.

[Spotty]

1 minute ago, hysel said:

Update, after 40 minutes, my shader cache is at 30%

From the comments that I had seen about how it plays on the Steam Deck you may as well request your refund now while you're still within the 2 hour refund window.

 

Refund the game. Buy it again in 6 months time when it's cheaper and not broken.

[DuckDodgers]

3 minutes ago, Alex Atkin UK said:

I was absolutely shocked that this game took about 30 minutes to compile shaders on a 5950X and then the load time to get into game was insane.

It took ~20 min on my old i7-6950X. Probably the quad channel memory boosted the proces, since it hammered all 20 threads to the brim.

[mariushm]

On my 5800x with RX570, it finished in around 1 and a half hours. 

Played it last night until meeting Ellie and stopped because it started crashing too much, like once every couple minutes. 

I manually updated the Oodle library to another version and that seemed to make the game crash less often, like once every 5-10 minutes.

 

Now I saw a patch 1.0.1.5 or something being released which claims to make game more stable, I'll check it in around 3-4 hours when I get home. 

 

I'm mainly disappointed that the game can't even play on the RX570 at 1080p low, it needs render resolution to be 1280x800 and then use FSR2 to bump it to my monitor's 1920x1200

it makes for weird image quality - the characters and things close look quite sharp and good but walls and signs can get a washed up look, and the hair has issues 

I posted about this here : 

 

ps ... wasn't surprised about this compiling shaders business, seen it before in Horizon Zero Dawn but it was much faster in that game.

[BetteBalterZen]

I was so close to preorder because of the TV series, was so hyped, but so glad now that I did not - even though refund is possible. 

It's kinda funny how earlier ports of well known PS games have been quite good and then when it's about PlayStations arguably biggest game ever, the port is absolute crap, like what the hell

[porina]

Waiting for the Digital Foundry video on it, not that I think there'll be any surprises but I like their format. They did comment that apparently many reviewers weren't seeded with keys before launch, so it sounds like publishers knew it was a stinker and went ahead with a launch anyway.

Looking at the date might show why. They probably wanted to record the release revenue in this quarter not delay it to the next. Short term "gain" for long term damage.

Skimming through Steam reviews, seeing complaints about shader compilation time. This is an interesting one, as it is there to eliminate shader stutter during gameplay. I wonder if they could do a more mixed approach between 100% pre-compiling before you start, and doing it on demand so you get constant stutters 1st playthrough. For example, Do a minimal pre-compile to get started, then dedicate a small portion of CPU to compile the rest in background, ordered in expected access turn so it is ready before it is needed, with minimal impact to gaming while it is still going on. This may be 1 core of a 6 core CPU, and 2+ cores on 8+ core CPUs for example. If you have a quad core you should expect pain regardless.

[hysel]

19 minutes ago, Spotty said:

From the comments that I had seen about how it plays on the Steam Deck you may as well request your refund now while you're still within the 2 hour refund window.

 

Refund the game. Buy it again in 6 months time when it's cheaper and not broken.

too late for me

[hysel]

Update, it took an hour for the shader to finish, just started game, looks really good on the Steam Deck. Hopefully, I will not experience crashes like other folks did. 

[mariushm]

 

8 minutes ago, porina said:

 I wonder if they could do a more mixed approach between 100% pre-compiling before you start, and doing it on demand so you get constant stutters 1st playthrough. For example, Do a minimal pre-compile to get started, then dedicate a small portion of CPU to compile the rest in background, ordered in expected access turn so it is ready before it is needed, with minimal impact to gaming while it is still going on. This may be 1 core of a 6 core CPU, and 2+ cores on 8+ core CPUs for example. If you have a quad core you should expect pain regardless.

The game literally paused on me for a few minutes (saying Please wait... ) a couple of times at 34% and 36% ... first time was while running with sarah in arms to get out of city right when the car hits the gas station and explodes, then before killing that guy and meeting Marlene 

I suspect they didn't prioritize much based on level/progression, because i was minutes in the game. I could play Horizon Zero Dawn just fine while it was still compiling, this one paused on me.

[Alex Atkin UK]

5 hours ago, porina said:

I wonder if they could do a more mixed approach between 100% pre-compiling before you start, and doing it on demand so you get constant stutters 1st playthrough. For example, Do a minimal pre-compile to get started, then dedicate a small portion of CPU to compile the rest in background, ordered in expected access turn so it is ready before it is needed, with minimal impact to gaming while it is still going on. This may be 1 core of a 6 core CPU, and 2+ cores on 8+ core CPUs for example. If you have a quad core you should expect pain regardless.

I don't really trust the developer to do the right thing, as I understand it they "fixed" that issue in Horizon by removing shader pre-compilation entirely.  Really dumb move as it wasn't even THAT slow, not like this.

 

5 hours ago, mariushm said:

On my 5800x with RX570, it finished in around 1 and a half hours.

Oh goodie, its compiling the shaders again but this time I get to watch what its doing.  Lo and behold, 99% of the time is spent on only a single CPU core, it only occasionally utilises them all - no wonder it takes so long.

 

To make matters worse its using just enough on the other cores to prevent that single core boosting to maximum.  I don't think having the intro screen fully 3D rendered is helping, its wasting CPU power and not to mention means I'm seeing 650W power consumption sat on the title screen.  It absolutely was a nice touch on the original game on console, where you're not going to sit on the title screen very long, but seems detrimental on PC.

Oh I may have miscalculated on my earlier post, seems it took more like 20 minutes but had it been using all CPU cores it surely would have been done in 5.

[nurax1337]

8 hours ago, hysel said:

Update, after 40 minutes, my shader cache is at 30%  

 

 

Have you been playing in the rain or is that a skin for the Steam Deck?

[hysel]

50 minutes ago, nurax1337 said:

Have you been playing in the rain or is that a skin for the Steam Deck?

That is DBrand skin lol

[Dracarris]

And I was already wondering why it is quite a lof cheaper than the RE4 remake okay, no buy until 60-80% steam discount as per usual.

[leadeater]

Turn down the quality settings, the game is a VRAM HOG! even at 1080p

 

[porina]

1 hour ago, leadeater said:

Turn down the quality settings, the game is a VRAM HOG! even at 1080p

RIP 8GB peeps. I would be included if I cared about this game, but this is another step on the 8GB isn't enough road. 

 

Did they dig any more into settings that affect VRAM usage? Or I guess I have to wait for Digital Foundry to do their analysis.

[decolon]

Between TLOFU and Hogwarts it looks like 8gb GPUs may be EoL. Both those games will run out of VRAM at 1080 ultra

[HarryNyquist]

It's worth noting that steam's 2 hour limit is not completely rigid. If you say "I was unable to play the game within 2 hours due to shader compilation taking 3 hours" you will almost assuredly get a refund.

 

I was able to do that with MS Flight Simulator when it took 6 hours to download the "asset packs" in-game and I wasn't able to actually play the next day.

[Holmes108]

12 minutes ago, decolon said:

Between TLOFU and Hogwarts it looks like 8gb GPUs may be EoL. Both those games will run out of VRAM at 1080 ultra

 

That VRAM chart above is definitely concerning, regarding this port (I haven't had a chance to try it yet, and not sure I should bother by the looks of it!). But Hogwarts at 1440p High runs quite perfectly on my 2070 Super, well over 10 hours in.

 

Is that VRAM usage in the image the VRAM 'required', or just what it may use up if available?

[WereCat]

34 minutes ago, HarryNyquist said:

It's worth noting that steam's 2 hour limit is not completely rigid. If you say "I was unable to play the game within 2 hours due to shader compilation taking 3 hours" you will almost assuredly get a refund.

 

I was able to do that with MS Flight Simulator when it took 6 hours to download the "asset packs" in-game and I wasn't able to actually play the next day.

While not really something you can rely on as much as a 2h limit.... I was able to refund a game with 16h of gameplay in the past. And few more games with over 2h gameplay as well.

But you must either have a good reason or sweet talk the support. Having the refund go to your Steam Wallet rather than back to your bank/credit probably helps as well.

[WereCat]

25 minutes ago, Holmes108 said:

 

That VRAM chart above is definitely concerning, regarding this port (I haven't had a chance to try it yet, and not sure I should bother by the looks of it!). But Hogwarts at 1440p High runs quite perfectly on my 2070 Super, well over 10 hours in.

 

Is that VRAM usage in the image the VRAM 'required', or just what it may use up if available?

You already hit a brick wall at 1080p if you set textures to Ultra with 8GB of VRAM.... On high it works fine though.

 

Look at the 1% lows with the 8GB cards, unplayable stutter mess. RTX 3060 with it's 12GB is beating 3070ti.

 

[leadeater]

56 minutes ago, porina said:

RIP 8GB peeps. I would be included if I cared about this game, but this is another step on the 8GB isn't enough road. 

 

Did they dig any more into settings that affect VRAM usage? Or I guess I have to wait for Digital Foundry to do their analysis.

Only the presets, no changing specific ones. Although the ones that have the most impact tend to always be the same anyway.

[porina]

24 minutes ago, Holmes108 said:

Is that VRAM usage in the image the VRAM 'required', or just what it may use up if available?

I was just thinking more about that too. I've no objection to increasing requirements for the higher end, but if 1080p medium "requires" 9.5GB I think that's a different problem. Looking at the charts it doesn't seem to have any problem running High or Medium at 1080p on 8GB cards so we're not necessarily there yet.

 

A quick trip to Steam Hardware Survey (Feb 2023) shows 28% have 8GB VRAM, and 17% have more than that.

 

2 minutes ago, leadeater said:

Only the presets, no changing specific ones. Although the ones the have the most impact tend to always be the same anyway.

Thanks. I'll await the Digital Foundry video then as they do usually go into better settings balancing performance and more.

[Kisai]

22 minutes ago, Holmes108 said:

 

That VRAM chart above is definitely concerning, regarding this port (I haven't had a chance to try it yet, and not sure I should bother by the looks of it!). But Hogwarts at 1440p High runs quite perfectly on my 2070 Super, well over 10 hours in.

 

Is that VRAM usage in the image the VRAM 'required', or just what it may use up if available?

 

Chances are it's the latter.

 

Like, not to sound like a broken record, but the refrain for "it doesn't run well on my PC" is always "it's not optimized" rather than "I'm trying to run it on a potato." Which tends to run closer to reality.

 

I'm interested in this game, but not in this state. Same with CP2077, I tried it at release, and was unplayable on a GTX 1080, so I was like, "nah, let it simmer", so two GPU's later...

 

I have an RTX 3090, and I quite honestly feel that more games seem to run no better than the 3070Ti.  Most games do not use more video memory because much OLDER games use "box" like loading areas, so you're not passing through massive worlds, you're really moving through what are a bunch of smaller rooms connected to each other, and you only notice the loading time if you aren't using a SSD at this point.

 

If you are using a mechanical drive, it's quite hilarious of the sudden change in loading time. Remember a SATA SSD is 5 times faster than the fastest mechanical drives, and a NVMe drive is 4-8x times faster than a SATA SSD. 

 

So when you play a game that is designed for a specific platform (Last of Us pt 1 was originally a PS3 game I believe) you can expect a somewhat impaired performance for the PC port. But this isn't a "remaster" it's actually a remake. So you can't even compare it to the previous game. And even if you could, most PS3 titles have to be remade for PS4/PS5/PC/Xbox1 anyway because the PS3 was hell to develop for.

 

The only way I can actually "max out" the RTX 3090 is by turning features I don't really care that much about, like the Raytracing or DLSS features, and even then, turning that stuff on, never improves the visual quality enough to justify it being turned on. If you can't run 4K native, you may as well not run it at 4K at all.

 

Which leads me back to the "it's not optimized" whargarble. Sure, maybe it isn't, we haven't seen a PC game from naughty dog, since 1989, for DOS. But building games for the PS4/PS5 is on Windows development hardware, so you can't exactly go "oh, but they have no windows developers." 

 

At any rate, this is a bit different from other developers (Square-Enix/Platinum games, and SEGA) where they have their own Windows-exclusive bug history. This I feel is Naughty dog over-estimating the hardware specs of Windows users by a significant margin. Like if that chart above is true in all situations, then a RTX 3080 is the minimum requirements.