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Assassin's Creed Unity - PC Performance thread

Yeah. I hope if the added tessellation isn't everywhere (maybe only on cobblestones on ground and rooftops?) that it isn't going to rip performance too much.
Deep down I really hope it's gonna be something phenomenal that will bend every high-end pc to their knees. Would be so cool to see tessellation everywhere. Probably not gonna happen... Who knows :)

well heavy tessellation should bring heavy visual improvements. but thats never the case, its always just a bunch of shit tessellated with little to no visual improvement.

That is so true.
 
Yeah. I hope if the added tessellation isn't everywhere (maybe only on cobblestones on ground and rooftops?) that it isn't going to rip performance too much.
Deep down I really hope it's gonna be something phenomenal that will bend every high-end pc to their knees. Would be so cool to see tessellation everywhere. Probably not gonna happen... Who knows :)



That is so true.

we kind of got that with crysis 2(excluding the phenomenal part). tessellation for the sake of tessellation. ill never understand why some pc gamers want performance sapping tech at any cost, even if the visual return is close to nil(metro 2033 advanced DOF is another example). not directing this at you btw.
 
Kind of late now for a tessalation patch. I'd still like the LOD to be fixed or at least improved upon. Tess patch would make the rooftops even more jarring with the tess patch and the comedy LOD. Heavy disclaimer - Not say its only for rooftops btw.

Do you want some dog poo with your Neapolitan ice-cream? Yes please Mr Ubisoft
 

Kezen

Banned
Kind of late now for a tessalation patch. I'd still like the LOD to be fixed or at least improved upon. Tess patch would make the rooftops even more jarring with the tess patch and the comedy LOD. Heavy disclaimer - Not say its only for rooftops btw.

According to Nvidia tessellation will be used on many assets :
A post-release update will introduce gamers to our GeometryWorks DirectX 11 Advanced Tessellation technology, which enables developers to quickly and easily generate tessellation displacement maps from pre-existing assets, and to efficiently integrate tessellation rendering into their engines with minimal work. Furthermore, our tessellation tech comes pre-packaged with adaptive tessellation factor calculation and frustum culling, making widescale usage a reality in open-world games like Unity.

In Unity, GeometryWorks is being used to add tessellation to roof shingles, roof tiles, cobblestones, brick roads and paths, archways, statues, architecture, and much, much more. And because this tessellation is real geometric detail, as opposed to simulated detail from bump mapping or normal mapping, tessellated detail in Unity is accurately shadowed by NVIDIA HBAO+ and NVIDIA PCSS, significantly improving image quality.
 
we kind of got that with crysis 2(excluding the phenomenal part). tessellation for the sake of tessellation. ill never understand why some pc gamers want performance sapping tech at any cost, even if the visual return is close to nil(metro 2033 advanced DOF is another example). not directing this at you btw.

Yeah, I know what you mean. I'm more like one of the people who want performance crippling tech but only if it comes with a massive visual improvement.
For example, I'm one of those who would say "No thanks" if Unity would get a tessellation patch which would introduce an enormous performance impact with a pile of nonsense tessellated with very little or no visual improvement at all.
 

gragy10

Member
Anyone got a guide to locking at 30fps (a console-esque 30fps that is)?
Alternating between 50-60 and crowd dips to 30 are killing immersion for me..
 
Heh no. Nothing about LOD is improved.

Unfortunately no, but I seem to recall LOD transitions having been "stylized". Like, the game tries to make you believe that the pop-in is due to the animus.

That's cheap.

Thanks guys, but I was talking about the hair in the cutscenes. IIRC, they lowered the hair LOD in the cutscenes to gain performance in the 2nd patch and I'm wondering if they corrected that.
 

Dez

Member
Set a custom resolution that's set to 30Hz, apply it, then launch the game?

It's fairly simple if you have an nvidia card - set the game to use adaptive vsync at half refresh rate in the nvidia control panel. I run pretty much all AAA games, including ACU, at 30 fps with maxed settings with this setting, and it's pretty much the same as console (with no dips). Don't muck around with custom resolutions as some monitors don't do a good job with 30 hz inputs.
 

sgs2008

Member
I cnat even get a smooth 30 fps with txaa on and max settings with 780 ti sli 1440p. I think the best settings for me are max with fxaa which gives me almost always 60 with very drops to 45.
 
I cnat even get a smooth 30 fps with txaa on and max settings with 780 ti sli 1440p. I think the best settings for me are max with fxaa which gives me almost always 60 with very drops to 45.

I don't think TXAA is worth it. I play the with same settings as you on 1080p and get the same framerate (GTX 970 G1). FXAA is really good in this game and I think it's the best choice if you want good IQ and a solid framrate.

The only problem I have performance wise is the occasional freezing. It happens less the more I play (for some reason) and it's only for a few seconds but other than that the game performs very well on my setup.
 

sgs2008

Member
I don't think TXAA is worth it. I play the with same settings as you on 1080p and get the same framerate (GTX 970 G1). FXAA is really good in this game and I think it's the best choice if you want good IQ and a solid framrate.

The only problem I have performance wise is the occasional freezing. It happens less the more I play (for some reason) and it's only for a few seconds but other than that the game performs very well on my setup.



I guess so im just sensitive to jaggies and shimmer they are still there with txaa but way way less but not rly worth if it doesn't run smoothyl
 
I guess so im just sensitive to jaggies and shimmer they are still there with txaa but way way less but not rly worth if it doesn't run smoothyl

txaa is so worth it. the only shimmering is on some of the vegetation in certain lighting conditions because its insanely low res, other than that its like 99.9% shimmer free.
 

Ce-Lin

Member
It's fairly simple if you have an nvidia card - set the game to use adaptive vsync at half refresh rate in the nvidia control panel. I run pretty much all AAA games, including ACU, at 30 fps with maxed settings with this setting, and it's pretty much the same as console (with no dips). Don't muck around with custom resolutions as some monitors don't do a good job with 30 hz inputs.

the problem is the loading times' length, gets doubled / tripled when you enable adaptive vsync at half refresh rate, for games that stream content from the HDD it can even lead to glitches and stuttering.
 

Ce-Lin

Member
how is this game optimized for multicore CPUs ? does it run better than AC3-4 ? which CPU is better for this game a 4970K or a 5820K ? I remember old AC games relying heavily on a single thread.
 
TXAA is very blurry compared to FXAA in ACU. Somehow Ubisoft have done a good job with FXAA, I would normally switch it off. Also I go from 40fps at 2560x1440 everything ultra FXAA to 5-15fps with TXAA and the game locks up its so slow. Lowering settings would not be worth it and nor would 1080p with this blurry TXAA. I find it a non option in ACU

I don't know if icecold is talking in general and doesn't have the game on PC. TXAA is the better option usually but its messed up in ACU

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/112982

Maybe if you like extra blur of TXAA to reduce shimmer, try force standard FXAA in the drivers and disable ACU's superior FXAA or use DSR and turn the smoothness up or use and injector with settings going after AA as you said (sgs2008) you'd use TXAA if weren't for the performance cost. You can get that amount of AA and blur in an injector.
 
i have it on pc, and the only way to combat aliasing as well as txaa is to downsample from 4k which is a performance nightmare. no combination of injectors looks remotely as good as txaa.
 

sgs2008

Member
TXAA is very blurry compared to FXAA in ACU. Somehow Ubisoft have done a good job with FXAA, I would normally switch it off. Also I go from 40fps at 2560x1440 everything ultra FXAA to 5-15fps with TXAA and the game locks up its so slow. Lowering settings would not be worth it and nor would 1080p with this blurry TXAA. I find it a non option in ACU

I don't know if icecold is talking in general and doesn't have the game on PC. TXAA is the better option usually but its messed up in ACU

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/112982

Maybe if you like extra blur of TXAA to reduce shimmer, try force standard FXAA in the drivers and disable ACU's superior FXAA or use DSR and turn the smoothness up or use and injector with settings going after AA as you said (sgs2008) you'd use TXAA if weren't for the performance cost. You can get that amount of AA and blur in an injector.


Im actually using a sweetfx profile with smaa not seeing much of a difference with it on, I mean for aliasing
 
Nvidia experience recommended soft shadows and TXAA on my 970, so I went ahead with that. And it run over 30 fps which was fine. I hated TXAA though, everything was gone through a vaseline filter and no longer looked like 1080p. I tried to play it for several minutes, but just couldn't stand all that blurriness, and switched to fxaa.

If AA is gonna give me good IQ, but giving me that perception of lower resolution, then I'd rather have the lesse AA option. I just wish they implemented SMAA t2x or smtg like that...
 
As far as AC:U goes, I gave up on in-game AA & vsync long time ago. It's just broken. :/

Even with my rig:
Core i5-4670K
8GB RAM
Gigabyte G1 GTX 970
SSD
Win 8.1 x64

and gaming at 1080p (PC is connected to a TV), I still get crappy, all-over-the-place performance with dips below 30fps and freezes if I use TXAA or MFAA/MSAA.

Since the latest ForceWare update (347.25), performance is substantially improved in AC:U.

Here are the settings that I use:
Texture Quality: Ultra High
Environment Quality: Ultra High
Shadows: High
Bloom: ON
AO: HBAO+

I forced FXAA, vsync, triple buffer and 16x AF through Nvidia Inspector.

Game looks and plays wonderfully, sticking to 60fps most of the time, with rare dips to ~50-ish in crowded areas.

Considering the tech mess that this game is, I'm perfectly happy with what I'm getting now.
 

b0bbyJ03

Member
the problem is the loading times' length, gets doubled / tripled when you enable adaptive vsync at half refresh rate, for games that stream content from the HDD it can even lead to glitches and stuttering.

What? I've never heard of this. Does this happen with all games? if so do you know why?
 

Ce-Lin

Member
What? I've never heard of this. Does this happen with all games? if so do you know why?

yes, by using adaptive vsync (half refresh rate) loading times are almost doubled, it's a known fact since the feature was included in the drivers and you can easily test it yourself by forcing vsync off then playing a game such as borderlands 2 or skyrim, then turn on adaptive vsync on and watch those loading times turn crazy slow.
 
Anyone heard any news of patch 5 or tessellation patch?
I still have the problem that I can't play with friends who are at my house and are connected using the same router as I. We have tested using a 4G USB network stick connected to another broadband and it works. So, LAN doesn't work. I read this also happened with Watch Dogs but it was fixed in a later patch...
 

JaseC

gave away the keys to the kingdom.
Now that I've moved from two 2GB 670s to a 4GB 980 I can finally run the game just fine.

Anyone heard any news of patch 5 or tessellation patch?
I still have the problem that I can't play with friends who are at my house and are connected using the same router as I. We have tested using a 4G USB network stick connected to another broadband and it works. So, LAN doesn't work. I read this also happened with Watch Dogs but it was fixed in a later patch...

Patch 5 is still en route:

2 days ago
Changed Depots

* 289651/encryptedmanifests/tu5/encrypted_gid: BDCDD7…BFB113 › 5F8B91…64EF28
* 289652/encryptedmanifests/tu5/encrypted_gid: E93874…3705F5 › 660B8F…DE8759
* 289653/encryptedmanifests/tu5/encrypted_gid: DE142F…7BBB93 › 0B7F55…518B9C
* 289653/maxsize: 5511761756 (5.13 GB) › 5511762875 (5.13 GB) (diff = +1.09 KB)
* branches/tu5/buildid: 510600 › 513001

If it hits and there's still no tessellation I'd consider the feature quietly cancelled.
 

paolo11

Member
Now that I've moved from two 2GB 670s to a 4GB 980 I can finally run the game just fine.



Patch 5 is still en route:



If it hits and there's still no tessellation I'd consider the feature quietly cancelled.

Patch 5 is performance patch, no?
 

JaseC

gave away the keys to the kingdom.
Patch 5 is performance patch, no?

That was the last patch. Ubi hasn't announced the fifth yet despite its obvious existence. Interestingly enough, though, it has been in the works for a month now, which is the longest development period thus far.
 

Damian.

Banned
I'm guessing AndyB is too embarrassed to show up in here with the giant clusterfuck of the promised Nvidia tesselation feature? It's probably a good thing, the PhysX "patch" for ACIV literally broke the game and made it unplayable, I'm guessing this does exactly that.
 
I'm guessing AndyB is too embarrassed to show up in here with the giant clusterfuck of the promised Nvidia tesselation feature? It's probably a good thing, the PhysX "patch" for ACIV literally broke the game and made it unplayable, I'm guessing this does exactly that.

im sure its not anything nvidias doing to delay the patch. im sure they arent happy about ubis development either. they paid for advertisement and are just getting bad press instead.
 

b0uncyfr0

Member
Decided to give Unity another go on a 670, help me out Gaf:

Is the in-game FXAA recommended over SMAA? Is there a difference between the in-game FXAA and Nv FXAA forced through Inspector?
 
crossposting because i figure some people here might be interested

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2t0BsiVu0jpa3J3NnhnRVhIZEk/view?usp=sharing

video comparing fxaa/msaa/txaa in that order. some things to note :

-i used the highest shadowplay bitrate but its still not lossless, the video compression does hide some of the shimmering. fxaa/msaa benefit from this far more than txaa.
-shadowplay hits the framerate harder when using msaa/txaa
-this is not the best or worst case for general aliasing in unity. the worst case areas will naturally skew things much more in favor of txaa.
 

b0uncyfr0

Member
Anyone still getting that 4-10 second freeze? Im getting it still on 1.4. Cant be sure if its my overclock or the game doing it.
 

Damian.

Banned
I get several freezes in the first few minutes of a session. It freezes for 1-2 seconds when I first get spotted, first get in a fight and do my first counter. It's typical Ubisoft jank. Thankfully it doesn't do it again until I restart the game.
 
So my 970 is coming today. Any hope that this game would be playable if I were to get it for cheap?

I have the PS4 version and was so turned off by the performance and muddy visuals that I put it down and haven't played it. I hear this game looks incredible on PC, but if it still runs like crap forget it.
 
Anyone still getting that 4-10 second freeze? Im getting it still on 1.4. Cant be sure if its my overclock or the game doing it.
No freezes for me since I switched to Windows 8.1 & latest NVIDIA drivers (347.25).
Had them before constantly.

So my 970 is coming today. Any hope that this game would be playable if I were to get it for cheap?

I have the PS4 version and was so turned off by the performance and muddy visuals that I put it down and haven't played it. I hear this game looks incredible on PC, but if it still runs like crap forget it.
This should be helpful. You're fine with 970 (but with a few compromises).
 

Stahsky

A passionate embrace, a beautiful memory lingers.
Hey dudes. I haven't done my homework, but I just built a new PC and tossed this in.

5820k I7

970 4GB (Soon to be two)

16Gb ddr4


Not seeing very good performance overall (Dropping environment to medium doubles FPS) Is there some magic trick to it, or something else?
 
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