Any multi-threading mods?

[xSOSxHawkens]

Hi all,

I have a 12c/24t CPU (3900x), but regularly find the game lag into the 30s and ocasionally 20's for FPS, and while doing so it always occurs with lowered GPU usage. It seems pretty obvious that I am hitting the CPU limit, probably on raw draw calls as I play at 4K and it often occurs when zooming in near the city.

I know multi-threading mods are rare for any game, but I also know that CSKL has a pretty large and dedicated modding comunity.

From personal testing it seems that the game can make reasonable use of 6 cores, and seems to thread out to 12 cores at most (from what can be seen in noticable loads) but when using anywhere near that there is never any high loading on more than a core or two (likely the render thread and maybe ai).

I have been thinking of trying out a low level wraper that will run it closer to metal via Vulkan but before trying such extreme measures I figured I would just ask if there are any known mods that help the game make better use of modern hardware...

Are there?

[snowflitzer]

hardly as it is not the mods but the utility engine they developer used!

[lost]

You can't make a game more multithreaded than the core game implementation already is. There is no possible way for a mod to do what you're asking. It requires rewriting the game implementation and/or engine.

You also cannot force a program to "run closer to the hardware". That requires literally rewriting the game engine in this case. Anything that purports to do so without rewriting the game itself (or possibly doing Bad Things with the OS level stuff) is snake oil and should be avoided.

[snowflitzer]

no, my friend! The hardware is always more advanced than the software as technology advances happen faster than the software coding process.

As this game relies on the unity engine it is not possible with a mod to change this!

[CyberVibes]

The games not designed to run at 4k which is where your issues start arising, but getting 20-30 fps is normal on most high end systems when pushing the resolution. You should try setting the games resolution to something less than 4k then use the dynamic resolution mod to reach 4k in game to see if that helps with fps.

[MarkJohnson]

Originally posted by xSOSxHawkens:

Hi all,

I have a 12c/24t CPU (3900x), but regularly find the game lag into the 30s and ocasionally 20's for FPS, and while doing so it always occurs with lowered GPU usage. It seems pretty obvious that I am hitting the CPU limit, probably on raw draw calls as I play at 4K and it often occurs when zooming in near the city.

I know multi-threading mods are rare for any game, but I also know that CSKL has a pretty large and dedicated modding comunity.

From personal testing it seems that the game can make reasonable use of 6 cores, and seems to thread out to 12 cores at most (from what can be seen in noticable loads) but when using anywhere near that there is never any high loading on more than a core or two (likely the render thread and maybe ai).

I have been thinking of trying out a low level wraper that will run it closer to metal via Vulkan but before trying such extreme measures I figured I would just ask if there are any known mods that help the game make better use of modern hardware...

Are there?

You system is already overkill for this game, there is no way to get a game to use more cores, it is within the core of the game.

But you are spot on, I have an 8-core/8-thread CPU and it is at it's limit. The game can only use 4-core/8-thread CPUs. Any more is just freeing up overhead.

I don't know of any game using more than 8-cores yet as they are too new and usually take 5+ years to catch up to game software.

The wrapper won't help as Vulkan isn't implemented into the game. The game needs rewritten pretty much, from the ground up to support more cores.

Sadly, you're stuck at around 30 FPS for this game, and lower if you use mods.

4k shouldn't be an issue. I still maintain my usually 30 fps zoomed in on a busy intersection on my 8-core 9700k, Vega 64 graphics (roughly GTX 1080). I get the same performance on my 1440p monitor as well. I also avoid workshop like the plague. So if you use workshop, be prepared for worse.

Considering this is a ant farm kind of game that doesn't need FPS, low FPS should be fine. I know a lot of users that play on less than 10 FPS. It's not like you're dodging or avoiding other players/NPCs.

[xSOSxHawkens]

Thanks all, I knew it was a long shot but figured I would ask...

Originally posted by lost:

You can't make a game more multithreaded than the core game implementation already is. There is no possible way for a mod to do what you're asking. It requires rewriting the game implementation and/or engine.

You also cannot force a program to "run closer to the hardware". That requires literally rewriting the game engine in this case. Anything that purports to do so without rewriting the game itself (or possibly doing Bad Things with the OS level stuff) is snake oil and should be avoided.

Not entirely true. Though *super* rare there have been mods to enable multi threading on certain games in the past.

Moreover about the Closer to the metal part, you absolutely can! Check over here in the Computers and Hardware forrums on steam about the current project to run DirectX through a native Vulkan replacemtn layer. Its an opensource cross platform project mainly targetted at linux, but is operable in windows.

https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/11/2149848024140726141/

I personally know one of the posters, with a meidocre system, who was able to achive nearly twice the frame rate, with better CPU and GPU utilisation and scaling in Borderlands 2 by pushing it through vukan instead of its originally intended DirectX via this exact tool in windows...

I hadnt planned to try the tool on my main rig, but given what I am getting in CSL, and guessing its down to object draw calls, I might give it a shot, if I do I will update both here and in hardware and OS thread!

[MarkJohnson]

It sounds like you may be construing adding multi-threading to increasing multi-threads/ Adding multi threading only frees up resources and gives a single threaded app better performance from giving itself a full unshared core to itself. Similar to setting process infinity, which wouldn't require extra resources of running another app.

The thread seem to show all Vulkan was doing was setting to DX9 mode, so you could just launch your games in DX9 modes on windows in the first place and gotten likely same, if not better performance.

But those kinds of apps are typically just snake oil.

[xSOSxHawkens]

Originally posted by MarkJohnson:

It sounds like you may be construing adding multi-threading to increasing multi-threads/ Adding multi threading only frees up resources and gives a single threaded app better performance from giving itself a full unshared core to itself. Similar to setting process infinity, which wouldn't require extra resources of running another app.

The thread seem to show all Vulkan was doing was setting to DX9 mode, so you could just launch your games in DX9 modes on windows in the first place and gotten likely same, if not better performance.

But those kinds of apps are typically just snake oil.

I dont think you looked into the app much. Or perhaps didnt get what its doing?...

I can tell you outright as a *long* time poster to those forrums (and a fellow IT professional) that a number of the people in that thread (though def not all of them) are quite knolwdgable on it and on computers in general...

Its doing far more than running DX9...

As for multi-threading, no, thats not at all what I was thinking it would do.

I am pretty sure from the way it bogs down this is entirely a draw calls limitation, as I dont think its Ai or game engine (but I could be wrong).

If its draw calls then I (might) luck out from the wraper... Kinda bored now, might try it...

[MarkJohnson]

There is already a mini-fps mod that is out that helps a little. But there are some working on a full version. I'm just not sure it will work in this type of game. It is very heavy CPU bound from the heavy AI calculations. I hope they do, and this game will run in DX9 mode, so hopefully they can take advantage of it, but they've been at it a long time. Not sure if you need to install the new extended DX9 or not.