Here's a Little Explanation for All the Optimization Threads

[Cetarii]

Let me explain this for you guys. The game's engine, or Cobra, cannot be optimized any further, because the reason why you get lower framerates is because of the management inside the game. By management I mean the AI engine and the Physics engine. Want proof? Take a look at Elite Dangerous, a game which I run on Ultra and get very rare dips lower than 60.

Now, because of the game's AI and the Physics inside the game, it causes a lot of stress on the CPU since it has to calculate so much code, and there is even more besides the Physics and the AI. This gives the impression that the game is a "CPU-Bound" game and relies on the CPU you have. If you take a system with the same exact parts, except for one having an i3-8350k and an i7-8700k, you will see that the game runs better, and smoother. Now of course you'll have higher FPS with a 8 core, 16 thread CPU rather than a 4 core, 4 thread CPU, since the CPU has more headroom. But, because the CPU has more cores and threads, the game has more headroom to make more calculations, resulting in a smoother experience. Now you could say a higher clock speed would help, but it'd really only help with the framerate rather than the smoothness.

Take a look at Cities Skylines. Now yes, that game isn't really optimized well, as the game doesn't really take advantage of the extra CPU cores or threads in a system as it should. But disregarding it, it doesn't matter if you have a GTX 1070 or a RX 570, the game will always lag when you have a large city. Like I said, it is because of the AI and Physics inside. Although it's more o' less the AI system that causes the framerate drops. It is the same here, although the engine is quite a bit more optimized and can manage the CPU well unlike Cities Skylines.

Do other parts affect the game's performance? Yes and no. RAM can and will help the smoothness of the game, but not nearly as much as a CPU will. I personally run with 8 Gigs of RAM, and I tend to have no issues, but I'd recommend getting 16 to make the game a little smoother. Solid State Drives or SSDs do sort of affect the performance. They will improve loading time, but since the map is not very large and doesn't really require a lot of textures to load, it doesn't really affect much at all, although it may help with some lag spikes. RGB lights though do increase your FPS by hundreds and I recommend buying them. (Lol, I am just joking, it won't do anything but spicen your set up). Graphic Cards or GPUs will help with your FPS, but you will still get FPS drops with larger parks. It may seem that I don't take in to account GPUs, but they do affect your FPS, and upgrading will make your FPS higher, although you WILL still get lower frames with large parks.

For now, there is nothing much Frontier can really do to improve the optimization, unless they take out feature, which we don't want them to do. As much as I hate people saying "Oh you want better performance, get a better PC bud.", I have to say that the only real thing to do is either get a new computer with better hardware, or upgrade your system to get better performance. I myself as a budget gamer do like 60 FPS for most games, but for this game, the FPS to me is fine. Even if you turn down the settings, the game still looks real good. You might not, but after a while, I get used to the lower frames per second, especially when I am entranced with building.

[Harbinger]

It's not really an engine limitation, more a graphics API limitation. DirectX 11 only allows a single CPU core to be used for passing information between the CPU and the GPU. It's a bottleneck that means the GPU cannot be fully utilised so the CPU has to work harder. It's something that can't be resolved until such times that Frontier are able to upgrade to a newer graphics API like DirectX 12 (which isn't good for anyone < Windows 10) or something more universal like Vulkan.

[Befitzero]

Originally posted by Harbinger:

It's not really an engine limitation, more a graphics API limitation. DirectX 11 only allows a single CPU core to be used for passing information between the CPU and the GPU. It's a bottleneck that means the GPU cannot be fully utilised so the CPU has to work harder. It's something that can't be resolved until such times that Frontier are able to upgrade to a newer graphics API like DirectX 12 (which isn't good for anyone < Windows 10) or something more universal like Vulkan.

I wonder how much work would it be for them to change over to the Vulkan API? Granted Vulkan has its share of problems also which tend to crop up on lower spec systems, but it would be nice if they gave us the option like a few other games I own do.

[Cetarii]

Well, it is partially true that it that API is part of the problem. From experience with other games, it seems like most games run on DirectX 11 today, since DirectX 12 is not really that much supported at the moment.

Looking at games that run on DirectX 11, such as GTA V or DiRT Rally, which are extremely well optimized games don't suffer from the same problem. Now I'm not saying that the game could not benefit from DirectX 12 or the vulkan API, I'm just saying that as far as experience DirectX 11 doesn't seem to be the problem.

[Jacknm2]

Originally posted by Viruses Loading™:

Well, it is partially true that it that API is part of the problem. From experience with other games, it seems like most games run on DirectX 11 today, since DirectX 12 is not really that much supported at the moment.

Looking at games that run on DirectX 11, such as GTA V or DiRT Rally, which are extremely well optimized games don't suffer from the same problem. Now I'm not saying that the game could not benefit from DirectX 12 or the vulkan API, I'm just saying that as far as experience DirectX 11 doesn't seem to be the problem.

Those games are not running calculations for thousands of AI accross the map as well as the physics for those guest AI and the rides them selves. This is where the bottle neck occurs which is the common census. DX11 is indeed causing the bottle neck, GTAV only simulates the AI in a certain radius around the active players and the AI isnt as advanced its usually "if this happens do this if not continue path" with a few other predictable variables. Dirt Rally only has thw phyics to push and virtually no AI.

The AI in Planet coaster is vastly different, making choices of rides, drinks and food etc, which path to take or which rides are favoured and this isnt programmed is more randomised and generated as you play.

Even with only 4 Cores and 8 Threads....most of my CPU goes under utilised due to the fact the games engine is able to access all of that potential resource, i know tthis because ive been monitoring it.

DX12 is immature and so is vulkan and they are not the be all end all of solutions but they may help in pushing some of those calculations to and from the CPU / GPU more easily as well as being able to access more cores and threads that are available.

On a side note, I've been thinking if adding Nvidia PhysX would help the game, that way people could use a dedicated PhysX card (cheaper Nvidia GPU in SLI) and that might releive some of the stress of the CPU...Was just a bi-thought in passing whilst at work lol.

[VisciousFishes]

Originally posted by Jacknm2:

Those games are not running calculations for thousands of AI accross the map as well as the physics for those guest AI and the rides them selves. This is where the bottle neck occurs which is the common census. DX11 is indeed causing the bottle neck, GTAV only simulates the AI in a certain radius around the active players and the AI isnt as advanced its usually "if this happens do this if not continue path" with a few other predictable variables. Dirt Rally only has thw phyics to push and virtually no AI.

The AI in Planet coaster is vastly different, making choices of rides, drinks and food etc, which path to take or which rides are favoured and this isnt programmed is more randomised and generated as you play.

Even with only 4 Cores and 8 Threads....most of my CPU goes under utilised due to the fact the games engine is able to access all of that potential resource, i know tthis because ive been monitoring it.

DX12 is immature and so is vulkan and they are not the be all end all of solutions but they may help in pushing some of those calculations to and from the CPU more easily as well as being able to access more cores and threads that are available.

On a side note, I've been thinking if adding Nvidia PhysX would help the game, that way people use a dedicated PhysX card and that might releive some of the stress of the CPU...Was just a bi-thought in passing whilst at work lol.

Durectx 12 has had poor acceptance due to the platforms that support it. Windows 8.1 and Windows Ten are the only operating systems on a PC Windows environment and, the Xbox One naturally. There is still a large user base that are running Windows 7 (for their own reasons) and while Windows 7 technically supports DX11 it is only feature set DX11.1. However more recent editions of windows, as I have previously mentioned, can support DX12 and ALL revisions (E.G. DX 11.2) of the DX 11 API more efficiently.

Adding PhysX to the game will cause performance hits, especially for AMD users. I think it would be a waste too as I don't see many features that would really make use of PhysX apart from water splashes and the entire F.x scenery. So, I believe PhysX will only benefit a percentage of the crowd while hindering all those who don't run Nvidia Hardware. (Just my tuppence hal'-penny)

Edit:- October's Steam Hardware and software usage

http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/

As you can see, the most popular O/S is Windows 7 X64 at 63.22% of Steam users. If I were looking at that, I would be reticent about adding DX12 support.

[Jacknm2]

^^ Of course, I understand why people didnt upgrade or move to Win 10 and I've seen the Hwsurvey myself and took part in it.

I'm only speculating, I clearly remeber one of the Dev's saying they had no plans to add DX12 support at this time and that was a while ago now and i dont think that ahs changed.

A lot of people have kept to windows 7 due to the lack of legacy support on windows 10, which is why I've still got a second machine still on Win 7 Ultimate So i can play those games that will not play on Win 10. Not to mention the other "reasons" lol....

The PhysX Thing was just a thought and yes it is a Selfish thing for Nvidia users, i wasnt suggesting to impliment it it was just a thought whilst i was doing busywork.

I honestly Dont think DX12 will do all the things people expect it to dut at some point people are going to move away from Win 7 and DX11. So we need to start pushing that envelope in my opinion.

Any way im gnna gett off this topic from now on and leave the future threads that will no doubt pop up lol. The devs have said them selves in terms of the engine/game there isnt much more they can do to optimise, they are limited by the API and hardware we have to day and they still have to consider low end users who think their PC is the balls but it reality its.... lol But I dont have an issue with that.

Any theres enough to read here for a while, Enjoy guys.

[Admiral Obvious]

I wouldn't at all be opposed to adding optional PhysX support. I know of multiple other games which have an optional setting for wether or not you want to use PhysX (most notably Borderlands, and other games which worked with Nvidia, like the recent Shadow of War). That might mean some sort of deal with Nvidia though, since I notice that you always get the Nvidia Ad banner when you launch most of these games.

[Keemallhippies]

so what is an ideal setup to play without limitations? I start gettin worse fps when theres a lot of scenery around my rides

[Cetarii]

Originally posted by jakethebusker:

Durectx 12 has had poor acceptance due to the platforms that support it. Windows 8.1 and Windows Ten are the only operating systems on a PC Windows environment and, the Xbox One naturally. There is still a large user base that are running Windows 7 (for their own reasons) and while Windows 7 technically supports DX11 it is only feature set DX11.1. However more recent editions of windows, as I have previously mentioned, can support DX12 and ALL revisions (E.G. DX 11.2) of the DX 11 API more efficiently.

Adding PhysX to the game will cause performance hits, especially for AMD users. I think it would be a waste too as I don't see many features that would really make use of PhysX apart from water splashes and the entire F.x scenery. So, I believe PhysX will only benefit a percentage of the crowd while hindering all those who don't run Nvidia Hardware. (Just my tuppence hal'-penny)

Edit:- October's Steam Hardware and software usage

http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey/

As you can see, the most popular O/S is Windows 7 X64 at 63.22% of Steam users. If I were looking at that, I would be reticent about adding DX12 support.

Actually the hardware survey is incorrect. The Windows 7 upsurge is wrong because of the influx of chinese players with PUBG. The actual percentage of people playing on Windows 10 is around 50 percent of steam users, while Wndows 7 is around 37-38 percent.

[vackillers]

Originally posted by Retorrent:

Originally posted by Harbinger:

It's not really an engine limitation, more a graphics API limitation. DirectX 11 only allows a single CPU core to be used for passing information between the CPU and the GPU. It's a bottleneck that means the GPU cannot be fully utilised so the CPU has to work harder. It's something that can't be resolved until such times that Frontier are able to upgrade to a newer graphics API like DirectX 12 (which isn't good for anyone < Windows 10) or something more universal like Vulkan.

I wonder how much work would it be for them to change over to the Vulkan API? Granted Vulkan has its share of problems also which tend to crop up on lower spec systems, but it would be nice if they gave us the option like a few other games I own do.

Frontier are moving to include DX12 and or Vulkan, but not, I repeat NOT for planet coaster because this would mean a rewrite for a lot of the core game engines code. This was talked about extensively over on the official forums as the game was nearly end of beta and after launch and this was confirmed. Frontier devs spoke pretty technically about what was needed to implement the other APIs which they were currently implementing into whatever the newer version of the "Cobra" engine is for "other" games they have not discussed yet and were not really allowed to talk too much about "other" API's at the time

But sadly this leaves their most CPU intensive game on their roster (Planet Coaster) in the dust when it comes to implementing Vulkan or DX12 which I still feel to this day one of the most bizzarre design descisions to game that is so heavily reliant on CPU to leave out considering vulkan and dx12 had been around for good long while before this game entered development. As I said this was confirmed on their official frontier forums.

[Harbinger]

If they were looking to implement a new graphics API to their engine it makes sense that they'd do so in a new game first so as not to start from a conflicted position. All we can do is speculate but it's entirely possible they're already working on this with their new Jurassic World game due for release next year.

That shouldn't mean that Planet Coaster would be left in the dust indefinitely, just that they'd need to have all the workarounds in place before they could even consider going back to update their pre-exiting games using DX11 to have conditionals for an either DX11 / or [Other API] proposal.

[joridiculous]

Originally posted by KillallHippies:

so what is an ideal setup to play without limitations? I start gettin worse fps when theres a lot of scenery around my rides

Simple. Get a better CPU.

[vackillers]

Originally posted by joridiculous:

Originally posted by KillallHippies:

so what is an ideal setup to play without limitations? I start gettin worse fps when theres a lot of scenery around my rides

Simple. Get a better CPU.

oh look another "get a better PC lemming" (i mean troll)

no, you just need to set the guest limit to what your PC limitation is. If you don't have the best CPU (even an 8-core 16-thread CPU can Struggle) with this game, you just need to set a guest limit to like 2500-4000. There is absolutely no need to have 10,000 guests or more in your park... This will improve performance EMENSELY!!!

You don't need to a new CPU, as even the newer CPUs hit the engines "hard limitation"... a new CPU ain't gonna do anything if you push it to the max anyway... people are stupid who suggest this...

If you have a lot of objects in your park, this is what hits the GPU the most, guests and audio hit the CPU. So if you are over cluttering your park with a ridiculous amount of objects and getting massive slow downs, cut down on the amount of stuff is in your park....

[Ed the Head]

Direct X 12 support will get added eventually. It's just a waiting game. Never say never. ;) This is a game that will get better over time, we just have to be patient. In a few years, it will probably have support for it. It's in their best interest to support it some day, they'll make more money by doing so.

[Keemallhippies]

Originally posted by =VAC=Killers:

Originally posted by joridiculous:

Simple. Get a better CPU.

oh look another "get a better PC lemming" (i mean troll)

no, you just need to set the guest limit to what your PC limitation is. If you don't have the best CPU (even an 8-core 16-thread CPU can Struggle) with this game, you just need to set a guest limit to like 2500-4000. There is absolutely no need to have 10,000 guests or more in your park... This will improve performance EMENSELY!!!

You don't need to a new CPU, as even the newer CPUs hit the engines "hard limitation"... a new CPU ain't gonna do anything if you push it to the max anyway... people are stupid who suggest this...

If you have a lot of objects in your park, this is what hits the GPU the most, guests and audio hit the CPU. So if you are over cluttering your park with a ridiculous amount of objects and getting massive slow downs, cut down on the amount of stuff is in your park....

thanks a lot. ive noticed that number of scenery mostly screwwed my fps. im too lazy to insert 34349239 scenery pieces, but whenever i added some workshop made ride filled with them its was instafpsdrop for me. will try to limit guests and see what happens