170 hours and the end of the line

[The_42nd_Element]

Sadly, after 170 hours of having fun, my game is finally broken beyond repair.

Every 5 minutes it just freezes. I cannot provide crashlogs as they are not being created during the freeze.
I will wait for the next patch and if that does not fix it, I will reluctantly move on and do other things.

It is a shame that a game with this much potential has this many issues. I really enjoyed the good parts.

So long, and thanks for all the fish!

[Tuqiri]

Might be best if you included a save file so the devs can have something to look at.

[CBJ]

Yes, a savegame would greatly increase the chances of us being able to do something about it.

[The_42nd_Element]

Here you go: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1GzCj2 ... dzRCNEXf-S

I have started a new game and can play with no problems. Therefore I am confident it's the save file.

Good luck!

[Scoob]

I'll give your save a try too, if that's ok, and see how it runs on my old system.

Edit: I just loaded your save, went external view of your ship so the station and planet were in view. I've then left it to run for about ten minutes and it's running flawlessly. A solid 60fps at my settings.

Going into your map view is pretty horrible, it drops to 14fps, but un-checking "Show orders" sees this go back up to 54-56 fps as I watch. So, generally speaking, this game looks to be running pretty well for me.

Let's compare system specs, mine is:

2600k @ 4.6ghz
32gb DDR3 1600
GTX 1070 @ 2ghz
2x SATA SSD's in RAID0
Windows 10 Pro

Edit 2: I've left your your save running for quite some time now, no freezes, not glitches, it's running remarkably well, considering how busy your game is. You have far more assets than me, but then my current game isn't a day long yet.

Scoob.

[Kadatherion]

Going into your map view is pretty horrible, it drops to 14fps, but un-checking "Show orders" sees this go back up to 54-56 fps as I watch. So, generally speaking, this game looks to be running pretty well for me.

Scoob, seems the universe has put you here to be my life saver (hopefully ). Completely missed that show orders check. I will try that as soon as I'm back home from work, because another one of my SEVERE issues with the map interface indeed is when I queue orders to my ships. Just 5 or 6 traders with 4-5 manually given orders can tank my fps from 40s (full map explored, a satellite in each sector etc) to 10-12.

[Scoob]

Scoob, seems the universe has put you here to be my life saver (hopefully ). Completely missed that show orders check. I will try that as soon as I'm back home from work, because another one of my SEVERE issues with the map interface indeed is when I queue orders to my ships. Just 5 or 6 traders with 4-5 manually given orders can tank my fps from 40s (full map explored, a satellite in each sector etc) to 10-12.

Hope it helps! It certainly makes a huge difference in @The_42nd_Element's game, but his universe is very busy. My own, not so much, though I do notice it when I issue orders to my squads, but it "only" dips to about 30dps, which is ok for a map view...just about.

Edit: his game is still running flawlessly btw, I've just left it running while I get on with other stuff...typing this on a different PC.

Edit 2: It's been running about an hour now, no issues what so ever. If you can get your system specs up @The_42nd_Element, perhaps we can see if there's an issue there.

From my observations of the game while running:

It's quite heavy on one Core, but that's X4 for you. For me, that busiest core is peaking at about 80% load for my 2600k @4.6ghz -at a lower clock, say the default 3.4ghz, it'd almost certainly be seeing CPU-related FPS drop. The RAM footprint is interesting, it was showing around 4gb Working Set, with about 6gb Private Bytes. However, it does appear to have done some memory management at Working Set is now 1.7gb with Private Bytes just over 7gb. Note: the two numbers are basically Working Set = current used RAM, Private Bytes = Working Set plus any cached data that's not been freed up. My numbers for that are high, as I have lots of RAM.

My GPU, at my settings, isn't being particularly taxed. It's not ramping up to its full OC, and it loaded at about 70% with Station and Planet in view (F2 view)

Scoob.

[lordpazuzu]

I tested this savegame in my workstation, and is working fine, yeah if you have all the filters for the map active it gets a bit of slowdown, even on my savegame (60 hours) this is happening, one way to have better performance is to just left the filters that you are really using, other way its a heavy draw for any system.

I have some panning constraints in the map and in the station build 3d view, even on a start game, the problem is that if you tilt your camera almost perpendicular to the ecliptic plane the panning works perfect, but as soon as you begin to tilt your camera in a more glazing angle relative to the ecliptic plane your panning gets constraint to just one axis, please it will be nice if someone else confirm this, this is happening on the map and in the station construction 3d view. I have also observed some draw glitches when you use the scroll bars in a map list.

My specs:

i7 5960x
64 GB Ram
1TB SSD
12TB HDD
Nvidia 1080ti x 2
Windows 10 pro v1803

[stefanEgo]

Sadly, after 170 hours of having fun, my game is finally broken beyond repair.

Every 5 minutes it just freezes. I cannot provide crashlogs as they are not being created during the freeze.
I will wait for the next patch and if that does not fix it, I will reluctantly move on and do other things.

It is a shame that a game with this much potential has this many issues. I really enjoyed the good parts.

So long, and thanks for all the fish!

Sorry to hear that you are running into the freeze issue. We'd be rather interested to get to know the culprit of the problem. Could you contact us at crash@egosoft.com for further instructions which might help us to understand what's going on on your machine?

[The_42nd_Element]

Let's compare system specs, mine is:

2600k @ 4.6ghz
32gb DDR3 1600
GTX 1070 @ 2ghz
2x SATA SSD's in RAID0
Windows 10 Pro

Hey Scoob,

I'm running a

4670 @ 4.2ghz
32g DDR 3 1600
GTX 1060
Windows 10 Pro
3 screen setup

I have NOT found the 'show orders' filter yet, but I will try to find it.

I have been unhappy with my fps the entire time. In map view it is only about 7-10, whereas on a station it was only 16-20fps (newest drivers and everything).
I am running a three screen setup and watch twitch while playing - but that has never been a problem in other games.

The weird part is that it really crashes a few minutes after loading it. Or rather freezes. Even ALT-4 takes up to 5 minutes to close the program.
I have been playing a new game for 4 hours now - no problems. Well, actually, that game is borked too now as ships wont produce (but that's another story).

@egosoft: I sent you an email

Thanks for all your testing and help,

Michael

P.S.: Filter found, didn't change fps much - but it did change, from 7-10fps to 16fps and station/spaceship from 16 to 24 fps- found some interesting 'orders' concerning destroyers and their 40 minions.
I'll see whether it crashes now or not.

If anyone has an idea about the FPS, I'd be interested to hear it.

[Scoob]

Hmm, that's odd. Your spec's aren't too dissimilar to mine. I have a 400mhz clock speed advantage vs. your PC, but your CPU is of a newer generation so is likely slightly better, despite the lower clock. You also have 32gb, same as me, so more than enough. Your 1060 is a bit weaker than my 1070, plus it's running three screens, which is doubtless a bit more taxing than my 1920x1200. Is your 1060 a 3gb or 6gb card? At just 1920x1200 I typically see around 2.5 - 3gb of video ram used, with triple screens you'd be going a fair bit higher I'd expect.

Have you tried just popping your settings to minimum and/or perhaps running on just one screen? This might help identify where your bottleneck might be.

I'm surprised "Show Filters" being off didn't help. Just to check, you un-checked the option in Filter Settings > Other Filters (4th tab) > Ship Properties: Show orders, right? That gave a huge boost for me in the map screen with your save.

Scoob.

[The_42nd_Element]

Hey Scoob,

"Show Orders" off did help the fps, just not dramatically.

More importantly, though, I have been playing now for 1 hour without crashes. I'd say the problem is fixed

ALSO: The interaction with the map is so fast now! I used to have to click 3-5 times before anything happened and now it's just one click and it's good.
You have no idea how great this is - feels like a brand new game!
I think the 'show order' option needs some optimizing (best optimization is to just remove it )

Thank you so much for your help!

The 1060 is only a 3GB one, but has no problems with fps in other games.
So I am not sure as to what the cause of the problem is here. But if a 'show orders' filter can effectively double my fps, I'd say it's possible that the cause is in the code

Once again, thanks everybody for your help!

I'm still committed to test and help make this awesome game better. It's frustrating on many levels, but also rewarding on others.

Best regards,
Michael

[Kadatherion]

I'd say it's a mix of a few concurrent issues, then. The map interface is seriously badly optimized, with things such as the show order filter or certain tabs being open bottlenecking the cpu a lot. Keep in mind that if you keep twitch open on another screen, that's going to be a non completely irrelevant load to the cpu as well, and the cpu spikes the map causes are EXTREME, they are in no way normal and, as such, comparable to any other (stable) game. Couple that with the fact you are running at the bare minimum video ram: I have MUCH better framerates than you in stations/actual game environments (where the CPU isn't much taxed and the GPU is what matters) just with the same 1060 but with 6 GB (and a much worse CPU). This even though, even at 1440p, it usually stays below 3gb of use.

My idea: when the CPU bottlenecks because of the messy map ui, it stops feeding your GPU (that's what happened to me when I got to the point of no return and I veryfied it), which can downthrottle and go to even 0% usage. At the same time, though, behind the map screen, there still is that 3d environment running, your GPU is just enough to handle it already in normal conditions and BAM: you crash. Basically, what helps you preventing (or at least mitigating) your CPU bottleneck on the map, helps the GPU not shutting down and still be able to render everything. If so, there's not much you can do with the map (until Ego manages to optimize it) except disabling filters like Scoob mentioned, but you can lower your texture settings so that your GPU uses less video ram and as such is probably less likely to bring you to the point of crashing when the CPU struggles at communicating with it. You probably shouldn't have to in normal conditions, but at least that's something you can control right now.

[Dakota-]

I'm not familiar with your (or any) three-monitor setup. I am assuming it's not just stretching 1920 pixels across 3 monitors and you are running that resolution or higher on all three of them. Just a suggestion: try running it with one monitor and see what happens.