-
Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.
-
We have made minor adjustments to how the search bar works on ResetEra. You can read about the changes here.
Why do some 30 fps games feel smoother than others?
- Thread starter El Mariachi
- Start date
Its this + frame pacing
Its why stuff like BotW or FH3 feels better than bloodborne
As others have said, frame pacing is one of the big ones. 30 FPS is going to feel smoother if every frame ALWAYS persists onscreen for exactly 1/30th of a second.
Another big one is controls. You can poll inputs way faster than you're sending stuff to the screen, but not all games do. On the flip side, various problems can also introduce extra input lag regardless of your target framerate.
Another big one is controls. You can poll inputs way faster than you're sending stuff to the screen, but not all games do. On the flip side, various problems can also introduce extra input lag regardless of your target framerate.
Let's assume that you are comparing two games running at 30FPS with no dips, and one feels smooth while the other feels not-so-smooth.
Frame pacing is likely the largest reason. Frame pacing introduces microstutter which can be very annoying. This can be introduced by a not-so-good V-Sync solution. Frame pacing is an issue on both PC and Consoles, but on PC, you can try and fix the issue by tweaking V-Sync settings per game/setting a framerate cap in RTSS or simply using G-Sync/FreeSync.
After that, another common problem is shoddy implementation of input, leading to input lag or unresponsiveness. This could be an issue with the animations or simply just too much input lag between the controller and the movement which makes everything feel sluggish. You can try to fix this by changing TV settings to game mode to minimize input lag (by turning off all the post processing) or using a lower response time display like a monitor. However, these fixes are less likely to work if the problem is not with your setup but rather with the game itself. Also check whether the display is running at 30Hz or 60Hz - certain times, forcing the display to 30Hz leads to better results.
And third, minor issue is that the motion blur isn't as well implemented. Better the motion blur, the more fluid the image.
Frame pacing is likely the largest reason. Frame pacing introduces microstutter which can be very annoying. This can be introduced by a not-so-good V-Sync solution. Frame pacing is an issue on both PC and Consoles, but on PC, you can try and fix the issue by tweaking V-Sync settings per game/setting a framerate cap in RTSS or simply using G-Sync/FreeSync.
After that, another common problem is shoddy implementation of input, leading to input lag or unresponsiveness. This could be an issue with the animations or simply just too much input lag between the controller and the movement which makes everything feel sluggish. You can try to fix this by changing TV settings to game mode to minimize input lag (by turning off all the post processing) or using a lower response time display like a monitor. However, these fixes are less likely to work if the problem is not with your setup but rather with the game itself. Also check whether the display is running at 30Hz or 60Hz - certain times, forcing the display to 30Hz leads to better results.
And third, minor issue is that the motion blur isn't as well implemented. Better the motion blur, the more fluid the image.
The Witcher 3 is not really a locked 30 fps game on PS4, it may and does go into 20s quite often.
Menus that are tied to 30 fps (or lower) kills me. This is clearly how the menus in Gravity Rush 2 are made and navigating them feels extremely sluggish.
A good example to test this in is The Last of Us on PS4 where you can toggle the 30 fps lock in the menu. 60 fps is responive and great, while the 30 fps menus are slow and frustrating. Another one is Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker on PSP which famously runs at 22 fps, while all the menus (I think) are 60 fps which makes the micro managing of items and mother base a pleasant experience.
This is why I'm always screaming on the inside when I see people say that higher framerates doesn't matter in genres like turn based RPGs or strategy games.
I would think it's because a game can be animated with 30 fps in mind instead of just simply dropped from 60 (native target) to 30.
Yeah aforementioned frame pacing... exactly. Good frame pacing, and most importantly a stable framerate. I would MUCH rather a game that runs at a perfect 30fps than a 60fps game that constantly dips to 45-50 frames. Why even bother with trying to aim high if it isn't consistent.
I disagree about motion blur though, I personally think that with a steady framerate motion blur just muddies up a game.
I disagree about motion blur though, I personally think that with a steady framerate motion blur just muddies up a game.
It has to do with frame pacing.
If you have proper frame pacing and you're downgrading a game to 30fps you need to render each frame twice so you'd end up with something like this: 1 - 1 - 2 - 2 - 3 - 3 - 4 - 4 - 5 - 5
But if you have poor frame pacing some frames will render more times or less times than they should, making the animation seem jittery: 1 - 1 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 5 - 5
That's the main reason. Of course if you have inconsistent FPS any frame pacing issues you may have become significantly worse.
If you have proper frame pacing and you're downgrading a game to 30fps you need to render each frame twice so you'd end up with something like this: 1 - 1 - 2 - 2 - 3 - 3 - 4 - 4 - 5 - 5
But if you have poor frame pacing some frames will render more times or less times than they should, making the animation seem jittery: 1 - 1 - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 5 - 5
That's the main reason. Of course if you have inconsistent FPS any frame pacing issues you may have become significantly worse.
I mean, there's some added input lag between 30 and 60 but on PC when I play W3 it's really noticeable not like in any other game, feels really sluggish to move almost like it's not working properly to be honest, that's why I opt for 1440p/60FPS on W3 too.
Actually the frame pacing of The Witcher 3 on Pro is mostly great (except in the swamp obviously). IMO the main problem of The Witcher 3 (in your case) is the lack of motion blur and the laggy controls.
Only if you're using a fixed refresh-rate display.
A variable refresh rate display eliminates that need. Now it's generally better to render as many frames as you can, instead of limiting to 30.
G-Sync / FreeSync are game-changers, and hopefully 2019 will see 120Hz HDMI 2.1 VRR displays.
Samsung have announced that their 2018 TVs will support 60Hz VRR, and that should be supported by the Xbox One X.
It's difficult to imagine a game that feels worse to play than Breath of the Wild. The performance of that is so bad, whether you're playing it on Wii U or Switch.
Make sure that you have enabled half-refresh V-Sync in the NVIDIA Control Panel or Profile Inspector and disabled the in-game framerate limiter.
Framerate limiters do not ensure proper frame-pacing like half-refresh V-Sync does, and The Witcher 3's framerate limiter is particularly bad at introducing stutter.
I couldn't agree more. Everything feels better at higher framerates, even 2D menus.
Sorry if this is kind of an old hat but when people say "frame pacing", do they mean essentially a consistent frame rate? Like when you have a game target 30 fps, that it always maintains these 30 fps (if it has "good" frame pacing)? When I watched that youtube video comparison someone linked earlier, I got that impression at least.
It's more to do with the rate at which the GPU outputs the frame. For example, a game could keep a constant 30 or 60 or whatever fps but it will feel off when each frame is output at a inconsistent rate. If the game is outputting 30 fps with each frame at the same rate, it will feel smoother even though we're talking milliseconds here. It's more noticeable on lower frame rates like 30 as the time in between each frame is larger and so more noticeable if inconsistent.
It means all 30 frames are ideally equally distributed over that one second. So basically 33,33ms between each frame. If that's the case you have good frame pacing.
If it starts varying you have bad frame pacing but you could still have a steady 30fps. It simply wouldn't feel smooth.
I actually find bad framepacing at higher framerates (60fps) quite irritating as well if not more.
That's usually when I turn motion blur off because you don't need it anymore to cover up 30fps shittyness so it's kinda jarring to then have that smoothness messed up by microstutters.
Here are the 6 keys to achieving a smooth 30fps framerate
- Consistent, stable frame pacing
- High quality motion blur
- Minimal input latency
- Streaming data from SSD's instead of HDD's
- Sufficiently fluidity of physics and animations
- Capped/locked to 30fps instead of variable/unlocked
Fulfill these prerequisites and you'll have the pleasure of people arguing about how your game is actually 60fps, despite all evidence to the contrary.
- Consistent, stable frame pacing
- High quality motion blur
- Minimal input latency
- Streaming data from SSD's instead of HDD's
- Sufficiently fluidity of physics and animations
- Capped/locked to 30fps instead of variable/unlocked
Fulfill these prerequisites and you'll have the pleasure of people arguing about how your game is actually 60fps, despite all evidence to the contrary.
Yeah I guess higher framerates are more responsive to input and so you'd notice the bad framepacing more.
I turn off motion blur whenever I can. I don't mind per-object motion blur if implemented well like in the Metro Redux games but I just don't get camera blur as it's just disrupting your vision.
Use half-refresh v-sync if you want a properly frame-paced 30 FPS on PC with an NVIDIA GPU.
If you have an AMD GPU you are at the mercy of the game developer offering proper 30Hz v-sync, or you can try combining an RTSS framerate limit with v-sync.
You could also try setting your display to a 30Hz refresh rate if it supports that.