I got the latest WHQL drivers from Nvidia yeah, don't use V-sync or anything and running the game in DX11 fullscreen. My card does have a slight factory OC afaik. Thing is, most of the time its just fine but sometimes, especially after a few rounds the fps in the menus just tanks. I might open a few boxes and go back into a match and my fps is totally fine in the actual game.
I noticed that under DX11 that Star Wars: Battlefront II has two higher Shadow settings beyond Ultra that are not available under DX12, these being PCSS and HTFS. I guess the addition of those is further reason not to bother with DX12 at all on NVIDIA graphics card, not least because, on my system anyway, it is absolutely impossible to get a smooth running game under DX12. It continues to judder and jerk and stutter and be all-round unpleasant to play on the exact same settings which the game runs perfectly fine on under DX11. In fact, even with HTFS shadows the game runs significantly better under DX11 than it does on Ultra shadows under DX12. DX12 is just a mess on my system for this game. What puzzles me though is that I've seen DX12 vs. DX11 comparisons and the game seems to run OK under both, albeit DX11 usually has the higher framerate. Since I do not have another PC to test the game on I am still none the wiser as to whether there is something else on my machine that prevents DX12 running as it should be. The stuttering/hitching in SWB2 under DX12 is kind of like what happens when memory fills up and data is being cached to the hard drive. However, VRAM usage is under 6 GB (out of 11 GB) in both DX11 and DX12 so it's not that plus the game runs perfectly fine under DX11 with virtually no stutter at all (perhaps a little right at the start when data is still being loaded) despite running off a SATA3 hard drive. I know I keep going on about it but I can't help thinking that the kind of performance I am experiencing under DX11 in this game is not what everyone else is getting...
Aren't the campaign cutscenes just pre-rendered full motion videos (FMV) rather than rendered real-time using the in-game engine? I've not played a lot of the campaign myself but of the ones I have seen the cutscenes seem to play OK.
Well I can definitely say that everything runs smoothly on Ultra with DX11, but so does DX12 with just a little bit of stuttering here and there that doesn't seem to happen with DX11. But it's really nothing to affect gameplay much. I'll stick to DX11 for a few days and replay some of the campaign missions (I have to anyway to get some of the collectibles I missed, s'not that I care much about them per se but it gives me a chance to play the campaign again which overall I actually enjoyed). Overall, I'd say that mostly (though, not only) the campaign intros to some of the missions were "hit" by running with DX12. But as I mentioned when the intro of the bigger maps play in multiplayer I do also get some stuttering there. But once the intro is done and the camera pans to the whole team and goes in first-person view and the match begins, then at that point everything is very smooth. The thing is that, of course, we ourselves don't know which system combinations DICE tested DX12 with internally. Did they try every single modern Intel and AMD CPUs? Did they optimize their current DX12 implementation with only a few select combinations of very specific Motherboards and Graphics Cards? They're not telling us so we're in the blind. I do have the feeling that some people just coincidentally happen to have near-identical, or simply identical system component combos that DICE tested it under and that's probably why it's "better" for those combinations than the rest. It's just my guess though. In any case, ultimately, there's indeed no "essential" reasons to use DX12. Especially considering that DX12 does not provide better visuals and is only there in the best scenario to simply provide a bit more performance. If it was well-implemented for everyone (probably never going to happen, for everyone and all combinations I mean) then sure, going with DX12 on Ultra might have been the better option but indeed for now DX11 is recommended and I myself see of course no issues with DX11 while everything is maxed. I haven't tried those two extra Shadow quality settings, however. I'll try them later since I'm curious if it improves the visuals to any noticeable extent or if it's mostly just extra settings to improve performance from using high quality shadows. Oh and, about the campaign map intros / cutscenes. I don't know if they are actually pre-rendered, that's a good question. They are obviously 'scripted' but pre-rendered or not now that's a good one, can't tell. The thing is - at least visually - I don't see a single difference when it 'leaves' a cutscene and goes to the gameplay. It's not like... let's say... Mortal Kombat 9 or MKX-level of "You're now in a pre-rendered cutscene" transition. It happens too smoothly in terms of transition in BF2 (outside of the occasional stuttering under DX12) that even if they are pre-rendered it feels and looks like it was only scripted and running 'live'. But on a technical level I do suppose that they were pre-rendered. It's just not obvious enough, so I'm not 100% sure about it. But under DX12 that's indeed where most of the stuttering happens.
PCSS and HFTS should be DX12 compatible, guessing the game doesn't contain the required Nvidia Gameworks SDK files for that though similar to The Division and having the shadow library .dll's only for the DX11 API though I don't know if that was ever resolved. (I do remember the ambient occlusion related .dll getting a D3D12 version at least.) PCSS is a bit blurrier and can have a shorter distance but it's a very natural representation of real shadows though at a hefty performance hit on all but the highest-end GPU models, HFTS is a bit more demanding still but not that much higher than PCSS while offering a superior shadow resolution and some other improvements on I think it's Maxwell architecture GPU's and newer? (PCSS works on AMD too in most games, HFTS requires CUDA compatibility and does not though the framerate hit is very noticeable.)
Yea I tried PCSS for 1 round and felt a slight performance hit for very little noticeable IQ returns so I'll just stick to the ultra setting. On the bug front of things, I occasionally get this annoying black screen crash where I might quit a round at the end of it and the main menu doesn't load up and the game gets stuck on a loading loop. Just happened to me after a few really good rounds and I lost my progress towards my challenges. Not a major issue as such but still a bit annoying. After 20 hours of playing I can say that I'm definately more than happy with my purchase thus far. I really like this game and don't get all the negativity towards it, I can understand some of the initial issues people had like Luke and Darth costing an arm and a leg but the whole loot box thing for example is almost a non-issue seeing a lot of the star cards tend to be just minor enhancements from what I've seen rather than some instant "I-WIN" bonuses. I'd argue that good map knowledge and situational awareness is still king. But hey, its early days and maybe some OP card combos might surface.
I know this won't matter for a lot of people. That regardless of what DICE tries to do it won't matter. But in my eyes, it's stuff like that especially knowing that it will be free that makes me happy that "more stuff" is coming and it's not just a bunch of useless weapons and character skins. https://www.ea.com/games/starwars/battlefront/battlefront-2/news/the-last-jedi-season-is-coming They're even going to expend on the campaign. For free. At this point, if anyone complains about that then I don't know what to say. Nothing will ever make the die hard haters happy. And Battlefront 3 won't do a thing to them anyway. But for me, I'm happy to see that they'll work on it and not just the multiplayer either. I think that a lot of things went so deep down the barrel that now it can only get better. I HOPE, for that to happen.
HFTS is really a nice improvement over PCSS. I loved it The Division. My understanding is that PCSS and HFTS (which is really a combination of hybrid raytraced shadows and PCSS) are parts of Nvidia GameWorks which is available only in DX11. These were not available in DX12 in The Division, either. :-( That being said, how’s the game? I understand that EA turned off microtransaction in this game for the time being. Loot crates thing aside, is this a fun game in both singleplayer and multiplayer?
Wait for it to come down in price, also, wait and see what EA do with the gambling aspect of the game after Christmas.
As I've mentioned in earlier posts, I really like the game! Always loved ( almost ) all things Star Wars and I've been a fan of Battlefield games since 1942. Ever since Battlefield 2 and the original Battlefront I've dreamed about Dice re-doing Battlefront as I was quite disapointed in the original Battlefront series even though it had its moments. Then Dice's Battlefront finally dropped and I tried the beta but the lack of content on release ( and content that was scheduled for dlc ) and the whole "pick up system" in game put me off and I also had a lot of other games to play at the time so I just never sort of got it even after all the price drops and sales. I'm so glad I picked up SWBF2 since this time theres plenty of content to keep you busy. Lots of MP maps across 5 modes and more on the way for free. Visually the game is almost without faults and the audio is just out of this world. Gameplay is fast and frantic with a bit on the arcadey side where aiming down the sight and crouching for less recoil isn't necessary. Some who are used to a somewhat more simulation style gameplay might find this a bit off putting but it definately works for me, especially after coming from Battlefield 1 where the guns felt really random and inconsistant to me. The single player campaign is a fun little distraction too, on Sunday I thought I'd give it a quick go and 3 hours later I was still playing it but this game is definately aimed for the multiplayer market. I could go on about the good stuff but I should probably list a few of the things that I'm not so keen on to keep this fair. Bearing in mind most of these are niggling issues and not major turn offs for me. The map list has a few duds like one of the Kashyyk maps where the first stage feels like you're battling a pair of bullet sponge tanks and not many players as the action is really spread out but this could also be due to my inexperience. I love the starfighter assault mode but due to me suffering from motion sickness I can't play it too much nor can I use much of the flying vehicles in the game as they can make my head spin. Not the games fault I know. I wish the game had squad leaders like in Battlefields with a quick menu to hand out orders like attack this or defend that. The game does hand out extra battlepoints for sticking together with your squad though and battlepoints mean you get to lay your hands on tanks and heroes quicker during the game. Some maps feel like the balance is a bit off either in favor of the attacker or the defender but this can easily be fixed or adjusted as more time goes on and we start seeing balancing patches once dice has more data. In fairness I've had rounds where my teams attacks have been hitting a brick wall and the game felt really in favor of the defenders but the next time with my team on attack on the same map, has managed to stomp the enemy team so it could just be a case of people getting used to the maps as its still early days. Some heroes can at times feel unstoppable but this can be countered with heroes in your team or through clever play so again just a case of practice and learning. A "medic" class would have been welcome since I always liked playing medics in Battlefields but the respawn times are short and the spawns drop you near the action so not a major issue for me. The time it takes to kill in this game is pretty quick and this has its good and bad sides. The good thing is that you can rack up some sweet kills but the bad thing is that during your first games you can end up spending a lot of time looking at the respawn screen as you're still getting used to things like I did when I first started. Now I'm starting to hit the top 5 of my team pretty consistantly so I guess its just down to getting used to the pace of the game and the maps. F***ing snipers... Lewt Boxes!... love or hate them they are there. I don't mind them myself, its nice to have a bit of extra to unlock and weapons and weapon attachements are still unlocked through gameplay so you only unlock the star cards through the boxes. I can see it being frustrating to someone who is looking to upgrade certain cards to the best quality but really... as an example a single upgrade to a card might only provide an extra .5 meters ( could be extra 1 meter, can't remember now ) to your granades blast radius or something similar which frankly I don't see all that game changing and more of an enhancement really as I said in one of my above posts. I've seen people complain about getting killed by people with all epic star cards who may or may not have bought them with real money when that was still an option but to that I'd say you could just as easily get killed by a guy with not a single star card equipped. Think theres videos on youtube with people kicking plenty of ass with no star cards equipped at all. Anyways, thats some of my random ramblings, hope it helps you decide wether or not to buy the game, your call. I know what I''ll be doing when I finish work tonight which is sit the missus infront of the TV to watch her period dramas or some crap while I shout "Roger Roger!" and blast some evil clone troops.
I just had a match on a NIGHT time version of Kashyyyk. It was STUNNING to see explosions and lasers lighting up the surroundings and created a whole new atmosphere and tension for not being able to see everything too well in the dark (well except for the Specialist class, mostly). However, I really wasn't aware that night time versions of maps existed to begin with. Is it just for Kashyyyk? Does anyone know if there's day / night time variants of maps like that for Hoth or Naboo and others? And, on a side note, is there a way to toggle Sprint? (for Keyboard key bindings) I know we can toggle Crouch, but there's no mention for Sprint. EDIT: Amazing, just had a match on a dusk (or dawn maybe) Hoth, it was glorious. We don't see that in my movie and it adds a new visual touch to that setting (same for night time Kashyyyk, that one was a visual spectacle of lights in the dark).
From what I've seen every outdoor map seems to have day/night mode and I believe some even have like dusk/dawn effects.
Thanks for that DeeGee. That story needs to make it to as many screens as possible because when EA attempts to reintroduce the 'loot crate' horsesh!t (and I am sure they will), the backlash needs to be as bad, if not worse, than it was the first time. What EA did to that dev is nothing short of disgusting. We as a community need to send a clear message to EA (and others like them) that we will not be purchasing their games or indeed supporting them in any way if they continue to behave in this manner.
Endor at night is pretty spectacular too, especially if you're defending and the attackers make it to the last part of the map where you see this towering AT-AT emerge from the forest with its searchlights on.
Finally got myself a 144Hz g-sync monitor and HOLY crap did it make a difference in starfighter assault. It's literally a game-changer, that mode is waaay too fast paced for just 60FPS. Of course, the other gamemodes benefit too, but this one I found to be striking. Basically went from the last 2-3 places to first 1-3 from upgrading my monitor. I didn't even mess with controls too much, just lowered the starfighter sensitivity (have advanced flight on so no auto-horizon positioning and use roll a lot too and hold for missles). Anyway, say all you want, but as a Star Wars nerd I find the space-battles in SWBF2 to be like one of my childhood dreams fulfilled. I hope they will keep supporting this mode and maybe even add to it.
