Framerate and Performance: Difference between revisions

1. If, in Single Player, you run into large lag spikes after some time playing you could be bottlenecked by lack of system memory (in extreme cases it can also crash with OutOfMemory exceptions, including graphics OutOfMemory issues). Vintage Story needs about 4GB-6GB of free RAM to run smoothly, plus approximately 2GB of headroom for your graphics drivers.  While the game is playable if you have 8 GB or less RAM, that may not be enough for totally smooth performance.  To help smoothness with low amounts of memory, in the game settings, try reducing view distance to 256 blocks, 192 blocks or even less and then you should be able to run the game on most systems with low RAM: it is also wise to close your web browser and all other running programs. If it's your own computer it is well worth considering purchasing more RAM, upgrading to 16GB or even 32GB or more. Buying more RAM can be a cost-effective upgrade in comparison to a new graphics card or CPU.  

Another option is to try playing the same game in multiplayer. You can run a dedicated server on another computer on your local network (copy the save file over to it, run VintagestoryServer.exe, and connect to it using its IP address) or you can rent an online server (for example, the VintageHosting service). A multiplayer game has reduced RAM usage and reduced % CPU usage on your gaming computer.  

4. The game supports 4k screens. Even so, the size of that screen places higher demands on the GPU and so framerates may be lower. On ultra-HD monitors, you can experiment with turning down the desktop resolution to a lower HD setting like 1920x1080. You can also keep an ultra-HD desktop resolution but use the in-game Graphics settings option for Resolution scaling, for example 50% or 75% resolution will still look good on a 4k screen, but with much less burden on the GPU - effectively it scales down the resolution of the scene for drawing purposes but then sharpens it to maintain a crisp appearance at 4k resolution.

5. Make sure your CPU is not overheating and therefore "thermally throttling". If you run Vintage Story with no VSync and unlimited frame rate, it will push one of your CPU cores to 100% permanently. That in turn will cause the CPU internal temperature to rise. You can monitor temperatures using a free 'Hardware Monitor' tool, or just listen to the fan noise ramping up! If the CPU internal temperature is approaching maximum allowed levels (90-100 °C on a modern CPU, that's hot enough to boil water) then the CPU should automatically switch to running slower than its maximum speed, this is "thermal throttling". This will slow down the game's performance. To prevent this thermal issue, use VSync or max frame rate limits to prevent your CPU cores reaching 100% usage - limiting the max frame rate to something sensible like 60fps or 72fps allows the system to rest for a short while between frames, and therefore reduces the chance of overheating. At unlimited frame rates GPUs can also overheat and thermally throttle, again the solution is a combination of proper cooling of the GPU, and not pushing graphics settings to their max limit.

6. If you experience lag spikes with no obvious cause in the game (you have a good GPU, reasonable graphics settings not too high, and plenty of RAM free) the cause could be [[Framerate_and_Performance#Causes outside Vintage Story|outside Vintage Story]]. For example, Discord seems to cause occasional lag spikes on some systems.