Widescreen Gaming Forum

Made an interesting discovery while modding. The SAGE engine ties the game speed directly to the framerate. The engine caps the framerate at 30fps, which is 'normal' speed. Take a look at what happens with the FPS uncapped:

http://generaladmission.home.comcast.net/files/RotWK_fastFPS.avi (Go, builder, go! :) )

Unfortunately I don't think there is any performance gain to be had by unlocking the framerate. I tested a complex battle scene and found that performance was the same capped or uncapped if the graphics demands forced fps below 30. And at higher FPS the game speed ramps up dramatically and unpredictably:

http://generaladmission.home.comcast.net/files/RotWK_PoorTroll.avi

I am very curious as to why they would tie game speed to the framerate. Surely the game speed could be independent of FPS, and it might yield decent performance gains during moderately complex scenes. Any designers in this forum with insight on this?

They probably figured that a drop in framerate meant that there was more on screen, and therefore more for the player to control, so they drop the speed to compensate for the increase in micromanagement.

Also, the settings I found didn't change anything about the interface. I found a forum that is mainly dedicated to C&C games which use the sage engine and posted the question to them in their BFME2 forum. I'm not holding my breath, though. The last post in that subforum before mine was in April.

I am very curious as to why they would tie game speed to the framerate.

I have absolutely no knowledge in game programming BUT maybe it's to ensure max smoothness of the models' animations during the most epic-scaled battles. Maybe all animations in BFME2 were designed at 30 fps to begin with, and tied to the framerate so that when the game slows down, the game doesn't get choppy and always feels smooth and "cinematic". Unfortunately this also means that anything higher than 30 fps will make it all go "Benny Hill fast"...

I sure didn't remember the framerate was capped, hopefully it won't be too much of an eyesore when scrolling the map left and right at 3840x1024 :?

Interesting ideas. You guys are thinking outside my 'box'. I know there must be one or more particular reasons for designing a game this way, but my lack of knowledge re:game design has me in the dark.

I've played Sage engine games since the first CnC: Generals. As best as I can tell, the games only lose FPS when the hardware demands become too great. I wouldn't worry too much about scrolling in TH resolutions, scavvenjahh. Your GTX card should do very well and you should only get slowdowns during major screen activity, or if there are so many units in play that the CPU becomes the bottleneck.

"Benny Hill fast" :lol:. Did you check out my fastFPS clip?

Mergatroid-
Thanks for investigating the HUD issue. If nothing pans out it's not a huge deal. The camera tweaks I've done for surround users actually make the game worth playing, with a fantastic horizontal FOV in particular. Without the tweaks, the game would apply such a cut to the Vert res that it would be like the camera is only 30' above the ground. Which reminds me, I need to get a screenshot of that so I have it for the before/after comparison.

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VirtualDub Game Recording Guide | BFME2 & RotWK Widescreen/Triplehead Mods

Here are the before/after shots for Triplehead resolution.

Regular (obviously unplayable for an RTS)


Modded camera


Better, no?

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VirtualDub Game Recording Guide | BFME2 & RotWK Widescreen/Triplehead Mods

WAAAAAAAAAAAY worse! The developer did not want it to be like this!

THINK OF THE DEVELOPERS VISION!

:lol:

THINK OF THE DEVELOPERS VISION!

Myopia FTW! :lol:

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VirtualDub Game Recording Guide | BFME2 & RotWK Widescreen/Triplehead Mods

Everybody knows that the developers vision isn't what the consumer actually wants anyway. They just learn to like what they are given.

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EVGA GeForce GTX 970 SC ACX 2.0 3.5GB | 3 X LG Flatron 24EA53VQ in Nvidia Surround | Optoma HD20

They just learn to like what they are given.

9 words that could be traced to the root of innumerable social, cultural, economic, political manipulations/atrocities throughout history. Hence, we are called "sheeple".

Well spoken, Mobster.

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VirtualDub Game Recording Guide | BFME2 & RotWK Widescreen/Triplehead Mods

Stumbled upon this accidentally. It looks as if my Triplehead camera tweaks will also work for 16:10 resolutions (and possibly 4:3) and allow play at a camera height of 900.

Check out the view distance!


Look at the mininmap...it shows that you can see nearly half of an 8-player map! The camera is still zoomable down to any level.

I would not consider this optimal for a single-screen setup, but for those of you hankering for a 'skycam' (one of you voted Higher! in the poll), this should float your boat. :wink:

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VirtualDub Game Recording Guide | BFME2 & RotWK Widescreen/Triplehead Mods

BFME2 is natively Vert-. Could this be used to make it Hor+?