FPS weapon lag switch problems

[Squal_FFVIII]

This is one of those "mystery" type issues. Lately I been seeing a lot of players complaining here in the forums and also have in game friends who suffer from this so I decided to actually make a topic sharing my experiences with this unknown issue.

It' an issue that some players have and some don't. Some players with toaster PC's run the game butter smooth on low settings with no weapon switch lag during lobby or TA's.

However there are those playing with awesome gaming rigs core i 7's and GTX 670s and better, that have these fps drops on maxed or low settings! It's pretty retarded.

There's also another very controversial thing. That thing is called "the good client" pro "l33t" TAer's claim that if you relaunch the game an X amount of times you will eventually get the "good client" which in return will give better overall game performance meaning no weapon fps drop and faster load times.

Now, I can speak on behalf of all these claims since i've experienced every single one of them.

Let's start. Back when the game first came out I was playing it on a 2006 intel core 2 duo dell PC with 2 gigs of ram (ya I know pretty shit) and a 8800GT. On low med settings I would get a constant 60 fps while doing quests but in the lobby with people walking around and such I would get random fps drops/stutters but it wasn't that bad.

On this machine the weapon lag switch was kinda random sometimes I would get it sometimes not, even if a player was using a nikishi.

Around feb of 2013 I bought a new graphics card for my pc hoping I would boost pso2's performance I ended up getting a GTX670 however this was a mistake because my 2006 PC was just overall too weak to fully take advantage of the card. Regardless I didn't have money for a brand new core i7 build. So I went with it.

The outcome? terrible. I was able to play the game on maxed settings, at 60 fps (not at all times) but I suffered greatly from weapon lag switch. Any weapon in the game would make me lag it was horrible. The lobby was a stutter fest for me and so were TA's. Also, I had stutters on everything. For example if an npc talked during a quest I would get the "weapon lag" type problem.

Now came 2014 Finally I had some money to burn since I was doing good :) I decided to build myself a nice core i 7 4770K machine FINALLY! My budget was 1000 dollars so I knew I could build something nice specially since I already owned a good graphics card (gtx 670). I ended up with a 4770K Oced to 4.4ghz 16 gigs of ram and my GTX670. It also had a samsung evo ssd.

So of course happy with my new rig I decided to play my favorite game PSO2! The outcome? Great, but I would still get lobby stutters but nowhere near as bad as on my 2006 pc but it wasn't the smooth experience that I wanted in the lobby. Now what about the weapon lag switch you ask? Well it was completely gone! During TA's I was always the first one to load and I had zero fps drops during weapon switching even if I was using a nikishi! I had a consistent 60 fps during pse bursts and overall butter smooth gameplay during TA's and normal quests. The only place that I had fps drops/stutter was in the lobby. Regardless I was still very happy since my performance was WAY better than it had ever been. This was all on 1080p and fully maxed settings and also using Nvidia inspector to add better Anti Aliasing to the game.


Now one day just out of the blue my performance tanked hard! On this same machine that ran the game great (aside from the lobby) all of a sudden I logged in to huge fps drops during weapon switching and horrible load times. I went from being the first to load to being the last! and again every weapon caused fps drops for me it was insane >.<

I couldn't believe that my i7 4770K was now also chocking with this game when just the day before it was running it perfectly!(back in 2014)

At this point I was pulling my hair out thinking "Wtf happened? Why is my game running like shit again for no reason? Even on such a nice machine :(" I couldn't find any solutions until one day one of these "l33t" TAers told me about the "Good Client" so I asked him to explain it in detail to me. He said that the game generates a "performance client" if you will everytime you log in to the game. So naturally I asked him how to obtain it. He said that you get it by restarting the game over and over until you get it and that it would be noticeable because the loading would be faster than the normal "choppy" loading.

At first I was like "There's no way this can be true...I bet this guy is trolling me..." But I was desperate to get that awesome performance I once had so i gaved it a shot. I had nothing to lose. So here I was like a retard logging in and logging out trying to find this "good client" i tried for like an hour and nothing, then on one of those retries I was finally able to obtain the "good client" no lie! The game loaded fast! It wasn't choppy or stuttery and I had no weapon lag switch once again! I was like "Holy fucking shit! Are you fucking serious?!" Please excuse the language I just want to give you guys a real experience here.

I went into a TA run to test my new found performance and sure enough I was back! Ultra fast loading and no weapon lag switch even with maxed out graphics and Anti aliasing using Nvidia inspector. At this point i'm thinking to myself "Omg..the dude wasn't lying to me, he wasn't trolling, he was telling the truth. There IS a hidden "good performance client".

However as awesome as this was as soon as I logged out back into my desktop the "good client" was gone and I had to "hunt" for it again. Now one thing I noticed about this "good client" I noticed that restarting my PC made a big deal with hunting down the "good client" because everytime I restarted the "good client" would come quicker.

Once I had the "good client" I would just afk and not log out to be able to keep the "good client" and not have to hunt it down again.

Now after the whole ddos attacks happened and the servers came back I was one of the lucky people who had TWC and I was able to log in and guess what? I was back to getting the "good client" everytime! No matter if I logged out or anything. Everytime I logged in I would get the "good client" my game was pretty much back to normal.

Crazy huh? This is one hell of an issue IMO. It's one of the most bizarre issues i've ever encountered in modern PC gaming. Ever since that my PC has been running the game with the "good client" again up until now May 2015.

It's almost like the ddos attack "fixed" the "bad client" for me. It's an issue that we will probably never understand.

Now in 2015 I have yet another new rig this one meaner and cooler than the other one. It has a 4790K Oced to 4.6ghz, 16 gigs of HyperX Savage Memory running at 2400mhz and with now my old GTX 670. Now you're probably asking why would you still be using the 670 on such a new machine? Simple, i'm waiting for the 980ti. That card will complete my new build ^^

But back on topic! This new PC also runs the game with the "good client" at all times ever since the DDOs attacks the "bad client" hasn't shown it's ugly face again! Atleast on my end.

Now I know this last bit could have been completely left out, but I just wanted to give you guys a full update to all of this.

Now I know some people may say this, but no, this is not a "look at my hardware" type thread so don't think that.

Now why does this issue exist? I have no clue. My guess is that SEGA just fucked up the game's code at some point and never fixed it or cares to fix it.

I made this thread to simply share my experience with this bizarre issue. It's an issue that i'm quite passionate about.

Anyways's I hope this helps some people who are still struggling with the "bad client". From my own personal experience this issue can attack even strong PC's! such as in my case.

Sorry for such a long post, but I really do hope you guys find it useful. Specially the ones suffering from this issue. As for the "l33t" TAer who shared this info with me, he doesn't want me to post his name here so I will respect him and not say his name. I hope you understand ^^

[Squal_FFVIII]

I don't blame people for not knowing about it or even believing in it. It's a very weird issue. Even when the TAer shared his knowledge with me I thought he was just trolling, but no as you can see from my long post it's a very real thing and this "bad client" can even attack good pc's.

As for why it magically stopped for me. That's also a mystery. I can tell you that no hardware changes were made and the only real changes came from the normal windows 7 updates. However I highly doubt that fixed the "bad client".

As it stands now it almost seems like my account itself is "locked" onto the "good client" since I don't have to hunt for it anymore. Something SEGA did while they were fixing the DDOS attack must have put me on the "good client list".

I know all this sounds kinda crazy, but what else can we think? I'm proof that it's not because "bad performance only happens on toaster pc's" We can easily rule that out. Plus, I have other friends who have non toaster PC's (core i5's and 7's with GTX760 or better) who have this "bad client" problem too.

Also, you are right. Ever since the new Ult quest there has been a lot of performance issues complaints even from the JP players.

My guess is that the "bad client" is being given to more players now?

It's very stressful having to hunt down the "good client" I been there so I know your pain. I don't know why i'm magically on the "good client list" but I am very happy that I am.

Here's a couple of tips you can take to try to hunt down the "good client.

Try removing the english patch. There were a few times that when I removed the english patch I was able to get the "good client" 100% of the time.

Do this by simply clicking on the third option in the official launcher. It will do a file check and replace the english files with legit japanese ones.

Another thing you can try is to restart/reboot your pc meaning actually clicking on "restart" in the windows menu.

Lastly if any of these methods don't work just keep relaunching the game the "good" client will eventually come. I agree with you Hollow SEGA needs to get their act together and fix this nonsense. I know this may sound terrible, but I hope more Japanese players get the "bad client" maybe then SEGA will trully look into it and try to fix it.

[n_n]

Here are some tips to get the "good client" though. You know when you first fire up the game a "SEGA" logo comes out and some dude says "SEGA..." Well ok look carefully at the logo and if the transition is smooth then that's a good indication that you're going to get the "good client". If the SEGA logo comes in and the animation for it is stuttery or choppy you will get the bad client! So to save time don't even bother logging in only until you get a smooth "SEGA" animation.
Nah, that's not right. I'm not sure why that logo stutters, but it's been doing that since September or October last year. Regardless, my friends and I have rolled some incredibly good clients but the logo still stuttered.

[milranduil]

^ same. Stutters during intro screen have never corresponded to good (or bad) client for me. Lobby load is a very rough indication, but you can't truly tell until you test weapon swap fps drop in camp (you get more fps/longer lobby load in full block anyway if you spawn there).

[Squal_FFVIII]

Ah ok those were just tips though i'm not 100% sure on them of course. There were a couple of times were my SEGA intro was very smooth and I would end up with a "good client".

Adios, for me I was able to tell if I had the good client or not when loading to the lobby for the first time. Meaning right after you pick your character then you get taken into that blue spiral loading screen with a light energy ball floating around. If the loading while in this spiral thing was choppy or had major stutters it was a 100% chance that I was on the "bad client".

I can assure you that it was 100% and if it still happened I would even record it to prove it.

Now if while loading in the blue spriral/tube type thing was smooth with no stutters/pauses then I would 100% get the "good client".

Another indicator of the bad or good client is when your character itself loads/materializes in the lobby itself (after that blue spiral/tube thing) if your loading screen (the blue screen) had a smooth animation without stutters and your character materialize quickly and you are able to move him or her around as soon as he she materializes then you are on the "good client" now if your loading screen is ultra choppy with stutters and when your character materializes and you are in a "stuck" position meaning you see your character in the lobby but you can't move him or her for a couple of seconds then you are on the "bad client".

This was always the case 100% of the time. Again it's a shame that I never recorded this behavior, but I assure you that i'm not lying nor making this up.

So to sum it up yes you can indeed tell just by loading screen and being in the lobby itself. You don't even need to fire up a TA to trully test it.

[milranduil]

I don't care how much recording you do, if you aren't testing fps at any point, then you have no hard evidence to support the claim that lobby load alone will tell you good from bad client...

EDIT: to add to that, how do you then determine "good" client from "great" client from "perfect" client? This is a spectrum, not an on-off switch...

[AlphaBlob]

When I had bad client earlier, each time I changed maps, the game almost seemed to freeze (cursor started rotating). It also made the loading longer, I was late for the 30sec teleporter in EQ twice.

[Searaphim]

As a hardware and software programmer I find it funny how you describe the issue as distinctive clients with different performance. I guess it makes the issue easier to understand. All I see here is the results of a poorly coded/optimized game that has trouble with resources management. The issue does exist but it's the same client that sometimes get better performances under certain conditions on boot. It's nothing new if you played your games on PC since the early 90s.

[Squal_FFVIII]

I don't care how much recording you do, if you aren't testing fps at any point, then you have no hard evidence to support the claim that lobby load alone will tell you good from bad client...

EDIT: to add to that, how do you then determine "good" client from "great" client from "perfect" client? This is a spectrum, not an on-off switch...

That wouldn't be a problem. Plenty of times I had bandicam on to test the FPS during the load times. Every stutter/pause on the load screen would equal 40 all the way down to 20 FPS once the transition was back to smooth it would be at 60. So yes, FPS were def dropping during those "choppy" loading moments. The reason I didn't bring this up was because I think I made it pretty clear that I know what exactly the bad client or the good clients were. Besides why would I waste my time making this up? If you actually bothered reading my first post you would see that it's not something i simply made up. Now I know you haven't called me a liar but I just want to make that clear. I know my first post is long, but that's because i'm trying my best to explain my situation and my personal experience in detail.


In short the stuttering was so bad that I didn't even need to keep running bandicam to test for fps since it was very obvious at that point. I was able to tell simply by my longer load times/weapon switch lag/frozen state when my character materialized in the lobby when moving from lobby to lobby etc etc. No need to run an fps monitor software to know I was on the "bad client".

That said, I didn't know there was also an "in between client" now i'm not calling YOU a liar, but from my own personal experienced i've seem to only be able to get the bad or good. There was never a time where I was like "well atleast this client doesn't seem too bad" it was either good or bad meaning, no weapon lag switch (no fps drop) or bad (big fps drops from 60) when people switched weapons (myself included).

I play my game on a locked 60 fps with vsync forced via the Nvidia control panel. My monitor is a 60hz monitor. Sure I can play it at a much higher FPS with my rig but with horrible tearing.

Alphablob, your case seems even more severe, but I think that's just because there are hardware differences here. If you have a good PC then even if you get the "bad client" it's not so bad. Like my game was still playable don't get me wrong. But the constant stutter (fps drops) when people switched weapons was unbearable along with the longer load times that come with the "bad client". If you have decent hardware and you get the "good client" then your load times in TA's are very very fast. Also serious TAers like to tone down their graphics settings to the lowest possible and then hunt for the "good client" for maximum loading speed and fps.

[wefwq]

Some JP suggested that unlocking your FPS might relax stuttering on weapon change issue, also restart your game after playing a while might help the game being more stable.
Having "smooth SEGA logo" on startup not always mean the game will be lag free.

[Squal_FFVIII]

Ill go ahead and edit my post. Again I may just have gotten lucky by having a smooth SEGA logo (no fps drops) and getting the "good client" but since 3 people already said this doesn't matter I don't want to mislead people :)

[milranduil]

See the problem is you aren't using exact fps drops here. I can tell you a "perfect" client is minimum fps drop during a weapon swap. The best I've ever had is, playing on 120fps cap, 111->110 with weapon swap to empty palette and 9 fps drop when switching from TD jetboots to kongou while dashing (and this client was on slider 5 as well, so I got incredibly lucky). Most clients I run on 120 fps cap are 111-> 95~98 empty ws and 111->80~84 TD jb to kongou though with some bad ones including 111-> 85~90 empty ws.

Like I said before it doesn't matter how much "testing" you do, if you aren't measuring anything, it's a waste of time. That's how you solve problems with anything, measuring something relevant and using it determine the issue/solution, or in this case discovering that selective client is a continuous spectrum.

[Vatallus]

I don't have much problem with this. If I have fps lag on weapon switch it is usually due to the fact there is a million people on for Magatsu.

If how well the game works varies on start ups then I would claim that is a game optimization problem. Which we know this game has problems with. Hell even stunlocking enemies puts stress on your GPU. This isn't even notable until Ultimate when you heavily stunlock an enemy.

I'm talking so bad that the enemy is loading or moving extremely slow. If you run programs like Nvidia Inspector or other GPU equivalents you can watch your GPU load explode to 100% in about 5 seconds if the enemy doesn't die quick enough. I've been having problems with Ultimate randomly crashing. I came to three conclusions.

1. Using the vanilla client seemed to stop this or make it happen less.
2. Extremely stunlocked enemies are pissing off my Geforce GTX 650 Ti 2 GB x16 GPU.
3. Stop playing the game in Window Mode. (In my case changed to V.Full Screen)

Ultimately Number 3 has produced the best results and so far Ultimate has stopped randomly exploding. Actually the game has stopped randomly exploding period.

Sega is running PSO2 on an outdated game engine. That isn't the best of ideas if you honestly planned to make your game last 10 years, but I've seen worse game optimization. World of Tanks comes to mind when I say that.

[sol_trigger]

what are you doing sega... SE has updated their DX11 FF14...

[Flaoc]

im actually convinced this is true.. i couldnt even play lillipa with shaders off sometimes and got stutters on stupid shit..

then i kept restarting my game until i got the smooth screens then went onto a campship and weapon swapping was a lot smoother and i was even able to switch to shaders on for lillipa and im on a toaster..

performance wise wasnt much different than non shaders for lillipa desync wise.. strange that this works but there seems to be some truth behind it

[wefwq]

what are you doing sega... SE has updated their DX11 FF14...
I'd rather have them optimize the game before actually upgrading to DX11.
But it's kind of silly using outdated stuff when you want to make a game that actually live for another 10 years.

Moving to DX11 are actually doable for them now, since they don't have any reason to obliged to support winXP now as they stated that they drop winXP support back when microsoft announce winXP support has ended.

[Squal_FFVIII]

im actually convinced this is true.. i couldnt even play lillipa with shaders off sometimes and got stutters on stupid shit..

then i kept restarting my game until i got the smooth screens then went onto a campship and weapon swapping was a lot smoother and i was even able to switch to shaders on for lillipa and im on a toaster..

performance wise wasnt much different than non shaders for lillipa desync wise.. strange that this works but there seems to be some truth behind it


It's very true most players who have posted here have experienced this one way or another. Your experienced seems somewhat like mine. It's a BS problem that needs to go away. I mean why can't everyone just get the "good client" from the get go? Obviously the "good performance" is there. Why must we restart our games a ton of times just to find it?

Funny thought...Imagine that's also part of the game? I mean in the game we hunt down good rare items, maybe sega is making us hunt down the "good client" aswell? lmao

Also, This game needs DX12 not 11 =P Supposely DX12 games will make much better use of multi core cpu's and such. I'm not a hardware or software engineer though so I don't know to much about it.

[silo1991]

i been having this issue in the emergencys lately too no clue whats triger it even in VH im still having the problem

[Nitro Vordex]

It really just does sound like the game is poorly optimized. Having multiple clients is just silly. You're not getting a good client, you're just getting how the game should be running, which means it's poorly made. Sega wouldn't have any benefit on having a "good" client. It'd be like throttling people randomly. And speaking of throttling, I'm assuming since you have TWC that you never changed ISP's, as that would assume anything resembling a choice in your area. :wacko: That's an important part to put in. There's far too many variables in this situation.



ISP issues, due to the DDoS, TWC being stupid, or any other multitude of internet-related issues.
Hardware, though we've pretty much covered that point.
Software, aka PSO2's (rather half assed, honestly) coding.
User error. Not saying you, but this is as much a variable as any of the others. This includes incorrect settings, and even a placebo effect, seeing what you were already searching for, though your FPS measurements mitigate this somewhat.



And whatever else I'd forgotten.