[foolfromhell]

I recenty got back into FS2 to play the continuation of the Blue Planet storyline. I last played when BP: AoA first came out. I have a decent computer- it's a 2017 MBP with 16gb of RAM, an SSD, dedicated graphics card, etc. It can play most modern games at a decent framerate but I'm getting hammered on FS2, even with the selective options like glowmaps, shadows turned off. I get 8-15 FPS, sometimes going up to 30 if there are no other ships in the field. Can someone please help me out?

Here's a link to the log if it helps: https://fsnebula.org/log/5cd10b92cb0d3311bd2e7178

edit: I hit about 35FPS with all the settings enabled in the FS2 main campaign with all MediaVPs enabled. It's real slow for Blue Planet though.

[foolfromhell]

A second issue: the game CTDs a few minutes into the mission where you need to protect the Temeraire against the Ravana and Demon destroyers. Log file attached.

[attachment eaten by a Shivan]

[General Battuta]

Huh. Try removing the advanced VP files from the Blue Planet and MediaVPs folders. Put them somewhere outside the FS2 folder so they don’t load.

Also, try turning down the ‘lighting detail’ setting in the in-game options menu.

[mjn.mixael]

It's important to note that, while it's been getting much better, FSO is still not optimized like modern games. CPU can be a serious bottleneck here even if your GPU is top of the line.

[theperfectdrugsk]

If you've got Nvidia graphics, you'll likely need to manually tell Nvidia control panel to use your graphics card anytime you download a new nightly build.  They tend to default to the integrated graphics, at least on my rig.

[Mito [PL]]

it's a 2017 MBP

MacBook Pro?

dedicated graphics card

So, looking up 2017 MacBook Pro specs. Usually a mildly clocked i7 with some decent single core boost clocks, that shouldn't bottleneck it too much. But the graphic chip... Radeon Pro 560? I can't seem to find proper benchmarks, hmm. Maybe someone can help me with that a bit? I have a suspicion this could bottleneck a bit. But to such an extent?

[The E]

According to the log, the card self-identifies as a Radeon R9 M370X, a 2015 mobile card that's actually a rebranded Radeon 7770, which itself is 7 years old at time of writing. It really isn't "fast" by modern standards; it offers about the same performance as a desktop GTX 1030.

Unfortunately, there's not a lot to be done, performance-wise. From the log, I can see that the real performance-hungry feature (shadows) is disabled; It might be possible to claw back a few more FPS by also turning off post-processing (Glowmaps, on the other hand, have a negligible effect on performance; disabling them is only recommended on systems that are really starved for VRAM; the 2 GB your card should come with are plenty). Other than making sure that you're using a release build and that the lighting settings in-game are set to 1 or 2, there's little you can do to improve performance.

[Mito [PL]]

Hm, I'm pretty sure I used to play BP with a Radeon R7 265 and usually turning off shadows was enough to achieve rather satisfactory results in all but the most fancy battles. Maybe the "Disable deferred lighting" flag would help?

[foolfromhell]

it's a 2017 MBP

MacBook Pro?

dedicated graphics card

So, looking up 2017 MacBook Pro specs. Usually a mildly clocked i7 with some decent single core boost clocks, that shouldn't bottleneck it too much. But the graphic chip... Radeon Pro 560? I can't seem to find proper benchmarks, hmm. Maybe someone can help me with that a bit? I have a suspicion this could bottleneck a bit. But to such an extent?

I was wrong - it's a 2015 MBP. Apple replaced my computer two years ago and I got the years mixed up.

I used to play this game in 2007, 2008 with all the settings to max. I guess the graphics settings have improved considerably since? I'll try disabling advanced, etc. I'm not getting a new computer any time soon and I want to play the campaign.

Thanks!

[FrikgFeek]

It really isn't "fast" by modern standards; it offers about the same performance as a desktop GTX 1030.

Looking it up on userbenchmark it seems the GT 1030 is about 57% faster than an M370X. In fact it's barely above the UHD 630 integrated chips in modern intel processors and is behind the gen 2 Ryzen iGPUs.
So yeah, that GPU is definitely too weak to run FSO at higher framerates, especially BP with its huge battles, fast-firing weapons which produce tons of light sources, and relatively high-poly models.
So while there are some settings you can turn down to improve framerate a bit the only real solution is to get a better graphics card.

[CT27]

By the end of the year I hope to get a better computer/graphics card.  I saw a good deal on a prebuilt system...I know it's not the newest card out there, but would the NVIDIA GTX 1070 be good for playing FSO at a good level?

[theperfectdrugsk]

Given that I do alright on a laptop with a 960m, the full-fat 1070 should be just fine.