Release of my Age SOMEWHERE.

[Chacal]

You might feel that I'm endlessly bashing him

Yes.

[diafero]

Diafero said in another post that he, "perform some automatic checks, and file organization normalization". http://forum.guildofwriters.org/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=5535

Is it possible that these normalizations have caused SOMEWHERE to get slow and jerky?

I hardly believe so. Most of what I do is read-only, for example I make sure all sound files used by the age are present, and all sound files shipped with the age are used.
The only thing I change is the Python file: The code that links to another age is replaced by code calling into the Offline KI, so it can make sure the link is valid before performing it. This does not have an impact on rendering performance.


EDIT: Btw, denost, if you want a linking image and a book cover to appear for your age, you can find the instructions at http://www.guildofwriters.org/wiki/Offl ... umentation. I can create an image from the link-in point, however as the author of the age you will probably have some idea how the linking panel should look like?

[Calena]

I've popped in and out of this age a few times and still haven't had the time to do it justice or get all the way through it. As a builder, I can appreciate the massive amount of time and effort denost2 put into this age. We could use more talented people like him that are willing to commit 3 years (!!!) to building a quality age. Thank you denost2.

As far as the lag problem, if I had the time right now (which I really don't), I'd take a look at your blend file to see what's causing it. The age is massive, so my first guess would be to simplify meshes by reducing poly count (the decimate modifier is useful for this), turn collision off visible meshes wherever possible and replace it with simple colliders and incorporate VisRegions. The Wiki has instructions to optimize the age for performance and there are other builders and developers here who know what they're doing and can answer detailed questions.

Annabelle, I agree with Chacal. Blasting someone for something you know nothing about, especially in this forum where builders come to learn, is arrogant and inappropriate. I don't mean to offend, but since you can't offer a solution, it would be better to say nothing.

[Sirius]

The version I downloaded from Megaupload was jerky as well. Ok, a 1.9 GHz processor with 1.5 G ram is not really the best choice for video games, but as far as I know about these things, I rather think it is Plasma's rendering limit. As Calena said, Cyan always used occluders and VisRegions for their Ages, and using it for this kind of wide open spaces might be better.
I don't think the collision can affect game performance (I already used a single collider with more than 13.000 faces without lags). They just slow down Age loading.

[dendwaler]

For game performance Visregions definitely is the thing that makes the difference.
My age "Turtle Isle" may be one of the best examples to demonstrate it.

The first version was hardly playable on an average PC.
The last one, with much more vertices then the first, is playable on every PC, only by using Visregions.

If you spent 3 years on building an age, then it is certainly worth to spent another month to master Visible regions.
As Calena said, put in questions if you don't understand a part of it.
And be sure to use the visregions tool from Tachzusamn. He also made a short video tutorial with how to do it.

You did a great job in building your age." Somewhere" which deserves better critics.
http://forum.guildofwriters.org/viewtopic.php?f=59&t=5129&p=52333&hilit=visregions#p52333

[denost2]

Dear explorers,

So many reactions, comments, questions last days oblige me to try to give you the state of my reflection.
My answers are global and want to treat the differents points evocated by your posts.

First
I began three years ago to learn blender and all associated softwares to create a personnal Age for my grandsons.
So I hoped to show them other game than those that are currently proposed to young persons.

I learn everything on THIS FORUM. So thank you to everybody who provided very intelligent help on this forum.

I used 3 different computers to create and use SOMEWHERE

1st Computer to CREATE and TEST
Dedicated to Age creation. No Internet...
------------------
System Information
------------------
Time of this report: 6/13/2011, 09:11:46
Machine name: UTILISAT-55F961
Operating System: Windows XP Professional (5.1, Build 2600) Service Pack 3 (2600.xpsp.080413-2111)
Language: French (Regional Setting: French)
System Manufacturer: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.
System Model: P55-UD3R
BIOS: Award Modular BIOS v6.00PG
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM) i5 CPU 750 @ 2.67GHz (4 CPUs)
Memory: 2044MB RAM
Page File: 306MB used, 3629MB available
Windows Dir: C:\WINDOWS
DirectX Version: DirectX 9.0c (4.09.0000.0904)
DX Setup Parameters: Not found
DxDiag Version: 5.03.2600.5512 32bit Unicode

Results :
GOOD
NO LAG
Note:
No shadow option during game
Game off line


2nd Computer to CREATE and TEST

------------------
System Information
------------------
Time of this report: 1/18/2012, 09:53:11
Machine name: PC-UTILISATEUR
Operating System: Windows XP Professional (5.1, Build 2600) Service Pack 3 (2600.xpsp.080413-2111)
Language: French (Regional Setting: French)
System Manufacturer: TOSHIBA
System Model: Satellite P300
BIOS: PhoenixBIOS 4.0 Release 6.1
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU T6400 @ 2.00GHz (2 CPUs)
Memory: 3066MB RAM
Page File: 242MB used, 5729MB available
Windows Dir: C:\WINDOWS
DirectX Version: DirectX 9.0c (4.09.0000.0904)
DX Setup Parameters: Not found
DxDiag Version: 5.03.2600.5512 32bit Unicode

Results :
PLAYABLE
SMALL LAG
Note:
No shadow option during game
Game off line


3rd Computer to TEST
------------------
System Information
------------------
Time of this report: 2/4/2012, 14:56:54
Machine name: JP-HP
Operating System: Windows 7 Édition Familiale Premium 32-bit (6.1, Build 7601) Service Pack 1 (7601.win7sp1_rtm.101119-1850)
Language: French (Regional Setting: French)
System Manufacturer: Hewlett-Packard
System Model: HP Pavilion dm1 Notebook PC
BIOS: InsydeH2O Version CCB.03.60.43F.12
Processor: AMD E-350 Processor (2 CPUs), ~1.6GHz
Memory: 3072MB RAM
Available OS Memory: 2666MB RAM
Page File: 751MB used, 4578MB available
Windows Dir: C:\Windows
DirectX Version: DirectX 11
DX Setup Parameters: Not found
User DPI Setting: Using System DPI
System DPI Setting: 96 DPI (100 percent)
DWM DPI Scaling: Disabled
DxDiag Version: 6.01.7601.17514 32bit Unicode

DIFFICULTY TO PLAY
LAG
Note:
No shadow option during game
Game off line


To optimize the Age I mainly did:
- decreasing of vertices ( from 130 000 at the maximum to 80 00 today)
- decreasing of colliders
- cancelling of some permanent movements

I tested VisRegion once, may be on year ago.
But in front the difficulty to apply this technique on this Age I discouraged me and preferred and choosed to continue to develop the game.
I should have insisted.

Now,
I am working on the ICE WORLD following SOMEWHERE
For the moment I did not plan to work again on SOMEWHERE
And, frankly, actually optimization of SOMEWHERE is not "my cup of tea"

BUT I ACCEPT REAL HELP for this work
I could provide the BLENDER file

[denost2]

Is the 'Ice age travel book-room' the final destination of the age? Not sure if there is some other clue I missed.

Yes it is
For other clue : I do not know...

[denost2]

however as the author of the age you will probably have some idea how the linking panel should look like?

You are right
I propose the following picture for the linking book
http://uploading.com/files/b35bee65/SomewherePIC2.jpg/

[diafero]

Thanks, I put it online

[Calena]

To optimize the Age I mainly did:
- decreasing of vertices ( from 130 000 at the maximum to 80 00 today)
- decreasing of colliders
- cancelling of some permanent movements

I tested VisRegion once, may be on year ago.
But in front the difficulty to apply this technique on this Age I discouraged me and preferred and choosed to continue to develop the game.
I should have insisted.

Now,
I am working on the ICE WORLD following SOMEWHERE
For the moment I did not plan to work again on SOMEWHERE
And, frankly, actually optimization of SOMEWHERE is not "my cup of tea"

BUT I ACCEPT REAL HELP for this work
I could provide the BLENDER file

denost2 - there does seem to be something strange going on here. According to the specs you give here and the size of your age files in my .dat folder, lag shouldn't really be a problem. This age is less than half of the size of the last age I built and my age didn't have any problem with lag. I didn't use VisRegions in that age either (I don't know how to yet ). Something is causing the lag, but it doesn't appear to be any of the usual culprits.

One clue might be that everyone seems to be experiencing the same type of lag, unlike when dendwaler released Turtle Isle. In that case, the bigger the computer, the less lag experienced.

Even though you want to move on to your next age and let this thing go, it might be worth tracking down the problem to ensure that you don't run into the same thing with your new age. Could you post your Python.0.elf and audio.0.elf files online? Maybe they'll give us a clue.