Chasing a 60+ fps number was already my mission as I fixed different parts of the game. After all the symbols optimizations I came to a realization.
Dipping down from a large number makes the game feel a lot more choppy and unpolished, compared to a game that’s always not running very smooth.
To better explain this idea here’s a tiny bit of math:
In a hypothetical scenario where Game 2 is an 2X clone of Game 1. There is a Choke point A effecting both Games independently.
Game 1 runs at 30 fps. Choke point A takes up 20% GPU power. Which brings down the fps to 24.
The difference in the frames lost is 6.
Game 2 runs at 60 fps. Choke point A takes up 20% GPU power. Which brings down the fps to 48.
The difference in the frames lost is 12.
Here’s what I noticed,
Whenever a buttery smooth game chugs, its highly noticeable. But a chuggy game chugging more doesn’t seem so bad.
I first started noticing this when every time the average fps rose up, the Game felt great. But some random areas that I never even noticed before seemed to be chuggy now. This gave chasing the fps game a new meaning to me. I had originally planned to fix the overall fps and then the problem areas. And this is what I eventually realized.
Chasing for a more consistent fps number throughout the game is more important than tying to get the highest number.
This was the opposite approach than the one I had planned initially when I started optimizing the game. Again this my conclusion while testing out these scenarios. Could be different for you! So test it out and maybe let me know!! 🙂
All this, reminded me of something my lead engineer had mentioned. https://shahbazsekhon.com/optimization-amdahls-law/
