[GameGPU] ARK: Survival Evolved, GameWorks

[Techhog]

It's almost the end of 2015 and how is this game looking?

Cannot maintain 30 fps on this rig:

Intel Core i7 6700K 4.00 GHz
8 GB DDR4 RAM
2x Nvidia GeForce GTX 980 4GB

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7HMEQUGows

Looks like this game is going to need a $1000 6950X + 16GB RAM + Pascal flagship GPU just to run well maxed out, unless some major optimizations happen before launch. Usually games that run this bad less than a year from release are unlikely to improve performance 2-3X which is what this game needs. It's going to be interesting comparing Far Cry Primal vs. this in terms of graphics vs. optimization trade-offs. This is easily my personal front-runner pick for the worst optimized PC game of 2016.

A golden 6950X that can OC to at least 4.6GHz on air*

 

[guskline]

A golden 6950X that can OC to at least 4.6GHz on air*

I bet a 6950X that can OC to 4.6 on air will be much more than $1,000.00

 

[SimianR]

The performance in this game has actually gotten worse for me over the last few months. Every so often they'll include something in the patch notes saying improved performance, but I'm not seeing it. It's disappointing to see where this game is at. Not to mention they screwed the game balance up pretty badly as well.

 

[RussianSensation]

The performance in this game has actually gotten worse for me over the last few months. Every so often they'll include something in the patch notes saying improved performance, but I'm not seeing it. It's disappointing to see where this game is at. Not to mention they screwed the game balance up pretty badly as well.

The game was so badly coded, that even an i3 4330 beats 2500K/2600K/3970X.

I don't understand why they decided to use UE4 for this game when CryEngine has a track record of perfectly executing the settings they went after and since it's a proven engine and is well optimized by now, it would have been a safer choice. Sounds like it came down to $ again.

FC Primal is running like butter on consoles but ARK Survival chokes a flagship PC.

 

[SimianR]

The game was so badly coded, that even an i3 4330 beats 2500K/2600K/3970X.



I don't understand why they decided to use UE4 for this game when CryEngine has a track record of perfectly executing the settings they went after and since it's a proven engine and is well optimized by now, it would have been a safer choice. Sounds like it came down to $ again.

FC Primal is running like butter on consoles but ARK Survival chokes a flagship PC.

FC Primal looks very beautiful. I want to play it just to roam around and take it all in, even if the gameplay isn't all that different from older far cry games. It's too bad EA doesn't license Frostbite 3 - because damn does SW:Battlefront look good and run well across all hardware setups too.

 

[Arachnotronic]

The game was so badly coded, that even an i3 4330 beats 2500K/2600K/3970X.

I don't understand why they decided to use UE4 for this game when CryEngine has a track record of perfectly executing the settings they went after and since it's a proven engine and is well optimized by now, it would have been a safer choice. Sounds like it came down to $ again.

FC Primal is running like butter on consoles but ARK Survival chokes a flagship PC.

UE4 probably has an easier tool-chain that's been battle-hardened after many iterations + massive numbers of licensees have used it & given feedback. There are almost certainly far more developers who can effectively use the UE4 tool-chain than can use CryEngine.

If I were starting my own studio tomorrow, I would use UE4 to build the game, not even a question.

 

[RussianSensation]

There are almost certainly far more developers who can effectively use the UE4 tool-chain than can use CryEngine.

Thus far I can count a total of 0 well-optimized UE4 games that have come out. Can you name one?

Even one of the most technically mediocre UE4 games destroys modern GPUs.
http://gamegpu.ru/action-/-fps-/-tps/hatred-test-gpu.html

There is no track record of a well-optimized UE4 game to date that I can think of. Either this game engine takes a lot of effort to optimize for its next gen effects OR it's too demanding for current GPU architectures. What makes it worse for ARK Survival is that the game looks bad & runs even worse so there is no trade-off between graphics and performance.

There is no comparison with CryEngine - Ryse Son of Rome, Crysis 3, The Climb.

Right now, ARK Survival looks worse than Crysis Warhead, worse than Far Cry 3 and runs like it's a next gen 2018 videogame.

 

[Arachnotronic]

Thus far I can count a total of 0 well-optimized UE4 games that have come out. Can you name one?

Even one of the most technically mediocre UE4 games destroys modern GPUs.
http://gamegpu.ru/action-/-fps-/-tps/hatred-test-gpu.html

There is no track record of a well-optimized UE4 game to date that I can think of. Either this game engine takes a lot of effort to optimize for its next gen effects OR it's too demanding for current GPU architectures. What makes it worse for ARK Survival is that the game looks bad & runs even worse so there is no trade-off between graphics and performance.

There is no comparison with CryEngine - Ryse Son of Rome, Crysis 3, The Climb.

Right now, ARK Survival looks worse than Crysis Warhead, worse than Far Cry 3 and runs like it's a next gen 2018 videogame.

Right, I didn't say anything about actual engine quality/optimization. I am saying that Unreal Engine is ridiculously popular which makes it an attractive choice for game studios that don't have the resources to "roll their own" so to speak.

There's a reason that CryEngine isn't popular and I don't think it has to do with the quality of the engine/renderer (Crysis 3 is freaking gorgeous).

EDIT: I just realized that I wasn't making my point clearly. When I said "developers" I mean game designers . Think level designers, folks who write effects, animators, and so on.

Having a great tool-set that makes games easier to build is key to a great engine.

Why do you think that id Software, whose engines were arguably more sophisticated/optimized with Carmackian Magic (c), didn't do all that well in the game engine licensing arena compared to Epic? It wasn't a failing of the underlying core engine, it was a failing of the tools used to create the game content.

When I was a youngster, I dabbled in building my own levels for games like Q3A, Unreal Tournament 2004, DOOM 3, etc. and I remember hating using the id engines but loving the Unreal Engine. The tools were just that good.

I haven't used CryEngine or Unreal Engine 4, but I'd imagine that CryEngine is just a pain in the ass while Unreal Engine 4 is a pleasure.

 

[Snafuh]

I don't understand why they decided to use UE4 for this game when CryEngine has a track record of perfectly executing the settings they went after and since it's a proven engine and is well optimized by now, it would have been a safer choice. Sounds like it came down to $ again.

You should take a course in game development. Using the CryEngine would probably result in the same disaster. Out of the box both engines are not suited for open world games. Even with licensed engines like the CryEngine and UE you need some capable devs to make a good game with it. The game also lacks any kind of art direction.
And please don't compare AAA CryEngine titles with Indie UE4 titles. Both Unreal Tournement and Vanishing of Ethan Carter run very well. I hope you realized the Ethan Carter benchmarks you linked are with 200% resolution scale.

I haven't used CryEngine or Unreal Engine 4, but I'd imagine that CryEngine is just a pain in the ass while Unreal Engine 4 is a pleasure.

I haven't used the latest CryEngine but earlier versions always felt more like a Crysis maker than an actual game engine. It was hard to get rid of the Crysis look and feel.
The Unreal Engine has some ugly presets (Light shafts are not really good, SS reflections can be wrong and ugly, it's easy to make everything too shiny) but it is easier to make a unique game out of it. The UE4 indie games use a lot of default effects and animations and both artists and programmer don't spend as much time on optimization as AAA devs.

 

[tential]

If you use cryengine I will most likely consider your game no matter what. If you use ue4 or some other engine? Forget it.

Has cryengine been used in open world games though? That's the only thing I can think of.

 

[DarkKnightDude]

Thus far I can count a total of 0 well-optimized UE4 games that have come out. Can you name one?

SQUAD runs pretty well on my hardware and its on Unreal Engine 4. Though its currently in early access.

 

[Snafuh]

If you use cryengine I will most likely consider your game no matter what. If you use ue4 or some other engine? Forget it.

Has cryengine been used in open world games though? That's the only thing I can think of.

You chose the games you play based on the engine?

All those games were made with the same engine. You can make a Unity game which looks better than a Cry Engine game.
An engine is just a tool. Every big production puts thousands of hours into a game engine even if they license an engine. That's why Rocksteady used Unreal 3 for the latest Batman. Their version of the engine was full of custom tools and solutions for problems.

The engine is the least meaningful indicator for the quality (both gameplay and graphic wise) of a game.

And CryEngine was used for the open world game State of Decay

 

[MajinCry]

CryEngine isn't suited for Open World games? What?

It bloody well is. Back when I was fluffing about with World Machine 2, CryEngine was quite happy with me 4096x4096 heightmaps. On a 6670 ddr3.

'Course, there wasn't much else going on 'cept for textured terrain, but come on. If it weren't suited fer Open World games, ya wouldn't be able to chuck in huge landmasses. I call bollocks.

Edit: Hell, Bethesda has been making open world games with Gamebryo. The same engine that was used for Sid Meier's Pirates! and Tenchu.

 

[tential]

You chose the games you play based on the engine?

All those games were made with the same engine. You can make a Unity game which looks better than a Cry Engine game.
An engine is just a tool. Every big production puts thousands of hours into a game engine even if they license an engine. That's why Rocksteady used Unreal 3 for the latest Batman. Their version of the engine was full of custom tools and solutions for problems.

The engine is the least meaningful indicator for the quality (both gameplay and graphic wise) of a game.

And CryEngine was used for the open world game State of Decay

I use a lot of criteria. Yes game engine matters to an extent because I need a game to be in a playable state at resolutions/settings I'll use. So if it's a horrendously optimized engine with a studio who I know is terrible at adding custom additions to those engines then I will absolutely wait til it's a bargain bin game.

I'm not sure why you mention the latest batman. That game ran horrendously.

 

[Snafuh]

I'm not sure why you mention the latest batman. That game ran horrendously.

Because it is very different than any other Unreal Engine 3 game.

Edit: Hell, Bethesda has been making open world games with Gamebryo. The same engine that was used for Sid Meier's Pirates! and Tenchu.

I said out of the box. The "Creation" engine Bethesda uses has nothing to do with Gamebryo used for Pirates.
And using the Editor and placing some nice stuff in a big world has very little to do with making a open world game. Of course you can use the CryEngine for a open world game. You can even get good graphics and performance out of it. But you need some capable graphics programmer, artists and time for it.

It seems like the team of Ark hasn't invested enough time in the game(engine) yet. But the game is not even "out" for a year. Discussing early access and with the conclusion the engine is bad makes very little sense.
That's why I am out of here. But please don't put to much weight in the name of an engine. The underlaying code can be very different than the code of a game using the same engine, released the same day.

 

[MajinCry]

And using the Editor and placing some nice stuff in a big world has very little to do with making a open world game. Of course you can use the CryEngine for a open world game. You can even get good graphics and performance out of it. But you need some capable graphics programmer, artists and time for it.

...Isn't what makes an open world game different from a non-open world game, well, there being a sizeable world?

Those last two sentences of yours hold true for all game engines.

 

[railven]

You should take a course in game development. Using the CryEngine would probably result in the same disaster. Out of the box both engines are not suited for open world games. Even with licensed engines like the CryEngine and UE you need some capable devs to make a good game with it. The game also lacks any kind of art direction.
And please don't compare AAA CryEngine titles with Indie UE4 titles. Both Unreal Tournement and Vanishing of Ethan Carter run very well. I hope you realized the Ethan Carter benchmarks you linked are with 200% resolution scale.


I haven't used the latest CryEngine but earlier versions always felt more like a Crysis maker than an actual game engine. It was hard to get rid of the Crysis look and feel.
The Unreal Engine has some ugly presets (Light shafts are not really good, SS reflections can be wrong and ugly, it's easy to make everything too shiny) but it is easier to make a unique game out of it. The UE4 indie games use a lot of default effects and animations and both artists and programmer don't spend as much time on optimization as AAA devs.

Biggest flaw of his complaints for me is always comparing AAA studios to indie devs.

I wonder which game, regardless of tools/engine, would most likely yield better results:
million dollar backed project from AAA publisher/developers
or
indie dev, self publishing on Steam Early Access, working of pre-orders/kickstarters/donations.

Hmmmmmm....

EDIT: Also, interesting tidbit about the Vanishing of Ethan Carter.

Welps here is the game without 200% scaling:

 

[Headfoot]

It seems that Unreal 4 will benefit greatly from DX12 as it seems CPU hungry. In all likelihood, it probably does all of the tasks more efficiently and using less CPU than on Unreal 3/3.5, but it does so much more that quantity overrides any efficiency gains.

 

[RussianSensation]

Both Unreal Tournement and Vanishing of Ethan Carter run very well.

Ya, considering the first game doesn't look graphically impressive it should run at 60 fps on a 970 at 1440P without any issues.

http://gamegpu.ru/images/remote/htt...t_GPU-Action-Unreal_Tournament_-test-HD_1.jpg
http://gamegpu.ru/images/remote/htt...t_GPU-Action-Unreal_Tournament_-test-HD_2.jpg
http://gamegpu.ru/images/remote/htt...t_-UE4-Win64-Test_2015_03_25_17_27_00_989.jpg
http://gamegpu.ru/images/remote/htt...t_-UE4-Win64-Test_2015_03_25_17_25_41_214.jpg

vs.

http://www.co-optimus.com/images/upload/image/star_wars_battlefront_walker_assualt_explodsion.jpg

http://bandofgeeks.fr/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/Star-Wars-Battlefront-Sullust.jpg

http://core0.staticworld.net/images/article/2015/11/2015-11-16_00046-100628341-orig.jpg

So far UE4 games have all brought current gen graphics at best with next generation graphical demands. I wouldn't be surprised if an UE4 engine AAA game with graphics this good would require a $1000 Pascal Titan to run well at 1440P while right now a 390/970 can do the same task with Frostbite.

EDIT: Also, interesting tidbit about the Vanishing of Ethan Carter.

Welps here is the game without 200% scaling:

That's because if you played this game or actually read reviews if you don't believe me, this game looks really bad with 100% scaling and AA Methods work poorly with it. The only way to get good sharpness in this particular title is to enable 200% scaling. Since at least 2 of you didn't do research on this topic, you immediately looked at those benchmarks because running this game properly means 200% scaling has to be enabled in the first place.

100%
200%

Biggest flaw of his complaints for me is always comparing AAA studios to indie devs.

Oh I knew this argument is going to come up as lame excuse for justifying how every UE4 game until to date is unoptimized turd compared to CryEngine or Frostbite games.

I guess it's easy to put down "Oh it's just an indie developer" and ignore 2 facts: (1) No one has been able to make a well-optimized UE4 game engine to date unlike CryEngine and Frostbite engine games; (2) there are other titles in development right now by very small studios that blow ARK Survival out of the water and look amazing. Dude, Ark Survival is everything that's wrong with PC gaming = more than 2 million copies sold in Early Access and the game looks and runs like garbage.


Escape from Tarkov

"The first and essential mode will be available with the game release, the story mode. The game session (typically an hour or hour and a half long) will take place on a large, about 5-10 sq. km., open location. The player will have to consecutively clear all of these raid scenarios, with several possible exits, each determined by the game story. By completing one scenario, the player unlocks the next one. Players can return to the previously unlocked scenarios in search for particular loot or more detailed exploration (which can lead to the uncovering of side quests and locations)..
When all scenarios (there will be around 10 of them) are completed, a free roam mode will be unlocked. In this mode, player can move around a 15 sq. km. area without any time limits."

"Q.What are the hardware requirements?

A.The hardware requirements are yet to be determined, but we will try to keep them as low as possible. Right now, the game shows 120+ FPS with ultimate graphics on the PC that is above average, but not overpowered.

Unity 5

Face it, many of today's games are horribly optimized and there is no game in 2015 that should run at 30 fps @ 1080P on a 980Ti unless it's easily the best looking and most complex PC game ever made which ARK Survival isn't considering its graphics as of now are not even at Crysis Warhead level. You might want to replay 2008's Crysis Warhead and compare its physics, lighting, vegetation to ARK Survival, a game that may launch in 2016. For a game that's 8 years newer and has so many other PC games to learn from, so many more experienced programmers to hire, ARK Survival's level of optimizations on the PC as of right now is a F-.

I guess if you feel better about buying another $650 2016 flagship card, then the more unoptimized 2016 PC games will become, the more justifiable the GPU upgrade is. For me I compare games vs. what was done in the past and how well the older games run as well look as what's out on the horizon (like Far Cry Primal) or Ghost Recon Wildlands. It doesn't take a computer programmer to see that games like ARK Survival or Just Cause 3 are the completely opposite of PC games that push the envelope and do not serve as a great example of great trade-off between next gen graphics and optimization.

 

[MajinCry]

What exactly is the issue with ARK? Is it just that everything is run on a single core? Or are there just so many individual textures being used, without any care to create texture atlases, causing draw calls to skyrocket?

 

[dogen1]

What exactly is the issue with ARK? Is it just that everything is run on a single core? Or are there just so many individual textures being used, without any care to create texture atlases, causing draw calls to skyrocket?

It's still deep in development. It could be any of a huge number of things.

 

[tential]

Dude, Ark Survival is everything that's wrong with PC gaming = more than 2 million copies sold in Early Access and the game looks and runs like garbage.

Honestly everyone needs to stop and reread THIS small portion again.

This is so true.

Are we seriously excited to pay for games early, with no real knowledge of the completion of the project, to run and look horrendous?

PC Gamers literally are letting PC gaming become worse, while defending it to defend their ego's that "PC Gaming > All". Meanwhile, consoles and PC graphics are closer than ever....

It's going down hill, but gamers are too egotistical to demand more from studios/games. They're just happy to be apart of the Superior "PC Master Race", whether they like to admit it or not, they'd never consider console gaming, so they just accept whatever these studios/games are because it's PC so > consoles.

 

[3DVagabond]

Honestly everyone needs to stop and reread THIS small portion again.

This is so true.

Are we seriously excited to pay for games early, with no real knowledge of the completion of the project, to run and look horrendous?

PC Gamers literally are letting PC gaming become worse, while defending it to defend their ego's that "PC Gaming > All". Meanwhile, consoles and PC graphics are closer than ever....

It's going down hill, but gamers are too egotistical to demand more from studios/games. They're just happy to be apart of the Superior "PC Master Race", whether they like to admit it or not, they'd never consider console gaming, so they just accept whatever these studios/games are because it's PC so > consoles.

We have too many people who's mommies and daddies are forking out the money and all the kid has to do is say, "I want."

 

[tential]

We have too many people who's mommies and daddies are forking out the money and all the kid has to do is say, "I want."

I mean, if you have a remotely decent job, you can afford a new GPU every year. It's not a large expense. People's Cellphone Bills, TV bills, etc. are FAR more than a new GPU every year.

I don't pay Cable bills anymore, my cellphone bill is nonexistant due to cheap alternatives, that easily makes up a GPU purchase every year.

These games are poorly optimized, look like crap, and we're barely seeing an improvement in graphical fidelity. In fact, we're seeing regressions in performance to image quality ratio a lot of the time.

And people are OK with this. Throw in one cool lighting feature over a game with horrible textures and people are excited that a a feature is branded, rather than the fact the game looks bad, and takes a ton of GPU horsepower to run.

And no, I see a lot of people with GTX 970s and 960s on here.

And they're dropping settings to play at 1080p on a 970 for these new age games. While before, these were definitely enough for games that looked better than these new games.

I'm not blaming Nvidia either. Because it's not like they're forcing people to buy these games. The market is willing to keep picking up these turd titles over and over again. We're just getting what we ask for. PC gamers are speaking out with our wallets and saying that graphical fidelity isn't something we really care about. We just want the game. The people who want the nice graphics will pay $1k+ for it. So that's what's going to happen until someone starts making well optimized good looking games in the market and starts making a profit doing it.

 

[3DVagabond]

I mean, if you have a remotely decent job, you can afford a new GPU every year. It's not a large expense. People's Cellphone Bills, TV bills, etc. are FAR more than a new GPU every year.

I don't pay Cable bills anymore, my cellphone bill is nonexistant due to cheap alternatives, that easily makes up a GPU purchase every year.

These games are poorly optimized, look like crap, and we're barely seeing an improvement in graphical fidelity. In fact, we're seeing regressions in performance to image quality ratio a lot of the time.

And people are OK with this. Throw in one cool lighting feature over a game with horrible textures and people are excited that a a feature is branded, rather than the fact the game looks bad, and takes a ton of GPU horsepower to run.

And no, I see a lot of people with GTX 970s and 960s on here.

And they're dropping settings to play at 1080p on a 970 for these new age games. While before, these were definitely enough for games that looked better than these new games.

I'm not blaming Nvidia either. Because it's not like they're forcing people to buy these games. The market is willing to keep picking up these turd titles over and over again. We're just getting what we ask for. PC gamers are speaking out with our wallets and saying that graphical fidelity isn't something we really care about. We just want the game. The people who want the nice graphics will pay $1k+ for it. So that's what's going to happen until someone starts making well optimized good looking games in the market and starts making a profit doing it.

The post I made and the one I responded to have nothing to do with hardware pricing. Why are you mentioning it in response to what I said? More comprehension failure?

It's about paying good money for crap. When you have someone paying for the games who isn't playing them but simply supplying them to their children (Because we love our children and want them to be happy.). When you have kids who have no idea how much work someone has to do to earn $100 (Because entitlement is a way of life these days.). Combine those and you have a totally uninformed buying decision that allows garbage to be peddled to the masses.