Help! Overlord runs like a slide show for me!

[LintMan]

I just installed Overlord and I seem to be getting a disastrously low frame rate with it. I don't know if there's a way to get the real number but it must be in the single digits: the cinematic tutorial pieces at the beginning where Gnarl talks to you are all in stutter-step for me. It's absolutely unplayable.

There's no way this should be a problem on my PC:
Intel Core 2 Duo E6700
Xfx GeForce 8800 GTX XXX (factory OC'd)
4GB Dominator2 DDR2 RAM
Raptor 10K RPM hard disk
XBox 360 controller
Windows Vista Ultimate

I generally play games at 1280x1024 to 1600x1200 with high to max settings and have no issues. STALKER performed fine for me at those resolutions, and so did Oblivion/Shivering Isles and Half Life 2/Ep1.

With Overlord, I reduced the settings down to a chunky 800x600 with medium detail, and there was *absolutely no improvement*. Something is obviously going wrong here.

I've also installed the Overlord 1.2 patch, with no improvement there, either.

Any ideas?

Edit: changed title to mention I found a solution (see below)

 

[Scouzer]

...new drivers?

 

[buzzsaw13]

Originally posted by: LintMan
Windows Vista Ultimate

I believe thats the problem.

 

[HardWarrior]

Originally posted by: buzzsaw13

Originally posted by: LintMan
Windows Vista Ultimate

I believe thats the problem.

Anything to back this statement up other than you having XP installed?

 

[buzzsaw13]

Originally posted by: HardWarrior

Originally posted by: buzzsaw13

Originally posted by: LintMan
Windows Vista Ultimate

I believe thats the problem.

Anything to back this statement up other than you having XP installed?

Not really serious here, just poking fun at Vista

 

[mb]

Hmm... this is what I would try:
Uninstall game, reboot.
Uninstall nvidia graphics drivers, run Driver Sweeper, reboot.
Install the latest drivers. 32bit Vista drivers. or 64bit Vista drivers. Reboot.
Install Overlord. Test it without the patch, see how it works. Patch it, then see how it works. If it works fine, do nothing.
If it still doesn't work, try this hotfix http://www.nvidia.com/object/w...ws_vista_hotfixes.html

If none of that helps, I don't know what to tell you.

Overlord runs great on my machine, both when I had 32bit Vista and now that I have 64bit.

 

[HardWarrior]

Originally posted by: buzzsaw13

Originally posted by: HardWarrior

Originally posted by: buzzsaw13

Originally posted by: LintMan
Windows Vista Ultimate

I believe thats the problem.

Anything to back this statement up other than you having XP installed?

Not really serious here, just poking fun at Vista

Okay. But you do understand that there was no indication that you were joking, right?

 

[Regs]

No artifacts in other games?

I'm RMA'ing my factory over clocked GTS because Command and Conquer 3 ran super slow and had a few artifacts... while other games ran perfectly fine. Medieval 2 ran smooth too....until horizontal bands distorted the screen.

I tried Doom 3 just to test it more, but play through fine for 5-10 minutes.

 

[Noema]

Originally posted by: HardWarrior

Originally posted by: buzzsaw13

Originally posted by: HardWarrior

Originally posted by: buzzsaw13

Originally posted by: LintMan
Windows Vista Ultimate

I believe thats the problem.

Anything to back this statement up other than you having XP installed?

Not really serious here, just poking fun at Vista

Okay. But you do understand that there was no indication that you were joking, right?

Specially considering we have our fair share of Vista haters screaming "Z0mG V1st4 suxxx!!1" at every opportunity, and they aren't really joking.

 

[LintMan]

Originally posted by: mb
Hmm... this is what I would try:
Uninstall game, reboot.
Uninstall nvidia graphics drivers, run Driver Sweeper, reboot.
Install the latest drivers. 32bit Vista drivers. or 64bit Vista drivers. Reboot.
Install Overlord. Test it without the patch, see how it works. Patch it, then see how it works. If it works fine, do nothing.
If it still doesn't work, try this hotfix http://www.nvidia.com/object/w...ws_vista_hotfixes.html

If none of that helps, I don't know what to tell you.

Overlord runs great on my machine, both when I had 32bit Vista and now that I have 64bit.

I had tried most of those things already without any luck, but retried them again in your order with still no luck.

Then it occurred to me that I'm running my video card in the second PCI-e slot on my motherboard. (A problem with my case caused me to put it there). It's been running that way for months with no problems (Shivering Isles and Stalker both worked great with this configuration).

The details for the MS SLI hotfix mentions something about the system not using the second GPU in SLI mode with DirectX 10 and I thought maybe something similar was happening to me since my GPU was in the secondary slot. The hotfix itself didn't help, but I was finally motivated to deal with my case problem and put the board back in the primary slot. One more set of driver installs, and problem solved!

Like buzzsaw13, I was actually expecting this to be a Vista issue, likely related to the memory ones those MS hotfixes address. It still might be just Vista, but who knows, this problem might have bitten me in XP as well.

Thanks everyone!

 

[Regs]

You sound like you have the same problem as I did. Though having my 8800 by my chipset HSF unit caused some instability.

 

[mb]

That's weird.. because I had my 8800 in my middle PCI-E slot for a while because I was too lazy to switch around my hr-03 plus cooler, and Overlord ran fine even though the 8800 was in an 8x PCI-E slot.

But, I'm glad you got it working :thumbsup:

 

[LintMan]

Originally posted by: mb
That's weird.. because I had my 8800 in my middle PCI-E slot for a while because I was too lazy to switch around my hr-03 plus cooler, and Overlord ran fine even though the 8800 was in an 8x PCI-E slot.

But, I'm glad you got it working :thumbsup:

I think my secondary might have only been a 4x slot, so maybe that factors in. (But, again, other more graphically intensive games worked fine with that setup). Oh well, I'm just glad it works now. Thanks for the help!

 

[weeheed]

Take away the 360 controller and play with the keyboard and mouse.
Right now i'm using Logitech Rumblepad 2 and it works fine.
I tried my 360 controller and it became unplayable