Quantum Break: More like Quantum Broken.

Feb 19, 2009
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http://www.computerbase.de/2016-04/quantum-break-pc-uwp-probleme/

Firstly.

Moreover Vsync can not be switched, so that the maximum frame rate is linked to the refresh rate of the monitor. If the frame rate is no longer on or above the refresh rate used, Quantum Break knows also no mercy and halves the frame rate - from 59 possible be so represented 30 FPS. But those were not all limitations.

The G-Sync technology and freesync not work or is not properly.

This game has a 30 FPS cap. You can disable it. But disabling it will result in a ridiculous behavior. VSYNC is enforced via Win10 UWP. What happens is the frame rate on a 60hz monitor, will flip between 60 fps (if a GPU can reach it), and if it drops even to 59 fps, it drops down to 30 fps. There are massive stutters for all GPUs tested once this 30 fps frame rate cap is removed. o_O

If your monitor has a higher refresh rate, the stepping will be closer together, but no less jarring.

The problem is the old double-buffering vsync implemented by Remedy or it's UWP integration.

Quantum Break uses Classic Double Buffering so that the frame rate will be halved. If the frame rate alternately and then falls to a 60-Hz monitor below 60 FPS again on the value, there is a constant up and down between 30 and 60 FPS - the game degenerates with changing frametimes of 33.33 and 16.66 ms.

Frame time and such measurement cannot use Fraps or FCAT (DX12 & UWP limitations), but Intel's PresentMon works.

Pcgameshardware.de did a few GPUs and here's their results, summarized.

http://www.pcgameshardware.de/Quantum-Break-Spiel-15745/Specials/Technik-Test-1191358/

Top row is 1080p, bottom row is 1440p.

kTCmGzd.jpg


mYl2PZU.jpg


There's a video with the 980 showing this problem on pcgameshardware.de, and it's not good (the gameplay matches the PresentMon data). Scroll down to the bottom, start from 1:20m. Stutter-ville.

It seems MS has learnt absolutely NOTHING from the GoW:U disaster.

The game is basically unplayable unless you enjoy a 30 fps lock for the "cinematic feels". Oh, just as annoying, there's a heavy film grain filter that cannot be disabled. OMG.

I simply don't get why MS is wasting their money making games that won't sell, because let's face it, UWP is unpopular and the fact that they ship broken UWP games is going to reinforce gamers to avoid it like the plague.

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Edit: This problem can be fixed relatively easy, and it's a shock that these guys did not do it for the launch. All they need is dynamic vsync, which they actually use on the Xbone, so that if the frame rate drops below the monitor refresh rate, vsync is disabled (I suspect they could not do this, due to current UWP limitations). The other approach is to use triple buffering vsync and this will prevent the major 60 <-> 30 fps flip, with a slight cost of input lag (which is fine for a SP game).

Edit 2: Video from Digital Foundry, apparently the stutter is worse on NV, 390 runs it quite well! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zK2BUeYqLVI < --- 390 pwning the 970 hard, 50% to 90% faster! There's also potentially a problem with PresentMon not reflecting gameplay for AMD, as it's visually fine in recorded gameplay. Until there's a better tool, video capture is still the most reliable metric.
 
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SPBHM

Diamond Member
Sep 12, 2012
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from what I've heard the game was 100% an Xbox One exclusive until very late they decided to do this port, which clearly didn't work well... hopefully they will patch it, because the game itself is interesting....
but yes, these DX12 games like this one and Gears of War by MS are very poorly optimized,
 

ThatBuzzkiller

Golden Member
Nov 14, 2014
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Looking at those graphs it appears that AMD is winning big time ... D:

DX12 is a true saviour for AMD ... :D

Are they even using async compute ? :|
 

IllogicalGlory

Senior member
Mar 8, 2013
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This has to be one of if not the most disastrous PC port in recent memory. Resolution doesn't work properly (some things are rendered at 720p and such, just like the Xbone), UWP bullsh*t, no Anistropic Filtering, absolutely disgusting levels of performance and they jacked the price up on this relative to Xbone version.

How many of these disasters will it take before the industry realizes that this won't work anymore?
 
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Feb 19, 2009
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Looking at those graphs it appears that AMD is winning big time ... D:

DX12 is a true saviour for AMD ... :D

Are they even using async compute ? :|

Nobody is winning. It's all unplayable unless on a 30 fps cap. lol

The FPS is just a semi-interesting metric here, if it was not flipping all over the place, it would be much more relevant.
 

master_shake_

Diamond Member
May 22, 2012
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thank god microsoft is embracing pc gaming again.

the should let up a bit though.

looks like they're strangling it to death.
 

ThatBuzzkiller

Golden Member
Nov 14, 2014
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Nobody is winning. It's all unplayable unless on a 30 fps cap. lol

The FPS is just a semi-interesting metric here, if it was not flipping all over the place, it would be much more relevant.

These spikes are due to V-sync been on at all times, I guess they could add a V-sync option for people who want to deal with screen tearing instead of poor frametimes ...

It's still a win for AMD since Remedy practically knocked down Nvidia by two tiers ...

R9 390 = GTX 980 TI OC
 

HurleyBird

Platinum Member
Apr 22, 2003
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Looking at those graphs it appears that AMD is winning big time ... D:

DX12 is a true saviour for AMD ... :D

Are they even using async compute ? :|

On xbone, almost certainly. On PC? No idea.

Quantum break is a game that really pushes the boundaries of what the xbone is capable of rendering, so it comes as no surprise that it is optimized so single-mindedly for GCN. On the PS4 side, if Drive Club, The Order, or the new Drake game are ever ported to PC, I'd expect to see something similar given how much those games push the graphical envelope.

On the other hand, it's possible that Nvidia will be able to pull off some big performance boosts with newer drivers. This is one hardware enthusiasts should watch closely -- if Nvidia is able to significantly shrink the gap with drivers, and if Pascal based cards do much better vs. Maxwell in QB relative to other games. If the answer to both is no, then AMD's so-called "chess game" might just end up bearing fruit. If the answer to either is yes, then that's a very good sign for Nvidia.
 
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ThatBuzzkiller

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Nov 14, 2014
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On xbone, almost certainly. On PC? No idea.

Quantum break is a game that really pushes the boundaries of what the xbone is capable of rendering, so it comes as no surprise that it is optimized so single-mindedly for GCN. On the PS4 side, if Drive Club, The Order, or the new Drake game are ever ported to PC, I'd expect to see something similar given how much those games push the graphical envelope.

On the other hand, it's possible that Nvidia will be able to pull off some big performance boosts with newer drivers. This is one hardware enthusiasts should watch closely -- if Nvidia is able to significantly shrink the gap with drivers, and if Pascal based cards do much better vs. Maxwell in QB relative to other games. If the answer to both is no, then AMD's so-called "chess game" might just end up bearing fruit. If the answer to either is yes, then that's a very good sign for Nvidia.

If it were PS4 games, they would most likely show even more bias towards AMD since the compute power per geometry processing is even more skewed than the X1 ...

As for Nvidia releasing drivers it's very strange that they haven't done so yet when a AAA game studio like Remedy usually works with all IHVs and DX12 allows less opportunities with driver optimizations too ...
 
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Feb 19, 2009
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As for Nvidia releasing drivers it's very strange that they haven't done so yet when a AAA game studio like Remedy usually works with all IHVs and DX12 allows less opportunities with driver optimizations too ...

They already released "Game Ready" drivers for QB. Awhile ago actually.

This broken mess is the fault of UWP & Remedy/MS.
 
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So a game is broken if it doesn't have an option to turn off V-sync or if you don't want to play at 30FPS ? :\

It's not a good treatment for a AAA title, they want $69.99 for it, and we're supposed to be happy with a 30 fps cap or stutter?

At least implement a dynamic vsync if UWP vsync can't be overriden. ATM there's only two options, 30 fps lock, or dial down settings a lot to achieve 60 fps minimum. Not good for PC gaming.
 

ThatBuzzkiller

Golden Member
Nov 14, 2014
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It's not a good treatment for a AAA title, they want $69.99 for it, and we're supposed to be happy with a 30 fps cap or stutter?

At least implement a dynamic vsync if UWP vsync can't be overriden. ATM there's only two options, 30 fps lock, or dial down settings a lot to achieve 60 fps minimum. Not good for PC gaming.

The game is pretty demanding so cut Remedy some slack. The game shades at 720p and temporally reconstructs to 1080p on the X1 ...

I agree that Remedy should put in dynamic V-sync since it's on the X1 ...
 

AtenRa

Lifer
Feb 2, 2009
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A couple more Game releases like that and we can put MS DX-12 games at the same boat as GameWorks titles.

PC Games are taking the road to hell lately. Only one or two out of 10 titles are released in a good function manner. Hope other studios will release much better non broken DX-12 games the coming months.
 

VirtualLarry

No Lifer
Aug 25, 2001
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A couple more Game releases like that and we can put MS DX-12 games at the same boat as GameWorks titles.

PC Games are taking the road to hell lately. Only one or two out of 10 titles are released in a good function manner. Hope other studios will release much better non broken DX-12 games the coming months.

Yeah, this UWP thing sounds like it really limits games pretty badly. MS is killing PC gaming?
 
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dogen1

Senior member
Oct 14, 2014
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It doesn't seem like the performance would be that bad if v-sync could be disabled, at least for amd.

It looks like the 390 would be hitting around 45-50fps at 1080p max, which doesn't seem too far off from where it should be. The xbox is probably running a notch below max, and it's rendering essentially at 720p(ignoring temporal reconstruction) 30fps. So that's ~2x the pixels at a 50-60% higher framerate, at potentially higher settings. That would need around 3-4x the gpu, and an r9 390 is basically 4x the xb1 gpu.
 

IllogicalGlory

Senior member
Mar 8, 2013
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TheBuzzKiller said:
The game is pretty demanding so cut Remedy some slack. The game shades at 720p and temporally reconstructs to 1080p on the X1 ...
It does that on PC too, independent of which resolution you choose, or something of that nature. IQ sucks.

And you know what? Xbox one has an underclocked (85% of desktop clocks) DDR3 R7 260 in it (SRAM is nice though). This game tanks on an overclocked 980 Ti (nearly twice the clock speed, insanely faster memory, almost 4x the shaders, higher IPC). 1080p60 should be a breeze. Absolute failure.
 
Feb 19, 2009
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So far the one redeeming feature seems to be that IQ doesn't drop much from Ultra -> High.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpNfxO-LveQ

NV users on forums are reporting that the game runs much faster on High/Med than Ultra for them, where the 980Ti is capable of 60 fps stable at 1080p.

I guess that's an option.

But this forced vsync needs to go, or add the dynamic vsync that they use on Xbone. Cos that's the better approach.
 
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ThatBuzzkiller

Golden Member
Nov 14, 2014
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It does that on PC too, independent of which resolution you choose, or something of that nature. IQ sucks.

And you know what? Xbox one has an underclocked (85% of desktop clocks) DDR3 R7 260 in it (SRAM is nice though). This game tanks on an overclocked 980 Ti (nearly twice the clock speed, insanely faster memory, almost 4x the shaders, higher IPC). 1080p60 should be a breeze. Absolute failure.

It doesn't since there's no way to temporally change the sample positions in PC DirectX ...

The Xbox One is comparable to an HD 7770 and if we factor in better compilers and tools (Pure launch DX12 is not enough to close the gaps.) it could perform about 20% better than the PC equivalents and then we have to factor in the higher quality visuals too ...

Some games are just too hard to render at 1080p60FPS even with the best GPU money could buy ...
 

StrangerGuy

Diamond Member
May 9, 2004
8,443
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Nobody is winning

Bolded for the F-ing truth.

How more times does this needs to happen and dollars from their wallets lost on both software and hardware before the PC gaming master race gets that into their thick heads of theirs?
 

tential

Diamond Member
May 13, 2008
7,348
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So a game is broken if it doesn't have an option to turn off V-sync or if you don't want to play at 30FPS ? :\
Actually yes it is if it's a pc release. That's just unacceptable end of story this isn't debatable for the pc market.


Sad thing is, I've already filed ms releases under the same heading as game works. I expect them to be broken, although with Ms, I expect it to be even worse.
 

airfathaaaaa

Senior member
Feb 12, 2016
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that pr team or ms rivals the old of amd on stupidity what they are thinking and they keep letting such an unplayable game to even considered ready
 

TheRyuu

Diamond Member
Dec 3, 2005
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But this forced vsync needs to go

I believe they already stated that it is going. It should be included in the May update[1]. Stuff like mods are actually already supported[2] but the developer had to explicitly add support for it. I don't know if they intend to change any of the other stuff (which may actually already work).

UWP would never had worked in its current state because nobody would ever buy anything on it. It looks like it might actually become something usable but I'll reserve judgement until I actually see the changes.

Also remember that FSE no longer exists in the W10/DX12/WDDM 2.0 era and instead you get something like pseudo fullscreen but still actually borderless. Nvidia's Do's and Don'ts article[3] explains it pretty well. In this new mode the dwm shouldn't matter either, you can still get uncapped framerates and as far as I'm aware performance shouldn't be impacted.

[1] http://wccftech.com/uwp-vsync-fix-coming-overlay-modding-eventually-allowed/
[2] https://github.com/aL3891/AppxInstaller
[3] https://developer.nvidia.com/dx12-dos-and-donts#swapchains