Very effective way to increase FPS

[Soul Reapir]

Hey guys,

I was still kind of angry with the crappy FPS I was getting on my machine, so I went searching for some hints and tips. That's when I found this puppy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GN3Sjt0EFw4

This increased my FPS a ton, increasing my average FPS on the benchmark by 20 frames! This fix was especially helpful with loss of frames when zooming in. I barely notice any FPS drop when I zoom-in on the action now. I hope this helps you guys as much as this helped me. Definitely making my experience with the game a lot better.

Btw, do any of you know what this is actually doing? Because if this trick can be recreated on more games, I'll make a day out of doing this to all of them .

Extra note: This will reset your graphics settings and UI settings, so you'll have to change those back to what you want after this fix. It does not however effect any mods such as GEM thankfully.

[alQamar]

Hello thanks for the post, can you please run a benchmark in Rome 2 with the measure taken and after it and please post both result here? that would be really great thank you so much!
Increasing a ton, really don't help me at the moment.

(noticed you won't be able to do it, so perhaps anyone that would like to try out this solution should do)

Bascially he is deleting the preferences.script.txt so deleting all Rome 2 graphics settings. After that installing the DirectX distributional (dxwebsetup.exe). Normally you should have this installed as Steam does it. Perhaps it is bugged.

To be sure you have the lastest one please use dxwebsetup.exe from Microsoft, maybe a newer version as the one that come around with the game(s). However a fact Microsoft haven't updated this redist package for long time, also true it is NOT installed by Windows Updates nor it is automatically included in this patch level of 2011 in Windows XP, 7, and 8, so it makes much sense to check if it is up to date.


With a patch AFTER release CA modified the auto recognition of the graphic card and due you deleted the preferences he will now differently adjust your settings than they might be on "auto" before.

While I do not disagree with your idea and posting, I doubt this is a proper patch for bleeding wounds of many.

[Altimis]

Set units detail from above "high" to "high"

your FPS would be far alot better

Its not make your units look uglier, its just show how far its will be rendered

Description is misleading IMO

[Sun Jetzu]

I want to do this but I fear that my game wont work afterwards or something. OR CA releases a patch and I cant get it because I deleted this, or that my radious wont work anymore because I did this. Idk to many unkowns for me to be messing around with it. I could use better FPS but I dont want to not play the game. Can anybody let me know about any of my fears to alleviate them a little. it would be nice to get an fps boost.

[elor70]

I want to do this but I fear that my game wont work afterwards or something. OR CA releases a patch and I cant get it because I deleted this, or that my radious wont work anymore because I did this. Idk to many unkowns for me to be messing around with it. I could use better FPS but I dont want to not play the game. Can anybody let me know about any of my fears to alleviate them a little. it would be nice to get an fps boost.

Unless you delete the whole game folder you have nothing to worry about,steam re downloads any deleted files.
About the fix,its probably another one of those voodoo fixes. all it does is reset your graphic settings,the increase is because your graphic settings got lowered. no need to delete anything to do this,just go to options in game and tone down whatever you want.

[Sun Jetzu]

Unless you delte the whole game folder you have nothingto worry about,steam re downloads any deleted files.
About the fix,its probably another one of thoose vodoo fixes. all it does is reset your graphic settings,the increase is because your graphic settings got lowered. no need to delte anything to do this,just go to options in game and tone down whatever you want.

o okay thank you, yea I love the high end graphics. maybe not for large battles but for my slow motion videos yes. Thanks again!!!! Also I love your signature. The art it speaks to me. Check out Volound channel and his video on rome 2. its a rant and i think part 1 is only out. Theres a hilarious part with a dogs face and the broken rome 2 faces that had me in stitches!!!!
Found the link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DA6BOjqjfvI

[Prof]

Tried it, got my FPS boosted by 25. ^^

[alQamar]

I want to do this but I fear that my game wont work afterwards or something. OR CA releases a patch and I cant get it because I deleted this, or that my radious wont work anymore because I did this. Idk to many unkowns for me to be messing around with it. I could use better FPS but I dont want to not play the game. Can anybody let me know about any of my fears to alleviate them a little. it would be nice to get an fps boost.

you should have read my posting Sun. You are deleting the settings file he will instantly recreate once you launch the game.

[alQamar]

Tried it, got my FPS boosted by 25. ^^

guys. I wonder if you just read posts... by 25 what? +25 fps +25% fps, how you compared it... etc. What's so hard giving objective feedback on a quite interesting topic?
I will try it my own now. :&

[SamueleD]

Hey guys,

I was still kind of angry with the crappy FPS I was getting on my machine, so I went searching for some hints and tips. That's when I found this puppy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GN3Sjt0EFw4

[...]
Btw, do any of you know what this is actually doing? Because if this trick can be recreated on more games, I'll make a day out of doing this to all of them .

Yes:

1. He deleted all of his game preferences (I do it with every new patch).
2. He verified the integrity of the Rome II game cache, basically making sure that all the Rome II files are there (again, I do this after every patch).
3. He reinstalled DirectX, using the installer that comes with the game, technically using the DirectX Runtime webdownloader that you can get from Microsoft should do the same thing, the only difference is that the installer in the game is the entire SDK (software development kit), which you shouldn't need to just run the game.
4. He doesn't show on which settings the game is (it should be on the ones that the game auto-detects based on your GPU) and doesn't tell us which GPU he's using and runs the benchmark.

You should not that the video is old (September) and the game version is also old. It probably works simply because it gives you a clean preference file, with default settings, which are designed to make the game run smoothly, all the reinstall DirectX crap should be pointless, since in 99% of cases you should already have the latest compatible version of DirectX installed.

As alQ said, after one of the first patches the auto-detect settings were changed (lowered), which means that, if you were using the earlier default settings, resetting everything would give you lower settings, which means higher fps.

There's no magic trick, if it's working for you it simply means that the settings you were using were not optimal.

[Prof]

guys. I wonder if you just read posts... by 25 what? +25 fps +25% fps, how you compared it... etc. What's so hard giving objective feedback on a quite interesting topic?
I will try it my own now. :&

By an average of 25 fps.

[SamueleD]

By an average of 25 fps.

Good, that means that the settings you were using before were far too hard for you graphics card.

[alQamar]

So then guys,

I really don't want to appear selffish, but I am benchmarking this game since release and I am really into this topic and know what I am talking about when it comes to Rome 2 performance and possible tricks.

But as no one seems to be willing to test this approach objectively and some even do not understand what will be affected by this "trick" I spent some time myself and have to debunk this.


WHAT DOES THIS TRICK DO?
- lowering or at least adjusting your ingame graphics preset based on your hardware, according some profiles CA made and delivered with the game. Nothing less or more.


WHEN WILL IT HELP TO IMPROVE MY PERFORMANCE?
- if you are not adjusting graphic settings for this game yourself, or perhaps set them too high by yourself.
If you have better FPS then it is because your auto configuration has been revised in the database CA did and thus lower your graphic settings ingame. CA even documented this change in their patch log, stating on their forums, some auto preset where too high on launch and they consequently lowered it.

WHEN WILL IT NOT AFFECT MY PERFORMANCE:
If you do not have better FPS than before the trick you have done nothing wrong as he still picks the same settings, after the deletion of the settings file and the start of the game.
He will create a new preferences.script.txt (your graphic settings) once you terminate Rome 2.


- The FPS "improvement" will only affect you, if you do not adjust the graphic settings in the options menu manually. Mainly not raising them again.


Please think about it and you will understand my point.

I measured the game with the only objective method we have been offered, the ingame benchmark and compared performance again before and after doing this trick.
The deletion of the preference.script.txt assigned my settings to the ultra preset, testing the same settings before doing this trick I was able to find out that he is not boosting or improving your FPS aslong you are on the same settings.


Even we would love to jump on any bandwaggon of hope and see Rome 2 performance issues solved this one does not, regrettably

If you read the description of the youtube video, you might have noticed even the youtube made a disclaimer this trick might work for some and not for some others. And I explained it now why.
If you have any questions I am likely here to give you answers.

after applying the trick



before it:




0.1 fps is a measure tolerance, not a change.

[Soul Reapir]

When you say that this trick only changes your graphics settings you have to be wrong, unless you purely mean settings in the preference text file. I am using the same exact graphics settings that you can set in-game as I was before this fix, and it improved my FPS by 20 frames for the benchmark. So unless there are settings in the preference text file that are not changeable in the in-game settings menu, you are incorrect. Even in the video the guy says because of this fix, he can turn his graphics settings HIGHER then before because of the performance boost. I recommend everyone tries it. If it helps you like it did me and Prof (both gaining 20-25 FPS) then that's awesome, if not, this trick does not hurt anything besides you have to redo your graphics settings.

[elor70]

When you say that this trick only changes your graphics settings you have to be wrong, unless you purely mean settings in the preference text file. I am using the same exact graphics settings that you can set in-game as I was before this fix, and it improved my FPS by 20 frames for the benchmark. So unless there are settings in the preference text file that are not changeable in the in-game settings menu, you are incorrect. Even in the video the guy says because of this fix, he can turn his graphics settings HIGHER then before because of the performance boost. I recommend everyone tries it. If it helps you like it did me and Prof (both gaining 20-25 FPS) then that's awesome, if not, this trick does not hurt anything besides you have to redo your graphics settings.

The "fix" simply resets your graphic settings to a lower/higher defualt pre sets depending on your PC,nothing magical here. the so called increase happens because:
1.Your graphics are toned down.
2.something else non rome 2 related changed in your PC(installing drivers,re booting the PC,changing CPU/GPU settings,etc...)
3.While you changed back to the usual settings you use after the reset you forgot to increase something and or forgot to tick one of the boxes down in the menu(VRAM,SSAO,FOG,etc)

[SamueleD]

When you say that this trick only changes your graphics settings you have to be wrong, unless you purely mean settings in the preference text file. I am using the same exact graphics settings that you can set in-game as I was before this fix, and it improved my FPS by 20 frames for the benchmark. So unless there are settings in the preference text file that are not changeable in the in-game settings menu, you are incorrect. Even in the video the guy says because of this fix, he can turn his graphics settings HIGHER then before because of the performance boost. I recommend everyone tries it. If it helps you like it did me and Prof (both gaining 20-25 FPS) then that's awesome, if not, this trick does not hurt anything besides you have to redo your graphics settings.

Mmmh, there are only four (five) possible explanations:

• The preferences file has a setting that influences the game performance, but can't be changed in-game, this setting has remained in your pref file since day one, generating a new one solves the issue (this possibility is the main reason why I delete my pref file with every new patch).
• Your DirectX files were bugged and hampered your PC performance in DiretcX applications, a clean installation of DiretcX has solved the issue.
• Your game files were bugged, checking game cache integrity fixed them.
• Your preference file was using an old preset, too demanding for your GPU.
• (You did it wrong, you are not using the same settings, of course there's a difference!)

This "method" fixes a problem, it doesn't "massively improve your performance", it helps fixing a problem with your computer/game installation/settings, which means that it will work only if there is a problem to be fixed, if your settings/pc/game installation has a problem doing this will fix it, if not it won't change anything.
If the method works for you it simply means that you had at least one of the problems I listed, there is no magic trick involved.

Nowhere on the video he stats that he can use higher settings, he simply states that he can achieve 60 fps in the benchmark with highest settings. Which is a very vague statement considering that we don't know A) What hardware he's using B) What settings he's using. C) What settings he was using before.

Consider that the video is from September 11, 2013, a few days after patch 1 (and before patch 2), which notes:

Higher average frame rates with out-of-the-box settings (more conservative settings)

In which case, a new pref file would have improved your fps, and it would still do, if your pref file was still the same since September 3.

[Tr0tskY]

thought I might as well try this since I don't play this game anymore (in part due to bad performance, but mostly due to all the other problems)
didn't affect me one bit.

One thing I do notice is that anytime I verify my Rome 2 cache it ALWAYS re-aquires a file that is 12.1mb in size, Every time. What is this mystery broken file?

[Soul Reapir]

Well I won't argue with you guys then. You seem to know what your talking about. But for whatever reason it worked for me and at least one other person already, so I'm happy.

[Totalheadache]

this seems like it's good for people who arent familiar with optimising their pc/settings.

however if it works for some great.

in over ten years of experience have only ever found in the majority of cases a driver update/patch to never be more than a few fps here and there. however it's not all about about fps but smoothness as well, so any fix is worth attempting.

just recently i updated to windows 8.1 from vista and bf4 def runs better on my setup now (was surprised to find that an os change could really improve things, although people were saying this in beta). so will never rule out fixes like these even though personally i dont think it will make much diff for me. cant try it out because am not playing rome2 while the moronic torches are still in use.

[Denco]

Set units detail from above "high" to "high"

your FPS would be far alot better

Its not make your units look uglier, its just show how far its will be rendered

Description is misleading IMO

Lower settings do lower unit variety though, which is very noticeable playing the "barbarians tribes".