Rome: Total War stutters at all times

**Geleco** · May 12, 2013, 08:23 PM

In battles and in the campaign map, the game just stutters for apparently no reason. My system specifications are massively in front of the specs for the game (the reason why I think this is happening) and I'm running Win 7 64 ultimate. This is the Steam version of the game. I played Rome on my older pre-assembled Gateway from 2007 for a while, but now that I have a new computer I thought it would destroy the game. I looked all over the place but can't find a way to fix this.

DxDiag:

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**irishron** · May 12, 2013, 08:31 PM

Stutters as in scrolling over cites and mountains for instance?
Do you have any mods installed?
Have you tried various graphics settings including resolution?

**MrVoila** · May 14, 2013, 11:34 PM

I have this same problem man. Are you by chance running an ATI videocard and CCC? I think it may have something to do with that. Your stutters are kind of random, right? Like while you're moving, your framerate will drop to around 30 for like a quarter of a second, right? On the campaign map, too.

**taylorb1031** · July 18, 2013, 04:06 AM

I know this thread is old but I just wanted to give the solution to the stuttering problem since I had the same problem and this seemed to fix it.
It seems the game might have a problem auto detecting newer video cards or processors so we have to delete the auto detect settings or I guess you could just change them and try to figure out what to put the settings at.
Anyway here is the file location to delete or change the settings to eliminate the stuttering.
Click start,computer,local disk C program files x86 if you are on 64 bit or just program files if not on 64 bit,Activision,Rome Total War,Data then scroll down and look for descr_auto_optimise_options.txt and delete it.That is it your game should now run without the stuttering.

**MrVoila** · September 12, 2013, 10:23 PM

Originally Posted by taylorb1031

I know this thread is old but I just wanted to give the solution to the stuttering problem since I had the same problem and this seemed to fix it.
It seems the game might have a problem auto detecting newer video cards or processors so we have to delete the auto detect settings or I guess you could just change them and try to figure out what to put the settings at.
Anyway here is the file location to delete or change the settings to eliminate the stuttering.
Click start,computer,local disk C program files x86 if you are on 64 bit or just program files if not on 64 bit,Activision,Rome Total War,Data then scroll down and look for descr_auto_optimise_options.txt and delete it.That is it your game should now run without the stuttering.

Hi taylorb. Thanks for the attempt, I'm not sure about the original author, but your suggestion did not work for me unfortunately

. I still get massive stuttering all the time, rendering the game pretty unplayable.

**JVR** · October 29, 2013, 03:00 PM

ya didn't seem to work for me either, goddammit! I just wanna play my old Rome mods bnut not li8ke this frame rate is so slow on campaign map its brutal

**darkfng** · November 03, 2013, 12:12 AM

My new laptop came with dual graphics cards, Intel and Nvidia. The default setting for Rome Total War was using the Intel chipset, which caused stuttering.

I right clicked the desktop, entered Nvidia control panel, then 3d settings and selected my RTW.exe and chose the Nvidia card as the preferred choice.

The game runs perfectly now.

I have actually changed the default for everything to Nvidia, can anyone tell me what the point of the Intel chipset is? It seems like it would always be a poorer choice than Nvidia.

**War lord** · November 03, 2013, 09:13 AM

Originally Posted by darkfng

My new laptop came with dual graphics cards, Intel and Nvidia. The default setting for Rome Total War was using the Intel chipset, which caused stuttering.

I right clicked the desktop, entered Nvidia control panel, then 3d settings and selected my RTW.exe and chose the Nvidia card as the preferred choice.

The game runs perfectly now.

I have actually changed the default for everything to Nvidia, can anyone tell me what the point of the Intel chipset is? It seems like it would always be a poorer choice than Nvidia.

The Intel is the onboard graphics, the Nvidia is the graphics card you payed extra for.

**darkfng** · November 03, 2013, 07:43 PM

Thanks, do I need the onboard graphics? What is the point of Acer selling me a laptop with onboard graphics and a separate video card? Is there a benefit to having/using the onboard graphics that I am not seeing?

**irishron** · November 03, 2013, 08:12 PM

Any of Intel's i cpus have builtin graphics. you buy them that way. Total War games is when you need the dedicated graphics cards to play and pay for. Movies will play great on the integrated chip and be a power saver.

If you want to know more your cpu and the Nvidia graphics card you have, research Optimus Technology.

**Halie Satanus** · November 04, 2013, 10:18 AM

My RTW ran fine up until recently, right about the time I installed RII. Now I get huge lag with RTW (RII has never been playable).. I'm if installing RII really has caused this (Directx problem maybe), or if it's just co-incidence..

**irishron** · November 04, 2013, 11:01 AM

I'd say coincidence. Are you using high poly count textures? I read CA uses them for RII.

**Halie Satanus** · November 04, 2013, 11:15 AM

Nothing this machine can't handle, it worked before no worries... I'll get into it when I have more time... cheers any way..

**JVR** · November 08, 2013, 11:47 AM

you would think the brilliant minds at CA would figure this problem out already

**LucaP1000** · December 10, 2013, 04:41 PM

To not create another topic, I've gotten just recently a stutter-freeze issue with several Total War games. I've played for months with no problem, but now both Rome and Medieval II have started getting constant mini-freezes for no reason. It doesn't happen a lot in the menus, but in-game, it always freezes every 3 seconds and it's unplayable, unless I pause the battle, which stops it somehow. I also have a similar issue on Rome 2: the game is normal, but the music freezes every 3 seconds (probably connected to the Rome-Medieval 2 issue). I've checked the pc for viruses because it's strange, but nothing found; I've already tried reinstalling Rome 1, but the problem is still there. Only on Napoleon I have no issues at all. Hope someone can help me, thanks in advance.

**irishron** · December 10, 2013, 05:24 PM

Originally Posted by LucaP1000

To not create another topic, I've gotten just recently a stutter-freeze issue with several Total War games. I've played for months with no problem, but now both Rome and Medieval II have started getting constant mini-freezes for no reason. It doesn't happen a lot in the menus, but in-game, it always freezes every 3 seconds and it's unplayable, unless I pause the battle, which stops it somehow. I also have a similar issue on Rome 2: the game is normal, but the music freezes every 3 seconds (probably connected to the Rome-Medieval 2 issue). I've checked the pc for viruses because it's strange, but nothing found; I've already tried reinstalling Rome 1, but the problem is still there. Only on Napoleon I have no issues at all. Hope someone can help me, thanks in advance.

Clean out your computer's case.
Be sure all fans are working correctly while open.
Check your temps and voltages.

**LucaP1000** · December 11, 2013, 07:52 AM

Strange. To make it clear, the game runs perfectly at a normal framerate, it's just that this mini-freezing problem just popped up out of nowhere one of these days. I don't think it's related to fans-temps-voltages because it only happens on those games. It might be the graphic card, but I haven't updated it recently. Albeit there's several windows updates I got at about the same time the problem appeared.

**irishron** · December 11, 2013, 09:05 AM

Possibly coincidence.
Do the Windows updates, then the graphics updates, then check the voltages and temps.
I have had a bad time tracing things like this in the past because about three things happening at once and trying to figure out which one caused.

**LucaP1000** · December 13, 2013, 11:45 AM

I think it has to do with some settings, nvidia and the game. I've tried running many times with slightly different results. I'll see if I can find the source of the problem. Thanks for the help, though