Question on Shogun 2 performance

[frozentundra123456]

I just got Shogun 2, and am interested in what is limiting my performance. I have a HD7770 and an i5 2320. I am playing at 1080p, a mix of high and ultra settings, no AA, get about 30fps.

I assumed I would be GPU limited, which I am most of the time, since GPU usage is 100%. But surprisingly, one core of the cpu pegs immediately at 100% as well, while the other 3 cores show low usage, less than 40 or 50 percent. So question is, am I cpu limited as well as gpu limited? If I got a stronger graphics card and use the same settings, would I see an increased framerate or would the cpu then be limiting. I thought this game was supposed to be fairly well coded for multiple cores, but with my system, it seems very dependent on single core performance.

 

[blastingcap]

Shogun 2 is one of the slowest-loading games out there, a CPU and GPU hog, and even if you turn it down to DX9 instead of DX11 it's still slow. And not very multithreaded so multiple cores will not save you, as you have found out. I refuse to buy any more games by Creative Assembly until they put more serious effort into multithreading their games.

 

[frozentundra123456]

Shogun 2 is one of the slowest-loading games out there, a CPU and GPU hog, and even if you turn it down to DX9 instead of DX11 it's still slow. And not very multithreaded so multiple cores will not save you, as you have found out. I refuse to buy any more games by Creative Assembly until they put more serious effort into multithreading their games.

Yea, I did not mention it, but I was very frustrated by the load times too. The first time I started the game, I thought it was not going to load at all because it sat so long on the loading screen.

 

[BrightCandle]

No game I know of uses all your cores at 100%, they simply don't multi thread on that way. You determine limitations by over clock/under clocking one of the components and rerunning the benchmark. If the game responds linearly to the increase/decrease they that is the bottleneck. In your case I would suspect you are GPU limited for your fps and CPU limited for game load.

 

[blastingcap]

Yea, I did not mention it, but I was very frustrated by the load times too. The first time I started the game, I thought it was not going to load at all because it sat so long on the loading screen.

Use DX9 and it becomes bearable. DX11 load times are simply crazy. SSD will not fix it, nor will a fast GPU. The game is apparently CPU bottlenecked unpacking textures or something.

 

[frozentundra123456]

No game I know of uses all your cores at 100%, they simply don't multi thread on that way. You determine limitations by over clock/under clocking one of the components and rerunning the benchmark. If the game responds linearly to the increase/decrease they that is the bottleneck. In your case I would suspect you are GPU limited for your fps and CPU limited for game load.

Good advice, but I cant really overclock either one. I have an off the shelf system with an H77 mb, so cant overclock the cpu. I had assumed I could overclock the HD7770, but every time I try to overclock even a few mhz it crashes the display driver. Dont know if I just got a bad card for overclocking or if my PSU is not up to it. I dont think the PSU should be a problem though, it is a Dell XPS with a 460 watt PSU. Even if not the best quality it should easily handle a 7770 and allow some headroom for overclocking.

I am just shocked that it shows this load on one core of the cpu. I have never seen this in any other games, even supposedly cpu intensive ones like Skyrim and SC2.

 

[blastingcap]

Good advice, but I cant really overclock either one. I have an off the shelf system with an H77 mb, so cant overclock the cpu. I had assumed I could overclock the HD7770, but every time I try to overclock even a few mhz it crashes the display driver. Dont know if I just got a bad card for overclocking or if my PSU is not up to it. I dont think the PSU should be a problem though, it is a Dell XPS with a 460 watt PSU. Even if not the best quality it should easily handle a 7770 and allow some headroom for overclocking.

I am just shocked that it shows this load on one core of the cpu. I have never seen this in any other games, even supposedly cpu intensive ones like Skyrim and SC2.

Shogun 2 is close to being a single threaded game. CPU bottleneck for many people.. same as for SC2 though at least for SC2 it's two-threaded.

And upcoming TW games will be piles of stinking poo in that regard as well, if this thread is accurate:

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/show...-not-going-to-optimize-CPU-usage-past-low-end!

 

[PowerYoga]

SSD cuts down on load times a bit, but not by much. It's one of the only games I keep on the SSD, but I haven't played it much as of late.

 

[Agent11]

Honestly I've never really been bothered by the load times.

 

[mizzou]

weird, I haven't had any loading issues... nothing special here in my PC its 3 years old

 

[shortylickens]

The game is bigger than my SSD.

 

[tacosrcool]

The game is bigger than my SSD.

Get a bigger one then!

Shogun load times are long but not unbearable