So, recently I got into No Man’s Sky and I can’t believe how terrible this game feels to play at times considering it came out in 2016.
My system specs are:
- Intel i7-8700K 6-core @ 3.7Ghz (Boost 4.7Ghz)
- 64GB DDR4 @ 2666Mhz
- AMD Radeon RX 7900 XTX
- 512GB Samsung 960 PRO
I am running on default HIGH preset @ 1080P and occasionally during starship launch / landing, teleport, or fast spin around with the camera, the game slows to a crawl for a second or so…
If I try to play on the default ULTRA preset @ 1080P, the game tends to slow to a crawl during normal jet pack surfing around the planet.
I mean, I know I am playing it on an 8th generation Intel processor and Linux using Steam Proton, but good Lord… there is no excuse for this. I can play RDR2 (a newer title and much more demanding game) max default GFX settings and it screams @ 1080P; it’s not like I am 4K gaming here…
If anyone has any suggestions, please… I am all ears.
In addition, if anyone else is playing using a Steam Controller, the default supported config is great; however, the right trackpad for camera look is kind of screwed up due to simulating a joystick with a deadzone. If you change the config to have no deadzone it worrks 100% better.
Personally I would prefer mouse look on the right trackpad, but I don’t know if No Man’s Sky can support dual input like that.
I don’t have NMS nor a 7900 XTX, but I guess first thing I’d do is install hwinfo and run it in the background to make sure nothing is overheating. As far as I know, NMS is not a cpu intensive game, so I don’t think the processor is the culprit.
I guess resizable bar could be a problem (in that the 8700k doesn’t support it). I don’t know that it would make a huge difference but it is one issue (only ~10% uplift I would wager).
I guess lastly maybe something with your ssd? I can’t recall if the 960 pro had the firmware overheating bug or whatever or if it was a different model.
I did see one video on YouTube benchmarking 3440x1440 NMS on ultra at 120+ fps, so there’s definitely something going on. It could be the proton version or something as well. If I have some time I’ll look into that, but hopefully hwinfo or any monitoring of your choice can at least get you to rule out a thermal throttle scenario.
I did some research on resizable bar for Intel, and the i7-8700K does support it, and so does my motherboard, but it wasn’t enabled; however, this does not have any perceptible impact on performance that I can tell despite some online sources clearly indicating it can boost performance ~10-20% if the game is GPU bound. I did verify in Linux that the previous bar was set to 256MB and 2MB, and after enabling it detects the AMD 7900 XTX has 24GB VRAM and sets the bar to 32GB, so… it is working, just not seeing improvements.
This leads me to either NMS is CPU bound for me or there must be something else going on. I checked my SSD temps and while it does run much hotter than a traditional HDD, it is within the data sheet specs of 60-70 C. I will have to try and monitor more often to see if I can find out what is going on…
As far as dual input goes, just try it and see and you can always switch back if it doesn’t work.
Everything else is weird. The only issue I notice one the steam deck, a far lesser machine, is a spot of lag the moment you leave atmosphere. This can be “resolved” by unpacking a game archive file with the downside of having an additional mod notification when launching game.
If you haven’t already, try using proton ge or tkg but these days it’s hit or miss whether there is a noticable difference from the steam default. It could be the packed archives though, there is a “mod” on nexus that details how to just unpack it yourself.
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Just to add another data point, I have the same experience on windows and haven’t been able to solve it. I’m on windows 10, also an 8700k, and an RTX 3090. This build has no issues running modern stuff like cyberpunk /w ultra raytracing, starfield, bg3, etc.
Performance was never perfect but it absolutely tanked a few major updates ago. I THINK it was around the time the performance issues cropped up on the series x as well.
If you find any cause other than just “doesn’t play nice with older Intel CPUs” I’d love to know.
