Wouldn't it be great if the game got updated to 64-bit, DirectX11 and better multicore support?

Given how well (not well) their development team optimized graphics with DX9, don't expect their fingers to fly over their keyboards any better the second time around with a higher DX release.

I've entered bizarro world. Steve is being relaxed and Xord is the cynic. 🙂

But yes, I agree it would be nice. It's really the main thing that SWTOR would need to expand going forward. Too many potential users try things like PvP and get turned off by the poor fps.

I've entered bizarro world. Steve is being relaxed and Xord is the cynic. 🙂

 

But yes, I agree it would be nice. It's really the main thing that SWTOR would need to expand going forward. Too many potential users try things like PvP and get turned off by the poor fps.

Ultimately, the thing to focus on is the goal - improving performance (measured by FPS) in Warzones and 16-man Ops - rather than magic-wand methods of getting there.

After all, a bad algorithm remains bad if you port it to 64-bit / DX11 / Multicore. Given that 64-bit will do exactly nothing for or against the quality of the algorithm(1) - unless the problem springs from how the two instances of SWTOR.EXE communicate with each other (which could be eliminated by a 64-bit build) - it's fair to regard it as essentially unimportant.

I'd vote for DX11 support (requires at least Win7) as the most likely to provide direct benefit because it would *force* a rewrite of multiple parts of the game, and would probably provide an opportunity to chase out some of the primary weirdness and slowness from how "masses of players" are handled.

More parallelism (the essential element of what people mean when they say "multicore") might have an effect, but *probably* would require a move to a more recent DX version, e.g. DX11 for the most gain. (Aside: Horizon Zero Dawn has substantial parallelism in the main-CPU part of the game - it can fully load all 16 logical CPUs on my 8 core hyperthreaded main machine.)

(1) Well, it will do one thing *against* improving the algorithm. The compiled code and data will take up more memory, which will cause more cache spill, and cache spill is a major cause of slowness. More importantly, an increased memory footprint is more likely to cause "TLB" spill - the TLB is a different sort of cache, one that caches page table entries, and it is very small. My i7's TLB contains only 64 entries (per executing thread), which is hardly anything at all.

Reality Check....

If they Started TODAY, on 64bit....

It would not be ready for release for 4 to 6 years.

It WILL require a total rewrite of the entire game including changing the Game Engine. The hacked beta Hero engine they are currently using most likely can NOT be upgraded to 64bit much less be able to handle DirectX 11.

A new Game Engine will mean a total rewrite of ALL the graphic designs. Total rerecording of ALL voice-overs. Total redesign of ALL cut scenes. Total redo of all Gear, Weapons, Armor, Decorations, a total rewrite of the Entire game.

In short there is way too much that would need to be changed that is currently running on a Hacked Highly Modified Beta version of the Hero engine. There is NOTHING that could be used from the old engine or from the old Data. That would include loosing All your Characters and their gear since it's code is 32bit and the graphic wire-frame mats used for EVERYTHING is all written for 32 bit DirectX 9c.

If they ever do it, it would cost MILLIONS and take YEARS to do.

It's not a simple as everybody seems to think it is.

Don't Hold your Breath.....

Wouldn't it be great if the game got updated to 64-bit, DirectX11 and better multicore support?

Wouldn't it be great if I had wheels? I'd be a truck.

Vroom! Vroom!

Reality Check....

Small reality check on your reality check.

Total rerecording of ALL voice-overs.

Actually, no. Sound files are sound files. They might need to go back to the masters and regenerate the in-game data, but there's no reason to go back to the voice actors.

'Course, if they threw away the masters, that's a different story... (But I don't know whether they did or not, and nor do you.)

Wouldn't it be great if I had wheels? I'd be a truck.

 

Vroom! Vroom!

not really, you could be a segway

not really, you could be a segway

I thought that it was if one had wheels, they'd be a wagon...

On topic;

I don't know, CPUs and Cores and whatnot basically confuse me. (I'm a gaming geek, not a tech geek) Whenever talk starts about updating graphics and so forth, I always get concerned about the requirements being pushed past what people's computers can meet...

It WILL require a total rewrite of the entire game including changing the Game Engine. The hacked beta Hero engine they are currently using most likely can NOT be upgraded to 64bit much less be able to handle DirectX 11.

 

A new Game Engine will mean a total rewrite of ALL the graphic designs. Total rerecording of ALL voice-overs. Total redesign of ALL cut scenes. Total redo of all Gear, Weapons, Armor, Decorations, a total rewrite of the Entire game.

 

It's not a simple as everybody seems to think it is.

But it doesn't need to be as hard as you think it is. It would depend a lot upon certain aspects of a new 'engine'. Mainly it would depend upon how easy it would be to convert the current graphic and sound files to the new engine. It's conceivable that the conversion could be automated.

I thought that it was if one had wheels, they'd be a wagon...

 

 

On topic;

I don't know, CPUs and Cores and whatnot basically confuse me. (I'm a gaming geek, not a tech geek) Whenever talk starts about updating graphics and so forth, I always get concerned about the requirements being pushed past what people's computers can meet...

Not much of a techie myself, but I can't imagine them doing too much that would prevent a good chunk from playing their game. I know they've put out expansions that caused a lot of people to stop, but that was because they chose not to, and BW messed up. But to actually do something that stopped players from being able to play is a different situation....I hope.

But it doesn't need to be as hard as you think it is. It would depend a lot upon certain aspects of a new 'engine'. Mainly it would depend upon how easy it would be to convert the current graphic and sound files to the new engine. It's conceivable that the conversion could be automated.

That all depends on how badly they hacked the Beta Hero Engine. If they created new code that was not part of the original Game engine then there is no way they will ever be able to port or convert this game over if there are Non-Standard commands or operations created for the Hacked server that were NOT part of the original.

We have no idea how this was done but going on the fact that the current set of Dev's can not repeat the Original Game style or programing. That would suggest that they drastically changed the engines code to the point that only the devs that created that code really knows how it works. Thus why Patches and Addons are so badly written and buggy where the Original Game was NOT.

That all depends on how badly they hacked the Beta Hero Engine. If they created new code that was not part of the original Game engine then there is no way they will ever be able to port or convert this game over if there are Non-Standard commands or operations created for the Hacked server that were NOT part of the original.

 

We have no idea how this was done but going on the fact that the current set of Dev's can not repeat the Original Game style or programing. That would suggest that they drastically changed the engines code to the point that only the devs that created that code really knows how it works. Thus why Patches and Addons are so badly written and buggy where the Original Game was NOT.

I think they said before that they hacked the code pretty bad, some of the original devs did, then the newer ones added their own. It's been used as an excuse for them not updating a lot of the older stuff.

But it doesn't need to be as hard as you think it is. It would depend a lot upon certain aspects of a new 'engine'. Mainly it would depend upon how easy it would be to convert the current graphic and sound files to the new engine. It's conceivable that the conversion could be automated.

ESO uses a heavily upgraded and mofiified Hero Engine, which among other things offers DX11 support (and much better character creation). Do Bioware/EA still own the rights to that, or did they sell it off completely to ZOS?

Maybe. Depends what's causing the game's problems.

I'm thinking that it won't fix BioWare Magic™