TSE has random lag spikes

[nintendonut888]

Hello. I have a most peculiar problem. I have owned both Serious Sam HD games for a year now, played and loved both of them. Unfortunately, this second playthrough has a big problem. At seemingly random points in the game, the game will suddenly lag like crazy. I don't have a great computer, so I always play on the lowest settings, and normally it runs perfectly fine. However, at these random points, the FPS dips to 4 FPS - clearly unplayable. Not just in Serious Sam, but the entire computer slows down, and other games and programs too. No other game I own does this. After five to fifteen minutes, it returns to normal.

I've dealt with this so far because I really love the game, but I am at the Grand Cathedral and I have to randomly stop every five minutes or so for fifteen minutes to pass before I can play again. I'm hoping that there is a solution to this problem, as well as an explanation for why this didn't happen my first playthrough. Since the problem may very well be related to my graphics driver, I have an Nvidia GeForce 9100. I notice there's an Nvidia-related thread, but I also don't understand what it's trying to tell me to do. Please help - I really wish to play the game without these frequent lag spikes.

[Mischievous]

Ohh odd, I have the same GPU as you. Does the game do that at the same spots or are they random? Did you got new drivers lately ? How long ago was your play through ?

[nintendonut888]

They appear to happen at completely random points. Throughout the game, it has happened outdoors, indoors, while walking, fighting, after dying, after breaking a setpiece, and once even on a pause screen. No matter how hard I try I can't find a correlation, other than the fact that it tends to happen more often in specific areas. For example, the main area in Elephant Atrium lagged every three minutes or so, while The Citadel was relatively merciful.

I did get a new driver, but it was a direct result of me trying to fix this problem. I accidentally deleted the computer's integrated graphics driver, but that was also a GeForce 9100, so it shouldn't have made a difference in the end.

My first playthrough was back in July when I first got the game. However, the last time I played before this was something like September of last year, when I beat TFE again (with no problems) and went as far as the Snake Yard in TSE (again, with no problems).

Were there any large updates involving the game during that time? At this point it's the only explanation that makes sense to me.

[Solais]

Actually, it's around that time, the end of October, last year when we got the Serious Editor, and the modded version patch.

[nintendonut888]

It's worth also saying that this problem appears to be inherent to TSE; I played TFE for about ten minutes and no slowdown ever occurred. Is there any way to roll back updates or something?

[Dean Sekulic]

My first guess would be overheating issue. It looks like it. :-/
Can you, just for test, select higher quality?
TIA

DEN

[nintendonut888]

Originally Posted by Dean Sekulic

My first guess would be overheating issue. It looks like it. :-/
Can you, just for test, select higher quality?
TIA

DEN

Well, I'm quite amazed (though seeing as you're Croteam I shouldn't be surprised). I turned up all performance options to medium (from lowest), and not only is my computer better than I thought it was, the lag spikes seem to be gone. I've been playing for fifteen minutes and nothing has happened! I don't know exactly why this is helping but, thank you! Now I can blow up hundreds of kamikazes in peace.

EDIT: ...Actually, it is slowing down now. Still, doing this has raised my playing time ten-fold. I completed nearly the entire war sequence near the end of Grand Cathedral without slowdown.

[Alen Ladavac]

I can't reach Dean right now, but if he said it is possibly heating issue, have you tried to improve cooling? Usual approach is to open the computer case and eventually blow a portable desk fan into it. Also, is it hot in your room (you know.... playing in the summer without air conditioning)?

[nintendonut888]

My computer (this one at least) has never had heating issues before this, and again they only happen while playing Serious Sam. Plus, that wouldn't make sense. Where I live, we are experiencing one of the mildest years on record with days rarely climbing above 70 in summer, and I played the first time in the middle of July last year with no problems.

It's again worth saying that his suggestion to raise the quality did help immensely. While it did slow down two more times before the end (I was at the Grand Cathedral), said slowdown came much further apart and lasted only two or three minutes, as opposed to the ten to fifteen it used to. This makes me think there's some stranger problem than a simple overheating, but you're the experts.

[Alen Ladavac]

Can you please post SamHD_TSE.log, please? From a session where such lag spikes occured. Maybe that sheds some light...

[Alen Ladavac]

Ok, so here's more info. What Dean meant was that if either GPU or CPU is overheating, bumping up higher quality only one of them ("CPU speed" only or "GPU speed" only), might give the other a bit more advantage and it won't heat so much. (Though you might try to accomplish the same thing by setting gfx_iMaxFPSActive to lower the maximum frame rate.)

Note that the fact that it didn't overheat last summer, does not necessarily mean it doesn't do so this year. What's the difference? Either the dust accumulated on the fans or grilles in the mean time, and/or plain age of the hardware. As most modern hardware is running near the peak of its allowed temperature range, it ages faster and unavoidable small material defects become more prominent after time.

Here is a thread from nvidia forums that confirm that 9100 often has similar problems, and that it is caused by overheating: http://forums.nvidia.com/index.php?showtopic=99637

But it could be the same thing with the CPU. You can't be sure at this point.

So.... let me tell this once again, if I had a dime for every time where opening the case, vacuuming the dust (be careful while doing that!) and/or pointing a fan into the opened case helped in cases of slowdowns and crashes, I'd be a rich man by now.