[Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
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Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
Yes, that. If you hit 'Pause' while game loads, it indeed is in paused state afterwards, but all (NPC) objects are not visible before you unpause a bit. I had saved while chasing Oddy. After load (and "pre-paused") the 3D model was visible, but no icon on map or gravidar. Had to unpause (briefly) to be able to select/target it again.
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Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
There is one thing I want to still try to speed it up more:
- Cache the save-game directory on a RAM-disk and synchronize back to permanent storage using a low priority process while the game is running.
This should also help with other games that have large savegames.
I have no clue if using a RAM-disk helps though, so will need to test that first.
- Cache the save-game directory on a RAM-disk and synchronize back to permanent storage using a low priority process while the game is running.
This should also help with other games that have large savegames.
I have no clue if using a RAM-disk helps though, so will need to test that first.
Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
a) Use Linux. It has better save times because of how the OS and Filesystem (even the archaic ext4) are designed and ofc much better Scheduler. The game runs 20% faster on same rig under Linux, using my 12 core (24 thread) CPU too compared to windows.Roeleveld wrote: ↑Mon, 1. Mar 21, 13:10There is one thing I want to still try to speed it up more:
- Cache the save-game directory on a RAM-disk and synchronize back to permanent storage using a low priority process while the game is running.
This should also help with other games that have large savegames.
I have no clue if using a RAM-disk helps though, so will need to test that first.
b) On Windows do the following to speed the save times.
- remove save folder from indexing
- remove save folder from the Windows Defender through exception
- remove save folder from any other antivirus you have
Ofc saving on HDD or SSD it still much slower than on M.2 NVME.
Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
Already doPanos wrote: ↑Mon, 1. Mar 21, 15:11a) Use Linux. It has better save times because of how the OS and Filesystem (even the archaic ext4) are designed and ofc much better Scheduler. The game runs 20% faster on same rig under Linux, using my 12 core (24 thread) CPU too compared to windows.Roeleveld wrote: ↑Mon, 1. Mar 21, 13:10There is one thing I want to still try to speed it up more:
- Cache the save-game directory on a RAM-disk and synchronize back to permanent storage using a low priority process while the game is running.
This should also help with other games that have large savegames.
I have no clue if using a RAM-disk helps though, so will need to test that first.
Got NVMe and 16 core CPU.b) On Windows do the following to speed the save times.
- remove save folder from indexing
- remove save folder from the Windows Defender through exception
Test if you can save time by not compressing the save file (it option at settings). If you have a quad core it will save time. If you have 8-12-16 core (16/24/32 thread) CPU not that much.
- remove save folder from any other antivirus you have
Ofc saving on HDD or SSD it still much slower than on M.2 NVME.
Still planning on testing using tmpfs for the savegames.
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Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
Do the game save Data of destroyed objects? seams unlogical to keep track of objects no longer present in the universe
i know some games saves the data where a object came from etc and what happen to it (it if for example station is destroyed it's objects no longer have a function so it should no longer be present within the savefile
also i would not mind a game setting's that reduce log files to a hour, if the savefile getting smaller by it. (smaller savefile faster loading)
i know some games saves the data where a object came from etc and what happen to it (it if for example station is destroyed it's objects no longer have a function so it should no longer be present within the savefile
also i would not mind a game setting's that reduce log files to a hour, if the savefile getting smaller by it. (smaller savefile faster loading)
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Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
What percentage of the save is the log?abisha1980 wrote: ↑Tue, 30. Mar 21, 22:29Do the game save Data of destroyed objects? seams unlogical to keep track of objects no longer present in the universe
i know some games saves the data where a object came from etc and what happen to it (it if for example station is destroyed it's objects no longer have a function so it should no longer be present within the savefile
also i would not mind a game setting's that reduce log files to a hour, if the savefile getting smaller by it. (smaller savefile faster loading)
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Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
If this is the case then it would mean sub optimal I/O calls. I doubt it is the case.
HDDs are not slow in this situation. The save file is a continuous file and as such most HDDs should be able to hits speeds of at least 60 MB/sec write and probably higher. In this case writing the entire save file to a mechanical drive should take roughly 2 seconds. Compared with the 30-40 seconds to save this should get masked entirely by asynchronous I/O. This is assuming the file cache does not swallow it up entirely in which case you are effectively writing to a RAM drive already which is faster than even a high end NVMe drive.
Destroyed stuff that has fully decayed should not get saved. Of course if it is all cleaned up properly is another question and it is possible that there could be bugs causing objects or data to effectively leak.abisha1980 wrote: ↑Tue, 30. Mar 21, 22:29Do the game save Data of destroyed objects? seams unlogical to keep track of objects no longer present in the universe
i know some games saves the data where a object came from etc and what happen to it (it if for example station is destroyed it's objects no longer have a function so it should no longer be present within the savefile
also i would not mind a game setting's that reduce log files to a hour, if the savefile getting smaller by it. (smaller savefile faster loading)
Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
Look, as I wrote earlier,if you use Windows 10 deactivate the indexing and the antivirus check on the save folderImperial Good wrote: ↑Wed, 31. Mar 21, 03:30If this is the case then it would mean sub optimal I/O calls. I doubt it is the case.
HDDs are not slow in this situation. The save file is a continuous file and as such most HDDs should be able to hits speeds of at least 60 MB/sec write and probably higher. In this case writing the entire save file to a mechanical drive should take roughly 2 seconds. Compared with the 30-40 seconds to save this should get masked entirely by asynchronous I/O. This is assuming the file cache does not swallow it up entirely in which case you are effectively writing to a RAM drive already which is faster than even a high end NVMe drive.Destroyed stuff that has fully decayed should not get saved. Of course if it is all cleaned up properly is another question and it is possible that there could be bugs causing objects or data to effectively leak.abisha1980 wrote: ↑Tue, 30. Mar 21, 22:29Do the game save Data of destroyed objects? seams unlogical to keep track of objects no longer present in the universe
i know some games saves the data where a object came from etc and what happen to it (it if for example station is destroyed it's objects no longer have a function so it should no longer be present within the savefile
also i would not mind a game setting's that reduce log files to a hour, if the savefile getting smaller by it. (smaller savefile faster loading)
It will greatly speed your saves.
Blame sht MS products on that. Even the archaic ext4 is faster than Windows Filesystem let alone the more current new ones.
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Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
The file systems used by Windows is more than fast enough for such effectively trivial workloads. My own personal testing with Java showed I could easily hit read speeds of over 2 GB/sec (including decompression, garbage collection stalls and other sub-optimal overhead) and write speeds which saturate an underlying mechanical drive. Maybe it is not the fastest, but if it goes effectively the speed limit does it matter for tasks like this?
Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
It may be fine with large continuous blocks of data. However IO can be pretty terrible compared to Linux when it comes to iterating or generally operations with more than a handful of files.Imperial Good wrote: ↑Thu, 1. Apr 21, 18:07The file systems used by Windows is more than fast enough for such effectively trivial workloads. My own personal testing with Java showed I could easily hit read speeds of over 2 GB/sec (including decompression, garbage collection stalls and other sub-optimal overhead) and write speeds which saturate an underlying mechanical drive. Maybe it is not the fastest, but if it goes effectively the speed limit does it matter for tasks like this?
Not that that is necessarily of any concern here.
X:BtF: 7/10 | X2: 8/10 | X3:R/TC/AP: 8/10 | X:R: 3/10 | X4: 0/10 (3 points for split ships and stations, 4.0 -> -50 points).
If you are raising pirate activity, give me meaningful ways to deal with them PERMANENTLY. Better things to do than replacing ships every 10 minutes, or babysitting ships getting harassed.
Stopped playing X4 with 4.0 due to outrageous, needless and pointless nerfs to everything. Don't change what wasn't broken in the first place.
If you are raising pirate activity, give me meaningful ways to deal with them PERMANENTLY. Better things to do than replacing ships every 10 minutes, or babysitting ships getting harassed.
Stopped playing X4 with 4.0 due to outrageous, needless and pointless nerfs to everything. Don't change what wasn't broken in the first place.
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Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
it's obvious the game is to blame for the slow loading, i use NVMe on my C drive and have foundations stored on my other NVMe drive that have a speed of 3.2GB/s
i read somewhere on this topic or a other the problem is world building, so that needs fixing
so why not use the same tactics other games use loading low resources then add higher resources into the memory?
if i load for example cyberpunk 2077 it only takes 5 seconds to load a game no matter the size of the save (cyberpunk is 68,9GB that's almost 3.5 more data) (foundations is only 19,8GB)
The devs can also cheat by loading only the sector the player is in, i do not see why the game need to build the whole universe if you only can be present in a single location.
also i think this need to be addressed before the devs go making more content to the game because more data means even longer loading
i read somewhere on this topic or a other the problem is world building, so that needs fixing
so why not use the same tactics other games use loading low resources then add higher resources into the memory?
if i load for example cyberpunk 2077 it only takes 5 seconds to load a game no matter the size of the save (cyberpunk is 68,9GB that's almost 3.5 more data) (foundations is only 19,8GB)
The devs can also cheat by loading only the sector the player is in, i do not see why the game need to build the whole universe if you only can be present in a single location.
also i think this need to be addressed before the devs go making more content to the game because more data means even longer loading
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Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
Majorly different games, you just cannot compare them.abisha1980 wrote: ↑Thu, 1. Apr 21, 18:58it's obvious the game is to blame for the slow loading, i use NVMe on my C drive and have foundations stored on my other NVMe drive that have a speed of 3.2GB/s
i read somewhere on this topic or a other the problem is world building, so that needs fixing
so why not use the same tactics other games use loading low resources then add higher resources into the memory?
if i load for example cyberpunk 2077 it only takes 5 seconds to load a game no matter the size of the save (cyberpunk is 68,9GB that's almost 3.5 more data) (foundations is only 19,8GB)
The devs can also cheat by loading only the sector the player is in, i do not see why the game need to build the whole universe if you only can be present in a single location.
also i think this need to be addressed before the devs go making more content to the game because more data means even longer loading
Cyperbunk doesn't have to care about anything that is beyond your view distance. X4 on the other hand has to create at least some kind of representation in memory for every single ship and station in the entire universe, whether or not you even know about that station/ship does not matter. The entire economy is simulated at all times, as such all the ships and stations have to exist. It also needs to simulate them traveling, track ship/station inventory, subtract or add from/to it. To be able to do that the station has to have some form of existence in memory. It won't load any of the assets for it, it is not being rendered, there are no collision checks etc, but it still has to exist and be tracked in order to be able to simulate the economy properly.
They are already kind of cheating with OOS combat for example iirc, to reduce the amount of calculations necessary (e.g. no projectile simulation for fights, just look at weapons equipped compare strengths and be done with it [oversimplified]).
X:BtF: 7/10 | X2: 8/10 | X3:R/TC/AP: 8/10 | X:R: 3/10 | X4: 0/10 (3 points for split ships and stations, 4.0 -> -50 points).
If you are raising pirate activity, give me meaningful ways to deal with them PERMANENTLY. Better things to do than replacing ships every 10 minutes, or babysitting ships getting harassed.
Stopped playing X4 with 4.0 due to outrageous, needless and pointless nerfs to everything. Don't change what wasn't broken in the first place.
If you are raising pirate activity, give me meaningful ways to deal with them PERMANENTLY. Better things to do than replacing ships every 10 minutes, or babysitting ships getting harassed.
Stopped playing X4 with 4.0 due to outrageous, needless and pointless nerfs to everything. Don't change what wasn't broken in the first place.
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Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
hmm got me thinking if they remove teleport or release it with a hard limit of 5 sectors they can basic have to simulate only 5 sectors around the playerXGamer wrote: ↑Thu, 1. Apr 21, 19:48Majorly different games, you just cannot compare them.abisha1980 wrote: ↑Thu, 1. Apr 21, 18:58it's obvious the game is to blame for the slow loading, i use NVMe on my C drive and have foundations stored on my other NVMe drive that have a speed of 3.2GB/s
i read somewhere on this topic or a other the problem is world building, so that needs fixing
so why not use the same tactics other games use loading low resources then add higher resources into the memory?
if i load for example cyberpunk 2077 it only takes 5 seconds to load a game no matter the size of the save (cyberpunk is 68,9GB that's almost 3.5 more data) (foundations is only 19,8GB)
The devs can also cheat by loading only the sector the player is in, i do not see why the game need to build the whole universe if you only can be present in a single location.
also i think this need to be addressed before the devs go making more content to the game because more data means even longer loading
Cyperbunk doesn't have to care about anything that is beyond your view distance. X4 on the other hand has to create at least some kind of representation in memory for every single ship and station in the entire universe, whether or not you even know about that station/ship does not matter. The entire economy is simulated at all times, as such all the ships and stations have to exist. It also needs to simulate them traveling, track ship/station inventory, subtract or add from/to it. To be able to do that the station has to have some form of existence in memory. It won't load any of the assets for it, it is not being rendered, there are no collision checks etc, but it still has to exist and be tracked in order to be able to simulate the economy properly.
They are already kind of cheating with OOS combat for example iirc, to reduce the amount of calculations necessary (e.g. no projectile simulation for fights, just look at weapons equipped compare strengths and be done with it [oversimplified]).
objects outside this region can be put on low calculation if object 1 moves at speed X it will take object 1 X time to reach destiny (very basic calculation a modern processor can handle this task with each for millions of objects
then they also need to add medium level (objects by players that gives a range view) say ships they only need to show a proxy of what's going on don't need to be accurate time the player is on the destination whole data set should be calculated
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Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
Do you even know what you are talking about? Cyperpunk doesn't have 68.9GB sized saves neither does Foundations have 19.8GB saves.abisha1980 wrote: ↑Thu, 1. Apr 21, 18:58it's obvious the game is to blame for the slow loading, i use NVMe on my C drive and have foundations stored on my other NVMe drive that have a speed of 3.2GB/s
i read somewhere on this topic or a other the problem is world building, so that needs fixing
so why not use the same tactics other games use loading low resources then add higher resources into the memory?
if i load for example cyberpunk 2077 it only takes 5 seconds to load a game no matter the size of the save (cyberpunk is 68,9GB that's almost 3.5 more data) (foundations is only 19,8GB)
The devs can also cheat by loading only the sector the player is in, i do not see why the game need to build the whole universe if you only can be present in a single location.
also i think this need to be addressed before the devs go making more content to the game because more data means even longer loading
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Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
I don't want to be rude but before throwing in suggestions for improvements, you should understand why there is a difference in loading times (and maybe also savegame filesize) between different games. We don't know the source code for the saving/loading algorithm but just based on pure theory, it should be clear, that it will take longer and why there are difference between your referenced Cyberpunk, or even X3 and X4. Maybe the save/load code is crappy, but even if it would be perfect, it would still be slower then what you have in many other games, like X3 or Cyberpunk. The game design philosophy of X4 is to be a much better simulation than every predecessor. And based on this you have certain advantages, but also disadvantages. Besides more CPU calculation, it results in longer load times. Your suggestions would result in a simulation that is more like X3.
And just comparing game folder size doesn't get you anywhere. By the way, in most cases, those difference are caused by simple more assets like mesh/textures, voice, etc.
And just comparing game folder size doesn't get you anywhere. By the way, in most cases, those difference are caused by simple more assets like mesh/textures, voice, etc.
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Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
whole data of both games, a save of foundation is 88,4 MB compare to Cyberpunk save is 2.2MB while Stellaris have a average of 5.5MB save and BG3 have save files of 8,6 MBRaptor34 wrote: ↑Thu, 1. Apr 21, 20:05Do you even know what you are talking about? Cyperpunk doesn't have 68.9GB sized saves neither does Foundations have 19.8GB saves.abisha1980 wrote: ↑Thu, 1. Apr 21, 18:58it's obvious the game is to blame for the slow loading, i use NVMe on my C drive and have foundations stored on my other NVMe drive that have a speed of 3.2GB/s
i read somewhere on this topic or a other the problem is world building, so that needs fixing
so why not use the same tactics other games use loading low resources then add higher resources into the memory?
if i load for example cyberpunk 2077 it only takes 5 seconds to load a game no matter the size of the save (cyberpunk is 68,9GB that's almost 3.5 more data) (foundations is only 19,8GB)
The devs can also cheat by loading only the sector the player is in, i do not see why the game need to build the whole universe if you only can be present in a single location.
also i think this need to be addressed before the devs go making more content to the game because more data means even longer loading
it clearly shows something is wrong with foundations it store 10 to 44 times more data then other games and it shows when you load the game
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Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
That's because it stores a lot more data in its saves.abisha1980 wrote: ↑Thu, 1. Apr 21, 20:22whole data of both games, a save of foundation is 88,4 MB compare to Cyberpunk save is 2.2MB while Stellaris have a average of 5.5MB save and BG3 have save files of 8,6 MBRaptor34 wrote: ↑Thu, 1. Apr 21, 20:05Do you even know what you are talking about? Cyperpunk doesn't have 68.9GB sized saves neither does Foundations have 19.8GB saves.abisha1980 wrote: ↑Thu, 1. Apr 21, 18:58it's obvious the game is to blame for the slow loading, i use NVMe on my C drive and have foundations stored on my other NVMe drive that have a speed of 3.2GB/s
i read somewhere on this topic or a other the problem is world building, so that needs fixing
so why not use the same tactics other games use loading low resources then add higher resources into the memory?
if i load for example cyberpunk 2077 it only takes 5 seconds to load a game no matter the size of the save (cyberpunk is 68,9GB that's almost 3.5 more data) (foundations is only 19,8GB)
The devs can also cheat by loading only the sector the player is in, i do not see why the game need to build the whole universe if you only can be present in a single location.
also i think this need to be addressed before the devs go making more content to the game because more data means even longer loading
it clearly shows something is wrong with foundations it store 10 to 44 times more data then other games and it shows when you load the game
Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
Unzip and take a look at the save.
You will see why it takes 15 seconds to save (on my PC at least) and about a minutes to load.
It keeps track of every single item (ships, stations, literal items, NPCs) in the universe.
You will see why it takes 15 seconds to save (on my PC at least) and about a minutes to load.
It keeps track of every single item (ships, stations, literal items, NPCs) in the universe.
Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
All that shows really is what I have said above already: It simulates and keeps track of every single ship and station in the entire universe (known to you or not), even if you have never even seen the sector and its not on your map, it is still being simulated and kept track of.abisha1980 wrote: ↑Thu, 1. Apr 21, 20:22it clearly shows something is wrong with foundations it store 10 to 44 times more data then other games and it shows when you load the game
Reason is simply that most of the economy is actually happening.
Of course if you want to resume that you will have to be able to restore that state during load, which means all these objects need to be present in the save game, which is why it is big.
For all the stations and ships, it needs to save where they are, what their current orders, equipment, health, cargo, etc. is. If it didn't then you would load a game and information would be lost. Your HQ might be getting an NPC delivery of 500 Hull parts for example. If that information were not in the save, then upon loading that delivery wouldn't happen anymore after loading.
You might have saved the game after having destroyed all turrets on a capital ship or station. If it didn't write the status of every equipment (e.g. turrets) on ships and stations to the save file for example, you would load that save later only to be greeted by all the turrets being in working order.
Last edited by XGamer on Thu, 1. Apr 21, 20:51, edited 1 time in total.
X:BtF: 7/10 | X2: 8/10 | X3:R/TC/AP: 8/10 | X:R: 3/10 | X4: 0/10 (3 points for split ships and stations, 4.0 -> -50 points).
If you are raising pirate activity, give me meaningful ways to deal with them PERMANENTLY. Better things to do than replacing ships every 10 minutes, or babysitting ships getting harassed.
Stopped playing X4 with 4.0 due to outrageous, needless and pointless nerfs to everything. Don't change what wasn't broken in the first place.
If you are raising pirate activity, give me meaningful ways to deal with them PERMANENTLY. Better things to do than replacing ships every 10 minutes, or babysitting ships getting harassed.
Stopped playing X4 with 4.0 due to outrageous, needless and pointless nerfs to everything. Don't change what wasn't broken in the first place.
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Re: [Rejected] Idea for a faster game save
their is no need to keep track of all objects within the universe
few thing's to improve
1. only save how many ships (traders etc) are within the current universe and reseed the game with new ships do you really recall XSSF-DDSDD trader 2 days ago? why is this even need to be stored
2.it don't need to store data on what happen to destroyed objects, ships or what asteroid you destroyed 2 day's ago
3.it only need to store data on what a object for example khaak station on sector and seed the game again
4.it don't need to store all station data, that's already present within the game it only need to store what happen to given object if it's not present it's no longer needed. (so a read log not some complex calculation etc)
5.just reseed marines and mechanics nobody knows the face of Khaargakkssaaa (only the pilots and station holders faces need to be saved)
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