Can we please have more options to lower graphics settings?

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Somehow accidentally deleted my post instead of editing it, derp.

Benchmarks sometimes don't quite take heat into account because very often the duration of the benchmark itself is far shorter than a gaming session. So you might get an okay enough result for a benchmark, but in an actual gaming session you might find that the longer you play the worse your performance gets due to heat issues.

Certainly the FFXIV benchmarks are far shorter than most people would play in a normal gaming session.

Benchmarks, at least in the case of xiv, should be enough to bring the heatsinks on low end equipment to their heat soak, if that's going to be an issue. You won't see a large heat differential in laptops between the benchmark and normal gameplay, for the most part.

[tdb]

When updating an MMO it's important to keep it accessible, even if the requirements have changed.

At some point though maintaining the lower settings will become more trouble than it's worth. They may require different shaders and code paths which will need to be kept up to date with everything else and tested. That doesn't come for free, so at some point it's necessary to just drop them and bump up the system requirements. At the moment the game's minimum requirement is a GPU which was released six years ago as a lower mid-range model; it has equivalent power to a high-end GPU from 11 years ago and today's low-end discrete GPUs can achieve the same performance.

Also the laptop that they have can run the ShB benchmark and get a Standard rating on medium settings - they get workable FPS there, but certain raids prevent them from performing well.

Isn't that screenshot from Stormblood benchmark though? I think Shadowbringers introduced some new and more expensive rendering techniques.

Not really, Benchmarks are designed as a WORST CASE SCENARIO, they're designed to test and thus they stress the machine to the limit of its capabilities of running the software. That's why its called a "Benchmark" and not a "Software that will show you what you MIGHT get"

That's not some kind of universal rule for benchmarks. Particularly for an MMO it's difficult for the benchmark to account for all the other players.

Hold up you have a GTX 1060? How are you even getting 15 fps lmao. Even with low settings. There's definetly something wrong with the setup. Not the game tho.

The OP has a GTX 1060 and is able to run the game without much issues. OP's friend gets 15 fps with hardware that hasn't been mentioned yet, though I strongly suspect an integrated GPU.

[CrystalRainbow]

Sound like they are playing on an Intel graphics. Witch yes can but isn't ment to reach 30 fps in a game like this.

[DumdogsWorld]

...

I think people missed the entire point of what I was trying to say.

I like consistency as much as I like high FPS. I shouldn't need to upgrade all of the hardware in my otherwise-decent computer so I can handle Limsa during prime time, when I can handle everything else in this game just fine.

Lower settings would help with that, not just with computers that run the whole game at 15 FPS.

[TheMightyMollusk]

Limsa in prime hours can give my PS4 Pro a bit of lag. An older PC is gonna chug on that many people in one place.

[DumdogsWorld]

Limsa in prime hours can give my PS4 Pro a bit of lag. An older PC is gonna chug on that many people in one place.

Exactly. The game may have the graphics engine and design of something 7 years old, but if I took a 7-year-old game that supports modding and spawned 100s upon 100s of unique character models, my computer will still chug.

Sometimes it's about volume and not quality. (But lower quality can still help)

[TwiibieTwuu]

Add an ability just to completely blur textures. And reduce polygons just so we can make it look like OS RuneScape

[Riardon]

Hate to say this but this is not going to happen.
The game will become more demanding in future.
It's the natural life cycle and evolution of long running MMORPGs.
Your friends really need to consider buying a new laptop if they play on one or upgrade their GPU if they are playing on desktop or buy a PS4 (you can find a low priced second hand).
There is a reason SE increased the minimum hardware requirements.
They can try lower the resolution. Other than that there is no trick to make it run better the weak hardware is the problem.

[Halivel]

Hold up you have a GTX 1060? How are you even getting 15 fps lmao. Even with low settings. There's definetly something wrong with the setup. Not the game tho.

It's not OP who has issues with FPS but their friend.


On a topic: I would welcome such a change honestly if it's possible, but wonder if there is anything what they can reduce even more than recent lowest settings give in the first place. Did your main tank consider a possibilty of upgrading their specs? It costs money of course, but no one says that they need to buy a top-1 details. Could buy something still fairly old, but enough to run the game on somewhat decent level. If it's still too much, maybe consider to switch to console version. Even regular PS4 does it fine.

Sadly, when it come to games, and MMOs specifically, you going to deal with the fact that sometimes you need to upgrade your system. Because if the game is that bad for your Tank atm, it probably means that their PC is 7+ y.o.

[Elamys]

This game is starting to reach a decent number of years in operation. WoW became very successful partly because it could be run on low end PCs, but should we expect PCs that ran WoW then to run it as it is now, 15 years later? It's the nature of long term online games: over time, you will need to upgrade your rig, because the game is going to keep making improvements that aren't compatible with older ones.

I mean, I'm not going to say no to more options, but there is going to come a point, eventually, where your friend will HAVE to upgrade their computer if they wish to continue playing. (Luckily, this game's requirements are rather low, so if they do some smart shopping, they can probably score something for an affordable price.)

As a side note, for PC players who are having issues in areas with a lot of people, you can limit the number of people displayed. System Config > Other Settings > Display Limits > Character and Object Quantity. It's not perfect, but it helps a lot. (I understand this option is not available to PS4 players for...reasons unknown? My info on that could be wrong.) I have mine set to minimum, and it is an absolute lifesaver.