4 ms·

fortnite only kind of works on console at 120fps and high graphics. everyone is on pc at 240 fps and performance graphics.

paulddraper 3y ago
> 240 fps Okay that seems beyond unnecessary.
- nathants 3y ago
  a lot of people are using 360 fps now, which may actually be unnecessary. playing on 240 fps feels extremely different. it’s about how the occasional rapid movement feels. spinning around, or making a series of edits in a fight. in a typical interactive movie type game with a controller, the maximum delta-v of camera or character is very low. 60 fps feels smooth the same way movies are fine at 30, a lack of low latency high delta interaction. in fortnite with a 24x48 inch mousepad, delta-v peaks pretty high, and when frame time goes above 4ms, you notice. low latency interaction makes the world feel more real in a way graphics can’t. graphics are important, but secondary.
  - paulddraper 3y ago
    I can believe that 60 to 120 is a noticable difference to the careful observer. But 120 to 240? Really?
    - nathants 3y ago
      definitely! it’s easy to mess around with since you can limit framerate to a lower level. the other part is frame dips. no matter the game, frames drop sometimes. a drop from 240 to 180 will be harder to notice than a drop from 120 to 80. 4ms consistent frame time is a challenging engineering target. whatever game dethrones fortnite will improve client side performance and reduce the effect of server ping on client side interactions.
      - paulddraper 3y ago
        You're assuming it will drop from 240 to 180. I don't see why it wouldn't drop from 240 to 80.
        nathants 3y ago
        it definitely could. unreal engine doesn’t seem to prioritize high performance, nor does the fortnite dev team. in fortnite competitive play, as soon as too many players are in the same part of the world, client and server performance goes south fast. in typical casual play, this never happens. in competitive play, it always happens. i’m exploring gamedev out of curiosity for this exact discussion. the metric i’m trying to optimize for is minimum frame rate[1]. frame rate is top left, min on left, average on right. video is 120 fps. i’m not sure yet what’s possible in varying scenarios of complexity, but there is definitely room for improvement! most interesting so far is how fast physx is. graphics are the bottleneck, not physics. 1. https://r2.nathants.workers.dev/world_building.mp4 https://r2.nathants.workers.dev/world_building.mp4
veave 3y ago
Pretty sure the % of pc fortnite players who play at 240 fps is under 0.01%
- nathants 3y ago
  it would be interesting to know. epic games is very secretive with their statistics. regardless of epic’s earning potential across various demographics of gamers, the most interesting demographic to me is those who are playing 240+. that group is passionate, dedicated, and always raising the skill ceiling. maybe some new game company can target that niche with a high performance game and a different revenue model. pay to play could be good, like quarters in an arcade machine. game servers are a cost center to all these companies, and this has a tangible negative impact on the gaming experience. even gamedevs at epic are probably seen as a cost center. epic’s profit center is the army of inhouse artists turning out endless digital balenciaga.
lockhouse 3y ago
My kids seem to do just fine playing it on their Switch Lites, so I'm not sure where you get that impression.
- nathants 3y ago
  everyone may be an overstatement, but since only epic knows the truth i’m sticking with it. i haven’t played, but fortnite on switch will be a very different experience. all your opponents will also be on switch or android. i’m sure it’s still tremendous fun, but get yours kids a pc on 240 have them compare the experience for you. i imagine it’s like renting skis vs having your own, except more so.
  - lockhouse 3y ago
    I'm sure a Lamborghini is a lot nicer to drive than a Toyota, but it's hardly necessary. I have no doubts that 240hz on a PC is an incredible gaming experience for any game that supports it, but Fortnite is very playable and enjoyable on considerably more modest hardware.
    - nathants 3y ago
      fortnite is very playable on a variety of hardware. this is probably good. it misses however what might be possible if a game targeted only high performance hardware. 240 monitors are not expensive anymore, and the typical fortnite build is highend cpu but not gpu. 240 is not as affordable as a ps5, but it’s not as unaffordable as a supercar. in fact it may just be the supercar for the masses!
      - lockhouse 3y ago
        Honestly, the price ratios are probably not that different between a Switch Lite versus a 240 hz gaming computer setup and a Toyota versus a Lamborghini. I have an M1 Mac mini...that thing is not playing Fortnite at 240 hz ever, so I'd need the whole shebang. I'm a filthy console gamer though.
tredre3 3y ago
You seem to have made your mind about "everyone" running fortnite at 240fps. But when I look into it it seems that only competitive players are running fortnite at 240fps. Casual gamers (ie the real "everyone") certainly do not. Going by the Steam Survey, a good chunk do have a PC capable of running fortnite at that speed (if you limit yourself to 1080p ultra low graphics), though the majority cannot and very few (relatively) gamers have a 240hz monitor to benefit from it.
- nathants 3y ago
  apologies for inflammatory rhetoric. my belief is that a significant minority of players have 240 fps monitors. i would be very curious to learn the real number. i would guess 2-20% of pc fortnite players. my assumption is that the majority of these aspire to be competitive players, or to play at that level casually. the number of players with greater than $10k lifetime earnings is tiny. fortnite is somewhat unique in that to participate in competition for money all you need is to be 13 years old. there is no need to join an organization or seek franchise. any motivated individual can participate from home without any 3rd party entanglement.

paulddraper 3y ago

> 240 fps Okay that seems beyond unnecessary.

nathants 3y ago
a lot of people are using 360 fps now, which may actually be unnecessary. playing on 240 fps feels extremely different. it’s about how the occasional rapid movement feels. spinning around, or making a series of edits in a fight. in a typical interactive movie type game with a controller, the maximum delta-v of camera or character is very low. 60 fps feels smooth the same way movies are fine at 30, a lack of low latency high delta interaction. in fortnite with a 24x48 inch mousepad, delta-v peaks pretty high, and when frame time goes above 4ms, you notice. low latency interaction makes the world feel more real in a way graphics can’t. graphics are important, but secondary.
- paulddraper 3y ago
  I can believe that 60 to 120 is a noticable difference to the careful observer. But 120 to 240? Really?
  - nathants 3y ago
    definitely! it’s easy to mess around with since you can limit framerate to a lower level. the other part is frame dips. no matter the game, frames drop sometimes. a drop from 240 to 180 will be harder to notice than a drop from 120 to 80. 4ms consistent frame time is a challenging engineering target. whatever game dethrones fortnite will improve client side performance and reduce the effect of server ping on client side interactions.
    - paulddraper 3y ago
      You're assuming it will drop from 240 to 180. I don't see why it wouldn't drop from 240 to 80.
      - nathants 3y ago
        it definitely could. unreal engine doesn’t seem to prioritize high performance, nor does the fortnite dev team. in fortnite competitive play, as soon as too many players are in the same part of the world, client and server performance goes south fast. in typical casual play, this never happens. in competitive play, it always happens. i’m exploring gamedev out of curiosity for this exact discussion. the metric i’m trying to optimize for is minimum frame rate[1]. frame rate is top left, min on left, average on right. video is 120 fps. i’m not sure yet what’s possible in varying scenarios of complexity, but there is definitely room for improvement! most interesting so far is how fast physx is. graphics are the bottleneck, not physics. 1. https://r2.nathants.workers.dev/world_building.mp4 https://r2.nathants.workers.dev/world_building.mp4

veave 3y ago

Pretty sure the % of pc fortnite players who play at 240 fps is under 0.01%

nathants 3y ago
it would be interesting to know. epic games is very secretive with their statistics. regardless of epic’s earning potential across various demographics of gamers, the most interesting demographic to me is those who are playing 240+. that group is passionate, dedicated, and always raising the skill ceiling. maybe some new game company can target that niche with a high performance game and a different revenue model. pay to play could be good, like quarters in an arcade machine. game servers are a cost center to all these companies, and this has a tangible negative impact on the gaming experience. even gamedevs at epic are probably seen as a cost center. epic’s profit center is the army of inhouse artists turning out endless digital balenciaga.

lockhouse 3y ago

My kids seem to do just fine playing it on their Switch Lites, so I'm not sure where you get that impression.

nathants 3y ago
everyone may be an overstatement, but since only epic knows the truth i’m sticking with it. i haven’t played, but fortnite on switch will be a very different experience. all your opponents will also be on switch or android. i’m sure it’s still tremendous fun, but get yours kids a pc on 240 have them compare the experience for you. i imagine it’s like renting skis vs having your own, except more so.
- lockhouse 3y ago
  I'm sure a Lamborghini is a lot nicer to drive than a Toyota, but it's hardly necessary. I have no doubts that 240hz on a PC is an incredible gaming experience for any game that supports it, but Fortnite is very playable and enjoyable on considerably more modest hardware.
  - nathants 3y ago
    fortnite is very playable on a variety of hardware. this is probably good. it misses however what might be possible if a game targeted only high performance hardware. 240 monitors are not expensive anymore, and the typical fortnite build is highend cpu but not gpu. 240 is not as affordable as a ps5, but it’s not as unaffordable as a supercar. in fact it may just be the supercar for the masses!
    - lockhouse 3y ago
      Honestly, the price ratios are probably not that different between a Switch Lite versus a 240 hz gaming computer setup and a Toyota versus a Lamborghini. I have an M1 Mac mini...that thing is not playing Fortnite at 240 hz ever, so I'd need the whole shebang. I'm a filthy console gamer though.

tredre3 3y ago

You seem to have made your mind about "everyone" running fortnite at 240fps. But when I look into it it seems that only competitive players are running fortnite at 240fps. Casual gamers (ie the real "everyone") certainly do not. Going by the Steam Survey, a good chunk do have a PC capable of running fortnite at that speed (if you limit yourself to 1080p ultra low graphics), though the majority cannot and very few (relatively) gamers have a 240hz monitor to benefit from it.

nathants 3y ago
apologies for inflammatory rhetoric. my belief is that a significant minority of players have 240 fps monitors. i would be very curious to learn the real number. i would guess 2-20% of pc fortnite players. my assumption is that the majority of these aspire to be competitive players, or to play at that level casually. the number of players with greater than $10k lifetime earnings is tiny. fortnite is somewhat unique in that to participate in competition for money all you need is to be 13 years old. there is no need to join an organization or seek franchise. any motivated individual can participate from home without any 3rd party entanglement.