Serious answer to the stutter issue.

[SessoSaidSo]

I have been having this issue since I started playing two years ago. I know everyone has this issue. Every video you watch you can see this problem. The answer is always the same...oh, it's unity, it's the GC. But, I mean c'mon now, this is full release and there is a glaring issue that has been present from the start and no one wants to openly talk about it on this forum as it is always pushed down the line. I swear it is as though people are willfully ignoring it. I would really, really like a comment from the team about this, I don't even care if it just them saying they can't do anything about it. I simply would like an official something regarding this issue because it is real and it is hurting.

I'm sorry if this is a rant, but after two years and 1900 hours (check my steam - http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561197993864598/recommended/220200 - I am legit) I think I am entitled to one hell of an opinion.

Thanks

Edited July 21, 2015 by SessoSaidSo

[r4pt0r]

My game runs just fine up to a pretty high part count, what is your specs?

mine:

i7-3770

GTX 660 video card

8gb ram

windows 7

Edit: my post is not meant to belittle anything, I am just unfamiliar with the problem. Since .90 performance has gone up for me greatly.

Edit II: also my game runs great 100% stock, good point Canadianvendingmachine.

Edited July 21, 2015 by r4pt0r

[SessoSaidSo]

This is not a spec issue.

GTX 980

i7-5820k

16GB DDR4

Asus X99 Deluxe motherboard

Running off of a Samsung 850 Pro 512gb SSD

Not a spec issue. I run at solid 60fps in VAB on Samsung 4k monitor. But it still stutters regardless of resolution. I'm not messing around here.

[TheCanadianVendingMachine]

How many mods?

[SessoSaidSo]

None. This issue should not be a surprise to anyone. Seriously, I am no casual, I know what this issue is.

[Red Iron Crown]

I only see stutter on my heavily modded installs. Stock and lightly modded installs play smooth as butter for me with all the settings turned up to 11 (on a machine with much lower specs), though I don't go nuts with the part count (very rare for me to have more than 200 parts in the physics bubble). I am also no casual and have played >2000 hours.

Why is it so important to you that someone from the team comment on this?

[SessoSaidSo]

Because, this is an issue that affects a not insignificant portion of the community and whenever someone brings this problem up they are treated with suspicion. Always asked what your computer specs are otlr what mods are being used and no one ever has an answer and this problem is ignored. I firmly believe that people who say they dont experience this issue are l being less than honest. Every video on youtube shows this bug. Back when this game was alpha and beta it was understandable, however, this game is full release and now it has become unacceptable.

[Red Iron Crown]

I firmly believe that people who say they dont experience this issue are l being less than honest.

My friend, I am many things but a liar isn't one of them. Good luck to you.

[SessoSaidSo]

My friend, I am many things but a liar isn't one of them. Good luck to you.

I disagree...you took your time to doubt what I am experiencing. I took my time to doubt what you say.

[Nemrav]

Running 2.2 ghz cpu(2mb L3 cache), intel integrated pentium graphics, 4gb ddr3 memory

I run 0 lag with up to ~130-150 parts and no explosions...

So how big are the ships you're making ? Does the lag come from when you're making a station or base ? (particularly a station ?) if you're making a station then more terrain is being rendered and you will be slowed down, and stations + bases both tend to get more parts than your pc can handle fast...

Also no one is being "suspicious" of people who ask these questions, what you are more endanger of is getting suspicion of you feeling entitled (rage person), just don't allow that to be the case, if you do... then things might get bad for you trying to find an answer. (and as provocative as this sounds, don't take it as such, I'm trying not to.)

Anyways, standard response is usually, "there are a bunch of rigidbodies(parts) that are connected, therefore their physics cannot be spread to different thread (therefore 1 good core cpu > multicores cpu). This means that physics which is a more intensive calculation if all on one cpu (makes lag), Unity 5 which is what the devs are implementing now can change that, even if the devs don't implement all those optimisations right away". The only non unity 5 approach I've heard is to simply weld as much of the ship into 1 part as possible which deteriorates gameplay of joint strengths..

And why don't the devs respond ? They will implement things from the suggestion forum, but they are almost always silent in it (like 1 post in a year silent).. the thing has been answered before (we can't do anything about it till we get unity5) and don't feel like repeating that explanation when forum lurkers do a better more efficient job !

[DuoDex]

Are you running any variation of the x64 game?

I believe this is an issue with Unity's garbage collection - and with luck will be improved by Unity 5 as it has an entirely new collection script.

[SessoSaidSo]

The issue is the GC. No dev has ever commented on this issue. You all misunderstand. I am not looking for a community sourced fixed. I am looking for a dev comment on this issue. The problem is unity not ksp, however, now that the game is full release that is no longer a proper response.

[DuoDex]

The issue is the GC. No dev has ever commented on this issue. You all misunderstand. I am not looking for a community sourced fixed. I am looking for a dev comment on this issue. The problem is unity not ksp, however, now that the game is full release that is no longer a proper response.

It's with the GC. Unity 5 has an entirely new GC. The devs have not commented because it's unnecessary - they're obviously trying to fix this issue as they are implementing a fix for it

[sal_vager]

The issue is the GC. No dev has ever commented on this issue. You all misunderstand. I am not looking for a community sourced fixed. I am looking for a dev comment on this issue. The problem is unity not ksp, however, now that the game is full release that is no longer a proper response.

Unity has had a stutter issue, which is known, since at least June 19th 2011.

[Link to Unity support forum]

But what do you really want? Squad cannot hack Unity to make this go away, it's pointless to say "Yeah we know, but we can't fix it", all they can do, and all we can do, is wait for Unity to fix their engine so it can handle projects like KSP.

And Unity have updated their engine, Unity 5 is real and Squad are currently porting KSP over from Unity 4 to Unity 5.

Will this stop the stutter? I don't know yet, it might, if it doesn't then the correct place to complain about this issue is on the Unity support forum, as the Unity developers are the only ones who can fix this, not Squad or any other Unity customer.

You're asking for a serious answer in the wrong place.

[klgraham1013]

That's weird. Apparently everyone experiences this, but I had a hell of a time trying to figure out what you all meant by stutter. At first, I thought you were just talking about lower frame rates when building big ships, but now it sounds like something else. How long do you need to play for this to crop up? I don't really play marathon sessions. More around 3 hours or so at a time.

Is this something that once I see, I won't be able to unsee it?

[Padishar]

To the people asking how big his ships are etc and blaming it on physics calculations, a generally slow frame rate is not the issue. The issue is that the game runs very well but every few seconds there is a noticeable pause. How noticeable this pause is varies from person to person, for some it can freeze for over half a second every few seconds.

...as the Unity developers are the only ones who can fix this, not Squad or any other Unity customer.

Sorry but, while it is true that Unity could mostly fix this by upgrading the version of Mono used, it is not true that Squad or any other Unity customer can not fix this. Squad could rewrite KSP to virtually eliminate all garbage creation during scenes and manually trigger the garbage collection at points where the player wont notice just like virtually every other person does that uses Unity to implement their game. Yes, KSP is a significantly more complex codebase than most other games (built on Unity or otherwise) but this doesn't change the fact that there are some terrible bits of coding in KSP that scatter garbage like a 1000kg bomb in the back of a garbage truck...

It's with the GC. Unity 5 has an entirely new GC. The devs have not commented because it's unnecessary - they're obviously trying to fix this issue as they are implementing a fix for it

<citation(s) needed>

Point by point:

> It's with the GC.

Yes, this is correct.

> Unity 5 has an entirely new GC.

As far as I am aware, this is not true. Unity 5 uses the same old version of Mono and the same, horrendously old and poorly performing garbage collection mechanism. There have been significant advances in garbage collection mechanisms both in .NET and in more recent versions of Mono but the only solution for now (or the foreseeable future) is to greatly reduce the amount of garbage being created.

> The devs have not commented because it's unnecessary - they're obviously trying to fix this issue as they are implementing a fix for it

This is a matter of opinion based on a faulty premise. The devs are not doing anything to directly address this issue, the Unity 5 changes will make no difference except that some of the existing UI code creates more garbage than it should and this may improve during the UI overhaul. It requires a different programming approach to what would be obvious for Mono/.NET. One of the first things that people developing games on Unity learn is that you should avoid as much creation of garbage during scenes as possible. GC based memory allocation has a number of advantages and disadvantages but the most critical thing for game development (or anything that requires consistent, high performance) is that you have little control over when the garbage collection runs and there is no way of telling how long it will take. It makes it too easy for developers to not think about memory allocation and deallocation because "the language runtime handles it automatically" when they actually have to think about it quite carefully and deliberately write their code in such a way as to reduce creation of garbage to a minimum. Lots of the slightly odd looking design decisions in the Unity API were explicitly made to make it easier to avoid these issues. I, also, would like to see an official comment from Squad that they are aware of the problem (to be fair they have done this part several times) and for them to commit to improving the situation within a reasonable timescale. I don't mind if this happens after 1.1 but I will be very disappointed if 1.2 (or whatever the next version will be) is not mainly a bug-fixing and optimisation update...

That's weird. Apparently everyone experiences this, but I had a hell of a time trying to figure out what you all meant by stutter. At first, I thought you were just talking about lower frame rates when building big ships, but now it sounds like something else. How long do you need to play for this to crop up? I don't really play marathon sessions. More around 3 hours or so at a time.

You can reproduce this on a stock install with a new save though it is usually more noticeable with lots of mods and a large save file. Just place a command pod in the VAB and then hold down the left or right cursor key to continuously rotate the camera. Keep watching carefully and you should see a glitch in the rotation every few seconds. If you can't see it there then try putting the pod on the launch pad and rotating as before. If you still can't see it then try with the Kerbal X stock vessel.

Is this something that once I see, I won't be able to unsee it?

That's quite possible. People's differing perceptions almost certainly plays a part in why some don't see the problem (or don't see it as badly) but there seem to be several other factors too...

Edited July 21, 2015 by Padishar

[pxi]

I've noticed this myself, but generally only in games that have been running for a while - total gameplay time in a particular save, as opposed to in a particular session of gameplay. About every 5-10 seconds a very slight pause, probably for about a quarter second, maybe even less. You could easily miss it if you weren't looking for it. It seems to happen to all of my savegames at some point, regardless of whether it's a modded game or not. I've played on the x64 and 32-bit clients, and see the same issue at some point regardless.

This is on a 2.4GHz Core 2 Quad with 4GB RAM, so pretty much a potato by current standards.

Having said that, it's not exactly game-breaking or anything. Roll on Unity 5.

[cantab]

It's been discussed extensively on the forums. As for Squad not saying much, well do they say much about any bugs before they actually release an update that fixes them? Not that I remember.

When it's noticeable it's one of the most obnoxious issues in the game and one that in my view Squad should fix. Passing the buck is unsatisfactory - if there's an issue with the game engine then the game developers just have to work around it. Squad already worked round Unity issues in fixing the original "deep space kraken".

By the way, if you haven't seen it, put a low-part count ship in low Mun orbit, enter a low timewarp like 5 or 10x, and look down. The motion should be absolutely smooth making any stutter easy to see.

[Red Iron Crown]

I'm going to have to try the reproduction steps mentioned here, I have never seen this effect in a stock install.

[SessoSaidSo]

Im sorry i had to get all angry to bring this out. But we obviously have a serious issue with the game. Peoples perceptions obviously have a lot to do with this problem. I want to say again, we know this is a unity issue, however, it is quite seriosly a game breaking issue. It needs to be fixed before this game can truly be called a full release.

Honestly the way the community and the team treats this issue has always upset me more than the issue itself. People are always asked their specs and what not when none of that actually matters as this event is replicated in vast array of situations. I feel that the community has really failed itself at explaining and describing the issue. Additionally the community has really failed to push the team to acknowledge and deal with this problem. Again if this was back 0.23.5 it wouldn't matter because it was 'alpha', but now we are talking true release 1.0.4. How acceptable is it (under any circumstances) for a game to freeze every 5 seconds? Ask yourselves that.

Edited July 21, 2015 by SessoSaidSo

[Guest]

Im sorry i had to get all angry to bring this out. But we obviously have a serious issue with the game. Peoples perceptions obviously have a lot to do with this problem. I want to say again, we know this is a unity issue, however, it is quite seriosly a game breaking issue. It needs to be fixed before this game can truly be called a full release.

Honestly the way the community and the team treats this issue has always upset me more than the issue itself. People are always asked their specs and what not when none of that actually matters as this event is replicated in vast array of situations. I feel that the community has really failed itself at explaining and describing the issue. Additionally the community has really failed to push the team to acknowledge and deal with this problem. Again if this was back 0.23.5 it wouldn't matter because it was 'alpha', but now we are talking true release 1.0.4. How acceptable is it (under any circumstances) for a game to freeze every 5 seconds? Ask yourselves that.

Peoples perceptions do have something to do with it. Unity has something to do with it. Your machine has more to do with it than anything. It seems to me that people with AMD hardware complain more about unity GC than anyone. One should keep in mind also that the development team is still learning about the issue also. It hasn't been that long ago that the game looked like this :

Garbage collection wasn't so much of an issue when the game was simpler. As time has progressed, the developers have learned new tricks. Code has piled on top of code. Things have grown more and more complicated. Fixing one bug causes another. etc. etc. The only thing that will totally resolve the issue is time. If the game continues to make money, the developers will continue to improve and so will the game. There will probably come a time when KSP 2 will become a necessity, A complete and total rewrite with all of today's popular features being the focus of code development. Not just "launching frogs into space". Patience is key. Support the developers with kind words of encouragement. One catches more flies with honey than with vinegar.

[klgraham1013]

Again if this was back 0.23.5 it wouldn't matter because it was 'alpha', but now we are talking true release 1.0.4.

I hear you, but, unfortunately, I don't think Squad sees this as a true release. It's obviously still in development, just not with the "early access" label anymore.

- - - Updated - - -

It hasn't been that long ago that the game looked like this :

http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_ly7h9g3ypu1qk0cbw.png

Umm...that was 4 years ago.

Edited July 22, 2015 by klgraham1013

[sal_vager]

Personal attack post removed.

We can discuss this issue without resorting to insults, thank you.

[katateochi]

Listen to Padishar folk!! He is very correct on this and we (him in particular) have put a lot of time into trying to understand this problem.

see this thread

As he says,

- it is a known unity GC limitation.

- unity 5 will not be getting a new GC

- the problem can be worked around with better asset/object management and this is something Squad has to tackle

This issue will occur in a pure stock install, BUT not in a fresh save. Even with a large craft it won't be very noticeable if that's all you have in the save.

It becomes more noticeable with lots of craft in flight.

Basically you need to push the game a bit in order to see it (more craft in flight is just one way to push it). I can't say exactly at what point to expect to see it, but in a pure stock career with 40 in flight craft the game became completely unplayable because of this. To start with the game ran nicely, but gradually as I put more craft in flight it because gradually more and more noticeable and less and less tolerable.

The problem is that if someone sets out in a fresh stock install to try and see this problem they won't see it, and we look like we've collectively invented this problem.

[vixr]

I seriously have not noticed this...I have a ton of mods and play for hours. I honestly have not seen this. Now it's all I can think about. I will fire up KSP when I get home from work and have a look.