Will the game run better on next gen compared to the previous one?

I was gonna have my tittle be "Can we expect the game to play better on next gen" but at this point I am done expecting anything. The latest Console development check-in did not actually give any information other than what was already expected to be the case for the last months.

Months ago, I mentioned that at that point, the game would probably be released on consoles after the next Gen has come out. It is now almost certain to be the case. I am currently contemplating buying a PS5 when it comes out.

My biggest concern about DDA has always been that it would run horribly on ps4 like DD2 does or at least did for the longest time, at least from my experience.

Would it be possible for someone at CG to actually address this? :

Do you know if the game will, straight up, run a whole lot more smoothly on the new Xboxs and the PS5 than it would on Xbox1/Ps4. Will it have a higher FPS lock than the expected 30 on current gen. To be clear, I want to know if it will have better performances, I am not talking about better graphics. At this point, almost in 2021 now, I just hope you can at least raise the fps lock when playing old gen versions of DDA on the new gen.

Without any actual optimization, I am really hoping to see/feel a real difference between the two gens concerning having tons of enemies and vfx on screen at once.

 

Edited October 25, 2020 by Windex

The game is designed to be playable on the Switch. So I don't think there will be any problems playing it on PS4. PS5 has full compatibility with PS4, I think? So that shouldn't be an issue either.

The enemy limits won't be any higher than they are on PC, that you can be pretty sure of.

Sure it was designed on the switch but it released on pc before anything else. I saw someone say that they were experiencing pretty big fps drops in later survival waves while using a 2080 TI. I will be shocked (in a good way) if there are no performance issues in large survival waves on consoles.

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The enemy limits won't be any higher than they are on PC, that you can be pretty sure of.

Yeah, it would make no sense. In fact, I always thought it would have been good performance wise, if they had just balanced the game differently for consoles and, at least slightly, reduced the number of enemies that can appear at the same time while making them stronger instead.

I was mostly hoping to hear that the Xbox1/Ps4 versions of the game when played on Xbox series x-s/Ps5 would have an higher frame-rate cap.

Edited October 30, 2020 by Windex

This is pure speculation, but I am fairly confident this is precisely why we don't have console release dates anymore.

• Pretty sure CG signed a deal with Nintendo that it would release on the Switch first, then other consoles later. Otherwise they wouldn't have originally implied simultaneous console releases on their Kickstarter, then later specified that it will be Switch exclusive before going to other consoles.
• When bringing DDA to the Switch they realized that performance on the console was abysmal
• Over the last bunch of months (I've lost track how many), they've been working with Nintendo and Epic to get performance up to par. It's just that the game is architected in such a way that this is proving to be a significant challenge.
• Since they can't release it to other consoles until they release it on Switch, they are forced into resolving the performance issues first instead of relying on more powerful hardware in other consoles.

I'm sure they'll eventually figure it out and get it in a good working state for the Switch. When that happens, I don't think we will need to worry about performance issues on other consoles, and possibly even PC. Again, pure speculation, but I do feel there's merit to this.

On 10/29/2020 at 7:48 PM, Windex said:

I always thought it would have been good performance wise, if they had just balanced the game differently for consoles and, at least slightly, reduced the number of enemies that can appear at the same time while making them stronger instead.

Given that cross-saves are a thing, it would be extremely risky for CG to tamper with number of mobs or equipment drop chances across platforms. With how loot-focused this game is, a change as big as altering number of enemies (which affects number of drops) would instantly make farming on one platform or another unequivocally worse or better. I don't think they're willing to risk that. I personally wouldn't want them to risk that.

Edited November 2, 2020 by gigazelle

On 11/2/2020 at 6:48 PM, gigazelle said:

Given that cross-saves are a thing, it would be extremely risky for CG to tamper with number of mobs or equipment drop chances across platforms. With how loot-focused this game is, a change as big as altering number of enemies (which affects number of drops) would instantly make farming on one platform or another unequivocally worse or better. I don't think they're willing to risk that. I personally wouldn't want them to risk that.

Thanks for taking the time to answer this thread. I have talked about that option being pretty much impossible with cross-saves a long time ago but omitted to mention it again here, I should have been more precise than simply saying "it would have been good".

Personally I am still hoping they do not give us the cross-saves feature. The progression to end-game is already going to be pretty butchered as it is with all the additional content that the console version will contain when DDA finally releases (like how some new dd1 maps made you able to skip so much content and time farming). I do not want people that have been playing for a year to be boosting everyone and having super powerful items going around on day one, on top of that.

1 hour ago, Windex said:

Personally I am still hoping they do not give us the cross-saves feature. The progression to end-game is already going to be pretty butchered as it is with all the additional content that the console version will contain when DDA finally releases (like how some new dd1 maps made you able to skip so much content and time farming). I do not want people that have been playing for a year to be boosting everyone and having super powerful items going around on day one, on top of that.

I think that cross-save is the way of the future and any game that does not do it will be left and forgotten. 

I understand your point, and I do think that something has to be done about the broken progression, but not having cross-save is not the solution. One of the points that sold me on the game was cross-save. I want to be able to whip up my switch on the bus (whenever we're allowed to be humans again) and continue my grind.

A better solution would be to lock out transfer from playing with fresh starts for a month or two, or if that's too complicated you could block transfers for one or two months.

We would not be able to comment on how next generation consoles, such as the PS5 and Series X, will handle DDA as we are actively and currently still developing our announced and existing console releases of DDA as a high priority.

We are currently optimizing game performance in-particular for the console version of DDA, and all future versions of the game - including how well the game will run on future next generation hardware, will benefit.

On 11/7/2020 at 12:19 AM, chpoit said:

A better solution would be to lock out transfer from playing with fresh starts for a month or two, or if that's too complicated you could block transfers for one or two months.

It feels kinda bad because I already talked about all that kind of stuff before with a lot more details but, in this thread, I did not feel like taking that time any more because to me it ended up being all a waste of time.

As soon as they announced the delay for console releases back then, I was the first one, in the DDA kickbacker forums, to mention that the cross-saves feature would be bad for the game experience of the players playing the game for the first time day one on console. Someone very high up in CG took the time to reply to that and they said that it had not even crossed their mind before I mentioned it and that person said they would talk about it with the team. I asked them multiple times to please temporarily disable the feature for at least a very short time when the game first releases on console to preserve the player experience of ; playing a game the very first day and getting to race with everyone else that just started playing to achieve things like content and trophies/achievements for consoles.

I never heard anything about that subject ever again after that initial response from a person at CG I mentioned above. And I read every forum posts for something like at least 2 months afterwards until I had pretty much lost any hype I had left about playing DDA.

Sorry for going so off-topic but it just felt bad for me to have people "correct me" by adding good points I already made a long time ago but did not take the time to mention/make again.


@Dani Thank you a lot for taking the time to answer to my thread's question.

Edited November 13, 2020 by Windex