As per the new sticky message today, they want detailed information about the lag issue. I know there are already a billion threads about this, but I wanted to go into a bit more detail with the issue, and possibly set a more structured standard about how we report the issues. I know, it could be a pipedream of them fixing this... because they probably knew about it before release,.. i just can't figure out what they plan on doing to fix this... but.. to stay positive I will post my information step by step to give bug feedback.

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To start this test, I turned my PS3 off the entire night while I slept, it has been powered down for 12~ hours.

System Stats - I have one of the older, very first few PS3s. 60gig, I think.
Save Game File Size - 11mb. For some reason, and I've been keeping track, the file size has been sitting around 11 megs for the past 10 hours of play time. Maybe it doesn't get much bigger? Or maybe I haven't explored many new places?
Save Game Play Time - 64 hours. I have been playing quite a bit since launch. Yesterday, after extended play, there would literally be some times where I could not play because I would have 5-10 second windows where I had ZERO frames in combat, was like a slideshow,.. but worse. Simple combat situations would take 10+ minutes, if i survived.
Character Level - 34
Propery Owned - I debated posting this, but considering the issue possibly derives from the game keeping track of everything you've done and keeping track of items.

• Mage College Quarters -- 100+ items
  
• Whiterun "Breezehome" -- 250+ items
  
• Companions Quarters -- 20+ items
  
• Markarth Home - " Vlindrel Hall" -- 50+ items

Play by Play -- No Spoilers Will Be Posted

0 Minutes - I Start my day in Markarth, and dabble around with exploring the city and working on an in-city quest line. So far, in door I have zero lag. Out doors (but still in Markarth) I have the random stutter, but nothing serious.

30 minutes - I'm still in Markarth, still no game breaking lag. I've read the other threads about Fast traveling and game loading most likely being the major culprit here.. will test soon.

45 minutes - Still questing in Markarth, and still no game breaking lag. At the one hour mark I'll leave the city. I just want to see if I can get it to lag without traveling around the world.

1 hour - My quest takes me outside Markarth, perfect! I Fast travel roughly to the middle of Skyrim. I travel on foot for about 5~ minutes to my destination, have 1 combat encounter, and still, no lag, or very minimal lag. Just entered a tomb, going to clear this dungeon and post back soon. My next test, if still I do not lag, will be to fast travel several times consecutively. But, so far, it seems that having my PS3 off for 12 hours really helped.

1 hour 20 minutes - Dungeon Cleared..towards the end I started getting small periods of time where I was reduced to about 5 fps for a about 5 seconds, but would return to smooth game play shortly thereafter. Going to do a test.. going to fast travel 10 times back to back.
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• Fast Travel 1 -- Slight FPS loss, but still playable "Dips" occur and the lag is noticeable
  
• Fast Travel 2 - Dips still occur, gameplay is still fine and playable, but the dips are annoying, and predictable.
  
• Fast Travel 3 - Stopping by Whiterun. As SOON as I load into Whiterun I am hit with my most noticeable lag hit yet. I haven't even loaded my home yet. Down to a constant 5 fps
  
• Fast Travel 4 - I travel to a random location in the wilderness and start sprinting around aimlessly to test out the lag. Its gotten worse, probably 4-5 ish. There are still spurts where I get no lag for a few seconds and I can see what I'm doing.
  
• Fast Travel 5 - I fast travel to an area that I haven't explored or altered. I don't get the same lag as the last few places, but it still "bottoms out" from time to time, especially when my screen loads a fantastic view of a wide open tundra, or loads a bunch of fog effects. But, for the most part, during this fast travel I adventure around for about 5 minutes with playable lag, albeit annoying.
  
• Fast Travel 6 - Traveled to a previously cleared dungeon area. I don't enter, but I wonder around the area and kill a few Frost Trolls and explore a bit. Lag isn't terrible, but it is definitely noticeable. It just not getting worse.
  
• Fast Travel 7 - Headed back to Whiterun, considering this is my most laggy visit so far. I arrive and the lag isn't as bad as the first visit during this test.
  
• Fast Travel 8 - I head back to Markarth to test out the lag here. Lag got worse, and considering this is a graphically more appealing city. Lag is still feels the same, and dips.
  
• Fast Travel 9 - Random bandit camp in between cities. Getting the same amount of acceptable lag.
  
• Fast Travel 10 - Going to test out Solitude, considering it is one of the most laggy places thus far. The load times are more significant now, up to about 1.5 minutes per load. I travel through the city sprinting and jumping around, and for the most part the lag isn't that bad, until I head towards the castle and I bottom out and get a few periods of time where I get 0 fps for a few seconds. I spend a few more minutes walking around the city and note that besides Whiterun, it is probably the second most laggy experience yet, with a constant fps below 10, and periods of time where I get 0 fps.

By now I a have been playing for about 2 hours and 30 minutes. The lag isn't game breaking, or as bad as it has been the past few days of playing after repeated amount of hours. I'm going to play for a few more hours and post back in this thread. The main thing that I could not reproduce in this 2.5 hour test was a situation where I could not move or fight, like yesterday. Yesterday, while I was not documenting like this, I suspect I had the system on for roughly 6-7 hours before hitting a situation terrible enough to where I had to quit playing. As far as turning the system off and on during the 6-7 hour stint after game breaking unplayable lag,.. a simple restart would subside the lag for approx 5-30 minutes, depending on what I was doing. But, I think, the 12 hour cooldown is what really fixed it thus far... hopefully we don't have to subject ourselves to that kind of cooldown to play this wonderful game!



Now, there is my feedback.. I tried to do so in a positive and mature manner. My opinion on this matter is that Bethesda has really let us down, considering the evidence from Fallout 3 never being fixed, it really scares me. I've been playing this series since Daggerfall, (one of the first rpgs I've ever played) and I remember opening it up on Christmas day and being amazed and playing it for a few days straight... I really don't want to add this experience with Skyrim to my memory as of how you guys handle games. Also, I feel a bit betrayed, because you released the game on veterans day, and being a veteran myself, I was happy to purchase this game and sit down and think "man what a nice gift on veterans day!" Turns out it feels like a big slap in the face.... I know that these bugs aren't intentional, but hopefully the "anger" and frustration from your fans will get Bethesda and whoever is responsible for fixing these bugs, more motivated to get this fix out asap.

see what you guys did bethesda you ruined veterans day

Good initiative, hopefully a moderator could make this a sticky!


System Stats - I have a 250GB Slim, bought it 2010.

Save Game File Size - 9mb.

Save Game Play Time - 35 hours.

Character Level - 22

Propery Owned - Two houses, one in Whiterun and one in Riften.
Around 60 items in Whiterun and 80 items in Riften.

I have 4 saves, 3 of them being Auto-Saves. I have about 150GB free space on my PS3 and I have installed the latest firmwire.

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My experience is that the game becomes worse for every hour and every save, most in terms of "Dips" and sluggish movement. The lag is constantly there, with the biggest problem being that the FPS drops to around 20-25 extremely often, which becomes frustrating very quickly. It feels like it lags a majority of the time, with severe drops when visiting larger and more dense areas, for ex. Markath and Whiterun. Also, when fighting many enemies at the same time, the lag is making it hard to keep playing.

I have also noticed that the FPS drops when im around fire. The game always lags when I use magic, scrolls or making rapid movements (jumping many times, swinging my blade etc.)

As of now, the game is playable, but it is really ruining the experience. I am becoming more and more frustrated with how Bethseda is handling this. The glitches and dips are becoming worse and it is really annoying having that laggy feeling around all the time.

PS. I′ll be posting another update when I have 12mb/50 hours of gameplay and see how it has progressed. Please Bethseda, this is not acceptable by any means and I hope that you are working (seriously, prioritize the LAG/FPS-drops!) to fix this problem.

UPDATE:

For those who read my first post in detail, I wanted to give an update for the current state of my game.

4 hours into game after 12 hour downtime - In the open world, my game is unplayable. Inside cities I still get standard choppiness but is playable. I don't want to post spoilers, but I spent the majority of my last 1.5 hours in a town and a dungeon in said town, so not a whole lot of open world travelling. THEN I traveled to open world, and bam, hit with unplayable, 2-3 fps lag that doesn't stop. It seems that time is the issue here, since my earlier test of fast traveling 10 times in a row did not produce game-stopping lag. But. now, after 4 hours I've hit the "unplayable" standard that we have all been talking about. Here in a few minutes I will restart my system, but I suspect that the lag will only stop for 5-30 minutes as usual, unless i stop playing for another 12 hours.

Last Update of the day:

4 hours 30 minutes into gameplay. Every place in the game has reached unplayable status. 1-2 frames in even the smallest house in the game.

So here we have it... 12 hours of system cooldown for 3-3.5 hours of decent play. 4-4.5 becomes unplayable. I know some will say you don't need to play for more than that, but hey, its the holiday season, and we paid for this



This sickens me, I'll keep an eye on the forums, but going to set this game down for a while. Hopefully a patch comes out sooner than later

Would a youtube video help with this?

I don't see why having the PS3 off for 12 hours will make any difference at all unless it's a heat issue. Do this would you? Turn off your PS3...put a fan on it for 5 minutes...turn it back on and load the game and start playing. Then advise us of the stability and performance. It would be very helpful.

EDIT..Might try to actually unplug power to the PS3 unit also for 5 minutes with the fan cooling it down. Thanks.

Yeah I didn't think the 12 hour thing would be anything outside of overheating either, but I did the test after 12 hours just because thats how long I wasn't playing for. Thus far we've assumed the file size had something to do with it, and Im pretty sure it still stands that that is the issue because you can start a new character after playing for 6 hours and have no lag from what I understand. Oh, and I dont have a fan to put on the PS3, or I would for this test. But, the temp of the room I have my PS3 in is rather cold, so I'm going to let it sit for about an hour and see what results I come up with.


and touching on the 12 hour thing again,. I'm sure there is a magic number we can let the ps3 sit and all the cache is gone and we're good to go for another 3 hours.. but we dont know what that is yet. But what I do know is after only shutting the PS3 down for a couple minutes nets a far less length lag free playtime, meaning if all I do is restart my PS3, it will only last for about 5-15 minutes before I'm back at the same unplayable 0-5 fps place we were before.

Bottom line.. trying to figure out what window of time we are looking at here, and why.. I think thats what we are getting at.


Edit : Power supply unplugged, Ill update here shortly.

Alright, for real, last update of the afternoon/evening.

I turned my PS3 off and unplugged the power cord for approx. 45 minutes to let cool down per request of Arkon111.

My results: I loaded the game, left the house I was previously lagged to death in and loaded into Markarth. The lag seemed to be a consistent 10fps or so,.. not nearly what it was 45 minutes earlier, but the gameplay was nowhere near as smooth as when I left the system off for 12 hours. I Fast traveled to the middle of skyrim, and adventured down a creek killing bandits and collecting Nirnroot for about 20 minutes, and the lag stayed the same,.. sub par performance but nowhere near unplayable... but nowhere near acceptable either.

My savegame played file is at 68 ish hours now, and I don't think it is getting worse per se,.. as I stated keeping the system off for an extended amount of time does weird things to it.

Bottom Line from my experiences and tests so far.... no matter how big your save file gets, the lag can be fixed if you turn off your system for extended periods of time, and depending on how long the system has been turned off, you will have varying amounts of time that you can play relatively lag free, but NEVER as fresh as a brand new game, (or a bare minimum acceptable fps rate for console users).


Oh and also some more data that was collected in other threads -- I've killed 22 dragons as of right now.. don't think that matters, but just thought i'd throw it out there.

Hmm this is a interesting experiment, will try to soon.

Thanks for all the work, Khadaq.

Also this, I walked a bit, killed 3 wolfs then discovered a cave, saved and my save file had gotten 100kb bigger..interesting...going to start of from a new save file, the file that the game saves automatically when you get of the carriage is 2MB.