» Fri May 27, 2011 6:42 am Here's my system outline:
GeForce 8800gt (512mb)
Intel C2D e6750 (2.66ghz, dual core)
MSI P6n platinum motherboard
4gb RAM
Basically, this system easily exceeds the minimum requirements on the box, but just can't run the game smoothly. After some discussion on Reddit, it appears that other people with Intel multicore CPUs are experiencing similar problems, especially combined with geForce 8x and 9x GPUs.
When running the game on minimum settings, I can get a good 45 FPS, but movement like walking and recoil seems to work on a completely different timeframe. While rendering is smooth, FPS-wise, everything about the game is twitchy. I would call it "uneven," since nothing seems to be able to maintain a consistent pace. It's like watching a video where a monkey is playing with a dial that controls playback speed.
Here's where it gets really weird: Changing graphics settings has absolutely no impact on my frame rate. Running at all lowest quality with shadows disabled through console runs just as well as with textures and shadows maxed (albeit no AO or fancy stuff my GPU just can't handle). Based on this, I believe that the issue is in the CPU, not the GPU. When running with the task manager open, I can see that the game uses 100% of one core and 70-90% of the other. With r_usethreadedrenderer, my FPS decreases to 20 and CPU usage maxes on both cores, but the game is actually smoother like this than it is at non-threaded 45fps. It should be noted here that every game maxes my processor for whatever reason. TF2 does the same thing, I assume it's just normal to utilize whatever power is available. However, TF2 aptly utilizes my RAM. Brink consumes all of 256mb...
TL;DR for Splash Damage: Your game uses way too much CPU power, and only one thread of it, while not even trying to utilize RAM or GPU power. The problem seems particularly prevalent on Intel Core2 systems with older nVidia GPUs.
I have an honest question for you. What kind of testing environment did you use to verify that this game worked? In the future, please beta test on a system made up of more than LAN-connected, 2011 gaming systems with enthusiast level nVidia GPUs and i7 processors. I mean this in the nicest way. A little diversity in your testing can go a long way.
