Advice on stuttering Thread - MISERY mod for S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat

I was wondering if anyone out there has any tips or tricks that I might not have tried yet to help with the stuttering, its currently making my game unplayable. I am able to play the game on vanilla on max settings and everything runs very well. I tried using the prefetch mod I found with Misery 2.0 but it crashed to desktop immediately. I have tried on every setting on every resolution but the game just stutters so bad its not even possible to play on. I also checked that steam was not running in compatibility mode. If nothing else are there any plans for a low calorie version of this mode perhaps in the works?

My specs
Intel I7-2630QM @ 2.00G
12 Gig Ram
GTX 560M
Win-7 64 Bit

Running the .exe as administrator?
Something worked very well for me : I changed the switch_distance located in gamedata/configs/alife.ltx

From 350 to 150 (vanilla values)

You should try 300 first then 250 then 200. If it does not help at 150 then there's another problem...

The switch distance helped a lot for me.

You could also install Absolute Nature 3 Lite over Misery 2.0, that seemed to stop a lot of issues I was having.

Cybersemtex wrote: Running the .exe as administrator?
Something worked very well for me : I changed the switch_distance located in gamedata/configs/alife.ltx

From 350 to 150 (vanilla values)

You should try 300 first then 250 then 200. If it does not help at 150 then there's another problem...

I opened the ltx file but I didn't find any switch distance thing.

Copy/paste everything written in the file

Cybersemtex wrote: -_-

Copy/paste everything written in the file

Well uuh... I turns out I just had to scroll sideways so yeah... Nevermind. c:

Hahaha good to know!
Keep us updated for your problem

uberhen wrote: You could also install Absolute Nature 3 Lite over Misery 2.0, that seemed to stop a lot of issues I was having.

Yeah, try this, it should help a bit. Misery's textures are completely unoptimized but fortunately the guy who makes Absolute Nature actually has some idea of what he's doing so it'll run better and look better, for the color if nothing else.

You can also optimize them yourself using DDSopt, I haven't bothered but I've heard it's really simple and doesn't take long. People have said the textures were cut down by at least 350MBs after using it. Here's a link: Skyrim.nexusmods.com be sure to get the pre-release version. Some people have said it causes errors with the UI textures so just delete that folder before you put the optimized textures in and be sure to keep a backup before you run the program.

There's a 10MB 4k res pinup poster of a chick in a bikini but most of the gun textures still look like garbage

Cybersemtex wrote: Running the .exe as administrator?
Something worked very well for me : I changed the switch_distance located in gamedata/configs/alife.ltx

From 350 to 150 (vanilla values)

You should try 300 first then 250 then 200. If it does not help at 150 then there's another problem...

Hey,

just wanted to ask what this "switch_distance" actually does?

Greetings

*edit*

found it:

SWITCH DISTANCE SETTING ;;;
;;; This crucial setting controls the distance on which 'online a-life' takes place. Beyond it NPCs are only simulated in memory and will not visible. Basically there is 'life' and thus combat beyond this distance. Vanilla value is 150, Misery scripts and setting have been specially tuned to operate on distance of 350 and higher. You can rise this is distance as much as you rig is able to support a good framerate.

Edited by: henniheine

Cadaurny wrote:
You can also optimize them yourself using DDSopt, I haven't bothered but I've heard it's really simple and doesn't take long. People have said the textures were cut down by at least 350MBs after using it. Here's a link: (link) be sure to get the pre-release version. Some people have said it causes errors with the UI textures so just delete that folder before you put the optimized textures in and be sure to keep a backup before you run the program.

I can confirm DDSopt made a noticeable difference.

Yeah, had very smooth framerates with nigh max settings (a bit lower than for Misery 1.2) , but the stuttering every 20 seconds or so drove me crazy.
After setting Alife to 250 meters and using DDSopt, the stuttering´s almost completely gone. There´s still a frame rate drop at Yanov station, especially at night, but that´s to be expected with all the high res textures present.

Downloading AN lite at the moment, maybe it can improve performance even further.

Thank you so much for the tips, guys!

A happy Stalker

Edited by: bava101

bava101 wrote: Yeah, had very smooth framerates with nigh max settings (a bit lower than for Misery 1.2) , but the stuttering every 20 seconds or so drove me crazy.
After setting Alife to 250 meters and using DDSopt, the stuttering´s almost completely gone. There´s still a frame rate drop at Yanov station, especially at night, but that´s to be expected with all the high res textures present.

Downloading AN lite at the moment, maybe it can improve performance even further.

Thank you so much for the tips, guys!

A happy Stalker

Using "DDSopt".. Do those "new" textures look as good as the original textures, or do you see a difference?

Mod is completely unplayable for me still. Game stutters and freezes about every 10-20 secs for a period of 1-10 secs each time. Eventually the game crashes and I have to terminate the task. Tried the advice in this thread.......Alife lowered and optimized textures installed. I am using the no pre fetch mod as well and it has absolutely no effect. Same random stutters and crashes. Got this is vanilla CoP and couldn't play the game as a result......thought it might be fixed in this mod but I still can't play it.

May be worth noting that the stutters seem to occur when sprinting most of the time and stops when you release the sprint button. Although not consistent enough to say that is the cause.

Running at full graphics.....fps is not an issue......above or around 60 at all times......DX10 and DX11 both have the same problems.PC: i5 3570K @ 4.4ghz / EVGA GTX 680 FTW 2GB / ASUS Maximus V Gene / 8GB DDR3 1600mhz / Creative Recon 3D PCI-E / Win7 64 bit

Also game crashes on startup if I don't force v sync through nvidia cp......no idea.Gutted as I was really looking forward to this mod.Can anyone help?

Really annoying and I am ready to give up to be honest. Not worth the hassel. :-(

Edited by: freejrs

henniheine wrote:

bava101 wrote: Yeah, had very smooth framerates with nigh max settings (a bit lower than for Misery 1.2) , but the stuttering every 20 seconds or so drove me crazy.
After setting Alife to 250 meters and using DDSopt, the stuttering´s almost completely gone. There´s still a frame rate drop at Yanov station, especially at night, but that´s to be expected with all the high res textures present.

Downloading AN lite at the moment, maybe it can improve performance even further.

Thank you so much for the tips, guys!

A happy Stalker

Using "DDSopt".. Do those "new" textures look as good as the original textures, or do you see a difference?

A difference is there, but it´s subtle. But try it for yourself, make a backup of your texture folder and if you don´t like the result, just copy it back.

I'm only getting stuttering when the game is loading new areas, most of the time the game runs fine, 40fps average. Is anyone else having similar problems?

silly but do I enter 300 from 350 at the start fo this line ? .

;;;; SWITCH DISTANCE SETTING ;;;;;; This crucial setting controls the distance on which 'online a-life' takes place. Beyond it NPCs are only simulated in memory and will not visible. Basically there is 'life' and thus combat beyond this distance. Vanilla value is 150, Misery scripts and setting have been specially tuned to operate on distance of 350 and higher. You can rise this is distance as much as you rig is able to support a good framerate.
switch_distance = 350 ; 950 ; 150 ; 350 ; 450 ; 500 ; 550 ; 600 ; 850 metres

For me it was an easy fix. Theres a mod out there that disables prefetching, and i haven't got a single issue with using it.

Forums.steampowered.com

As with the original CoP, most of the stuttering is caused by prefetching. The main downside to disabling prefetching is longer load times as far as i know, but only when loading the game for the first time after you run it. All subsequent loads will be at normal speed, until you restart the game of course.

Since the mod adds a lot more bloat to prefetch, it probably feels a lot more stuttery than vanilla.

Edited by: usersd

Cadaurny wrote:

uberhen wrote: You could also install Absolute Nature 3 Lite over Misery 2.0, that seemed to stop a lot of issues I was having.

Yeah, try this, it should help a bit. Misery's textures are completely unoptimized but fortunately the guy who makes Absolute Nature actually has some idea of what he's doing so it'll run better and look better, for the color if nothing else.

You can also optimize them yourself using DDSopt, I haven't bothered but I've heard it's really simple and doesn't take long. People have said the textures were cut down by at least 350MBs after using it. Here's a link: Skyrim.nexusmods.com be sure to get the pre-release version. Some people have said it causes errors with the UI textures so just delete that folder before you put the optimized textures in and be sure to keep a backup before you run the program.

There's a 10MB 4k res pinup poster of a chick in a bikini but most of the gun textures still look like garbage

Does anyone know which DDS file this stupid chick is on? I wish to change it to something smaller in size and also fits well with the game too. I can't believe these guys put a poster chick right at the trader. it just stands out like a soar thumb imo.

I personally like the picture of the chick in the station, to me it adds life to the game. Do you think a bunch of guys in an environment like that would just push aside all sexual feelings? I mean come on, there aren't any females in the zone.

But whatever. NO GIRLZ IN VIDYA GAYMES GUIZE!!!!!1!

They probably should have reduced the texture, 10 MB is unnecessary it for something like that.

Thanks everyone for your help and input. I changed the switch distance and it helped somewhat. I then proceeded to try and use DDsopt on the textures and I messed something up and all the textures defaulted to that blue missing texture color. I'm reinstalling the game from scratch because I forgot to make backups. Could someone give me a link to the Absolute Nature 3 Lite mod. I tried looking for it on moddb and google wasn't any help. Thanks again for the advice.

Here you go:

Moddb.com

And a very nice guy made a light texture pack for misery 2.0, it can be found here:

Moddb.com

bava101 wrote: Here you go:
Moddb.com
And a very nice guy made a light texture pack for misery 2.0, it can be found here:
Moddb.com

1.) :3
2.) There really is no need for "Absolute Nature Lite", if you intend to download my texture pack, as it already modifies ALL of the included textures to have a lower resolution - the meshes for objects appear to be of slightly bigger size in ANL, actually.
3.) You might also want to check the "Lag fix" that i have on my thread (in the link bava101 posted), it should increase performance by quite a bit.
4.) Perhaps you could also try running in DX9.

usersd wrote: For me it was an easy fix. Theres a mod out there that disables prefetching, and i haven't got a single issue with using it.

Forums.steampowered.com

As with the original CoP, most of the stuttering is caused by prefetching. The main downside to disabling prefetching is longer load times as far as i know, but only when loading the game for the first time after you run it. All subsequent loads will be at normal speed, until you restart the game of course.

Since the mod adds a lot more bloat to prefetch, it probably feels a lot more stuttery than vanilla.

The question is - does Misery 2 work correctly with those "non-prefetch" files?

Cause in those original Prefetch-files of Misery 2 (which you overwrite with this mod) is written a lot of stuff. Especially in "prefetch_single.ltx".

As far as i got it right here: Gamespot.com
There were already problems in "Vanilla - Stalker COP" with this no prefetch mod.

Edited by: henniheine

I haven't noticed any difference to be honest, i've been using it for a while. Then again i'm one of those guys who doesn't seem to ever crash.

Hell, i can minimize and maximize the game like crazy and it'll still be stable. So my advice? back up the originals and try it. There doesn't seem to be an impact in Alife, people still shoot themselves and mutants still fight and chase me. Artifacts still spawn. I still get ambushed by bloodsuckers... So I guess Alife isn't impacted.

Just looked at the original file and as far as i can see all that is written there are the files to prefetch, characters and items. The disabled file doesn't have any, simply because it doesn't prefetch anything. Makes sense.

Edited by: usersd

usersd wrote: I haven't noticed any difference to be honest, i've been using it for a while. Then again i'm one of those guys who doesn't seem to ever crash.

Hell, i can minimize and maximize the game like crazy and it'll still be stable. So my advice? back up the originals and try it. There doesn't seem to be an impact in Alife, people still shoot themselves and mutants still fight and chase me. Artifacts still spawn. I still get ambushed by bloodsuckers... So I guess Alife impacted.

Just looked at the original file and as far as i can see all that is written there are the files to prefetch, characters and items. The disabled file doesn't have any, simply because it doesn't prefetch anything. Makes sense.

Allright, i'll give it a try as soon as the patch is released.

Install: Only overwriting this gamedata folder, or is there anything else todo?

Edited by: henniheine