Horizon Forbidden West

I've played for 10 hours and can say they did a good job. It seems that all features of the Dual Sense controller work, even the speaker; I've only used it hardwired, can't say how it performs wireless. I'm still running into weird stutter after playing for a bit even after using DDU to uninstall the Nvidia drivers and then performing a clean install. I think there's something screwy with shaders not completely compiling or maybe my machine just can't keep up with shader compilation if they're trying to do it on the fly (CPU isn't slammed, though). Regardless, it's probably something they'll work out in a patch or a driver update because there seems to be a lot of discussion of stutter on the Steam forums, other than that the game seems like a solid port. I played through the Embassy fight, FPS started dropping about 3-5FPS during the initial cut scenes, I assumed because of higher-quality models for cut scenes, but the battle with Regalla's fighters was fine. I hit the persistent lag when I was allowed to free roam that particular area. Frame rate smoothed out once I got to the campfire and backtracked into the fight area. Dropping to the very low preset didn't affect FPS at all, it stayed the same and lag/stutter remained until I backtracked into the area, as if shaders had compiled and all was well.

I'm running:
Windows 11
i7-9700K, 32GB RAM, RTX 3090, Gigabyte z390 motherboard
OS on a 256GB Samsung 950 Pro @ PCIe 3.0 x4, Games on a 4TB Corsair MP600 Pro XT @ PCIe 3.0 x4 (PCIe 4.0 not available on this MB/CPU)
 
thoughts so far:
other than the 3 lines below the game looks good, runs well and is very fun.

the story and quests are WAYYY too heavy handed. Like a 3 year old can understand BAD GUY and GOOD GUY in every situation. and they HAMMER it home.
sometimes she doesnt jump the way i want her to.
I wish there was a 10 yard "collect everything near me" button. After a big battle it can take 5 minutes just collecting stuff.
 
Can someone test DirectStorage on and off to see its effect on FPS in this game? I get expected framerate but with massive drops to stutter-fest level. The Last of Us - Part 1 (patched) runs much better for me...

Forbidden West comes with 2 DirectStorage DLL files and renaming those files would disable DirectStorage (for testing purposes).

DirectStorage does not work with BitLocker or VeraCrypt or DiskCryptor or BestCrypt drives and I am not going to decrypt unless mentioned massive FPS drops are heavily helped by DirectStorage.

You can find out for sure whether DirectStorage is active by running a simple command described here - Post in thread 'Direct Storage - which drive to keep unlocked?' https://hardforum.com/threads/direct-storage-which-drive-to-keep-unlocked.2033199/post-1045826112 .
 
OpenSource Ghost said:
Can someone test DirectStorage on and off to see its effect on FPS in this game? I get expected framerate but with massive drops to stutter-fest level. The Last of Us - Part 1 (patched) runs much better for me...

Forbidden West comes with 2 DirectStorage DLL files and renaming those files would disable DirectStorage (for testing purposes).

DirectStorage does not work with BitLocker or VeraCrypt or DiskCryptor or BestCrypt drives and I am not going to decrypt unless mentioned massive FPS drops are heavily helped by DirectStorage.

You can find out for sure whether DirectStorage is active by running a simple command described here - Post in thread 'Direct Storage - which drive to keep unlocked?' https://hardforum.com/threads/direct-storage-which-drive-to-keep-unlocked.2033199/post-1045826112 .
Click to expand...
It won't affect FPS, they're not using it for texture decompression. Check out the article a few posts back, they had some pretty specific reasons to not use it. It's only used for increased load times.
 
DF-1 said:
thoughts so far:
other than the 3 lines below the game looks good, runs well and is very fun.

the story and quests are WAYYY too heavy handed. Like a 3 year old can understand BAD GUY and GOOD GUY in every situation. and they HAMMER it home.
sometimes she doesnt jump the way i want her to.
I wish there was a 10 yard "collect everything near me" button. After a big battle it can take 5 minutes just collecting stuff.
Click to expand...
There's an auto pickup setting I think, but it only works until your pack is full of a particular resource. That's my main issue wit hte game as well. Too much picking stuff up. Overall though, probably one of the most engaging open world games I've played in years, I might actually finish this one. Typically open world games I get tired of fairly quickly.
 
I don't know if Direct Storage is running, but for a game of this scale, it's extremely fast loading; like 5 seconds from launching from Windows to actually moving Aloy around.
 
OpenSource Ghost said:
Can someone test DirectStorage on and off to see its effect on FPS in this game? I get expected framerate but with massive drops to stutter-fest level. The Last of Us - Part 1 (patched) runs much better for me...

Forbidden West comes with 2 DirectStorage DLL files and renaming those files would disable DirectStorage (for testing purposes).

DirectStorage does not work with BitLocker or VeraCrypt or DiskCryptor or BestCrypt drives and I am not going to decrypt unless mentioned massive FPS drops are heavily helped by DirectStorage.

You can find out for sure whether DirectStorage is active by running a simple command described here - Post in thread 'Direct Storage - which drive to keep unlocked?' https://hardforum.com/threads/direct-storage-which-drive-to-keep-unlocked.2033199/post-1045826112 .
Click to expand...
Welcome to the club. Last of Us runs fine here, albeit I need to turn down some things, but it otherwise runs smooth. My drives aren't encrypted, I'm about to start removing software that might be resident (Citrix Workspace, Logitech, NZXT) to see if that matters. Game mostly runs smooth, but I've been unable to completely alleviate the stutter.


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcYgXJtW-XI
 
djoye said:
Welcome to the club. Last of Us runs fine here, albeit I need to turn down some things, but it otherwise runs smooth. My drives aren't encrypted, I'm about to start removing software that might be resident (Citrix Workspace, Logitech, NZXT) to see if that matters. Game mostly runs smooth, but I've been unable to completely alleviate the stutter.


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcYgXJtW-XI
Click to expand...

Rig?
 
31.4 hours into the game and have met only two bugs. One was a machine glitched below the ground and the other was unable to turn in a quest. Both were solved with quitting to main menu then loading a save.

Overall, my rating would be in the high 90s based on story, quests, visuals and performance. All, of which, are top notch relative to my system config.

Horizon: Zero Dawn blew me away. This, so much more.
 
I enjoyed the first game and had already heard from console players that this one was good. It also sounds like the PC version was done well which is a pleasant surprise, if they had released it a couple of months after the console version instead of a couple years I'd be buying it right now. Since they did the PC version right I will at least pick it up at the first halfway decent sale instead of when it hits the bargain bin like I did with the first.
 
djoye said:
Welcome to the club. Last of Us runs fine here, albeit I need to turn down some things, but it otherwise runs smooth. My drives aren't encrypted, I'm about to start removing software that might be resident (Citrix Workspace, Logitech, NZXT) to see if that matters. Game mostly runs smooth, but I've been unable to completely alleviate the stutter.


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcYgXJtW-XI
Click to expand...

Might be time to upgrade that 9700K.
 
Decko87 said:
Rig?
Click to expand...
It's an i7-9700K, 32GB RAM, RTX3090 (24GB VRAM), PCIe SSDs running at 3.0 speeds. The CPU is on the low-ish side (their minimum / recommended is i3-8100 / i5-8600), but CPU utilization is around 70% and GPU is around 70% with the game capped at 60FPS. Even if I drop to the very low preset the game has that weird frame pacing effect, but every time I clear the shader cache (%USERPROFILE%\AppData\LocalLow\NVIDIA\PerDriverVersion\DXCache) the game recompiles its shaders and the stutter goes away. Maybe if I re-reinstall the GPU driver it'll fix that.

Armenius said:
Might be time to upgrade that 9700K.
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I'm waiting as hard as I can for 15th gen Intel! :)
 
djoye said:
It's an i7-9700K, 32GB RAM, RTX3090 (24GB VRAM), PCIe SSDs running at 3.0 speeds. The CPU is on the low-ish side (their minimum / recommended is i3-8100 / i5-8600), but CPU utilization is around 70% and GPU is around 70% with the game capped at 60FPS. Even if I drop to the very low preset the game has that weird frame pacing effect, but every time I clear the shader cache (%USERPROFILE%\AppData\LocalLow\NVIDIA\PerDriverVersion\DXCache) the game recompiles its shaders and the stutter goes away. Maybe if I re-reinstall the GPU driver it'll fix that.


I'm waiting as hard as I can for 15th gen Intel! :)
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The game compiles some shaders before you first start the game. But, there are a lot of other shaders it compiles asynchronously in the background, as you play.

The devs said it mostly grabs the shaders you might need, in time. But, sometimes it doesn't. And that is probably more often, with an older CPU.
 
djoye said:
Welcome to the club. Last of Us runs fine here, albeit I need to turn down some things, but it otherwise runs smooth. My drives aren't encrypted, I'm about to start removing software that might be resident (Citrix Workspace, Logitech, NZXT) to see if that matters. Game mostly runs smooth, but I've been unable to completely alleviate the stutter.


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcYgXJtW-XI
Click to expand...


Trying disabling + Boost for NVidia Reflex. Normal Reflex can be enabled, but enabling + Boost cuts my FPS in half. There are other similar reports.
 
djoye said:
It's an i7-9700K, 32GB RAM, RTX3090 (24GB VRAM), PCIe SSDs running at 3.0 speeds. The CPU is on the low-ish side (their minimum / recommended is i3-8100 / i5-8600), but CPU utilization is around 70% and GPU is around 70% with the game capped at 60FPS. Even if I drop to the very low preset the game has that weird frame pacing effect, but every time I clear the shader cache (%USERPROFILE%\AppData\LocalLow\NVIDIA\PerDriverVersion\DXCache) the game recompiles its shaders and the stutter goes away. Maybe if I re-reinstall the GPU driver it'll fix that.


I'm waiting as hard as I can for 15th gen Intel! :)
Click to expand...
Yeah I would try that, GPU should likely still be pegged.
 
I'm loving the game, it seems bigger than the last one but I don't remember it well enough to comment. It's the best looking game I've ever played without question. I don't have access to path tracing so I can't comment on cyberpunk's PT mode. However, in terms of asset quality, it blows cyberpunk away. Particularly NPCs seem all as a high quality as any main character in the game which is not something I've ever experienced before. Everyone has excellent facial animation work, and all of their texture / modeling working is top notch. There are some visual effects they should've removed that break immersion for me. Like the weird dust cloud texture that's basically just a folded gradient looks awful out in the desert. It would've been fine with just the sand particle effects. At times it feels like they're just layering stuff on because they can.

The most outstanding part of this game design without question, without good visual design and world design none of it would matter, it would be a bland tech demo. The blending of sci-fi and historic native cultures just works so well and gives the whole game its feel. The costume design in particular is astonishing. The actual overarching narrative is excellent but the delivery of the story is ham fisted at best. Some of the characters are compelling, but for the most part the lines just aren't good (feels too much like a game). Overall I feel like it's a solid 9/10 game. I wish I had had some more organic ways to get weapons other than just buying them or forced to craft something, and they need better writers for the actual dialogue delivery and characters. There's just no nuance or depth to virtually anyone, particularly antagonists not named Sylens.


Just as a final note, this my first time using gyro aim in a game and it's so much better than just the controller, blown away by how much more engaging the PS5 controller makes everything.
 
I ended up doing a clean install of Windows 11, wiped the OS drive and re-installed most stuff, and the game ran flawlessly for two hours before I quit playing. I went through a few areas and cut scenes, so I think I put it through its paces. I ran on the 'very high' preset at 3440×1440 with the monitor at 60Hz + vsync to cap it at 60FPS and the CPU and GPU were still averaging 60-70% usage. I think something was up with the GPU drivers because I could resolve the issue by deleting the shader cache, maybe I should have tried cleaning up the drivers again, but it was about time for a fresh Windows install anyway.
 
AG_HFW_001.jpg
 
djoye said:
I ended up doing a clean install of Windows 11, wiped the OS drive and re-installed most stuff, and the game ran flawlessly for two hours before I quit playing. I went through a few areas and cut scenes, so I think I put it through its paces. I ran on the 'very high' preset at 3440×1440 with the monitor at 60Hz + vsync to cap it at 60FPS and the CPU and GPU were still averaging 60-70% usage. I think something was up with the GPU drivers because I could resolve the issue by deleting the shader cache, maybe I should have tried cleaning up the drivers again, but it was about time for a fresh Windows install anyway.
Click to expand...

Average CPU usage does not mean much, you can have 2 cores doing nothing, one at 50% and 1 struggling at 100%. I don't know how this game is coded, but foir the longest time for instance world of warcraft was limited to 1 thread for the main game with some minor stuff offloaded to others.

you should monitor individual cores to see if one is pegged at 100%
 
Frame hitching is evident more and more later in the game as you progress past 20% I've found. Before this is was basically hitch-free.

Here's what I mean, it's traversal stutter basically as you can repeat it simply back tracking the same area where the hitches happen:


View: https://youtu.be/PRIF6IaPrNc

Ignore the GPU use here. The GPU use is low because I am frame capping at 139fps for Gsync, the game is rendering far above 139fps otherwise so the GPU isn't actually needing to run at 99% indoors.
 
I’m only a few hours in but the game is running great on both my desktop and laptop. Decided to play this one with the dual sense, though I find aiming with a pad pretty awkward compared to a mouse the time slowing mechanic seems to negate that well.

Is there any benefit to playing on harder difficulties? Decided go with normal.
 
Normal is harder than most games on hard, so no, very hard is going to give even gaming vets a challenge from what I've seen. Even playing on easy you are likely to die a few times when met with a horde of different classed machines lol.
 
w35t said:
...though I find aiming with a pad pretty awkward compared to a mouse...
Click to expand...
Horizon Zero Dawn on PS4 was painful to me cuz of that. That's why I specifically waited for the PC version of the sequel. I didn't wanna play another Horizon game with a controller again. Normally I would be fine playing with a controller, but Horizon games require too much precision and accurate aiming (what with the targeting of specific body parts on the robo-animals and whatnot). I really struggled playing the first game with a controller, so I am definitely rockin' a mouse for Forbidden West.
 
w35t said:
I’m only a few hours in but the game is running great on both my desktop and laptop. Decided to play this one with the dual sense, though I find aiming with a pad pretty awkward compared to a mouse the time slowing mechanic seems to negate that well.

Is there any benefit to playing on harder difficulties? Decided go with normal.
Click to expand...
This game requires fast and precise aiming and target reacquisition, so I don't know why you'd torture yourself by playing with a controller.
 
robbiekhan said:
Frame hitching is evident more and more later in the game as you progress past 20% I've found. Before this is was basically hitch-free.

Here's what I mean, it's traversal stutter basically as you can repeat it simply back tracking the same area where the hitches happen:


View: https://youtu.be/PRIF6IaPrNc

Ignore the GPU use here. The GPU use is low because I am frame capping at 139fps for Gsync, the game is rendering far above 139fps otherwise so the GPU isn't actually needing to run at 99% indoors.
Click to expand...

I'm well past this part, didn't have hitching there and still don't have any 10+ hours later. Easy solution: Wipe and re-install Windows. ;) I wouldn't be surprised if there's some kind of GPU driver bug associated with this game. Lots of people report stutter with all kinds of supposed solutions, I was able to temporarily resolve it by deleting the contents of C:\Users\<username>\AppData\LocalLow\NVIDIA\PerDriverVersion\DXCache (some files won't delete) to force the game to rebuild shaders, but the stutter would eventually return and progressively get worse. Good luck.
 
djoye said:
I'm well past this part, didn't have hitching there and still don't have any 10+ hours later. Easy solution: Wipe and re-install Windows. ;) I wouldn't be surprised if there's some kind of GPU driver bug associated with this game. Lots of people report stutter with all kinds of supposed solutions, I was able to temporarily resolve it by deleting the contents of C:\Users\<username>\AppData\LocalLow\NVIDIA\PerDriverVersion\DXCache (some files won't delete) to force the game to rebuild shaders, but the stutter would eventually return and progressively get worse. Good luck.
Click to expand...
The process to delete the shader cache is a little more involved than that. You need to turn off the shader cache in the driver control panel and restart your PC to delete all the files in that folder.

Shader cache deletion process said:
  1. Open the NVIDIA control panel.
  2. Go to Manage 3D Settings.
  3. Turn off Shader Cache.
  4. Save and apply changes.
  5. Reboot your PC.
  6. After the PC boots, open the Run dialog box or File Explorer.
  7. Type the following environment variable into the Run dialog box or the File Explorer address bar and hit Enter: %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Temp
  8. At the location, find and open the NVIDIA folder.
  9. In the folder, find and open both the DXCache and the GLCache folder and delete all the items in the folders.
  10. Next, go back to the Local folder.
  11. Now, at that location, find and open the NVIDIA Corporation folder.
  12. In the folder, find and open the NV_Cache folder and delete the contents of the folder.
  13. Exit File Explorer.
  14. Now, go back to the NVIDIA control panel and turn on Shader Cache.
  15. Restart your PC.
Click to expand...

Could just do a clean driver install with Display Driver Uninstaller, too. That usually fixes issues that I can't otherwise explain on my end.
 
Armenius said:
This game requires fast and precise aiming and target reacquisition, so I don't know why you'd torture yourself by playing with a controller.
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So I can enjoy the game on my 65” C2 from the couch. I may go back and forth though.
 
Armenius said:
The process to delete the shader cache is a little more involved than that. You need to turn off the shader cache in the driver control panel and restart your PC to delete all the files in that folder.



Could just do a clean driver install with Display Driver Uninstaller, too. That usually fixes issues that I can't otherwise explain on my end.
Click to expand...
I both disabled shader cache, rebooted, removed files and sometimes just deleted what I could without disabling, both forced the game to rebuild shaders, neither were a long-term solution for me.
 
Made it to level 57 with fewer deaths than I thought I would be at. Combination of element weakness with hard hitting precision arrows are making battles a lot easier though still challenging.

One thing I hadn't been doing until last night and tonight was upgrading pouches. Been running on only precision arrow upgrade level 1 and hunter arrows level 1 this entire time.

At this point in time I am still collecting parts to upgrade the three legendary weapons I've obtained and once that is done I'll continue with the main story.
 
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Patch 1.1.47.0

-Remapping TAB now works correctly
-Added HUD Widescreen Scale options to the settings menu
-Various optimizations and stability improvements
-Custom difficulty settings now work correctly
-Improved Shieldwing responsiveness when using mouse and keyboard controls
-Fixed graphic corruption on waterfalls when using DLSS Frame Generation
-Fixed lighting issues that could occur in Tenakth settlements
-Master Vibration Intensity for DualSense controllers no longer resets with each game session
-HDR settings have been moved to the display menu to allow live viewing of changes
-The option to disable letterboxing in cinematics when using ultra-wide aspect ratios is now also available from the launcher
-Fixed visual issues with save previews when HDR is enabled
-Various minor UI fixes

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/2420110/view/4196865993345323108
 
djoye said:
I'm well past this part, didn't have hitching there and still don't have any 10+ hours later. Easy solution: Wipe and re-install Windows. ;) I wouldn't be surprised if there's some kind of GPU driver bug associated with this game. Lots of people report stutter with all kinds of supposed solutions, I was able to temporarily resolve it by deleting the contents of C:\Users\<username>\AppData\LocalLow\NVIDIA\PerDriverVersion\DXCache (some files won't delete) to force the game to rebuild shaders, but the stutter would eventually return and progressively get worse. Good luck.
Click to expand...
Reinstall windows? Good joke.

The traversal hitching is now completely gone as of the latest patch and nvidia driver update which triggered a new full shader recompilation on launch of the game.
 
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