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[matrix-cat]

The game's obviously very specifically optimised for the consoles and their juicy VRAM pools, so I don't necessarily begrudge them for not being able to adapt it for my paltry 2GB of the stuff. However, there's no excuse for not simply being transparent about it from the beginning. My card exceeds the minimum specs, and I can't get even a solid 30FPS with all settings as low as they go. Just list a 3GB minimum for VRAM in the system requirements, simple as that; I could have bought the PS4 version instead.

Of course, WB was too busy keeping the secret that the PC version had been outsourced to Iron Galaxy to worry about that.

 

[Huddy]

We asked Digital Foundry to take a quick look at the game as it stands - the results suggest that Batman: Arkham Knight today has seen no further improvements from its interim patch back in September.

The only noticeable changes were the addition of support for add-on and season pass content.

Oh Dear.

 

[Ludens]

Oh Dear.

This was pretty clear, when WB posted NOTHING in the patch log. Basically they pulled another Arkham Origins, that's it. No patches, DLC support so they can milk a little more their consumers.

 

[dr_rus]

Seeing how it performed on PS4 I'm actually wondering how it would've performed if they had access to dx12/vulkan from the start.

Much worse than it is performing in DX11 would be my guess.

Oh Dear.

The patch was for DLC support. There will be other updates down the line.

 

[Dictator93]

The game's obviously very specifically optimised for the consoles and their juicy VRAM pools,

Console games have at best 5.5-6 GB of total RAM available, of which probably 3-3.5 is dedicated to graphics by teams.

I have a hard time seeing why this game asks for so much system RAM and VRAM in combination even at its lowest settings. The texture quality is terrible on low.

 

[dk_]

I glad to hear that (but i only have 8gb of ram AND win10)

I also have 8GB and Windows 10. No problem!

 

[EatChildren]

Yeah. I mean, I get that games are using HQ textures these days, and a lot of them, and at 1440p with effects and shit cranked to full that's going to eat a lot of VRAM. But Afterburner reporting 5GB+ VRAM usage is pretty crazy. Nothing has gone that high for me. Closest is the rare 4GB peak in Inquisition, and that's with -1 mipmap bias contributing.

 

[Costia]

I am thinking about playing a batman game and i haven't played origins yet.
So which one is more fun? Knight or Origins?
I have a 970, so perormance shouldn't be a problem.

 

[Dictator93]

Yeah. I mean, I get that games are using HQ textures these days, and a lot of them, and at 1440p with effects and shit cranked to full that's going to eat a lot of VRAM. But Afterburner reporting 5GB+ VRAM usage is pretty crazy. Nothing has gone that high for me. Closest is the rare 4GB peak in Inquisition, and that's with -1 mipmap bias contributing.

Getting nervous? I would not worry about it.

I think this game is an outlier on the AAA landscape that has an extremely poor texture and object streamer (hence the stutters no matter hardware and settings).

 

[Spring-Loaded]

I am thinking about playing a batman game and i haven't played origins yet.
So which one is more fun? Knight or Origins?
I have a 970, so perormance shouldn't be a problem.

You'll never get a consensus for this question. I personally found Knight more fun because of the additions/tweaks to gameplay (namely stealth/predator stuff) and the Batmobile. However, all the games in this series are really similar, yet have strengths and weaknesses in different categories, so depending on what you value most, you could like any one of them the most. e.g. Asylum is outclassed in every way by its sequels, but you might like the setting of the asylum so much that you somehow enjoy it most overall.

Performance shouldn't be a problem with Origins, but for Knight, it's up in the air.

 

[heringer]

I got really bored by Origins and couldn't finish. I think it's partly because Gotham looked so bland and boring to navigate.

Only just started Arkham Knight, but so far I'm enjoying it. Batmobile is fun to control so I'll probably enjoy this.

 

[Stop It]

So it turns out yesterday I didn't get this patch through properly? I turned on my PC for lunch and am downloading 8.5GB, which is probably the DLC, strange.

 

[Tecnniqe]

The PC game that keeps on giving.

Spoiler

I bruteforced it at launch and have no intention of ever going back.

 

[Oracle Dragon]

I have a PC and a WiiU, so console versions are a non-starter for me. As a huge fan of the other Batman games I was really waiting for this release to be fixed so I could finally buy it.

I know it is having trouble with high graphic settings. But with the details turned down is it better/playable? I have only a 560Ti, if I have to do low textures and resolution, that's what I have to do, but is it even possible? Or is it already hopeless for me?

 

[mdzapeer]

I already finished the game with with September patch, and it ran pretty much at 60 fps (higher if unlocked) locked at 1440p (99%@60 fps) or 2880x1620 (98%@60 fps with drops to 55 in heavy scenes) without hitching or stutters, 1080p was 100% locked 60 (with all gameworks effects to boot).

All high settings, nvidia smoke effects only disabled for higher than 1080p resolutions.

System:
I7 5820K@4.2 Ghz
32 GB DDR 4
running off SSD
980 ti ACX OC edition EVGA

It all comes down people complaining about Batman AK performance on their old hardware...they still have 670s(my old card) and 8 GB RAM, PS3 generation made lesser machines super OP comparatively. Hardware pushing next gen games and those same PCs (even though they can STILL get better performance@ higher than 1080p with 30 fps) are getting trashed.

No doubt it is poorly ported and very RAM hungry, but this kind of drop in performance should be expected if your moving to the big next gen only games. Ass Creed Unity is another example.

The is game is guilty of not scaling to hardware.

 

[Glitchesarecool]

So game comes out and they still didn't fix the things people actually had problems with, or is it just not compatible with lower or mid tier systems? What the fuck were they working on all this time?

Oh wow, they're trying to get steam players back by offering TF2 items.

 

[mdzapeer]

So game comes out and they still didn't fix the things people actually had problems with, or is it just not compatible with lower or mid tier systems? What the fuck were they working on all this time?

Oh wow, they're trying to get steam players back by offering TF2 items.

I would say it does'nt scale well to low or mid end hardware. They fixed the game for the high end systems.

 

[inm8num2]

Some press about the re-release:

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2015-10-29-batman-arkham-knight-is-still-broken-players-say

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2015/10/29/batman-arkham-knight-problems/

(sorry if already posted - searched and didn't see)

 

[lashman]

Batman: Arkham Knight PC still broken, players say

"At least 12GB" RAM now recommended on Windows 10.

(...) We asked Digital Foundry to take a quick look at the game as it stands - the results suggest that Batman: Arkham Knight today has seen no further improvements from its interim patch back in September.

The only noticeable changes were the addition of support for add-on and season pass content. (...)

well then ...

 

[Nabbis]

Yeah, no thanks. Releasing half-assed games takes a new low in 2015 with a double release.

 

[daxy]

What surprises me is that Mad Max, WB's other big release this year, has had pretty great PC support, quick post-release fixes, extensive graphics customization options and runs well on very modest systems, even though WB left this to the wayside in favor of marketing the shit out of AK.

 

[dex3108]

What surprises me is that Mad Max, WB's other big release this year, has had pretty great PC support, quick post-release fixes, extensive graphics customization options and runs well on very modest systems, even though WB left this to the wayside in favor of marketing the shit out of AK.

Mad Max is done by Avalanche, and they make good PC games.

 

[kodecraft]

Mad Max is done by Avalanche, and they make good PC games.

So would've it been better to give AK Knight to a proper PC port house...or do it the Rockstar way and push the PC version back altogether to release it optimized?

 

[KingV]

No doubt it is poorly ported and very RAM hungry, but this kind of drop in performance should be expected if your moving to the big next gen only games. Ass Creed Unity is another example.

The is game is guilty of not scaling to hardware.

Ass Creed unity is also notoriously broken.

There are plenty of new games that outperform their console versions on relatively mid range pcs.

This is just a very poorly done port that WB didn't really care enough to fix.

In no world should you need a $2500 PC to play a game that runs perfectly acceptable on a console with a netbook CPU and a 7850 with 5 GB of usable ram.

 

[EatChildren]

Getting nervous? I would not worry about it.

I think this game is an outlier on the AAA landscape that has an extremely poor texture and object streamer (hence the stutters no matter hardware and settings).

My existence is nervous. Every day I look at my 980 Ti and question it.

But yeah, the texture streaming is dreadful. Asset streaming in general. In this latest build first time I call the batmobile on each load stutters like fucking crazy.

 

[Kezen]

Ass Creed unity was also notoriously broken.

Fixed. The game scales beautifully with the hardware, unlike Arkham Knight.

There are plenty of new games that outperform their console versions on relatively mid range pcs.

As much as we believe AK leaves performance on the table, this is already the case but the mid-range GPU in question must have at least 3gb of VRAM. A 4gb R7 370 should do the job.

In no world should you need a $2500 PC to play a game that runs perfectly acceptable on a console with a netbook CPU and a 7850 with 5 GB of usable ram.

At what settings though. Many multiplats need very high-end specs for max settings, and that's fine.

I'd argue that AK does not fully justify its requirements.

 

[dex3108]

So would've it been better to give AK Knight to a proper PC port house...or do it the Rockstar way and push the PC version back altogether to release it optimized?

Rocksteady is one to blame here in my opinion. Avalanche is good because they are doing games in their engine and they know how it works so they can optimize games so well. Rocksteady knows their FrankenUE3.x engine so they should do all versions. But they went easy route, almost 1:1 Console to PC port done by external studio with probably very small budget. Even if game had to be delayed on PC Rocksteady should have done PC version in house.

 

[tuxfool]

Rocksteady is one to blame here in my opinion. Avalanche is good because they are doing games in their engine and they know how it works so they can optimize games so well. Rocksteady knows their FrankenUE3.x engine so they should do all versions. But they went easy route, almost 1:1 Console to PC port done by external studio with probably very small budget. Even if game had to be delayed on PC Rocksteady should have done PC version in house.

It is clear that they were developing a 30fps console game. Their streaming engine simply cannot handle any better.

 

[Loxley]

What surprises me is that Mad Max, WB's other big release this year, has had pretty great PC support, quick post-release fixes, extensive graphics customization options and runs well on very modest systems, even though WB left this to the wayside in favor of marketing the shit out of AK.

That and Shadow of Mordor both had a pretty good port from what I remember (as did the previous Arkham games), what the fuck happened with AK? It's bizarre.

 

[lashman]

That and Shadow of Mordor both had a pretty good port from what I remember (as did the previous Arkham games), what the fuck happened with AK? It's bizarre.

Mordor and Mad Max weren't ports ... they were PC versions ... the consoles got the ports

 

[Kezen]

That and Shadow of Mordor both had a pretty good port from what I remember (as did the previous Arkham games), what the fuck happened with AK? It's bizarre.

We can only speculate but it's possible Rocksteady were not given enough budget to handle all three skus so one had to be outsourced and we all know which one it is in those situations.

Outsourcing is of course not the problem, but the publisher is guilty of not having given the PC team enough time and ressources. Maybe there were communication issues between the PC porting team the core engineer team at Rocksteady, maybe Iron Galaxy found themselves isolated and without too much technical details. It's entirely plausible that WB themselves have crudely underestimated the scale of the task, Arkham Knight is not your average UE3 game, it's very rich graphically and fined tuned for console hardware. Porting on PC is never straightforward under those circumstances.

Regardless, the game runs very well on my PC. I'm well aware it's not the case for everyone and that it could run better even factoring in the inefficiencies of the PC development environment.
I'm convinced the stuttering issues effect anyone but everyone is not sensitive to that to the same degree. Myself I would not say I'm completely turned off by stuttering provided it's not catastrophic and from my experience with AK it is not.
There is stutter for sure, I'm not trying to paint a prettier picture, I've posted my frametimes benches earlier, but it's nowhere near concerning enough to ruin my enjoyment of the game.
SSD + 16gb of RAM do wonder in this game.

 

[kodecraft]

It is clear that they were developing a 30fps console game. Their streaming engine simply cannot handle any better.

I have to agree with this, because last year I swore Rocksteady implied they were handling all versions.

This PC release is similar to The Evil Within PC release. It was capped at 30fps and seemed like by the devs a take it or leave it type situation.

But the eventually the port house of The Evil Within on PC patched it basically uncapping the PC version to 60fps, if the player chose in the options.

But it playa jittery in 60fps, proving its development never had intentions of it being played like that.

I believe AK has the same problem. These games are just thought of as concole to PC clines, the tender, love, and care for an optimized PC version is lost.

PC versions need to be their own version, if that makes sense, not a carbon copy. But companies want to save money and don't care.

 

[dex3108]

We can only speculate but it's possible Rocksteady were not given enough budget to handle all three skus so one had to be outsourced and we all know which one it is in those situations.

Outsourcing is of course not the problem, but the publisher is guilty of not having given the PC team enough time and ressources. Maybe there were communication issues between the PC porting team the core engineer team at Rocksteady, maybe Iron Galaxy found themselves isolated and without too much technical details. It's entirely plausible that WB themselves have crudely underestimated the scale of the task, Arkham Knight is not your average UE3 game, it's very rich graphically and fined tuned for console hardware. Porting on PC is never straightforward under those circumstances.

Regardless, the game runs very well on my PC. I'm well aware it's not the case for everyone and that it could run better even factoring in the inefficiencies of the PC development environment.
I'm convinced the stuttering issues effect anyone but everyone is not sensitive to that to the same degree. Myself I would not say I'm completely turned off by stuttering provided it's not catastrophic and from my experience with AK it is not.
There is stutter for sure, I'm not trying to paint a prettier picture, I've posted my frametimes benches earlier, but it's nowhere near concerning enough to ruin my enjoyment of the game.
SSD + 16gb of RAM do wonder in this game.

No. Avalanche probably got way less money than Rocksteady for Mad Max but they did all versions of the game. You know why? Because they care about products they make. Rocksteady made that version of UE3 engine and they made game so it is their responsibility to release working game.

 

[kodecraft]

Tango Gameworks modified the game engine ID Tech 5. Rocksteady modified UE3.

Why?

 

[Kezen]

No. Avalanche probably got way less money than Rocksteady for Mad Max but they did all versions of the game. You know why? Because they care about products they make. Rocksteady made that version of UE3 engine and they made game so it is their responsibility to release working game.

How do you know the budget of each game and how much ressources were given to both of those devs ?
We don't have any information regarding that, which is why I made clear in my previous post that I was merely speculating.

For all we know Avalanche may have been granted enough in terms of man power and budget to handle all three skus but that was not the case for Rocksteady.

The truth is those who feel robbed can only direct their anger towards WB. We don't know Rocksteady's responsabilities in all this.

The game will probably never be "fixed" performance wise.

 

[ashecitism]

Tango Gameworks modified the game engine ID Tech 5. Rocksteady modified UE3.

Why?

In Rocksteady's case it was a familiar engine to them, also they had a deal to use UE3 and were making the game before UE4 properly launched. It wasn't a good idea to transition a WIP project to a new engine in the middle of development.

 

[dex3108]

How do you know the budget of each game and how much ressources were given to both of those devs ?
We don't have any information regarding that, which is why I made clear in my previous post that I was merely speculating.

For all we know Avalanche may have been granted enough in terms of man power and budget to handle all three skus but that was not the case for Rocksteady.

The truth is those who feel robbed can only direct their anger towards WB. We don't know Rocksteady's responsabilities in all this.

The game will probably never be "fixed" performance wise.

It is their product as much it is WBs product. They are makers and they are ultimately responsible for projects they make. If they cared they would make good PC version with delay or without. Yes we can be angry on WB and we should but Rockstady is guilty too. If you care about your product and your customers you do right thing. Hell even Rockstar did proper PC version for GTA V because they had PC version in mind from start. It is simple they didn't care about PC version and they were focused on console version. Then they realized that game has huge issues on consoles too so they focused all their power to make those good. So PC version ended up being mostly 1:1 port.

And based on marketing and both games you can clearly see that Mad Max got way smaller budget.

 

[Kezen]

It is their product as much it is WBs product. They are makers and they are ultimately responsible for projects they make. If they cared they would make good PC version with delay or without. Yes we can be angry on WB and we should but Rockstady is guilty too. If you care about your product and your customers you do right thing. Hell even Rockstar did proper PC version for GTA V because they had PC version in mind from start. It is simple they didn't care about PC version and they were focused on console version. Then they realized that game has huge issues on consoles too so they focused all their power to make those good. So PC version ended up being mostly 1:1 port.

And based on marketing and both games you can clearly see that Mad Max got way smaller budget.

You can't ask a dev to do a good job without proper budget and ressources. I don't doubt Rocksteady are very talented but it's possible they have not been given enough to make a proper PC version, and the result would have been no different had outsourcing not been an option. I don't buy the story that Rocksteady purposefully put the PC on the back burner or don't care about the PC platform whatsoever.
The thing is we can only speculate, we don't know what went wrong and when the decision to outsource was taken.

Regarding budget, smaller does not mean insufficient. Mad Max may have not benefited from as much dev budget as AK but it might have been sufficient for them to handle all three skus with ease.
It's possible it was simply not the case for Rocksteady which had no choice but to ask WB to outsource since they just couldn't do the PC version justice under the circumstances.
The ones responsible are the folks at WB for having made an improper choice pertaining to the PC porting team, or they may have not put enough on the table to guaratee a solid PC version.

I don't believe Rocksteady have to share the guilt, they made a superb game which sadly did not release in the best of shape on PC.

 

[Noray]

It is their product as much it is WBs product. They are makers and they are ultimately responsible for projects they make. If they cared they would make good PC version with delay or without. Yes we can be angry on WB and we should but Rockstady is guilty too. If you care about your product and your customers you do right thing. Hell even Rockstar did proper PC version for GTA V because they had PC version in mind from start. It is simple they didn't care about PC version and they were focused on console version. Then they realized that game has huge issues on consoles too so they focused all their power to make those good. So PC version ended up being mostly 1:1 port.

And based on marketing and both games you can clearly see that Mad Max got way smaller budget.

Plenty of ports done by port houses turn out fine. Blaming Rocksteady in this scenario with no inside knowledge is ignorant. Even assuming the state of the game is 100% their fault (it is not) WB decided to publish it when they KNEW that it was a shit-show. And they decided to re-release it just as broken as before. Direct your ire towards Warner Bros, not Rocksteady.

 

[KingV]

I'd argue that AK does not fully justify its requirements.

Then we are in agreement.

That's basically why everybody says the game is broken. Sure,it runs pretty well when you throw a PC with $600 video card, $500 CPU and 4x the RAM that most gamers are running.

But really, it shouldn't struggle to deliver a smooth 30fps at 1080p on a 970 or 960 with an i5 4690 and 8GB, considering that it can run well on a console.

 

[Kezen]

Then we are in agreement.

That's basically why everybody says the game is broken. Sure,it runs pretty well when you throw a PC with $600 video card, $500 CPU and 4x the RAM that most gamers are running.

But really, it shouldn't struggle to deliver a smooth 30fps at 1080p on a 970 or 960 with an i5 4690 and 8GB, considering that it can run well on a console.

I would be surprised if a 960 could not run it at 30fps with all settings engaged except Gameworks. Stutter could still be an issue though.

 

[KingBroly]

After the PC versions of MK X and Arkham Knight, I don't think I'll be purchasing another WB published game for a long time. Inexcusable anti-consumer horseshit. Both of them. Unacceptable. The PC market is big enough to where it shouldn't be treated as a bastard stepchild by any publisher or developer.

 

[IMACOMPUTA]

i gave in and downloaded it.

it runs well (around 30 - 45fps) for a while only with a few long hitches here and there, then after as certain amount of time it just crashes, then a error window pop ups

my system is
Windows 10 Premium
AMD FX-6300
8GB 1866MHz memory
AMD R9 380 4GB

I already own all of the batman games, except the blackgate prison one. Oh well, bring on Fallout 4.

edit: I tried to record some gameplay but when the game crashed the video file got busted.

 

[SapientWolf]

After the PC versions of MK X and Arkham Knight, I don't think I'll be purchasing another WB published game for a long time. Inexcusable anti-consumer horseshit. Both of them. Unacceptable. The PC market is big enough to where it shouldn't be treated as a bastard stepchild by any publisher or developer.

To be fair, MKX eventually got fixed (but the online multiplayer is shit regardless of platform). I would definitely avoid pre-ordering from WB though. It's always a gamble.

 

[KingBroly]

To be fair, MKX eventually got fixed (but the online multiplayer is shit regardless of platform). I would definitely avoid pre-ordering from WB though. It's always a gamble.

I usually play MK for single player, so online wasn't really a concern. But I hadn't heard it had been fixed, probably because the player base is gone for it on PC.

 

[Coolade]

After the PC versions of MK X and Arkham Knight, I don't think I'll be purchasing another WB published game for a long time. Inexcusable anti-consumer horseshit. Both of them. Unacceptable. The PC market is big enough to where it shouldn't be treated as a bastard stepchild by any publisher or developer.

I wouldn't let rocksteady's poor work and WB's lack of concern over their licensed product stop you from playing Just Cause 3 from avalanche studios this December.

 

[KingBroly]

I wouldn't let rocksteady's poor work and WB's lack of concern over their licensed product stop you from playing Just Cause 3 from avalanche studios this December.

Isn't JC3 a Square published game?

 

[Coolade]

Isn't JC3 a Square published game?

Ah my bad I assumed since Mad Max was published by WB Just Cause 3 would be as well.

 

[Kezen]

To be fair, MKX eventually got fixed (but the online multiplayer is shit regardless of platform). I would definitely avoid pre-ordering from WB though. It's always a gamble.

The safe advice is simply never to pre-order a PC game, you never know how well a game will run before it's out in the wild.
Always wait for performance reports.

Next in line will be Fallout 4, it's easy to predict a relatively poorly optimized game considering Bethesda's track record. I mean I don't recall Fallout 3 running particularly well.
Let there be no illusion about Fallout 4. It's just not going to run well regardless of your PC.

 

[PHOENIXZERO]

It helps that Avalanche isn't owned by Warner Brothers so they don't have as much if any say in who really did what with Mad Max and I'm sure Avalanche put in a fair bit of their own money into it.

Console games have at best 5.5-6 GB of total RAM available, of which probably 3-3.5 is dedicated to graphics by teams.

I have a hard time seeing why this game asks for so much system RAM and VRAM in combination even at its lowest settings. The texture quality is terrible on low.

Unless Sony and MS have given developers another GB still they have 5GB of the 8GB to work with.