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[Santar]

So I've never been one to care much about resolutions or framerates. The only time it really bothers me is when it severely affects the gameplay. Like in Dead Rising 2 off the record on the ps3 where every time you looked at a horde of zombies the entire game ran in pretty much in slow motion.

I've been playing Dark Souls on the ps3 lately and I must say I'm surprised at how much worse than Demon's Souls it runs.
The part that really got to me was when you fight those crystal guys near the lake with the hydra. When those crystal guys do that ring of crystal attack the game basically slows down to single digits.

That is a slowdown that actually affects the gameplay of the game for me.
I keep hearing that the framerate is supposed to be pretty bad in a place called blight town.
How bad is it?

Is it just some random hickups here and there, or is it more like the crystal attack thing where the entire game slows down to a grind?
I'm starting to think about playing it on the pc if a lot of the game is plagued with severe slowdown.

 

[Demoskinos]

I'd say it gets into the teens in blight town at times.

 

[Zophar]

Blighttown is as bad as it gets but it never gets as low as the spike you're describing. The rest of the game is perfectly fine; played through it multiple times over several characters.

 

[Grinchy]

The framerate is really horrible in Blighttown, but it was still one of my favorite sections of the game. I'm pretty sensitive to framerate, but I forced myself to get over it for Dark Souls. Stick with it and you'll appreciate the game.

 

[SonicXtreme]

Playing single player? Go PC.

Do u want multiplayer? Stick with the 3. Population on consoles dwarfs PC due to the way it handles connections on PC. Sure if PC is your only choice you can do multi on it but from a few hundred hours on PC and console dueling and coop is much bigger pool on console (PC used to be almost completely broken connection wise but it's acceptable nowadays, just not as good as console )

 

[sixteen-bit]

They should've called Blighttown "Shite Town".

The framrate was soo bad there.

 

[Mendrox]

I'd say it gets into the teens in blight town at times.

That's part of the experience ;-) blighttown is the real Souls. I won't ever forgot the horror back then

 

[YianGaruga]

If you have the option of playing on PC, do it. The difference is significant and the game is an even better experience.

 

[Morfeo]

This game has horrible framerate all over. But Blighttown is in its own league. Much worse than the lower gardens. Just have to look forward to it!

 

[Santar]

Thanks for the replies.
Dang, doesn't sound too good
It just seems like the devs bit off more than they could chew with this game.
I'm pretty sure there's a framerate hickup every time you backstab a enemy even.

It's just disappointing coming from Demon's Souls which ran fine.
I just fear that if I keep going on the PS3 and find the framerates too bad I won't have it in me to restart on the pc.
If I wasn't so afraid of spoilers I'd check out a video of Blight Town on the ps3, but alas

 

[JudgmentJay]

Not gonna lie, Blighttown at 60 FPS on PC is a delight after playing the PS3 version.

 

[Yudoken]

Please play Dark Souls on pc if you can.

Spoiler

Praise Durante

 

[Gbraga]

Not gonna lie, Blighttown at 60 FPS on PC is a delight after playing the PS3 version.

I still can't quite run it at 60fps on my PC, but from what I hear, it's still way better than the alternative.

 

[Brandon F]

It wasn't much better on 360 either, still I found PS3's framerate mostly easy to condition to. I had very little problem negotiating through Blighttown so long as you take it slow and keep your wits about you. Framerate can be a dog, but it really didn't matter that much given how careful you need to manage your footing and battles there.

 

[zma1013]

Playing single player? Go PC.

Do u want multiplayer? Stick with the 3. Population on consoles dwarfs PC due to the way it handles connections on PC. Sure if PC is your only choice you can do multi on it but from a few hundred hours on PC and console dueling and coop is much bigger pool on console (PC used to be almost completely broken connection wise but it's acceptable nowadays, just not as good as console )

I'd say the opposite is true. Apart from endgame dueling levels and areas, last time I played it on PS3 there was not a soul on. PC had more people on probably due to the recurring Steam sales which inject new players in now and then. Still they both seem pretty sparse just because it's old and everyone's moved onto DS2 and Bloodborne. Might as well play the PC version for superior image and framerate.

 

[Wagram]

Play Dark Souls II on PS3. It struggles to maintain 25 at times. If you plan to play that I definitely recommend the PC version. It's by far and away superior.

 

[ElTorro]

Dang, doesn't sound too good

I wish they had ported Dark Souls to PS4/XBO, not just Dark Souls 2.

 

[Durante]

Not gonna lie, Blighttown at 60 FPS on PC is a delight after playing the PS3 version.

I heard all the complaints about the area and was really surprised when I got there and it turned out to be one of my favourites in the game.

 

[Ysiadmihi]

Restart on PC, OP. You'll be surprised how quickly you'll blaze through areas you've completed previously.

 

[Prelude.]

Since we're on topic, doesn't DaS have a few gamebreaking issues at 60fps? I've played it at 30 for that reason but I keep reading about how good it is at 60 so maybe they have been fixed?

 

[Ysiadmihi]

Since we're on topic, doesn't DaS have a few gamebreaking issues at 60fps? I've played it at 30 for that reason but I keep reading about how good it is at 60 so maybe they have been fixed?

Rolls and jumps are shorter, sliding down a ladder might cause you to accidentally fall through the floor, and a new one I've noticed on a current playthrough is some enemies will spawn in the wrong place, but that's very rare and hardly gamebreaking.

It's totally worth dealing with these issues to play at 60fps, and DSFix allows you to swap to 30fps by pressing Backspace so if you need it, it's there. I have it bound as a button on my controller with Joy2Key.

 

[Servbot24]

Blighttown sometimes goes to 15fps, but thankfully good design > good frame rate. Enjoy the game.

 

[Prelude.]

Rolls and jumps are shorter, sliding down a ladder might cause you to accidentally fall through the floor, and a new one I've noticed on a current playthrough is some enemies will spawn in the wrong place, but that's very rare and hardly gamebreaking.

It's totally worth dealing with these issues to play at 60fps, and DSFix allows you to swap to 30fps by pressing Backspace so if you need it, it's there. I have it bound as a button on my controller with Joy2Key.

Eh, I don't know, I'd say it's pretty damn inconvenient.

 

[TouchMyBox]

I heard all the complaints about the area and was really surprised when I got there and it turned out to be one of my favourites in the game.

Toxic dart assholes would still be annoying at any framerate though.

Blighttown sometimes goes to 15fps, but thankfully good design > good frame rate. Enjoy the game.

If only that were true, then I could play through Demon Souls.

 

[zma1013]

Rolls and jumps are shorter, sliding down a ladder might cause you to accidentally fall through the floor, and a new one I've noticed on a current playthrough is some enemies will spawn in the wrong place, but that's very rare and hardly gamebreaking.

It's totally worth dealing with these issues to play at 60fps, and DSFix allows you to swap to 30fps by pressing Backspace so if you need it, it's there. I have it bound as a button on my controller with Joy2Key.

How odd. I never noticed any of that on my PC playthroughs. I'll have to pay attention next time.

 

[Durante]

Eh, I don't know, I'd say it's pretty damn inconvenient.

There's literally one jump in the game where you have to enable the 30 FPS lock.

Anyway, unlocking the framerate is a very good idea even if you cap it at 30 FPS, because it's still much smoother than the game's (broken) default framepacing.

 

[JudgmentJay]

Eh, I don't know, I'd say it's pretty damn inconvenient.

Playing the game at 30 FPS after you've experienced 60 is more inconvenient. You can make most jumps in the game even without the toggle, and falling through the floors when sliding down ladders is very rare. I don't toggle for ladders and I've fallen through the floor once over ~200 hours of 60 FPS play.

 

[Yudoken]

How odd. I never noticed any of that on my PC playthroughs. I'll have to pay attention next time.

I've noticed the ladder problem when I was sliding down the ladder under the bridge where the dragon spies fire.

 

[MatrixMan.EXE]

I decided to dust off my PS3 and try Dark Souls for an hour the other day since I've been playing loads of Bloodborne and Dark Souls II on PS4 recently.

Been nearly two years since I'd played it, and I forgot I was in NG+++ in Blighttown...oh boy...the framerate was worse than I remember it being. Can't believe I put up with that shit last generation.

 

[Prelude.]

There's literally one jump in the game where you have to enable the 30 FPS lock.

Anyway, unlocking the framerate is a very good idea even if you cap it at 30 FPS, because it's still much smoother than the game's (broken) default framepacing.

I see. I'll probably give it a go since I recently started it with a new character.

Edit: Uh, it actually skips the splash screens now.

 

[Gbraga]

Rolls and jumps are shorter, sliding down a ladder might cause you to accidentally fall through the floor, and a new one I've noticed on a current playthrough is some enemies will spawn in the wrong place, but that's very rare and hardly gamebreaking.

It's totally worth dealing with these issues to play at 60fps, and DSFix allows you to swap to 30fps by pressing Backspace so if you need it, it's there. I have it bound as a button on my controller with Joy2Key.

My understanding is that you fall faster at 60fps, roll and jump distance is actually the same. Which is why you only notice a difference when you're trying to jump to some platform.

I lock it to 30 if I'm speedrunning, but for normal runs 60 is perfectly fine, hitting backspace if you need an item and you're having trouble reaching it at 60.

 

[Ysiadmihi]

My understanding is that you fall faster at 60fps, roll and jump distance is actually the same. Which is why you only notice a difference when you're trying to jump to some platform.

That definitely sounds more accurate. I noticed I was falling very quickly when stepping off of the Blighttown "elevators".

 

[Duxxy3]

Upper blight town is probably the worst running section of the game. If you can make the back road run to lower blight town I would suggest that route.

 

[cireza]

Not telling you to stop playing the game (it is a fantastic game), but for your information Dark Souls II runs pretty well on PS3.

 

[Santar]

Not telling you to stop playing the game (it is a fantastic game), but for your information Dark Souls II runs pretty well on PS3.

That's good to hear, was wondering how DS 2 ran.
Would you say it runs better than Dark Souls 1?

 

[Brandon F]

Would you say it runs better than Dark Souls 1?

It does run somewhat better than DS1, the loading times being a bit lengthy though as the largest sticking point. Not too different from BB loading currently though.

 

[Atheosuede]

I just started playing DS1 (made it to NG++ in DS2) and even on PC the frame rates are terrible in Blight Town on my GTX 970.

Question for you - How did you fair against Capra Demon? It took me more tries to kill him than it has for any boss in any FROM game ever .

 

[Duxxy3]

I just started playing DS1 (made it to NG++ in DS2) and even on PC the frame rates are terrible in Blight Town on my GTX 970.

Question for you - How did you fair against Capra Demon? It took me more tries to kill him than it has for any boss in any FROM game ever .

Are you using DSfix?

 

[Ysiadmihi]

I just started playing DS1 (made it to NG++ in DS2) and even on PC the frame rates are terrible in Blight Town on my GTX 970.

That seems odd. I've played Dark Souls on both a 560ti and a 7970 and had no problems with the framerate at any point in the game. What DSFix settings are you using?

 

[BennyBlanco]

Since we're on topic, doesn't DaS have a few gamebreaking issues at 60fps? I've played it at 30 for that reason but I keep reading about how good it is at 60 so maybe they have been fixed?

I put like 200 hours in at 60 fps and never once slid through the world or found a jump I couldn't make.

It's so good at 60 fps it almost ruined bloodborne for me.

 

[JudgmentJay]

I just started playing DS1 (made it to NG++ in DS2) and even on PC the frame rates are terrible in Blight Town on my GTX 970.

Question for you - How did you fair against Capra Demon? It took me more tries to kill him than it has for any boss in any FROM game ever .

I get 60 on a 680 downsampled from 1620p -> 1080p. Sounds like you've got something misconfigured in DSFix.

 

[Fisty]

Play Deadly Premonition on PS3, and thank your lucky stars that Dark Souls plays as well as it does on PS3 because it could be sooooo much worse

 

[JudgmentJay]

That's good to hear, was wondering how DS 2 ran.
Would you say it runs better than Dark Souls 1?

It runs >30 FPS in some areas and <30 FPS in some areas. Majula, the hub, felt like 20-25 FPS. It's not great.

 

[nogoodnamesleft]

Blighttown sometimes goes to 15fps, but thankfully good design > good frame rate. Enjoy the game.

what

 

[Raist]

I'm replaying Demon's Souls these days and good lord the fight with

Spoiler

False King Allant

just utterly kills the framerate. Dem alpha effects.

 

[Grief.exe]

Framerate in console Souls games

 

[FistOfSyn]

the only REALLY noticeable framerate issues are on blighttown, the rest is fine

not to say that the dipping is acceptable

 

[Durante]

I just started playing DS1 (made it to NG++ in DS2) and even on PC the frame rates are terrible in Blight Town on my GTX 970.

I had great framerates in Blighttown on my 770. There's something wrong there. Are you using unlocked FPS?

 

[Atheosuede]

I had great framerates in Blighttown on my 770. There's something wrong there. Are you using unlocked FPS?

Unlocked and I'm running with DSFix, but my framerates are still brutal. I thought it was just a product of the port. I'll definitely need to look into this again. Thanks for sharing!

 

[Santar]

I just started playing DS1 (made it to NG++ in DS2) and even on PC the frame rates are terrible in Blight Town on my GTX 970.

Question for you - How did you fair against Capra Demon? It took me more tries to kill him than it has for any boss in any FROM game ever .

He definitely was the most frustrating boss in any of the souls games I've played (demon's souls and bloodborne). The area is just so cramped and those dogs makes it hard to get around. After you manage to kill them it gets a lot easier. Not a fun boss.