Unreal Tournament: Game Of The Year Edition Running Slow On Decent PC.

[Werge]

Hey everybody, so I recently purchased Unreal Tournament: GOTY on Steam. The first Unreal Tournament game, and it's running real choppy and lagging. I've played it years ago on much slower PCs and it ran seamlessly. Is there anyway to fix this? I use Direct 3D, not Open GL.

[CrocMagnum]

 

This has to do with Multi-Core CPUs, UT99 has a hard time adjusting to modern rigs. The Renderer is not the problem by the way. 

 

The old way to solve this problem was to manually force UT99 to use a Single Core (Open Task Manager [Ctrl+Alt+Delete] > Set Affinity > Core 1).

 

Nowadays the best way to fix the slowdowns is to install the "UT99 v469 Community Patch": UT99 v469 Community Patch

 

From the Patch Notes: "Rewrote some of the core timing routines so the game runs more smoothly (and with less glitching) on multicore CPUs and in long-running games."

Edited February 26, 2022 by CrocMagnum

[Blzut3]

If for some reason one insists on running vanilla, if I recall correctly you may also need to disable CPU core frequency scaling since it calibrates the game speed to the CPU clock (Turbo Boost, Turbo Core, SpeedStep, Cool'n'Quiet, PowerNow, etc).  So affinity fixes the skipping (since instruction count differs per core), and disabling power saving fixes the game speed (since calibration causes boost to happen and then it dials back when the game isn't considered demanding).

 

But really just better to use the patch.

[Werge]

27 minutes ago, CrocMagnum said:

 

This has to do with Multi-Core CPUs, UT99 has a hard time adjusting to modern rigs. The Renderer is not the problem by the way. 

 

The old way to solve this problem was to manually force UT99 to use a Single Core (Open Task Manager [Ctrl+Alt+Delete] > Set Affinity > Core 1).

 

Nowadays the best way to fix the slowdowns is to install the "UT99 v469 Community Patch": UT99 v469 Community Patch

 

From the Patch Notes: "Rewrote some of the core timing routines so the game runs more smoothly (and with less glitching) on multicore CPUs and in long-running games."

 

 

I installed the patch and now it only runs the audio when I launch the game from Steam and displays a black screen. What should I do now?

Edited February 26, 2022 by Werge

[CrocMagnum]

1 hour ago, Werge said:

I installed the patch and now it only runs the audio when I launch the game from Steam and displays a black screen. What should I do now?

This could be a Renderer issue or a Sound issue: 

 

Renderer Issue

 

You should try to switch to another Renderer, try OpenGL. If you cannot access the game anymore you can change the Render by modifying the UnrealTournament.ini in located at "unreal/system/unrealtournament.ini" you should change the following line:  

[Engine.Engine]
GameRenderDevice=D3D9Drv.D3D9RenderDevice

 

Change it to 

 

[Engine.Engine]
GameRenderDevice=OpenGLDrv.OpenGLRenderDevice 

 

***OPTIONAL: for the record they are enhanced Renderers (updated with more options) for both D3D and OpenGL: 

 

Unreal engine Direct3D 10 renderer from kentie's site: Enhanced D3D 10 Renderer (kentie)

enhanced OpenGL renderer from Chris Donhal: Enhanced OpenGL Renderer for UT99 (cdohnal)

 

The new renders above will allow you to enable new features like "Anisotropic Filtering x16" and much more. Enabling these features is explained on the kentie's page I mentioned just above in this post.  OPTIONAL***

 

Sound Issue

If this is a sound issue you might need  to change a line in the same unrealtournament.ini, search the line:

UseDirectSound=True

Then set DirectSound to False.

Edited February 26, 2022 by CrocMagnum

[Werge]

OP here, I'm also having the same problem with Unreal Gold. (The original Unreal game.) Is there a fix for this too?

[Dweller Dark]

2 minutes ago, Werge said:

OP here, I'm also having the same problem with Unreal Gold. (The original Unreal game.) Is there a fix for this too?

 

The UnrealGold227i patch here should fix it, I have it installed myself: https://www.oldunreal.com/downloads/unreal/oldunreal-patches/

[CrocMagnum]

10 minutes ago, Werge said:

OP here, I'm also having the same problem with Unreal Gold. (The original Unreal game.) Is there a fix for this too?

 

The method I mentioned for UT99 also applies to Unreal Gold, you just need to find the "Unreal.ini" located "Unreal Folder>System>Unreal.ini"

 

BUT before you go there: for Unreal Gold the "Unofficial Patch 227i" (here) is a must, it enables Widescreen, already includes "D3D8/D3D9 OpenGL" updated Renderers and fixes a ton of issues. 

Edited February 26, 2022 by CrocMagnum

[Dark Pulse]

Don't use the official DirectX or OpenGL renderers; they're absurdly out of date and modern GPUs will ironically struggle with them. (UT99 was originally a Glide-based game, after all! OpenGL was second-best, DirectX was a distant third - and even there we're talking DirectX 7!)

 

Much better is to download the patches from OldUnreal (which will come with updated renderers), and tend to implement some fixes.

 

You'll also want to limit the FPS of the game to no more than 200 or so. The timing loops start getting wacky when you go past that. (They technically already are, but only for particle effects.)

Edited February 26, 2022 by Dark Pulse

[Werge]

OP here, I got it working! I just had to choose the right graphics renderer. Thanks guys.

[Redneckerz]

 

1 hour ago, Dark Pulse said:

Don't use the official DirectX or OpenGL renderers; they're absurdly out of date and modern GPUs will ironically struggle with them. (UT99 was originally a Glide-based game, after all! OpenGL was second-best, DirectX was a distant third - and even there we're talking DirectX 7!)

 

Much better is to download the patches from OldUnreal (which will come with updated renderers), and tend to implement some fixes.

 

You'll also want to limit the FPS of the game to no more than 200 or so. The timing loops start getting wacky when you go past that. (They technically already are, but only for particle effects.)

This is what i did on my HD4600 based rig. I just went ahead and did the OldUT patch as a baseline instead of UT436 (The last version).

 

It runs smooth as butter here.

[dpJudas]

8 hours ago, Dark Pulse said:

(UT99 was originally a Glide-based game, after all! OpenGL was second-best, DirectX was a distant third - and even there we're talking DirectX 7!)

I don't know about that. Originally the DirectX renderer was far better than the OpenGL one. So much so that OpenGL wasn't even officially supported by the game (you had to click a radio button for unsupported renderers to choose it). It is also debatable if it was a Glide-based game as it released with all three renderers.

[Dark Pulse]

3 hours ago, dpJudas said:

I don't know about that. Originally the DirectX renderer was far better than the OpenGL one. So much so that OpenGL wasn't even officially supported by the game (you had to click a radio button for unsupported renderers to choose it). It is also debatable if it was a Glide-based game as it released with all three renderers.

Well, admittedly I'm doing some slight revisionist history, because I'm referring to the very early Unreal updates.

 

The game did indeed ship with all three renderers (so did Unreal). But there was definitely a preference for Glide. Take posts like this for example, a dusty, crusty Unreal Technology post from 1998:

 

Spoiler

Status of Direct3D 10-28-98

 

All Drivers

Some issues across-the-board with switching between fullscreen and windowed mode, and switching resolutions during gameplay. We're looking into theses issues.

 

Riva TNT

Has lots of potential, but there are major problems with their Direct3D driver: rainbow colors, time-lag, w-buffering issues, missing textures.  We are hoping nVidia will issue an updated driver soon.  The ball is in their court now.

 

Riva 128

Their latest driver should run Unreal OK.  The framerate isn't very good, and there will be a lot of "stuttering" since texture downloads are very slow on this hardware.  Some users are reporting that creature polygons appear corrupted.    Hopefully nVidia will fix thie error in their driver.

 

Intel i740

There are some problems with their currently-available Direct3D driver, but they have an internal beta driver which fixes many problems.  Hopefully this will be ready for the public soon.

 

ATI Rage Pro

They have a beta Direct3D driver which runs Unreal pretty well (though it doesn't appear to be available for public release yet).  Multitexturing currently isn't working with Unreal, because of a hardware limitation (it can't multitexture a paletted base texture map along with a non-paletted light map).

 

3dfx Voodoo2

There isn't any reason to use Direct3D for Voodoo2, since we support Glide natively and that tends to be more stable and faster, but their latest Direct3D driver does run Unreal pretty well.  Their detail texture blending (D3DBLEND_DIFFUSEALPHA) doesn't work, which breaks detail textures.  There are reports of missing lightmaps in some areas (not sure what's wrong).  3dfx could get a performance increase here by implementing subrect Blts and hardware triangle-fan setup.

 

S3 Savage 3D

Works well with their internal beta Direct3D driver.  Not sure when this will be available via the web.

 

Matrox G200

Works pretty well.

 

Rendition

Works pretty well.

 

Permedia

Only supports monochrome lighting due to blending limitations.  Explosions are displayed with a black background (due to a bug in the current Unreal code).  Fairly slow texture downloading -- performance isn't great.

 

Drivers we consider playable, in best-to-worst order

Voodoo2: Fastest of all.

Savage/G200: Reasonable performance. Not as fast a fill rate as Voodoo2, but texture downloads are fast, and they support palettes, making for a steady frame rate.

Rage Pro/Rendition: Reasonable performance. High display quality in truecolor mode.

 

The others should be playable pending public release of improved Direct3D drivers for their hardware.

 

On Permedia, Riva 128, and Rendition, you may get better performance using Unreal's software renderer, especially if you have a Pentium II class processor.  This isn't such a bad thing, because the software renderer supports all of Unreal's key features, including truecolor lighting and volumetric fog.

 

Also, two days earlier, October 26th, 1998:

 

Spoiler

More about 3D API's

 

In an interview on Voodoo Extreme, I gave my opinion in the ongoing OpenGL vs Direct3D debate, and I wanted to add some more information here.

 

First of all, both our DreamForge partners working on the OpenGL support, and our Direct3D partner have both done a very high-quality job, given the constraints of Unreal and the 3D card drivers available.  My feelings on the two 3D standards are based completely on their API's and the quality of drivers available.

 

Next, I wanted to give some more detail on the code.

 

API support layer | Lines of C++ code

3dfx Glide | 1711

Direct3D | 3123

NEC PowerVR | 4049

OpenGL | 5697

 

Now, the Glide is the simplest, because it's aimed at the Voodoo family of 3D cards, which are very standard and straightforward to support.  For programming to 3dfx cards, Glide is the ideal API.  For people thinking "If Glide is so great, why don't other 3D cards support it?"  The short answer is, if Glide supported other manufacturer's 3D cards, it would pick up all the complications involved in real-world Direct3D and OpenGL programming: Testing for core capabilities, working around driver bugs, etc.

 

The Direct3D code is next in simplicity.  It began as a working 1600 line driver, then expanded as it was optimized and support was added for 3D cards that lack key features.  The Direct3D API follows the traditional Microsoft model of being not very beautiful code, but dealing with real-world hardware robustly, by providing a capability-querying mechanism and well-tested drivers.

 

The PowerVR code is large because the PCX2 chip's rendering approach is very different than what Unreal was designed for.  This makes the implementation fairly complex, though the next-generation PowerVR, currently on-hold in the PC market while NEC focuses on the Sega DreamCast, is a great chip that's more traditional in its architecture, and more optimal for Unreal.

 

The OpenGL code is large because of optimizations and support for lots of real-world hardware.  If reduced to plain-vanilla OpenGL, this would probably be the simplest and most stable driver of them all, because the OpenGL API is very straightforward.

 

It may have supported the others, sure, but it's fairly clear Glide and/or 3dfx hardware was, at the very least, the preferred one.

Edited February 27, 2022 by Dark Pulse

[dpJudas]

Okay fair enough, I agree that those quotes clearly indicate they actually wrote the glide driver themselves while outsourcing the other two drivers to contractors. So I guess you're right about that.

 

You should take the quote about OpenGL there with a bit of salt though. Their original OpenGL driver was never stable at all, which is why you had to explicitly insist on using it (via the radio button for unsupported drivers). It wasn't until Daniel Vogel started to fix the driver that it became actually usable. That didn't happen until the UT public source release for Linux. That's because the original version left out a few render states that both glide and D3D had implemented. Early on the OpenGL version also suffered greatly from mouse lag - at least on my system. I personally knew Daniel Vogel at the time, so I know he didn't work at Epic until later (in fact, doing this volunteer work was the way he landed that job to begin with).

Edited February 27, 2022 by dpJudas

[Werge]

OP here, do Unreal Gold and Unreal Tournament: GOTY still have official multiplayer servers, or some way of playing multiplayer?

[luke11685]

I've got lags in unfinished cancelled Jazz Jackrabbit 3D that was mysteriously leaked online...etc.

[Dark Pulse]

11 hours ago, dpJudas said:

You should take the quote about OpenGL there with a bit of salt though. Their original OpenGL driver was never stable at all, which is why you had to explicitly insist on using it (via the radio button for unsupported drivers). It wasn't until Daniel Vogel started to fix the driver that it became actually usable. That didn't happen until the UT public source release for Linux. That's because the original version left out a few render states that both glide and D3D had implemented. Early on the OpenGL version also suffered greatly from mouse lag - at least on my system. I personally knew Daniel Vogel at the time, so I know he didn't work at Epic until later (in fact, doing this volunteer work was the way he landed that job to begin with).

Yeah, I know. Back then I ran UT with D3D, of course. But nowadays, Chris Dohnal's OpenGL and/or D3D10 drivers are still by far the better ways to go.

 

4 hours ago, Werge said:

OP here, do Unreal Gold and Unreal Tournament: GOTY still have official multiplayer servers, or some way of playing multiplayer?

UT99 still definitely has all sorts of community servers running and the server browser still definitely works.

 

Unreal Gold, probably, though obviously less than UT99.

 

And for what it's worth, even if both went down, you can directly connect to an IP, or host your own server for others to connect to. On modern-day hardware, even running a full 32-player dedicated server alongside the game would be negligible in terms of both resources and bandwidth.

 

And remember, this was the late 90s - none of today's modern matchmaking shit.

Edited February 27, 2022 by Dark Pulse

[Redneckerz]

4 hours ago, luke11685 said:

I've got lags in unfinished cancelled Jazz Jackrabbit 3D that was mysteriously leaked online...etc.

How is that relevant to the OP, the topic, other than that Jazz 3D uses the Unreal Engine?

[Jello]

4 hours ago, luke11685 said:

I've got lags in unfinished cancelled Jazz Jackrabbit 3D that was mysteriously leaked online...etc.

Hmm, possibly because it was an unfinished, cancelled game that was mysteriously leaked.

 

I'm no expert, but that would tell me they weren't entirely done with it.

[luke11685]

That's the thing. That's the idea.

On 2/28/2022 at 1:47 AM, Jello said:

Hmm, possibly because it was an unfinished, cancelled game that was mysteriously leaked.

 

I'm no expert, but that would tell me they weren't entirely done with it.

By the way I want to apologize how so sorry I am about quite recently about taking not right rather wrong language skills grasp,influent english language. It's because due to as matter of fact I'm from Poland.