Performance issue running simple love game

[chute]

Edit: it seems to be an issue with my system, even though it's plenty powerful enough. more info 7 posts down.






Hi all,

I'm new to love development and game development in general. I'm trying to create a tile-based scroller and I'm running into some problems.

I want to create a rather detailed map with several layers of tiles. Here's what I have so far:

-a tile library of ~4200 32x32 tiles loaded as individual images into a table (ie. tile[1] -> tile[4200])
-a 40x30 map with about 16 drawn layers, each layer being a table containing a table for each horizontal line (like the tile based scrolling tutorials)
-code that will draw the map tile by tile, layer by layer
-smooth scrolling of movement

The map draws, but when you move around the game seems to "freeze" when loading new lines, and the freezing seems to get worse as time passes.

I've trimmed down the tiles table so that it will only load tiles that are displayed on the current map (about 300, in the attached example), but that did not help. some of the tiles are still at high indexes though (ie "tile[4000]"). I don't know if that's a problem.

I've cut down the number of layers in the map to 5, but that only seems to stem the tide.

I've checked and rechecked that no newImage or other potentially draining functions are being called in love.draw or love.update.

When sitting still or moving about normally love seems to take about 10-15% CPU and 25 megs of memory. When it "freezes", CPU drops to 0-2% but memory stays constant.

I'm at a loss. I've attached what I have so far, if anyone cares to take a look.

Thanks in advance!

[josefnpat]

Hi all,

I'm new to love development and game development in general. I'm trying to create a tile-based scroller and I'm running into some problems.

I want to create a rather detailed map with several layers of tiles. Here's what I have so far:

-a tile library of ~4200 32x32 tiles loaded as individual images into a table (ie. tile[1] -> tile[4200])
-a 40x30 map with about 16 drawn layers, each layer being a table containing a table for each horizontal line (like the tile based scrolling tutorials)
-code that will draw the map tile by tile, layer by layer
-smooth scrolling of movement

The map draws, but when you move around the game seems to "freeze" when loading new lines, and the freezing seems to get worse as time passes.

I've trimmed down the tiles table so that it will only load tiles that are displayed on the current map (about 300, in the attached example), but that did not help. some of the tiles are still at high indexes though (ie "tile[4000]"). I don't know if that's a problem.

I've cut down the number of layers in the map to 5, but that only seems to stem the tide.

I've checked and rechecked that no newImage or other potentially draining functions are being called in love.draw or love.update.

When sitting still or moving about normally love seems to take about 10-15% CPU and 25 megs of memory. When it "freezes", CPU drops to 0-2% but memory stays constant.

I'm at a loss. I've attached what I have so far, if anyone cares to take a look.

Thanks in advance!

I'm not having any problems at all :( Can you provide steps to reproduce your issue?

0mloc.png (108.55 KiB) Viewed 549 times

[chute]

try doing a full run around the edge of the map (don't go off the edge )

[chute]

ok, just tried it on my crappy Craptop(tm) and it works fine there.

I guess it's time for a reboot...

[josefnpat]

try doing a full run around the edge of the map (don't go off the edge ;) )

I walked all the way around the edge of the map, and added a fps graph, and still am not having any issue. Perhaps your hardware isn't as up to date as you would like?

p63Zp.png (13.26 KiB) Viewed 550 times

[chute]

I have an AMD Phenom 2 quad core and a Radeon 5870.

That shouldn't matter though, as I've tried the code on an old laptop running a P3 with intel graphics -- it works fine on that machine.

I've rebooted. I've closed all programs (even dropbox, teamviewer, etc.). I've updated video card drivers. I'm running the latest love.

I will try running some other .love games to see if there are performance issues with them.

any ideas?

[chute]

ahhh! I've tried several projects from the demo forum. Mario Kart racing, fruitless, motion blur demo, relentless, TAOTRTWGE, and an unnamed topscrolling shooter.

none of them have any performance problems. Is there anything else i can try?

[chute]

ok, I've tried just running love.exe to get the rubber piggy demo.

I watched it for a while and it freezes too. About once every 10-30 seconds.

I really don't want to reinstall windows :/

[chute]

I have also played several other retail games recently as well (penny arcade 3, quantum conundrum, arkham asylum, braid) with no problem. No freezes, high framerates.

[josefnpat]

See if you can update your video card drivers.

After that, perhaps boot into a Linux liveCD, and see if it really is your hardware?