Topic: Assassin's Creed: Unity

[MysterD]

Both XB1 + PS4 versions of AC:U will be locked at 900p @ 30 frames per second

[MysterD]

{Place-holder}

[idolminds]

That is kind of a strange decision or rather a strange justification (to avoid the debate). Like...why even announce it?

Its so weird that resolution has become such a huge deal in console gaming. You guys remember the old PC vs console arguments and how having "27456x192734" resolutions didn't matter as long as the game was good? Good times.

[MysterD]

About the consoles versions stuck at 900p - well, that's not good for PS4 gamers. One of the big-sells of the PS4 was it could do 1080p; while the XB1 was a coin toss on if it's support 1080p or not.
Why announce it? So Sony gamers know ahead of time, before buying the game - don't expect 1080p support here.
I wouldn't be surprised if Microsoft tossed Ubi $, so they would have both versions running at 900p.

And, I wouldn't be surprised if later, PS4 gets a re-released AC:U Complete Redux HD 1080p Edition with base-game plus all DLC's.
Especially since releasing a game and then re-releasing it in full in HD-quality with all its DLC's seems to be a thing now - i.e. see Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Ed, Deus Ex: HR - Director's Ed, Metro 2033 Redux, Metro LL Redux, etc.

Given their "parity" stance here - I just hope the ACU PC version doesn't get locked at 900p @ 30fps.
We saw how Watch Dogs PC turned out, as it got basically down-graded to the console versions - again, that whole "parity" thing.

While I could tolerate 30fps as long as it don't dip too far when things get intense - the 900p is a not good for a brand-new AAA title on the PC.
I don't sit on a couch, a distance away. I sit right up to my 23'' inch monitor, very close. We need a higher-res here on PC, w/ that big of a monitor + sitting that damn close.

[scottws]

If the PS4 version is capable of running the game at 60 fps in 1080p but is locked to 30 fps at 900p because that's all the Xbox One can do, that is crap for any reason at all.

[MysterD]

If the PS4 version is capable of running the game at 60 fps in 1080p but is locked to 30 fps at 900p because that's all the Xbox One can do, that is crap for any reason at all.

Agreed.

[idolminds]

Yeah, its crap. Which is why the announcement is weird. "Hey guys so just so we can avoid having you all bicker we're going to gimp one version of the game. Plz preorder!" I know they tried to explain it with the AI thing but it still seems like a weird thing to come out and talk about.

[Cobra951]

That is kind of a strange decision or rather a strange justification (to avoid the debate). Like...why even announce it?

Its so weird that resolution has become such a huge deal in console gaming. You guys remember the old PC vs console arguments and how having "27456x192734" resolutions didn't matter as long as the game was good? Good times.

It's stupid beyond belief.  I guess fanboys have nothing better to argue about than the difference between high definition and higher definition.  Most people game on small sets with panel resolutions like 1366x768, or middling-size sets across a room.  If you really care about res, you have to get the hardware, which means PC and 4K screens up close (or really huge ones).  Consoles are fine anywhere in the official HD spectrum.

The performance difference between the XB1 and the PS4 is at most 50%.  The difference in throughput from 900p@30 fps to 1080p@60 fps is 288%, if I did the math correctly.  If Ubisoft is claiming that they had the game running at a consistent, locked 60 fps at 1920x1080 on the PS4, but could only manage 30 fps at 1600x900 on the XB1, either they need to fire the XB1 team, or they're lying.

Not that I really give a shit.  There's no way this huge open-world game with thousands of NPCs was going to come out running at a vsynched and steady 60 fps at 1080p on a console.  No way in hell.  (I'm betting on the lie in my choice above.)  I fully expected 30 fps with some frame drops, and I care nothing about the resolution brouhaha.

Wait, wait.  I just read the short piece, and no one is claiming that the PS4 could perform that much better.  Rather, the amount of processing the game requires (no surprise there, and I just mentioned why) precludes full frame rate, on either console.  Saying that the choice of the same, lower throughput prevents needless bickering is just a bit of spin.  (No surprise there either.)


Edit:  Yep, nothing to do with console wars.  Ubi didn't gimp anything for parity purposes.

[Xessive]

Not that I condone the bitching about resolutions etc. but I feel like I was let down by this new generation of consoles because my expectations were high.

Given the way consoles have often helped drive the standards of technology, I was expecting the PS4 and Xbox One to push the sales of 4K/UltraHD TVs by being able to run games at those resolutions at a solid 60 fps. That is part of what I define as a "next gen" console variation, that they effectively push for the next generation on all fronts. That's on me though for having apparently high expectations.

So I'm usually even more disappointed when I find that the PS4/XBOne are struggling with maintaining 1080p even at 30 fps.

Realistically though, it's not a game killer for me. The developers take careful measures to make sure that the games are presentable and completely playable at the chosen resolutions. In most cases the differences between 900p and 1080p are indistinguishable to all but the most discerning of videophiles.

[Cobra951]

You may find this article interesting.  Diminishing returns are knocking at the door.  We're at the point in the tech curve where, as long as we game on flat screens with joysticks and buttons, there isn't much of a frontier left to conquer.  The new gen is having trouble replacing the old because that 10X or so performance boost doesn't translate to anything dramatic on the screen.  It's like the difference between DVD and Bluray movies.  Yeah, it's there, and anyone who watches with some care will see the difference.  But if the DVD movie is better than the Bluray's, people will watch the DVD instead.  There isn't so much of a visual difference that the content will suffer.

[Xessive]

It's an interesting read. It rehashes a lot of the same discussions that came up with the initial announcements of the new consoles about how we define "next gen." It's true, it's not just about graphics.

With every generation of consoles some new elements in games were now available, whether it's in controls, gameplay mechanics, or a radical change in the hardware e.g. analogue sticks, move controllers.

I've always looked at graphics as more than just the visual appeal. Better graphics, like better processing, have allowed developers to add new features and gameplay mechanics. It's really just another venue for clever developers to take advantage of with interesting game dynamics. For example, looking for clues in an environment, without the appropriate texture quality or resolution it's not fun looking for clues in muddy images, if at all possible. A more intriguing example would the level of detail we're now able to put into facial animation, allowing more detailed characters with fathomable emotional expression; in games like L.A. Noire, an interesting gameplay mechanic to spot liars

While graphics are a part of the "next gen" enhancements they're just bells whistles if there's nothing to prop them up right. Take for example, Infamous Second Son; it looks great but if it came out on the PS3 with slightly lower quality visuals I don't think we would have missed much.

[MysterD]

Not that I condone the bitching about resolutions etc. but I feel like I was let down by this new generation of consoles because my expectations were high.

Given the way consoles have often helped drive the standards of technology, I was expecting the PS4 and Xbox One to push the sales of 4K/UltraHD TVs by being able to run games at those resolutions at a solid 60 fps. That is part of what I define as a "next gen" console variation, that they effectively push for the next generation on all fronts. That's on me though for having apparently high expectations.

So I'm usually even more disappointed when I find that the PS4/XBOne are struggling with maintaining 1080p even at 30 fps.

Realistically though, it's not a game killer for me. The developers take careful measures to make sure that the games are presentable and completely playable at the chosen resolutions. In most cases the differences between 900p and 1080p are indistinguishable to all but the most discerning of videophiles.

I think what's going to matter - is how close you sit to the HDTV and/or your PC monitor. As a PC gamer - I'm used to the monitor right in my face; so my Field Of View is going to be much different than a console gamer who might normally sit further away.

I can usually notice a difference w/out much problem what-so-ever, sitting like I do and where I do. I've been playing games for too long here and tinker w/ so many settings, it's hard for me to not notice this stuff; especially up-close.

EDIT:

You may find this article interesting.  Diminishing returns are knocking at the door.  We're at the point in the tech curve where, as long as we game on flat screens with joysticks and buttons, there isn't much of a frontier left to conquer.  The new gen is having trouble replacing the old because that 10X or so performance boost doesn't translate to anything dramatic on the screen.  It's like the difference between DVD and Bluray movies.  Yeah, it's there, and anyone who watches with some care will see the difference.  But if the DVD movie is better than the Bluray's, people will watch the DVD instead.  There isn't so much of a visual difference that the content will suffer.

Just like how I game, I often sit close to a TV. Not as close as how I play PC games, but I certainly notice a difference on my huge 1080p HDTV, running something in BR quality when opposed to DVD-quality; especially sitting up close.

If I'm too close when watching DVD, I have to move back. Being spoiled by 1080p and BR, sitting that close just doesn't work for me.

[MysterD]

Guru 3D -> UbiSoft engineer says Microsoft + Sony are pressuring PC versions to be set at 30 frames per second.

[MysterD]

RUMOR:

While these would likely make more sense for the recommended specs...
...If these are the minimums for ACU PC, expect VERY stiff requirements:

PC Gamer -> Rumored ACU PC system requirements look stiff, if they're true.

The ever-vigilant NeoGAF has found what could be the official system requirements for Assassin's Creed: Unity. The specs are reportedly from IntraGames—the South Korean publisher of Unity and other Ubisoft titles. But if IntraGames had released the requirements, they've since taking them down; and no amount of searching for cached versions of "어쌔신 크리드 유니티" has produced anything from an official source. Here, though, is a cached version of the (now also removed) original report from the site Ruliweb.

Caveats in place, here is what might be the system requirements for Assassin's Creed Unity:
Operating System : Windows ® 7 SP1, Windows 8 / 8.1 ® (64 -bit version only supported)
CPU: Intel Core® i5-2500K @ 3.3 GHz or AMD FX-8350 @ 4.0 GHz or higher (Intel Core® i7-3770 @ 3.4 GHz or AMD FX-8350 @ 4.0 GHz or more recommended)
RAM: 6 GB or more (8 GB or more recommended)
Graphics Card : NVIDIA GeForce® GTX 680 or AMD Radeon HD 7970, graphics memory 2GB or more (NVIDIA GeForce® GTX 780 or AMD Radeon R9 290X, graphics memory 3 GB or more recommended)
Sound Card : Direct X 9.0c compatible sound card and the latest drivers
HDD: 50 GB or more

Yup, that's a minimum requirement of a GTX 680—effectively restricting the game to the last few years of GPU tech.

Of course, that's only if a) the information is real, and b) is system requirements have any bearing on reality. Increasingly, it seems, they don't. Shadow of Mordor's highest system requirements asked for an absurd 6GB VRAM. I've yet to have a problem with 2GB.

Essentially then, system requirements are increasingly a crapshoot. Even if these ones are confirmed, you'd be better off waiting for the benchmarks.

We've contacted Ubisoft for comment.

[Cobra951]

Well, the new gen of consoles is out, so I can understand why PC ports are going to be more demanding.  The CPU and GPU tech in particular are going to need to be within a few years of current for good performance.  The consoles split the load across a lot of parallel processing in both cases (50% more in the PS4 GPU than the XB1's).  And you're absolutely going to need the RAM.

I was reading about this game's development when the whole idiotic fight over supposedly forced graphical parity between the consoles erupted.  The devs were incensed.  One of them said the game was running at 1 (one) fps a year ago, and only recently managed to get up to 30.  It presents Paris at full scale, as opposed to the reduced scale of cities in previous games.  (The Colosseum in Brotherhood was 2/3 scale, for example.)  It features thousands of concurrent NPCs that react to the player.  The vistas are impressive.  Performance takes a big hit, on anything that tries to run it.

[MysterD]

UbiSoft made those stiff PC requirements for ACU official.

[MysterD]

Well, the new gen of consoles is out, so I can understand why PC ports are going to be more demanding.  The CPU and GPU tech in particular are going to need to be within a few years of current for good performance.  The consoles split the load across a lot of parallel processing in both cases (50% more in the PS4 GPU than the XB1's).  And you're absolutely going to need the RAM.

I was reading about this game's development when the whole idiotic fight over supposedly forced graphical parity between the consoles erupted.  The devs were incensed.  One of them said the game was running at 1 (one) fps a year ago, and only recently managed to get up to 30.  It presents Paris at full scale, as opposed to the reduced scale of cities in previous games.  (The Colosseum in Brotherhood was 2/3 scale, for example.)  It features thousands of concurrent NPCs that react to the player.  The vistas are impressive.  Performance takes a big hit, on anything that tries to run it.

Given what we've seen from PC versions of TEW, Dead Rising 3, Ryse, Shadow of Mordor, and now ACU - looks like system requirements are getting very stiff again; especially on the recommended specs. ACU really takes the cake here, with its high minimums. And definitely - with new consoles here, we'll have more of these issues, as this causes PC specs to spike b/c they are aiming at a much more powerful low-system (XB1) than before (X360). Also, with more graphical fidelity + more higher-res' supported games - then the specs go up even more so.

I also think we're also seeing a lot more AAA PC versions just seem like they're getting less care, support, and optimization thrown into them than ever before, as well - especially stuff from AAA sector.

And also, who knows how much vid-card companies are also throwing $ dev's way - as I'll bet there's going to be some PC gamers who'll be upgrading parts or buying new PC's anytime from now to...whenever.

[idolminds]

Looks like I need to be prepared to upgrade my PC next year if I hope to play anything at all on it.

[MysterD]

Looks like I need to be prepared to upgrade my PC next year if I hope to play anything at all on it.

The way things are going - I might have to look into more regular RAM and 4GB VRAM GeForce 970.

[MysterD]

Bluesnews -> NVidia releases new 344.65 WHQL-certified driver for Assassin's Creed: Unity (PC)

[Cobra951]

This is now unlocked.  It looks so good.  Versailles is spectacular inside and out.  The visual-quality improvement even over the same system's version of Black Flag is striking.  Finally, variable "lens aperture" for darker areas.  Step into the shadows, and the area brightens up, while the sunlit exterior whites out.  Yes!  Shadows being too deep has always been a sore spot in AC games before.  But the useless brightness slider is still useless.  Bump it even a single notch, and the black gets replaced with grey--washed-out ugliness.  Someone needs to teach Ubisoft the meaning of gamma correction.

Crowds are as huge as promised, but not without cost.  The level of detail pops into the characters jarringly as you approach them, and since there's so many of them, with clothing details popping in at different times, it's just weird.  I hope they smooth this out in a future patch.

Still learning the controls.  The very first fight sort of bugged out, and I had to let myself get desynched and try again.  The assassin then went from invulnerable to cake.  Now I'm just walking around a bit, trying to get more acclimated.  Controls are mostly familiar, but there are some big changes that need practice.

[MysterD]

Assassins Creed: Unity - REVIEWS

METACRITIC:
XBox One.
PlayStation 4.
PC

Scored out of 10:
PlayStation Lifestyle -> 10
God Is A Geek -> 8.0
GameInformer -> 8
IGN -> 7.8
NZGamer -> 7.8
SoftPedia -> 7.5
GameSpot -> 7
Destructoid -> 7
Shacknews -> 7
Eurogamer -> 7
Polygon -> 6.5

Scored out of 5:
Cheat Code Central -> 4.4
GamesRadar -> 4 stars
Digital Spy -> 4 stars.

No score:
Kotaku

[MysterD]

Performance issues galore:
Kotaku on XB1 + PS4 issues.
PCWorld on PC issues.

[MysterD]

PC Gamer -> Ubi is aware of lots of AMD issues w/ ACU PC; is working w/ AMD to try and (hopefully) resolve them

[Cobra951]

The funny thing is that the console game seems to be working best on the XB1.  I played most of the day yesterday, and only had one problem area: the inside of a church where Arno jumps around the walls and chandeliers to find a switch, and then trigger a timed run to an entrance.  It was acting like Windows does when it runs out of real RAM and has to start swapping to virtual memory.  Momentary freezes every few seconds.  Very nasty.  Other than that, the worst frame rate I've seen is in the low 20s.  It takes huge crowds in an open area to make it chug that much.  Most of the time, it keeps close to 30.  Certainly nothing like the horror stories I keep reading about the PS4 version.

I haven't had a chance to test whether multitasking adds to the performance issues.  After I had those issues in the church, I realized that I had Internet Explorer and the Xbox Help app both running in the background.  IE was brought up by the game itself, when I selected AC Initates from the menu.  So I backed out to the Home screen and killed the 2 apps.  But then I couldn't get back into the trouble spot in the game.  Maybe there's a way, but I haven't found it yet.

The scope of the game is ridiculous.  Paris is presented full-scale, with seamless transitions from indoors to outdoors.  Everything is super-detailed and just gorgeous.  And then there are thousands of NPCs running around, sometimes congregating into massive throngs that make it difficult to walk the streets.  I can see why performance can be an issue.  Ubi went for broke on the scale and scope, and let everything else take a back seat.  I.e., they did exactly what Game Development 101 teaches you not to do.  Keeping the scope manageable, reining in grandiose expectations, is key to staying within budget and meeting performance goals.

But still, I'm glad this world exists for my unbridled amusement.

[PyroMenace]

Alex rips into AC Unity with a 2 star review.

Well that's disappointing. Those issues sound similar to AC3, but at least AC3 had at least a semblance of an interesting story. Now I'm curious how Rogue fared.

[MysterD]

Alex rips into AC Unity with a 2 star review.

Well that's disappointing. Those issues sound similar to AC3, but at least AC3 had at least a semblance of an interesting story. Now I'm curious how Rogue fared.

What is it w/ people not liking AC3 too much? Am I the only person that seemed to like AC3?

While I preferred AC:R's story + characters over AC3 by far...
...I much more so preferred the gameplay stuff (the additional parkour w/ trees), the  missions (especially naval missions) + hunting stuff in AC3 over ACR. I'm sorry - ACR's gameplay was "too much of the same" for me (after AC2 + AC:B); and I didn't like the new mission types in the game (base-game's tower-defense missions + one of the DLC's Portal-like puzzles for Desmond).

Of course - Altair + especially Ezio (ACR) are way more interesting than dull-as-hell Connor (AC3). Connor's "one note" of wanting to get revenge over 20-plus hours or so is as dull as Aiden Pearce's same "one note" of wanting revenge in Watch Dogs for 20-plus hours.

[PyroMenace]

Weird that you are essentially talking about and comparing the two worst games in the series. While the frontier stuff I actually liked and putting that aside, AC3 was one of the most unstable, bug ridden games I've ever played coming from a big developer, I'm amazed it somehow passed cert.

But not counting Unity, you could pick out any AC game and have a good time except for Revelations and AC3.

[Cobra951]

That review is impossible to read without spoiling a big chunk of the game.  I've gotten good at skipping whole paragraphs when I can see a spoiler developing, but here, the hops just land me in another spoiler.  What is it about modern reviewers and spoilers?  Movies have the same detractors in the press too.  So I stopped reading midway, and I won't return until I'm done with the game.

I've yet to have the game lock up on me, and I already described the one place where performance became unacceptable.  I've been exploring mostly, but that exploration involves lots of battles with many guards and lots of running and climbing through crowds and huge buildings.  No major issues yet after 2 days.  Sorry, I just don't understand the hate over the tech issues of this game.  If the amount of rough edges on this Version-1.0 game justifies this much hate, then the developers of the Saints Row series should have been dragged out into the street and shot.  I couldn't play SR4 for more than a few hours without a session-ending glitch or hard lock, and that was after it was patched.  SR3 wasn't much better.  Open-world games sometimes take a while to fix up; and sometimes the developers just can't get there at all (e.g., Bethesda with Elder Scrolls games), or they intentionally walk away from their responsibility to the buyers.  But who out there hates Skyrim so much over the crashing bugs that they want to sue the company, or trash the game altogether?  Instead, that game gets a lot of praise despite the longstanding technical incompetence in development.

What Alex used to sum up his dislike for ACU boils down to a program crash.  Everything else he described leading up to that point was the kind of action that AC games have been offering for years.  Program crashes are random unintended bugs.  If these infrequent events bring ACU down to a 40% score, then kindly go back and retract all the scores given to games like Skyrim.  Let's see those get failing grades too.

Edit:  Someone agrees with me.  Yay!

[Quemaqua]

Think you're being pretty unfair here, Cobra. Firstly, you said it yourself: this is exactly the same thing AC has been offering for years. It isn't new. Reading about it sounds exactly like every AC game that came before it. I lost interest in this series a long time ago, and while I really wanted to like Black Flag, which was new and different in terms of the piratey business, I had trouble keeping interest because everything else is stock-standard AC. I got bored with that less than halfway through the first game. Which isn't to say the game can't hold people's interest, only that clearly the formula has barely changed since the series began. I know that you're a big fan of the franchise, so you probably have trouble seeing it that way and it isn't terribly offensive to you, but I'd still say it's a pretty fair criticism.

Secondly, the technical problems are not the majority of what he focuses on. I really didn't see anything spoilery in the text, but I wasn't planning to play this anyway so I read on despite your warnings. This is nothing like your Skyrim comparison. That was lauded as an amazing game with some technical issues. Alex thinks Unity is a bad game that isn't fun and also has technical issues. The following are the standouts as far as his major points:

Unity is packed tighter with missions, side ventures, and collectible doo-dads than any Assassin's Creed before it, but so little of it is truly of interest, giving the game a weighed-down feel as you try to figure out what's worth pursuing, and what's merely a distraction. And while there are moments of genuine awe in Unity, almost all of them are visual in nature. This is by far the most incredible looking game in this series, with landmarks and characters rendered in unbelievable detail--when they're properly rendered, of course. The most enjoyment I managed to wring from Unity was in darting and weaving my way through the city, taking in the sights and marveling at what upgraded technology could offer this long-running series. When it came to actually playing Unity as it was intended, I found myself most often shaking my head in disappointment.

Those issues can undoubtedly be fixed by a patch somewhere down the road, but that patch seems unlikely to fix Unity's biggest flaw: it's just not very much fun. For all its hugeness and graphical splendor, Unity is starved for excitement. It's much too concerned with a story that feels confused by itself, wasting potentially interesting allies and antagonists in much the same way that it wastes the rich, violent history of its time period. The most interesting missions in the game come far too late, representing glimpses of a better game than the one you just spent hours playing. Even as a tech demonstration, Unity fails to captivate outside of its stunning art design. It's less a signal of the great things this series can do with new technology than an unusually large, frequently malfunctioning retread of what Assassin's Creed is already well known for.

I don't know about other reviewers and what they're mentioning, but it may be the case that the game just isn't doing it for people. Tack technical issues on top of that (which as you know is sort of subjective to experience ... I had absolutely no bugs of any kind but for maybe one or two crashes with Skyrim out of the box, even when hundreds of hours in it, and that's on both console and PC, whereas others clearly experienced some weirdness) and you've got a recipe for bad scores. And it does sound like, for Alex at least, Unity had a lot more problems than Skyrim. Unity's systems are a lot more streamlined and self-contained than some other open-world games, not to mention fairly similar to past AC games, so maybe that makes it seem less forgivable? I don't know. It also sounds like there are potentially a lot more crash and rendering bugs than there were with something like Skyrim. Regardless, I think if Alex thought the game itself were better, the technical issues would have just been a footnote with hopes for a patch. He more or less says that in the second quoted paragraph above.

[MysterD]

TotalBiscuit -> TB on the tons of issues he had w/ ACU PC; and he is on a new PC running two GF 980's.

[Xessive]

I've had a chance to play it on both the PC and the PS4. Both have serious performance issues.

On the PS4 the game is locked at 30 fps but the framerate dips well below 30 fps in certain segments, particularly during gameplay and in scenes with lots of crowds. This is a severe detriment to the fast nature of the gameplay, since you're mostly running around or in combat. By contrast, the in-game cutscenes run flawlessly and look gorgeous.

On the PC I've got the opposite issues! During gameplay I've fine-tuned the settings to get the best out of the gameplay on High settings. It's difficult to maintain 60 fps, even on the lowest settings and my PC specs are well above the minimum reqs. That said, the gameplay is smooth with barely a hitch. The cutscenes though are another story, the framerate drops below 20 fps and it feels like it's struggling to render the scene. This happens on the lowest settings as well. It's really weird. I've even dropped the resolution to 1280x720, the gameplay framerate leaps up to and past 60 fps but the cutscenes still stutter. The PC is suffering another major problem though: random crashing. The game frequently crashes to desktop with no error messages.

On the bright side Ubi just released a relatively large patch, ~792MB. Here's hoping this fixed some of the major stuff.

[MysterD]

On the PC I've got the opposite issues! During gameplay I've fine-tuned the settings to get the best out of the gameplay on High settings. It's difficult to maintain 60 fps, even on the lowest settings and my PC specs are well above the minimum reqs. That said, the gameplay is smooth with barely a hitch. The cutscenes though are another story, the framerate drops below 20 fps and it feels like it's struggling to render the scene. This happens on the lowest settings as well. It's really weird. I've even dropped the resolution to 1280x720, the gameplay framerate leaps up to and past 60 fps but the cutscenes still stutter. The PC is suffering another major problem though: random crashing. The game frequently crashes to desktop with no error messages.

Curious: what are your PC specs you running ACU on?

And "bleh" @ you running it on 720p settings.
If I wanted to run a game in 720p; or even somewhere b/t 720p + 1080p on a brand-new AAA game - I'd just buy a damn console.

[Cobra951]

TotalBiscuit -> TB on the tons of issues he had w/ ACU PC; and he is on a new PC running two GF 980's.

I like this guy.  Yeah, first-world problems, as he said (except the frequent crashing--that sucks from here to Somalia).  But the way he tells it is so entertaining.  I totally agree with him about the sleazy stuff in the game--the microtransactions, companion app, and that Initiates crap.  Three (3!) ways to ruin immersion and piss the player off.  I can't even run that companion app at all, anywhere.  I don't own a device capable of it.  I chose to play on a console, not a phone.  So what does Ubisoft do, they force me to go get a mobile device, or do without.  Nice.

[MysterD]

Well, this is interesting

PC , XB1 & PS4- AC Unity Current Known Issues

[snip]

Across All Platforms (PC / PS4 / Xbox1)

- Frame rate issues. WORKING ON IT
WORKAROUND BELOW
    What can I do in the meantime?
        If playing single player, we suggest that you disconnect from your internet connection (wifi or network cable). It could potentially improve frame rate.

[scottws]

Well, this is interesting

That is interesting.  What the heck is that about?  Do they have some sort of server-side content or telemetry stuff going on if the connection is up?

It's tough though if you are on WiFi.

[Xessive]

Curious: what are your PC specs you running ACU on?

And "bleh" @ you running it on 720p settings.
If I wanted to run a game in 720p; or even somewhere b/t 720p + 1080p on a brand-new AAA game - I'd just buy a damn console.

I've got a GeForce 780M with 4GB VRAM, 32GB RAM, and an Intel Core i7 4th gen.

720p is actually not that bad when you're sitting at a distance. On a 55" TV screen it's almost indistinguishable from 1080p if you're sitting at the minimum recommended 5ft distance. Obviously, if you nitpick you will see differences but it's not so bad. Anyway, the test confirmed that the framerate issues are not due to any limitation from my hardware.

Btw, the patch has indeed resolved a lot of the performance issues. I'm running at 1080p on custom settings (environment medium, shadows high, textures ultra, SSAO, and FXAA).

Game crashng ahs reduced but not totally gone; I have experienced one crash in 2 hours of gameplay.

[MysterD]

PC Gamer review for ACU PC is quite brutal - namely b/c of the technical stuff:
http://www.pcgamer.com/assassins-creed-unity-review/

If Ubisoft get it patched up, Unity could become a perfectly enjoyable part of the Assassin's Creed canon. It's a solid campaign elevated by quality assassination missions and an extraordinary setting that might just push the big number at the bottom of this review into the 80s, but with a big selling point out of operation, a raft of technical issues, performance problems, microtransactions and stilted combat and freerunning systems, Unity—in its current state—can only be considered a failed revolution. What a shame.

[MysterD]

I've got a GeForce 780M with 4GB VRAM, 32GB RAM, and an Intel Core i7 4th gen.

720p is actually not that bad when you're sitting at a distance. On a 55" TV screen it's almost indistinguishable from 1080p if you're sitting at the minimum recommended 5ft distance. Obviously, if you nitpick you will see differences but it's not so bad. Anyway, the test confirmed that the framerate issues are not due to any limitation from my hardware.

Btw, the patch has indeed resolved a lot of the performance issues. I'm running at 1080p on custom settings (environment medium, shadows high, textures ultra, SSAO, and FXAA).

Game crashng ahs reduced but not totally gone; I have experienced one crash in 2 hours of gameplay.

See, that's the thing - I do not sit at a distance, at all. I sit, pretty much, right up, to the monitor w/ my desktop PC. With my 23 inch monitor b/c I am sitting that close - I can easily tell the difference b/t 1080p and 720p; when graphical stuff is on or off; and when graphical settings are at different settings.

[Cobra951]

Played for hours again today.  Did the patch hit my system too?  (I thought it was PS4 and PC only.)  Because I swear everything was significantly smoother.  I don't know how to tell for sure.  Updates download in the background and are applied without my input or knowledge.  And I don't see anywhere in the game menus where the version number is displayed.  

The only issue I had today was trying to stand up under this low obstacle, and getting pushed to the wrong side of the world geometry.  Like falling through the floor, except it wasn't the floor.  I moved around a bit to check it out, and then I fast traveled out of it when I feared losing my footing into the grey void.  Missions, assassinations, lots of looting, lots of fights filled with chaos, smoke and scattering peasants.  No problems.