Control (Base Xbox One) has the lowest frame rate I've ever experienced

V23 · Jun 21, 2020

First off, no spoilers please, I'm fairly early in the game and, I assume, I'm going to be able to power through, despite the performance issues.

I had heard from posters here that the game had performance issues, especially on the base consoles, but I am usually fairly easygoing in what I find acceptable. I don't think I've ever dropped a game because of performance issues. Control is the closest I've ever come.

I'm playing on a base Xbox One (not even an Xbox One S) and am 4-5 hours into the game. The average frame rate appears to be around 22-25fps and whenever combat starts it seriously dips to 15-20fps. It is painful. I'm probably going to keep pressing on because I've come too far to turn back, but how on earth did everyone else put up with this?

The scary thing is I believe they released a patch to address frame rate and, apparently, the frame rate is even lower on base PlayStation! I can't even imagine what those people went through.

leng jai · Jun 21, 2020

There's probably still people who will claim they never noticed the game dropping frames.

Ramathevoice · Jun 21, 2020

If you're at all planning on getting a next-gen console, I'd wait to play it on that. It's an amazing game, and I'd hate for your experience and memories of it to be married by performance this poor.

.exe · Jun 21, 2020

leng jai said:
There's probably still people who will claim they never noticed the game dropping frames.

As someone who frequents performance threads, that is one-hundred percent accurate. Either that or they'll say it's not that bad in response to someone saying it's bad. The attitudes toward performance and imagine quality by both developers (inferred) and players for games on recent consoles have been baffling to me and leaving me increasingly cold towards console gaming.

Dr Pears · Jun 21, 2020

I Platinumed the game on base PS4 and yeah it was one of the worst game i've played this gen performance-wise. I guess I can understand why though, the game still looks mind-blowing even on base ps4

zoggy · Jun 21, 2020

Did you own a ps1?

lupinko · Jun 21, 2020

Looks like you didn't play any N64 games.

V23 · Jun 21, 2020

Open the map, game becomes a slideshow for 1-2 seconds...

Open the menu and then close it, game becomes a slideshow for 3 seconds...

.exe · Jun 21, 2020

zoggy said:
Did you own a ps1?

lupinko said:
Looks like you didn't play any N64 games.

Who gives a shit? Is the Xbox One a N64 or a PS1?
Few people are willing to go back to that era, in part due to these exact reasons.

ZeroX · Jun 21, 2020

Worse than Just Cause 3?

leng jai · Jun 21, 2020

V23 said:
Open the map, game becomes a slideshow for 1-2 seconds...

Open the menu and then close it, game becomes a slideshow for 3 seconds...

Even on the 1X the game freezes momentarily when you open the map though they might have fixed it after the patches.

V23 · Jun 21, 2020

zoggy said:
Did you own a ps1?

lupinko said:
Looks like you didn't play any N64 games.

Never owned a PS1 but I did have a Nintendo 64. I feel like what was acceptable back then is different to now though because of technological innovation.

GamerJM · Jun 21, 2020

.exe said:
Who gives a shit? Is the Xbox One a N64 or a PS1?
Few people are willing to go back to that era, in part due to these exact reasons.

OP said lowest they've ever experienced.

Maybe my experience just isn't the norm but I'm totally willing to go back to that era of games and most people I know are too. And moreover, poor graphics/performance in modern games pretty much hardly ever bothers me because I always think "eh, it could be worse".

Also I feel like I've played something within the last ten years that was worse than what OP is describing but it's escaping me. Uh, one of the Sonic games maybe? Boom?

TwoPikachus · Jun 21, 2020

This is why I didn't buy a console this been and won't until they prioritize 60+fps.

I haven't played this game yet because of the epic exclusivity but I damn well plan to when it comes to steam. Might need an upgrade though from the sound of this.

V23 · Jun 21, 2020

leng jai said:
Even on the 1X the game freezes momentarily when you open the map though they might have fixed it after the patches.

Sounds like an optimisation issue then, rather than hardware constraints.

lupinko · Jun 21, 2020

.exe said:
Who gives a shit? Is the Xbox One a N64 or a PS1?
Few people are willing to go back to that era, in part due to these exact reasons.

You obviously do to make a rude response like that.

.exe · Jun 21, 2020

GamerJM said:
OP said lowest they've ever experienced.

Maybe my experience just isn't the norm but I'm totally willing to go back to that era of games and most people I know are too. And moreover, poor graphics/performance in modern games pretty much hardly ever bothers me because I always think "eh, it could be worse".

Also I feel like I've played something within the last ten years that was worse than what OP is describing but it's escaping me. Uh, one of the Sonic games maybe? Boom?

I get it and it's also me being tired with the general attitudes and relativism like the quoted in performance related threads. Like, yeah it could certainly be worse. I put up with Ocarina at 20 frames per second back in the day. And I've played through a number of bad PAL conversions. It should be better nowadays. The priorities in terms of visual fidelity vs. stable frame rates seems all out of whack in many games, especially with shortcuts like dynamic resolution having become really popular.

Magio · Jun 21, 2020

I'm the kind of guy who really doesn't give a damn about higher framerates, if I'm not playing a fighting game or an esports-oriented title I couldn't care less about getting 60 instead of 30, but I do have a problem with devs releasing games that just don't hold anywhere near a stable 30FPS. Remedy really dropped the ball when optimizing Control for the base consoles. Yes the game looks amazing, but I still don't think it 'justifies' it running so poorly on this hardware, this isn't Shadow of the Colossus trying to run on a PS2.

Rockets · Jun 21, 2020

How's the FPS on slim PlayStation? Same as base?

Duck Sauce · Jun 21, 2020

Played perfectly for me but I have no issues with games that are 10-20 fps.

Eeyore · Jun 21, 2020

It was really bad on the PS4 Pro for me, not sure if it's been patched since around launch but I would literally have frame stopping when you loaded in a new area. It was bizarre.

Nida · Jun 21, 2020

Yeah I'm waiting to play this, Red Dead, and the Jedi game on next gen or new GPU. It looks amazing, but I want to play it while it looks and plays incredibly well.

degauss · Jun 21, 2020

Pseudo next generation game struggling at the end of the generation.

BoxManLocke · Jun 21, 2020

As someone who regularly switches from PS4 Pro to base and vice-versa, I was really taking the mid gen refresh for granted before.

The performance on plenty of games is substantially inferior on base and it makes for a really shitty experience.

Gundam · Jun 21, 2020

I had to miss out on Alien Isolation and Blair Witch because the base Xbox One performance was so awful. Guess I'll wait for Series X even if this hits game pass.

Bman94 · Jun 21, 2020

Sounds like my first experience with BioShock on my old Toshiba laptop on the lowest settings. It was definitely around 15 FPS all the time. If you like the game enough, you'll chug through it, I know I did.

Newman96 · Jun 21, 2020

Yeah as someone who generally isn't bothered when game performance dips, this one was particularly shocking.

Theecliff · Jun 21, 2020

it's not the worst framerate i've experienced on base PS4 (that'd probably go to agents of mayhem or telltale's batman series) but it is pretty bad, yeah. what's also bad is the amount of 'smearing' that happens when you move the camera, which i can only assume is a result of the game's TAA reconstruction solution combined with a low sample motion blur and an iffy framerate - which is a shame since it clearly can be a gorgeous game and the art is incredible. i'm still really enjoying the game despite these issues though and i'm definitely gonna crack on with it till completion.

between this and something like Jedi Fallen Order (another game that i've played recently on the base PS4) it's clear that these base consoles are becoming very long in the tooth for some multi platform developers and we're getting very clearly compromised versions. i'm excited to try them both out on a PS5, where even if they don't get new updates i'll at least be able to experience their Pro versions with even more stable framerates.

Odesu · Jun 21, 2020

leng jai said:
There's probably still people who will claim they never noticed the game dropping frames.

Ocarina of Time runs at 20fps on N64...all the time. Yet, millions of people love the game and have never really had any issue with the technical side of it. Shadow of the Colossus on PS 2 runs on 15 to 20 frames per second whenever you fight a Colossus. For years, I didn't notice at all. I have friends who still don't care. There are countless people now playing games on low-spec PCs with low, choppy framerates.

It's fine. Many people don't even know what "framerate" is supposed to mean. There's no need to infer that they only "claim" it - you probably didn't notice it yourself until some specific point in your life. Many people never do.

Control has a bad framerate on consoles, that's a fact. That it bothers every person or that they HAVE to notice it isn't.

Springy · Jun 21, 2020

I don't think it's as bad as I remember Far Cry 3 being on PS3, but it's definitely up there as one of the worst of the past decade.

thecaseace · Jun 21, 2020

I genuinely think issues of frame rates are frequently overblown on this forum and for most single player games I'll get by with a decent 30fps.

This game however has issued that make out tricky to play and as the enemy count rises it gets worse.

Cogniferous · Jun 21, 2020

Base PS4 struggled with Control's framerate at well. Dont know if it's as bad as the Xbox One, but when all the footage I saw before release was smooth it was very jarring.

EggmaniMN · Jun 21, 2020

Just be thankful it's not LICHDOM BATTLEMAGE bad

leng jai · Jun 21, 2020

SilentRob said:
Ocarina of Time runs at 20fps on N64...all the time. Yet, millions of people love the game and have never really had any issue with the technical side of it. Shadow of the Colossus on PS 2 runs on 15 to 20 frames per second whenever you fight a Colossus. For years, I didn't notice at all. I have friends who still don't care. There are countless people now playing games on low-spec PCs with low, choppy framerates.

It's fine. Many people don't even know what "framerate" is supposed to mean. There's no need to infer that they only "claim" it - you probably didn't notice it yourself until some specific point in your life. Many people never do.

Control has a bad framerate on consoles, that's a fact. That it bothers every person or that they HAVE to notice it isn't.

Yeah I didn't notice it when I was 8 playing N64. There's a difference between saying you don't care compared to you don't even notice its existence. It's hard to believe perception varies that greatly between people when they can't even notice a game dropping all the way down to 20fps constantly if they were actually paying attention. There's been plenty of games that have run in the low 20s or had obvious performance issues where there's always people who say theirs runs perfectly and they had any drops.

Kyuuji · Jun 21, 2020

It was fairly rough at the start on the Pro even. I ended up buying it for the X from wanting the best version I could get and then completing on both. It's rough the base consoles got a shit end of the stick. It's tricky with split console generations (base/pro versions) as unequivocally I would have wanted to play the game. It remains among my favourites of the generation, but then how should games be handled when we're so far along that games are seeking to max out those later consoles to the cost of the originals. Splitting them off into "pro only" releases would draw backfire I would assume? Maybe it wouldn't and maybe it's only a sales concern.

Hopefully this coming generation handles the mid-end of it's life with more thought to these areas.

Teapot Jeffries · Jun 21, 2020

I played Control on an OG Xbox One while I noticed the frame drops, they never really hindered my gameplay or enjoyment.

I just got done playing Days Gone on base PS4 and that was the first game in tremendous memory that actually gave me a headache at the constant stuttering. I was constantly crashing my motorcycle because it went to PowerPoint slides level frame rate. Between that and the textures never loading I was constantly restarting the game. That gets my vote for worst of the generation that I've played.

Laserbeam · Jun 21, 2020

I played through on a base PS4 and there were times during intense combat where it was almost at a stand still and I thought it was gonna crash for sure. It never did and the moment to moment gameplay always felt smooth enough to me that it wasn't an issue and I enjoyed my time with it.

Really weird though.

aevanhoe · Jun 21, 2020

.exe said:
As someone who frequents performance threads, that is one-hundred percent accurate. Either that or they'll say it's not that bad in response to someone saying it's bad. The attitudes toward performance and imagine quality by both developers (inferred) and players for games on recent consoles have been baffling to me and leaving me increasingly cold towards console gaming.

What are you talking about? Most console games don't have framerate drops. As for image quality, TLOU2 is probably the most gorgeous looking game of this generation and the framerate is holding steady. Most 3rd party games don't have issues either.

Control is a great game, but it doesn't run well on current consoles. That's it.

TheYanger · Jun 21, 2020

I mean, it seems quite bad (idk I played on PC) but I honestly wonder how long you've been gaming with the hyperbole.

Nuclear Muffin · Jun 21, 2020

Someone has clearly never played a game before 2013 (never mind from Generation 5 consoles!)

The frame rate drops in Control on Xbox One are fucking quaint compared to what we could see last gen, never mind what came before!

leng jai · Jun 21, 2020

aevanhoe said:
What are you talking about? Most console games don't have framerate drops. As for image quality, TLOU2 is probably the most gorgeous looking game of this generation and the framerate is holding steady. Most 3rd party games don't have issues either.

Control is a great game, but it doesn't run well on current consoles. That's it.

This post literally just proves the initial point that people love to claim they have magic versions with no frame rate drops or issues.

LCGeek · Jun 21, 2020

Brokenlynx said:
I genuinely think issues of frame rates are frequently overblown on this forum and for most sainthood player games I'll get by with a decent 30fps.

They are so overblown amd and nvidia have been making a quick buck off performance nuts since the 90s.

Oreiller · Jun 21, 2020

You haven't even seen the worst section of the game. One room in the second half of the game is a slideshow. If I didn't know any better, I would have thought my system was overheating.

V23 · Jun 21, 2020

Duck Sauce said:
Played perfectly for me but I have no issues with games that are 10-20 fps.

Aiming on a thumbstick is difficult at the best of times (aim assist notwithstanding). Trying to aim at 15fps is extremely difficult at worst, frustrating at best.

Karlinel · Jun 21, 2020

The frame rate dips in control are quite annoying, but to me the very worst are the loading times. I will enjoy it in a ps5 sooo much more...

WhiteRabbitEXE · Jun 21, 2020

TwoPikachus said:
This is why I didn't buy a console this been and won't until they prioritize 60+fps.

Then you literally never will. Having a console "prioritize" frame rate doesn't make sense, since frame rate is a function of developer priorities, so shy of the console manufacturer saying "you can't ship your game unless it's 60fps" I'm not sure how you expect that to work.

Deleted member 5086 · Jun 21, 2020

Kyuuji said:
It was fairly rough at the start on the Pro even. I ended up buying it for the X from wanting the best version I could get and then completing on both. It's rough the base consoles got a shit end of the stick. It's tricky with split console generations (base/pro versions) as unequivocally I would have wanted to play the game. It remains among my favourites of the generation, but then how should games be handled when we're so far along that games are seeking to max out those later consoles to the cost of the originals. Splitting them off into "pro only" releases would draw backfire I would assume? Maybe it wouldn't and maybe it's only a sales concern.

Hopefully this coming generation handles the mid-end of it's life with more thought to these areas.

I got it for the X but haven't played it yet. How was your experience with it there?

Kyuuji · Jun 21, 2020

Mist said:
I got it for the X but haven't played it yet. How was your experience with it there?

I had a great time with it! There's a few moments of slowdown in two of the more hectic encounters that come to mind but nothing that stalled my enjoyment or persisted. It looks stunning to compensate. The Old House is one of my favourite environments of the gen and the art direction excels, coupled with some of the best world building to date (you will hunger for and devour the notes in this game) it's a rabbit hole you're happy to jump down.

The destruction and environmental chaos that comes with the fights/abilities is handled well on the X and you're able to enjoy it without hitches outside of those mentioned. Fantastic game, really recommend it.

EvilBoris · Jun 21, 2020

What did Digital foundry say about control on OG Xbox?

Shawt21 · Jun 21, 2020

Wow, some of y'all are really smug.

Control (Base Xbox One) has the lowest frame rate I've ever experienced

User requested ban

The Favonius Fox

Slayer of the Eternal Voidslurper

Prophet of Truth

User requested account closure

The Favonius Fox

Prophet of Truth - HDTVtest