Lower Spec Version?

Feedback and support for the PC version of Osmos
HOD
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Joined: Sat May 01, 2010 11:45 am

Lower Spec Version?

Postby HOD » Sat May 01, 2010 11:51 am

Just a suggestion; but this game would be perfect for netbooks, but would require additional LOWER QUALITY graphics modes. Would this be an option for a future release?

Personally I think the charm could be preserved with the physics, the visuals could still work but with simpler rendering options.

It might give you a wider audience for this great game by providing a lower minimum spec.

waltercool
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Joined: Sat May 01, 2010 11:05 am

Re: Lower Spec Version?

Postby waltercool » Sat May 01, 2010 12:17 pm

What kind of netbook are you using? Im playing on an Acer Aspire One D250 and works excelent on Linux.

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Meal Worms
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Re: Lower Spec Version?

Postby Meal Worms » Sat May 01, 2010 12:57 pm

Hi folks,

Thanks for your comments. There actually *is* a rendering detail setting -- hit ESC in-game and see the 'Visual Options' menu.

Osmos has been designed to perform very well on low-end machines and netbooks; you should have no problem running the game smoothly with decreased rendering detail.

Happy Osmoting,
Dave

HOD
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Re: Lower Spec Version?

Postby HOD » Sat May 01, 2010 1:45 pm

I did TRY and lower the settings, but it was still unplayable on my Eee PC 1101HA. I guess it's the Intel GM500 that's letting the side down. I fully realise that's particularly under-powered (even for a netbook) but I've been surprised with what games I *CAN* actually run :)

BTW I had to let the game run for about 20+ minutes before the game would even let me in as far as changing the options. Maybe a separate 'Preferences' program could be run before running the game? Even with all the options set to 'low' or 'off' I was closer to frames per minute than frames per second! ;)

Of course it's fine on my 'proper' PC (gaming rig) but it just seemed like the type of game that didn't rely on fancy graphics, so I figured it ought to be well-suited to netbook play. A shame as if there were a 'safe mode' (ultra-low?) setting it would still be a great netbook game.

I might try the Linux route as I have a few distros I keep tinkering with on that machine.

waltercool
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Re: Lower Spec Version?

Postby waltercool » Sat May 01, 2010 8:05 pm

HOD wrote:I did TRY and lower the settings, but it was still unplayable on my Eee PC 1101HA. I guess it's the Intel GM500 that's letting the side down. I fully realise that's particularly under-powered (even for a netbook) but I've been surprised with what games I *CAN* actually run :)

BTW I had to let the game run for about 20+ minutes before the game would even let me in as far as changing the options. Maybe a separate 'Preferences' program could be run before running the game? Even with all the options set to 'low' or 'off' I was closer to frames per minute than frames per second! ;)

Of course it's fine on my 'proper' PC (gaming rig) but it just seemed like the type of game that didn't rely on fancy graphics, so I figured it ought to be well-suited to netbook play. A shame as if there were a 'safe mode' (ultra-low?) setting it would still be a great netbook game.

I might try the Linux route as I have a few distros I keep tinkering with on that machine.


Your problems seems have no sense... your EeePC is better that my Acer Aspire One. Maybe you are using a old Linux distribution with old Intel drivers.

Try updating your repositories and drivers, or try using a updated version of Linux (Ubuntu, Fedora, openSuse or Mandriva are good ones)

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liamdawe
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Re: Lower Spec Version?

Postby liamdawe » Sun May 02, 2010 12:20 am

I am using a netbook and the performance seems fine to me, not sure what graphics chip it has in it but as with most netbooks not a good one.

As said before what version of your OS are you using?

HOD
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Re: Lower Spec Version?

Postby HOD » Sun May 02, 2010 7:52 am

It's running Windows XP (SP3) and had the latest drivers. The 1101HA only has a 1.33GHz Atom CPU (and as before an Intel GMA500) but from reading more about this game I'm now suspecting it's sound related? When I first installed the game (from Impulse) the seperate AL install did seem to complete very quickly.

Would the game work on Puppy Linux (via WINE)?

HOD
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Re: Lower Spec Version?

Postby HOD » Sun May 02, 2010 8:29 am

D'oh! I must have skipped this bit in the FAQ...

usingD3D "1”

did the trick!

I can even run at the high setting now! :D

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Meal Worms
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Re: Lower Spec Version?

Postby Meal Worms » Mon May 03, 2010 4:25 am

Hi HOD,

One of our test machines on the beta was an Eee 701 laptop, Intel Celeron M processor 900MHz (albeit with external monitor, since the native display resolution of the laptop is less than Osmos' 800x600 minres). On this machine, the game was plenty playable with lower display settings (GL driver version was 1.4 Mesa 7.6.1).

Perhaps your problem was that you were video-out'ing to a high a res on your external monitor?

Anyway, glad you've got it working. So your solution was to run the PC version of the game in Wine, using the D3D renderer?

Dave

HOD
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Re: Lower Spec Version?

Postby HOD » Mon May 03, 2010 4:40 am

Nope, I found the game works fine on the Asus Eee PC 1101HA but only when using Direct3D (having manually changed the option in the config file). I'm running at it's native resolution of 1366x768.

The real problem here is that when you first run the game (without knowing anything about the advanced options) it takes so long for the game to even get to the first menu, that most people would simply give-up and think it was unusable!

With the default settings the game renders the initial loading screens so slowly it barely looks like anything is happening. I was just wondering if providing a seperate executable to set the options BEFORE loading the actual game might help? i.e. a very basic program without the fancy rendering slowing everything down.

I suspect it's down to the Intel GMA500 not supporting much in the way of OpenGL.

I must admit I'm now intregued to see if I can get it running under WINE (just because I like a challenge) ;)


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