Otter said:
curl-6 said:
I don't necessarily disagree, I was just theorizing as to the intent behind the decision, not defending it. DK actually holds 60fps the vast majority of the time, maybe they just figured that 30fps for like 2% of the time was better than an input delay 100% of the time. If they can just fix VRR, it would be a non-issue, so here's hoping. |
I done a little digging (chatgpt) because it got me curious about what was happening in all the other games we're seeing without this double buffer drop. I'm not especially sensitive to input lag, so not sure it would bother me and surely if 90% of games use it, it doesn't bother most gamers at this point?
Triple Buffer is the solution that adds most input latency, but allows organic FPS fluctuations, holding a frame in reserve. Mostly used for 30fps games. With triple buffering, the GPU has another frame in reserve, so instead of dropping straight to 20 fps, it can deliver a frame slightly late (~28 fps, ~25 fps), producing smoother motion.
Triple buffering was used in PS4 games like Uncharted 4, Horizon Zero Dawn, God of War, Shadow of the Colossus remake, and The Last Guardian (patched).
But importantly, it is not really used in 60fps games like Donkey Kong because its not needed.
Setup: V-Sync ON, double buffering. At 60 Hz, the frame budget is 16.7 ms. If a frame takes, say, 20 ms (≈50 fps), it misses the 16.7 ms refresh, but can still be shown on the next refresh cycle (≈33.3 ms). Because it doesn’t have to wait a full two cycles (like a 30 fps cap would), you see smoothish values like 55, 52, 48 fps. This is why many unlocked 60 fps console modes fluctuate in the 40–60 fps zone Some engines enforce strict frame pacing: if you miss the 16.7 ms slot, the engine deliberately waits until the next even 33.3 ms slot. That forces the game into 30 fps behaviour even though it’s targeting 60fps. Reason is developers may prefer perfect pacing (no jitter) over fluctuating performance.
Looking at DK in isolation I would suspect the frame rate is all over the place in these boss battles, so instead of constantly fluctuating a tonne & generally being well below 50 anyeway, they decided to just fix it to 30fps during these portion. This is my presumption.
Mario Odyssey (presumably on the same engine) does not drop to 30 and instead has drops into the 50s (8:52). I presume DKs are way more dramatic which is the reason for this solution.
For me, what is actually very interesting is to think the Switch 2 was being developed alongside Donky Kong. This must have caused some tension in regards to the systems target specs, it's not ideal for a team to have to make such severe sacrifices so early into a systems life.
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