PC Choppiness (long theory and rant to EA)

[donjn]

I was looking forward to this year's game on the PC.

Over the last year I have beem miffed by the ghosted, stuttering ball issue on high-end PCs. Why do I say high end PCs? Well it's simple. Through my research over the last year collecting countless posts on boards, newgroups and with some friends about this problem my conclusion was that MVP 2004 (and now MVP 2005) runs better on lower-end computers then it does on higher-end systems.

I have a theory behind this. I really think EA coded this game to run on lower-end systems. The specs on this game are very low. 800Mhz, 256 ram, and many users can run it on a Geforce 4MX card (3-4 years old) with no problems.

I have tried new drivers,(and properly uninstalled old ones). I have disabled sound cards and tried new ones. I have no conflicts, nothing much runs in the background when Windows starts. I can run Half Life 2, Doom 3 etc with full AA and AF with no problems. I have an Athlon XP 2800, with 1Gb ram and a Geforce 6800 card.

Back to my theory. I think that when the ball is thrown around it is not "in-sync" with the camera movement. Perhaps with higher-end computers the camera is moving faster than the framerate "locked" ball is, causing a stuttering issue. Xbox, PS2 and Gamecube processors are much lower than your typical nice machine of the XP 2800 range.

What I don't understand is how something like this makes it out of the door two years in a row.

Unfortunately I will not be playing MVP 2005 this year on the PC and this may be the final nail in the coffin for me and EA. I really hope someone at EA reads this and understands.

[MikeB]

The great thing about playing on PS2 is that you don't get the choppiness because you cannot really screw around with your system. You don't have conflicting frame rates, video cards, RAM, chip sets and the whole lot. You get no choice in what you have excluding the TV you use. And that doesn't really matter much (only bragging purposes).

[donjn]

bump

[Dan20FLA]

The problem is EA doesn't care. MVp 05 = the last installement, and they just don't care. Theres no conspiracy, they could care less about the PC platform. Even madden isn't that good for PC imo but that's a different issue. 04 had this same problem but it was mendable (FIXABLE) by changing refresh rates to 60 mhz from my regular 85. in 05 it does nothing. I had an ea tech guy laugh at me for bringing this problem up, he was sucha jerk off. Anyway w/e .. EA can F-off. Thnx for stealing more of my hard earned cash EA, really appreciate it.

[cubby]

I am sorry you guys are having problems. I am not having these problems. I just got an ASUS Nivida 6800 GT and played the first couple of days with an Nvidia 4200 TI and at first had slight ball stuttering on a throw from first to third.

I installed the latest drivers from Nvidia and it went away. I also got rid of the grass problem by raising the AF setting to 8x and now with my new card to 16x with no issues. i run a XP 2400+. I am sorry you guys are having problems. Why is it different for some people? Hopefully a patch comes out for you cause this game is amazing.

[ticks]

i run amd 64 3200 gig corsiar3500ram 9600 ati xt 10,000rpm sata 1200,1000 rez on sony 20.1 lcd game runs perfect not a single hang up in terms of smoothness of play still some bs taggin issues and i wish u could move forward and backwards in the box instead of just left and right but overall some major improvements from stock non patched mvp of last year.hitters eye helps players who cant pick up the ball and still like to play on allstar or mvp level.the auto return to the bag and base running has been reworked

[Hilltopper3339]

I've got a:

Pentium 4 2.66 GHz

ATI Radeon 9800 PRO

1 GB of RAM

70 GB HD

And it is conisderably choppy, most of it happening in the infield.

[PeterOS]

donjn i totally agree with you. How something like this makes it out 2 years in a row is puzzling.

[Snash13]

on both of my comps it runs great, no lag or choppiness at all.

1st comp: P4 2.4 GHZ

512 MB Ram DDR

GeForce FX 6600 256 MB Video Card

2nd comp:P4 2.0 GHZ

384 MB ram

GeForce FX 5200 128 MB Video CArd

[warehos]

no offense, but i think your system is what has the problem, not the game.

i run.....

amd 3200+ (2.2ghz)

768mb 3200 ddr sdram

radeon 9800 128mb

250gb 7200 8mb cache HD

-------------

works fine

if other games have the same issue, did you ever stop to think that it was your system not being configured properly in general (either hardware, or more than likely software).

the game is fine. it's your system

[rglass95]

I have a theory behind this. I really think EA coded this game to run on lower-end systems. The specs on this game are very low. 800Mhz, 256 ram, and many users can run it on a Geforce 4MX card (3-4 years old) with no problems.

More like "every game" is coded to run on lower-end systems. Lower specifications equals more customers.

[ortonius]

It's NOT the system. It's abundantly clear from the testing here that it is the game that is at fault. As I have stated before, I get choppiness on throws across the diamond only. It's like the game camera is panning/scrolling about 4 or 5 times on a throw from 3rd to 1st creating a "choppy" effect. (I would say it's equivalent to using a mouse wheel to scroll while surfing the web...a studdering effect) My system is home built and runs all other games at max detail with no problem. Hopefully, EA will put out a patch to fix the problem and we'll all be happy.

[p10s]

I got a P4 3.0

2GB of DDR Ram

GeForce6800 Ultra OC

And it has REAL bad choppiness.

I can run Doom 3, Farcry, and Half-Life 2 all maxed out settings fine. But this is killing me. :cry:

[Kriegz]

Not TOO big for me but I do notice it on some infield throws and when the pitcher walks back to the mound. I will look into those clocking things people have mentioned

[five]

Iplayed the first couple of days with an Nvidia 4200 TI and at first had slight ball stuttering on a throw from first to third.

I installed the latest drivers from Nvidia and it went away.

What driver version was that?

[rmats100]

Hardly noticable for me, but there is some kind of major common conflict that EA has allowed to slip by. So many people having this problem to the point where the game is no longer fun to play! This is just bad buisness. Strangely my system is nearly identical to donjn's system..

xp3000, nforce2 ultra, 1G Corsair, BFG gf6800gt

.. and I never even noticed till I recently found this forum a week ago. I played 2 seasons on 2004 too.

[Lurchman]

I have no probs at all, although my system is not the best. smooth runs at 1028

P4 1.6

1 gig SDR RAM

ATI Radeon 9800 Pro 256

[obredaan]

I think EA's track record with PC games especially, has always proven to be really bad. Most games they release on PC never play as smooth as they do on console. NBA Live, NHL, Fifa and Madden have always been like this and now MVP is the same thing. It's not because this is the last year that EA is making MVP that they ship the game as is, I think it is done almost intentionally so people are forced to purchase both pc and console versions. EA is well known for releasing games with a ton of bugs (ie Battlefield, MVP 2004) so this is no surprise to me at all that the same problem is occuring with alot of people. I remember the patches from last year improved the stuttering a bit along with lowering the refresh rate to 60hz and turning vsync on. I would like to see EA at least acknowledge the issue.

[buckstar]

I have an AMD 64 3500, 1 gig corsair ram and ATI X800 Ultra video card and the stuttering just plain RUINS the game for me. This game was not meant for high end systems, and what sucks is we are stuck with this product (no business I know will take it back). I just hope they patch it. I would have appreciated a warning on the box that this game was not meant for high end systems. But as someone else said, EA doesn't give a crap.

[Sidewinder]

I have noticed that the cameras have a tendency to zoom in while panning at the same time and the view is already pretty close in on Infield play.

I think once someone is able to pull the camera back for infiled play, that might help the situation. I know it did for me on 2k4.

In the mean time I have just underclocked my Radeon 9800 Pro and it plays about 90% smooth now. I put the Anistrophic Filtering to 8X to cure the shimmering glass and I am good to go! Using the Radlinker with the Radeon cards is a piece of cake that handles all that stuff automatically.

[Doby12]

Bottom line is I paid my hard eaned money for the PC version and the fact that its STILL choppy is ridiculous. EA better patch it soon. My system is on the upper end and I shouldn't be experiencing any graphical choppiness.

[Cool-J-Breeze]

Do you turn on the anti-aliasing and filtering in the driver profiles? Because the in-game graphic settings don't allow for this.

[Simfan]

Do you turn on the anti-aliasing and filtering in the driver profiles? Because the in-game graphic settings don't allow for this.

Where would I find in game graphic settings?

[schitonk]

i've spent a good deal ttrying to get the most acceptable combo for my vid card the last couple days and i think i know what is happening (sort of). i'm now playing at my desktop res, normal card clocks @ 60hz w/vsync on in RADLINK properties and off in game while getting a constant 60fps with AA @ 6X perf and AF @ 8X perf. there seems to be tearing, no matter that the frames are synced with my monitors refresh rate, which also displays 60hz in its display (on monitor). and this tear seems to hover in the center of the screen but not always. you can see it perfectly at the higher resolutions, it looks like when in the summer you look down a paved road and the heat rises, know what i mean? it's about 10% of the screen but since the camera centers itself on the ball in the middle of the screen it looks like the ball is lagging behind the camera. this is why infeild throws accross the diamond are so poor cause it's smack in the middle of the tear. on balls hit to the fences and the subsequent throws back in it seems to move down a bit, hence why those throws seem somewhat smoother.

now, i've had this monitor 3+ years and i will not leave it out of the question as being the culprit but since this is the ONLY time i get tearing like this i cannot rule out this game.

[Smokin_Joe]

I've got the same problem with a 2400M@2.5ghz - 2X512MB XMS3200LL - Abit AN7 - 6800LE 256MB. I hoped it would be better this year (played with a 9700pro last year) but the lagginess is still there. I'm using the 66.93's also at 1024X768 4XAA 8XAF, i'll try 16XAf and see if that helps.