S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl / GSC Game World
Ukrainian S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl was included in the list of the best games of 2024 according to ITC.UA editorial board (and journalists of some other publications). And now DSOGaming has included this game in its own anti-rating – a list of the worst optimized games. These are the games that disappointed with their PC optimization.
According to the authors of this rating, a poorly optimized game — is one that is not able to scale effectively on multiple processor cores, suffers from «console» flaws (small field of view, indicators for the controller only, poorly configured keyboard and mouse control, problems with mouse smoothing/acceleration). Problems with «staters» (delays and jerks during the game) are also taken into account. In addition, this list includes games that do not meet their hardware requirements or are unable to run on older PCs. This list is not ranked — games are presented in random order.
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl is impressive in terms of graphics, but in terms of optimization — it is a total disaster. The game is in beta and suffers from numerous performance issues. GSC GameWorld’s patches haven’t fixed the situation: delays in loading locations remain, scenes requiring high CPU power still slow down, and visual errors haven’t disappeared.
At the same time DSOGaming reviewers have included S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl in the TOP 10 games of 2024 with the best graphics.
The Until Dawn remake, created on Unreal Engine 5, was a real disappointment. The game has many technical problems on PC. Owners of powerful systems can partially ignore these shortcomings, but the game still suffers from numerous stability issues. Frequent crashes, corrupted saves, and malfunctioning Ray Tracing and Virtual Shadow Maps remain unresolved.
Dragon’s Dogma 2, created on the RE Engine, has become a real failure in optimization. 7 months after its release, the game still has serious CPU utilization issues. It is surprisingly heavy on hardware, especially in urban areas where NPCs appear literally in front of your nose.
Another remake on Unreal Engine 5 that did not meet expectations. Despite the use of Lumen technology, the benefits of this feature are almost imperceptible. Controls on the PC leave much to be desired, and delays in loading locations only worsen the experience.
Among the AAA games of 2024, many suffered from problems with delays (staters) when loading locations. On this list: S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl, Frostpunk 2, Until Dawn Remake, Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons Remake, Black Myth: Wukong, Alone in the Dark, Infinity Nikki, A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead, Outcast – A New Beginning. The worst in this regard were Silent Hill 2 Remake and SAND LAND. Especially SAND LAND was marked by furious staters due to the lack of pre-compilation of shaders. The game received only two patches that did not solve these problems.
Source: dsogaming