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[Keade]

Well, people aren't sensitive to input lag the same one another, but it was a big turn-off for me on my first game (forcing vsync off in my AMD drivers didn't change anything !), I had to switch to windowed.
Some people probably won't notice it at all, but I really hope this gets fixed, the game being hard enough as is.
That said, I really think Treasure coming to PC deserves all the support it can get.

A part from the input lag issue, the port seems fine. It runs fine with supersampling, of course The game is 60fps capped but not limited to 1080p, so if your display supports higher resolutions, the game should be able to cope with it.

[Formless God]

I think windowed has less lag than fullscreen but is not completely lag-free. Does the game force vsync on by default or something?

[mastermx]

Finally a solid shmup on steam.

There were already several amazing shmups on Steam though.

Oh really? Which ones are they? It's been a while since I've checked. Last I remember there were some decent shmups like james town, there wasn't anything like Ikaruga. Steam has a few indie shmups but nothing that really has the polish of an AAA title. And even the indie shmups that it does have are not the top tier of the top tier, it's not like crimzon clover is on steam.

Steam has a looong way to go in terms of shmups. All I need are some cave titles on steam, and I would be happy. Not even the latest ones, I would be happy with DOJ BL or other even older titles. Cave need to learn from the pricing tactics of Treasure. I know cave are now defunct and have completely left shmupdom, but if they theoretically release something on steam, I know them well enough now that their prices would be over the roof.

Can anyone else comment on the situation with input lag on this? I'm not going to throw away $10 on this if there is absolutely no way for getting this game to play properly.

hail good sir has remarked that input lag is still present even in windowed mode. Has anyone else noticed/confirmed this?

As to the topic of lag, I havent really notices anything on my end, but I havent had time to check it. I'll try to find a way to see if vsync can be disabled.

[katzinator]

Thanks for the feedback guys, but we're going to need something more concrete than hearsay. It has been confirmed that there definitely IS lag when in fullscreen, which very well may be related to vsync.

Running windowed mode is another matter. Could someone do a test of some sort (perhaps run side-by-side with the X360/DC/GC version) so that we know for sure?

I can't imagine anyone trying to seriously play this game with input lag and, frankly, this is a deal-breaker. It blows my mind they'd go as far as to add extra modes and PC-specific features but completely botch something as fundamental and vital as control responsiveness for a game as twitch-oriented as Ikaruga.

edit: Thank you, mastermx. I'm really looking forward to what kind of results you come up with.

[Squire Grooktook]

Finally a solid shmup on steam.

There were already several amazing shmups on Steam though.

Oh really? Which ones are they?.

Besides Jamestown, Satazius is a very high quality oldschool Gradius style game. eXceed 2nd is based on Ikaruga but feels different (much more of a twitch game and faster paced) and is VERY excellent (probably one of my favorite pc shmups). Ether Vapor Remaster is also pretty good, as are the Gundemonium games.

There's also Bleed and Metal Slug 3 if you count run and gun shooters.

[Keade]

@katzinator: you don't really need side by side with a console, what you need to measure is when the game processes input VS when they were actually pressed on your controller.
For windowed you could simply record the whole desktop at 60fps while keeping a reference input window visible somewhere. But there is no real input lag problem with windowed...

Fullscreen would be more tricky, I can't think of an easy way to do this :/

[MrMonkeyMan]

There absolutely is lag in windowed mode. You only need to play the game to realize it's there. Not as bad as full screen, but definitely noticeable. Makes the zig zag chaining part near the end of stage 1 kind of scary.

[katzinator]

@katzinator: you don't really need side by side with a console, what you need to measure is when the game processes input VS when they were actually pressed on your controller.
For windowed you could simply record the whole desktop at 60fps while keeping a reference input window visible somewhere. But there is no real input lag problem with windowed...

Fullscreen would be more tricky, I can't think of an easy way to do this :/

I'm not sure if I understand your proposal. Sure, you could record the whole desktop with a window showing the current buttons being pressed, but I don't think the game itself has any sort of service menu or "buttons pressed" screen. I doubt there would be much legitimacy in trying to correlate with ship firing and/or movement, since there is likely a fundamental delay/acceleration to be had with either animation (which would exist on any version of the game).

The only way I can imagine trying to truly observe how much "extra" lag there is introduced in the Steam version would be to mirror the same input to a lag-less console (or emulator) playing the game and observe any difference in ship responsiveness.

If I am mistaken with any of this, please feel free to correct me.

MrMonkeyMan, thanks for the feedback. I'm starting to feel like I shouldn't even bother with this port. It is a damn shame, since I was really, really looking forward to this release.

[StarCreator]

Windowed, with Aero (desktop composition) turned ON, should be fine if you're running Windows 7 or later; any lag you experience from that point is either the result of hardware (controller converters and monitors are most likely culprits) or something programmed into the game (needs testing to confirm if the game adds input lag). Fullscreen in Windows 7 almost always introduces lag in any game I try it in for some reason.

[Keade]

I doubt there would be much legitimacy in trying to correlate with ship firing and/or movement, since there is likely a fundamental delay/acceleration to be had with either animation (which would exist on any version of the game).

That's why you would need to compare the reference window with the first frame of the animations (most games try to give an instant visual feedback).
I will try it for windowed (more measurements cannot hurt), but I still have no idea for fullscreen...
Did you notice significantly more lag with Aero off, StarCreator ?

PS. the zig zag chaining part scared me even back on Dreamcast, no amount of responsiveness could make up for my lack of skill with it

[katzinator]

I doubt there would be much legitimacy in trying to correlate with ship firing and/or movement, since there is likely a fundamental delay/acceleration to be had with either animation (which would exist on any version of the game).

That's why you would need to compare the reference window with the first frame of the animations (the game feedback is usually instant).

I understand what you're saying, but to blindly assume that it is "usually instant" doesn't do much for us in terms of certainty.

[duckzero]

Eh. I'm going to buy this game. I'd like to see more games like this on PC in the future.

DRM is the (very small) negative of having such easy and quick access to games on Steam. I don't think anyone would be hyped to use Steam if they printed you a disc with no DRM and mailed it to you every time you bought a game.

[AntiFritz]

Few thing's I've noticed.

The control settings have been butchered since the xbox port, you can only set a function to be on maximum of two buttons, with no overlap.

You can turn "easy menu" on which makes the game menu like the xbox one, having it off has an arcade style menu. Except it isn't because what's his face isn't there walking towards his ship. Utterly stupid. I assume nesica was the same as this.

EDIT: Just remembered that you also can't set the hud exactly how you want it, there's only 6 presets.

[Chaos Phoenixma]

I don't really mind Steam since it's not invasive or anything and has some actual benefits to using it.

Now if they had other DRM on it, then I'd be complaining about that.

[Keade]

Could someone make the offline mode work, btw ? (please note that I highly doubt this is a DRM issue, considering no message is displayed to me when trying to start the game, and the Steam page does not mention anything about it).

[BazookaBen]

Dreamcast and Gamecube are v-synced and have no lag. Should be possible on PC too, no? For now, I can't in good conscience give them money for an unfinished game.

[ZellSF]

Thing about PCs and input lag, there's so many configurations it's impossible to say anything specific about input lag. All you'll get are subjective opinions, if you get any solid numbers chances are high they don't apply to your configuration.

Is as responsive as the 360 version here. Nvidia graphic card, usb keyboard (just for testing), fullscreen, vsynced, framerate limited to 60 FPS. Too bad about the lack of support for higher framerates.

Not an expert on the game, but I can notice input lag (I certainly did notice a lot of lag before I realized I had framerate limit set to 120).

Does not work in offline mode. I was actually online, just not connected to Steam's servers... So it's not third party DRM. Offline mode is one of the arguments I keep hearing when people say Steam's DRM is so friendly... I should remember this.

[Zaarock]

Forcing vsync off on nvidia drivers made fullscreen have way less input lag for me.. but as a result the game also started running too fast, and for example the stage 1 theme was still playing over eboshidori.

Windowed I get some slowdown even though my pc is well above the minimum requirements..

I can't seem to launch the game in offline mode either.

edit:
With vsync off & fullscreen I get 70-72 FPS (too fast)
in windowed my fps drops to ~52
Sucks.. I guess I need to figure out why it's slowing down so badly in windowed

If I switch the game to use a intergrated graphics card with way lower performance it stays at 60fps windowed, go figure.
Some problem with nvidia cards here I guess.

edit2:
Using my intergated intel graphics card I also get less input lag in windowed than fullscreen

[Koboldicus]

I think windowed has less lag than fullscreen but is not completely lag-free. Does the game force vsync on by default or something?

My frame rate plummeted in windowed mode. Not really sure why, guess I'll have another look at it tomorrow.

[AntiFritz]

Considering there is no error at all (the process just runs and then terminates) when in offline mode then It's probably a bug. Metal Gear Rising had the same thing (and if your internet went out the game crashed I think) which was fixed by platinum 12 hours after release. Hopefully treasure fix it.

[katzinator]

Thing about PCs and input lag, there's so many configurations it's impossible to say anything specific about input lag. All you'll get are subjective opinions, if you get any solid numbers chances are high they don't apply to your configuration.

Is as responsive as the 360 version here. Nvidia graphic card, usb keyboard (just for testing), fullscreen, vsynced, framerate limited to 60 FPS. Too bad about the lack of support for higher framerates.

Not an expert on the game, but I can notice input lag (I certainly did notice a lot of lag before I realized I had framerate limit set to 120).

Does not work in offline mode. I was actually online, just not connected to Steam's servers... So it's not third party DRM. Offline mode is one of the arguments I keep hearing when people say Steam's DRM is so friendly... I should remember this.

Which Windows version are you running? Additionally, do you notice any difference when going into Windowed mode?

[trap15]

Woo PC gaming

[ZellSF]

Thing about PCs and input lag, there's so many configurations it's impossible to say anything specific about input lag. All you'll get are subjective opinions, if you get any solid numbers chances are high they don't apply to your configuration.

Is as responsive as the 360 version here. Nvidia graphic card, usb keyboard (just for testing), fullscreen, vsynced, framerate limited to 60 FPS. Too bad about the lack of support for higher framerates.

Not an expert on the game, but I can notice input lag (I certainly did notice a lot of lag before I realized I had framerate limit set to 120).

Does not work in offline mode. I was actually online, just not connected to Steam's servers... So it's not third party DRM. Offline mode is one of the arguments I keep hearing when people say Steam's DRM is so friendly... I should remember this.

Which Windows version are you running? Additionally, do you notice any difference when going into Windowed mode?

Windows 7, and not really. Windowed mode should actually be slower (composition is known to cause input lag), but I notice no difference at all.

Think windowed mode being faster for some games is a AMD bug, no idea why that still is around.

[mastermx]

Besides Jamestown, Satazius is a very high quality oldschool Gradius style game. eXceed 2nd is based on Ikaruga but feels different (much more of a twitch game and faster paced) and is VERY excellent (probably one of my favorite pc shmups). Ether Vapor Remaster is also pretty good, as are the Gundemonium games.

Thanks for letting me know, didn't know steam had other shmups. Will definitely check these out.

As to the lag, I have experimented with forcing v-sync off on catalyst control centre, and I dont feel like I'm experiencing lag. Though if the topic of vsync is that important to you, I would hold off until someone can confirm something or if and when treasure patch it up and add the setting. PC games are very easily moddable. But from the replays I'm seeing there are people ripping this game up, high scores and perfect runs, they can't have done that with lag.

[hail good sir]

I just scored 22 million and I was really feeling the lag (this is in windowed mode) in certain places. I revise my it's mostly fine stance, some of this stuff is really hard to do like this, and I still haven't made it past the snakes in stage 5. Stone like will be a crap shoot like this. It's still awesome to have not messed up ch4 midbosses and all the other little fixes from the 360 version. I'm noticing so many little tiny things I never knew were different, besides all the stuff that I've read. There's a 203 chain stage 2 score up there but no truly top tier stage 3 or 4 ones yet which is where I think the lag is going to hurt the most.

I had the same problem in super meat boy as far as full screen vs windowed input lag and I'm on nvidia. I know it's not my hardware because I was screen tearing at 120hz with vsync off in full screen.

[Sixfortyfive]

Forcing vsync off on nvidia drivers made fullscreen have way less input lag for me.. but as a result the game also started running too fast, and for example the stage 1 theme was still playing over eboshidori.

Someone throw some tips my way on how to fix this because I'm having the same issue. The whole game is just running at turbo speed in fullscreen. Windowed mode seems fine. Running Win7 with Aero turned off.

[Zaarock]

I fixed it by turning on a hidden framelimiter in my driver settings using a program called Nvidia Inspector. There should be similar methods for other cards. Getting a lot of tearing now though.. I'm probably just going to use my intergated card because it has no problems in windowed.

[hail good sir]

Max prerendered frames to 1 seems to have produced a playable experience for me in full screen with vsync on.

[deexor]

It feels better in fullscreen with forcing max prerendered frames 1, but I'm too tired and might be imagining things.

For those not in the know, here's the gist of it, Nvidia version

[BazookaBen]

Cool... now how do you do that on an AMD card?