v0.3.6.41

Unofficial fork build. The official port is SuperMedo's uncharted_pc; please don't report problems with this build to him. Everything in 0.3.6.40 plus the changes below.

Installing: the launcher of 0.3.6.30 or newer offers this update itself; or unpack into a new folder and start Uncharted.exe.

Faster

• Profile-guided build: the port is now compiled with a profile of how it actually runs (recorded while playing all three games), so the compiler lays out and optimises the code that runs most. Together with fewer GPU pipeline drains when a compute wait is already met, measured on the developer's PC (RTX 4090, 3440x1440 native with DLSS (DLAA), frame rate unlocked; Uncharted 3, a 44-second route through the market, two runs each) against 0.3.6.36:

  • average frame rate +5% (123.5 to 130.0 FPS), lowest frame rate +12% (95.9 to 107.4 FPS);
  • with the CPU held back to resemble a slower PC (8 threads at 60% clock): average +10% (87.8 to 96.8 FPS), lowest +12% (56.8 to 63.8 FPS).

  Gains depend on the PC: they are largest where the CPU, not the graphics card, limits the frame rate, and small or none when the graphics card is the limit or the frame rate is capped.

• Cards with less than 8 GB of video memory no longer keep throwing out and reloading textures they still need (by mato215): such cards started evicting at 40% of their memory, below what the game holds outside textures, which could show as hitches and textures loading late.

• More shaders prepared ahead: the shader lists gained variants from more play sessions and a player's cache (Uncharted 1 +25, Uncharted 2 +30, Uncharted 3 +40), so fewer compile during play.

Fixed

• Flickering surfaces with DLSS, FSR or TAA on Uncharted 1's boat details and Uncharted 3's London bar (by Alex).
• The game no longer closes when it asks for an audio format the port does not play (AAC); it carries on without that sound (by iannitram).

Changed

• Crash reports: after a crash the log names the thread and the code that led to it, also inside graphics drivers, and the port writes a small crash.dmp (a few MB) into the user folder (by Jhojan Jiménez). BB_NO_CRASH_DUMP=1 turns it off.
• Shader preparation for other regions' releases is now an option (launcher, Advanced, Shader preparation: "Also prepare versions the port has no shader index for"). It is off by default again, as before 0.3.6.40. Copies of the collection whose game version the port knows but which it has no shader index for, such as the Spanish release (CUSA02826), can turn it on: the first start then reads all the game files (about 60 GB) once to find the shaders and keeps the result. This can take a very long time; a progress bar shows how far it is. With it off, these copies build shaders during play, with more stutter the first time each area loads.
• Progress while the game files are scanned: the shader preparation page and the launcher's bar now show this step ("finding the shaders in your game files (only this once)") with GB read and the time left, instead of looking frozen. On the developer's PC the scan of the collection's 59 GB took about one minute.