FF8 PC GF Boost slower than PSX - help?

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Hello out there, programmers!  Is there any way we might be able to mod FF8 into letting us mash boost faster?  On psx, we can mash considerably faster than in the PC version, which is a fun pasttime I'd like to recreate :)
 
I agree that the PC felt pretty slow, but I figured that was to prevent turbo controllers from going to 250 in two seconds on each summon. Is it really that different on the PSX?
 
I agree that the PC felt pretty slow, but I figured that was to prevent turbo controllers from going to 250 in two seconds on each summon. Is it really that different on the PSX?
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It's at least 30% more responsive on PSX... :(
 
Oh, I thought I'd just been slowed down with age; that's good to know at least :3
 
Might be the same problem as with FF7 battle system where everything is rendered in 15 fps. So assume that this could cause some kind of input lag.
 
Might be the same problem as with FF7 battle system where everything is rendered in 15 fps. So assume that this could cause some kind of input lag.
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Is the PSX version of FF8 in 30fps?
 
Is the PSX version of FF8 in 30fps?
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Both FF7 and FF8 run battles at 15fps on both platforms. The difference is in how menus are handled.

Y'see, the PlayStation versions of these games ran the battle menus at a full 60fps. Thanks to the goofy nature of how the system displays graphics, running a viewport and a 2D menu at totally different framerates was a thing you could do fairly easily. On PC, however, such a thing would be more difficult (just ask DLPB; he fixed the PC version of FF7 to work more like its PS1 counterpart, and it caused him no end of headaches). Squaresoft's solution was to just say "screw it" and run the entire screen at 15fps. This messes up pretty much everything that requires precise speed or timing, such as Tifa's slots limit break.

I assume this is what Kaldarasha is referring to. If FF8's menu logic is what's parsing inputs, and it's running at 1/4 the framerate, it'll screw up anything based on inputs.
 
Yeah, the button presses in ff8 psx would be at a full 60fps.  You are losing 4x the accuracy to press it. As Covarr said, just the same problem as the inaccuracy of the reels in FF7. Related to this is the PAL version of fighting games. In the UK, we had to suffer the fact that, for example, Tekken Tag would run at 50fps. This meant slower characters, but also more inaccurate button presses. At a full 60fps, fast reaction times are significantly more beneficial to winning than at 50. Imagine it this way: If I press a punch at frame 34 and my opponent presses block on frame 35, in the 60fps version, this will be registered as a hit for me.  But in PAL, the loss of 10 frames may mean they are registered on the same frame (since the extra accuracy does not exist). So a block will be registered. Remember, life "runs" at a much higher "frame rate". There has to be a limit to how many snap shots life itself has. How many fps we could theoretically make a game before some sort of limit (like the speed of light is a universal constant to velocity). I haven't looked into this much, but I do recall that one prominent theory is that life is actually like that - snap shots.  So what I am trying to get across is that relative to life, 60fps is 60 snapshots of life. And when you change that to 15, you can see why this is detrimental across the board. Your brain and eyes have a processing limit too, of course, which is why you see 30fps as a smooth motion :P It's all a trick of the brain. Some people have had damage to the specific part of the brain that joins frames into a continuing motion—for these people, a waterfall can appear completely still - then "update" at irregular intervals (the condition is called akinetopsia).

Solution?  Make FF8 battles 60fps :P
 
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Or rewrite the game in Unity. This takes probably the same time.  :-P
 
Thanks, everyone.  It looks like we might have an issue that I'm not sure would be easy to solve.

I know how much work went into FF7's FPS fixes, so I'm not sure we're going to have that fix anytime soon in FF8.

It also makes sense as to why using Squall's Trigger is less sensitive, as well as Irvine's 'shot's being slower and less responsive.  I don't think it's a 1/4 drop, so maybe for the PC version they doubled up the animation frames to 30fps to try to only halve the sensitivity to the menu? 

Also, in FF8, the screen isn't split between the menu and the gameplay window like it was in FF7.  Would this make it function differently?
 
The 3/4 drop is not directly speed. As I said, it's accuracy, which will have an effect on speed. You can't press a button 15 times a second, but that doesn't matter - with an accuracy reduced, it won;t be pressed as many times as with 60fps, because the input update is not being done as frequently. The accuracy is ruined. Sadly, as you've noted, ff8 has many more things that require precise input compared to ff7 (which only had 3 reels). It's far worse when dealing with things that require precise timing to a display on screen (like Squall's trigger) , because that picture will be moving in larger increments at the same time as reduced input accuracy.

Look at this video I made and you'll see the biggest issue:

 
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The 3/4 drop is not directly speed. As I said, it's accuracy, which will have an effect on speed. You can't press a button 15 times a second, but that doesn't matter - with an accuracy reduced, it won;t be pressed as many times as with 60fps, because the input update is not being done as frequently. The accuracy is ruined. Sadly, as you've noted, ff8 has many more things that require precise input compared to ff7 (which only had 3 reels). It's far worse when dealing with things that require precise timing to a display on screen (like Squall's trigger) , because that picture will be moving in larger increments at the same time as reduced input accuracy.

Look at this video I made and you'll see the biggest issue:

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Would this be something we could fix with HextLaunch?  Or would it require an insanely huge amount of work like the FF7 mod?  The only thing I really see that might be an enormous issue are the animations that 'stutter' - like gilgamesh, eden, etc.

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I just played FF8 with Fraps enabled and it shows 60fps on menus, 30fps in open world and 'field' scenes, and 15fps in battles
 
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HextLaunch only does what you tell it... which means editing assembly. The battles need to be changed to 60fps, which would require as much work as we have done with FF7 60fps battles - and probably more.
 
Minor semantic thing: I think the word you're looking for is precision, not accuracy. Inaccurate would imply it's pressing the wrong buttons, as opposed to simply not polling enough.
 
[EDIT]:
I just played FF8 with Fraps enabled and it shows 60fps on menus, 30fps in open world and 'field' scenes, and 15fps in battles
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That's exactly how it is in FF7 PC.  It's normal.  Well, it's not normal.  It's just lazy porting, as Covarr said. The only fix - repeating myself - is to make the battle 60fps with a great deal of effort. Updating the rest to 60 won't give you any bonus or advantage over PSX.
 
That's exactly how it is in FF7 PC.  It's normal.  Well, it's not normal.  It's just lazy porting, as Covarr said. The only fix - repeating myself - is to make the battle 60fps with a great deal of effort. Updating the rest to 60 won't give you any bonus or advantage over PSX.
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Crap.  :(

Do you think it's possible to change those functions in DirectX, or would it all have to be assembly changes?
 
It has to be assembly changes.  There is nothing you can do whatsoever to fix this outside of making the battles 60fps.
 
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