NFS Shift 2 Unleashed - wth

[mishra]

Well I was in the mood to completely change my playing habits and decided will give some driving game a chance.

Was thinking quite a bit and decided I want something more simulator'ish rather than arcade, so correctly or not I bought nfs shift 2 through Steam (since it was discounted).

Now started playing put all settings on max (I have gtx560Ti) and well 40fps ish, thought oke doke it's still a 2011 game so will drop the settings. As soon as I got more less stable, 50fps (while lowering details) decided OK lets give it a go.

Few issues thought:
- game looks terribly ugly (sometimes... it's hard to describe, but it's like something is not right, mostly it looks OK but on odd occasions seems like graphics is changed or what?
- most maps are giving me 45fps, but there are few where I get under 20fps !!!!
- Game crashes randomly, can play for hours and nothing, sometimes on loading first map it crashes ?!

I've lost my enthusiasm, I knew I shouldn't buy any racing game on a PC ... but decided to give it a go... and now I feel I wasted money.

Anyone else having similar issues?
Have to say it was an impulse buy without much thinking, thought racing game from NFS series and from 2011 will offer... well at least stability, what's going on... especially with some maps where I drop FPS to like 10-20, come on... I know its only gtx560ti ... but, that's with almost everything switched off - I can't imagine its my gfx being a problem.

 

[NilSatis]

Where did you buy the game/is it a legit copy? Is it patched fully? Are your gpu drivers up to date? Does this happen on any other games?

If it was a Steam buy then it should be patched.....I have this game, and it runs great (on most tracks with a couple of exceptions) on max settings on my 6950 2gb so the 560ti should be able to do the same. I bought mine retail (if i remember) but im not sure if it is patched up to the latest version; it certainly didnt perform as well as some games before a patch or two, but i believe this is the case with most people on this title. It always ran well enough for me not to notice any dips in fps; but im sure i remember it was bad on some tracks for some people when it wasnt patched.

Do you have any graphics settings enabled outside the game? I would advise against doing this and simply set them all in game if you havent done that. The game is also less than useful if you dont use the active helmet cam type view. This gives you the best experience and when the cars are viewed externally; quite frankly the physics seem a bit off. If the graphics look ugly then i would say that either the install is corrupt or you have driver issues. The latest Nvidia drivers seem to have caused a lot of problems for some people on certain games; may be worth rolling back if you have updated, and of course if they are not up to date try the latest ones. My version never crashes...it did pre patch; but before loading a track (or in the middle of loading; and it was rare). You should, if you havent done so, also be able to download the free legends dlc from EA Origin. There may also be the latest patch on there if it is a retail copy or the latest patch may be incorporated into that. Good luck. Let us know how ya get on.

 

[mishra]

Hey it's a Steam legit copy. I believe it is patched fully to version 1.0.2.0. My GPU drivers are from nvidia.com and of release 280.26 so I think that's up-to-date. And, no, it doesn't happen in any other games
I'm sure I have no other setting set outside of the game, I didn't messed with any of the setting except OC my card. Tried lowering the OC setting's but not much difference

With regards to "games look ugly" I was saying it does look ugly when all settings lowered/switched off. As a test I did set everything on Medium and most of the maps are fine, however on few tracks (ie, Miami) my fps drops to a very, very low levels. Sometimes also it happens on other tracks too. It's a very strange issue I'm having. I think something is not right with the game, due to fact it just crashes way too often... and it 99% times happens when it loads a new map.

I'll try different nvidia drivers and will try to repair steam library or whatever you call it.
Reason I'm bit surprised with game video settings and performance it's cause I've seen Drift 3 on mate's PC and well.. that seemed like completely different game on the same gpu so mhmhmhm ... I'll keep trying.

 

[NilSatis]

All the things you suggest to do are a good start; aside from a reinstall, or verifying the games cache via steam, the only thing i can think of doing is trawling the steam forums or trying to post your problem on there (better to search for someone with the same card having problems) and see if there are any common fixes. The GPU you have is an excellent card, and is more than good enough to run this game, it is a terrible engine on this game; compared to something like dirt 3 (I guess this is what you meant!) for sheer graphic performance; and if you want a driving game that will look/feel perfect and run really well; you cant go far wrong with Dirt 3 (hindsight eh?!)! Although it will run well, it will never run at the same fps at similar detail levels as Dirt2/3.

If the game crashes that much then a reinstall may be your best bet. It is worth a try if you dont mind waiting for the download. Good luck!

You also have the latest drivers so it may be worth a roll back to the previous set as you mention to see if this helps before reinstalling.