Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
Chapter
12
Optimizing Your Game
Optimization is a broad subcategory of game development that can be its own career field, much
like animation. In simple terms it is the process of improving the efficiency of game performance.
It sounds simple, anyway.
Each target platform has limitations in terms of the processing power of its CPU (central processing
unit) and GPU (graphics processing unit). The more detailed a scene, whether with a few highly
detailed models or a great many less detailed moving parts, the higher the demand on the
processors.
When the demand gets to be too much, game performance suffers: the player experiences long load
times, lags and other glitchy gameplay, or worst of all, the game crashes. The
optimization
process
is the series of decisions or tradeoffs made between maintaining game performance and the quality
of the graphics.
Target Performance
Target performance is typically stated in terms of a desired frame rate or frames per second (fps).
As discussed in Chapter 4, too low a frame rate and you lose the illusion of animated movement.
While in general higher frame rates should result in a better-quality visual experience, more complex
games requiring more processing per frame might run more smoothly at the lower end of the
acceptable fps target range.
Consoles and PCs have much more powerful processors than mobile platforms, so let's examine
games for mobile devices since they have the most limitations. Different mobile platforms have
distinct capabilities, and different versions of mobile devices will vary as well, with older units
generally having less memory and slower processors. You must decide early in the design phase
what your target market within the platform will be, which will in turn guide the target frame rate
you select.
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