I’m aware that compression rates are a trade-off between space and processing time, and that there’s some balance to be had. However, I don’t see this balance from plenty commercial games; what I see instead is disregard.
Here’s a made up example. Suppose you have a choice between compressing a game:
to 10 GiB, and it takes 2min to unpack it in a certain machine
to 3 GiB, and it takes 8min to unpack it in a certain machine
FitGirl will consistently pick the later option. And it would be fine if devs picked the former, or a middle ground… but they don’t. Instead, often you get a 10 GiB file that takes 10 min to unpack, the worst of both worlds.
And it isn’t just a matter of the compression algorithm. The developers also have the freedom to choose how they split files; but they often create 9001 files the size of an ant, that is going to hurt decompression times. (Paradox Interactive, I’m looking at you.)
I don’t know any that take a long time to unpack from developers. They do have to pre-compile shaders, but that’s different. Maybe I just don’t pay enough attention, or maybe it’s just because I don’t play many big budget games.
From the top of my mind, Europa Universalis 4. Even the base game takes ages to install, and I don’t think it’s just the Linux version.
Incidentally, I checked it in FitGirl’s site, found EU5 instead, and she’s complaining about the exact same thing:
Installation takes 5-12 minutes (depending on your system, mostly on your drive speed – the game has more than 49000 small files, Paradox never learn from their mistakes)
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I’m aware that compression rates are a trade-off between space and processing time, and that there’s some balance to be had. However, I don’t see this balance from plenty commercial games; what I see instead is disregard.
Here’s a made up example. Suppose you have a choice between compressing a game:
FitGirl will consistently pick the later option. And it would be fine if devs picked the former, or a middle ground… but they don’t. Instead, often you get a 10 GiB file that takes 10 min to unpack, the worst of both worlds.
And it isn’t just a matter of the compression algorithm. The developers also have the freedom to choose how they split files; but they often create 9001 files the size of an ant, that is going to hurt decompression times. (Paradox Interactive, I’m looking at you.)
Tagging @[email protected], as it addresses what they said too.
I don’t know any that take a long time to unpack from developers. They do have to pre-compile shaders, but that’s different. Maybe I just don’t pay enough attention, or maybe it’s just because I don’t play many big budget games.
From the top of my mind, Europa Universalis 4. Even the base game takes ages to install, and I don’t think it’s just the Linux version.
Incidentally, I checked it in FitGirl’s site, found EU5 instead, and she’s complaining about the exact same thing:
I did play EU5 (and 4 ages ago) and didn’t notice the issue. I guess I just don’t pay attention to it.