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Okay, so I realize that this might seem like a comparatively unimportant issue to address, especially on a subreddit where you can't go two threads without seeing another suggestion for an invaluable update that needs to be worked on ASAP - but Jesus Christ, something needs to be done here, because I've been trying to grind out some Proteans for about two hours now and I'm approaching the end of my rope.
To bring everyone up to speed: When pulse and cinder cores explode, they cause a large number of particles to start spiraling around every player in the vicinity. This sudden spike in resources totally annihilates lower-end GPUs and freezes the game client. This freeze is permanent, and the only way to keep playing is to reload the client.
Normally, Runescape's thin population means that this doesn't pose any problems. The particles will spawn around one or two players and you can go on with your 'scaping. But in highly-populated skilling areas, such as Prif or Artisan's Workshop or W84 Lumbridge Market, the issue occurs frequently. During DXP weekends, when most players are stocked up on pulse and cinder cores... it's inescapable.
If this is the first time you've heard of this issue, you might be tempted to respond with something along the lines of "So what? Move to an empty world!" The issues with this response are threefold: Firstly, core explosions give a combined 10% extra XP gain rate and 10% bonus XP consumption rate, which is a pretty substantial bonus to miss out on; secondly, you sometimes specifically WANT a pulse core skill boost (such as a Woodcutting boost before a Bloodtree run), and therefore need to be present for up to five or ten explosions; and thirdly, maybe I'm just weird, but I legitimately enjoy the social aspect of Runescape and I'd much rather be chatting to other players around a portable instead of skilling by myself at a dead bank.
This issue has been present for years. Just searching "Reddit pulse core crash" on Google will turn up dozens of historic threads where people raise this issue. I have tried every fix commonly suggested: lowering all my graphics options to minimum, lowering the foreground framerate to 5 FPS, visiting an underpopulated world so less particles spawn, visiting an overpopulated world so most of the players aren't rendered due to overcrowding and less particles spawn... Nothing works. Hell, at the start of DXP when pulse cores are going off five times a minute, I'm lucky if I can stay logged in for longer than a few seconds.
I think it's important to stress how this isn't a "standard" game performance complaint. If I were having trouble getting good performance in a brand new boss fight, I would still be annoyed, but at the very least Jagex could use the argument that modern PvM encounters require a baseline level of visual complexity, and a rework would demand substantial dev time. But that's just the thing - I'm not having trouble in those situations. My sh*tty integrated graphics card is sufficient for me to reliably grind GWD3 bosses with minimal issues. This isn't me whinging about being unable to engage in visually complex, graphically demanding gameplay - this me being fundamentally unable to engage in some of the least graphically demanding gameplay in Runescape due to it being interspersed with unreasonable and unnecessary spikes in GPU usage brought on by a SINGLE visual effect which, by the way, is ENTIRELY EFFING POINTLESS.
It's just bad game design. Imagine if you were able to play Minecraft with flawless 60 FPS performance, but then your game had a 50% chance of crashing every time an Enderman teleported or some sh*t. The solution is not to buy a new graphics card - the solution is for Mojang to stop spiking resource consumption by 1000% for an event that does not require it.
I do not think this is an unreasonable request. There are a million ways that Jagex could fix this problem with very little dev time, which I know is valuable. They could add a graphics option to turn off the animation. They could lower the number of particles spawned by the explosion. THEY COULD REMOVE THE ANIMATION. Give this task to an intern, or something!
Bottom line: while this issue might only affect a small number of players, it will also only require a tiny amount of effort to resolve. So please, Jagex. I want to play your game. f*cking let me.
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