CXL Memory Leak

[tjh876 31]

If you haven't noticed it, well then lucky you. Memory leak is an issue that makes CXL a game that might not be worth starting again, after having to close due to this issue. This issue seemed to never get a fix that I am aware of, nor does there seem to be a post in this proper place regarding it. This issue has been around ever since the beta last year, and I find it somewhat of an annoyance, after you can't move around your city easily because you get poor frames. Not only this but it also seems like you can have plenty of ram, and still not have it make dent in it. So, if you have any ideas on trying to get around this, please post something here, so that anyone who knows and has dealt with the issue can have some reference. Thanks.

[kingBosko15 1]

i have already noticed that. many months ago. and they didnt fix it. when my city is big the game just lagg so hard only 5 fps.(my computer is enought strong i know that.)

[tjh876 31]

Yeah, it is an issue that I hope is resolved in the '11 version. The problem also is that Cities XL can not utilize all system resources that are available (doesn't seem to use a lot of RAM, as well as cores) some of this mentioned in my other thread about multicore support. What seems to be this issue is all back to the way the game was written, but that is still questionable as well. This issue becomes very annoying if you try to play the game, and have a decent system (I myself have an i5-520m, 4gb of RAM, dedicated ATi graphics...) and the game struggles after awhile, even on low. If you have any recommendations, they are greatly appreciated here. Thanks.

[alaeldinbm 0]

yes when city reach over 5 mill pop then the game completely hang. on other hand the traffic might take longer time to appear. my computer is really strong: core2duo 2.2Ghz, 4GbRam, 512mb dedicated graphic card.

[Winter Dragon 0]

5 million? It slows down for me with just 50,000 people after ~20-30 minutes.

AMD 6000+ Dual Core (~3.0GHz)

3GB DDR2-800 RAM

9500GT (512MB) PCI-E

Windows XP 32 bit + sp3

Page file size: 6GB

I run the game on medium detail, but it makes no difference on low or very low detail. The game becomes unplayable for me after ~20-30 minutes whether I have 50,000 people or almost 500,000. I know my system is a bit old now but the game starts smooth when loading a city and gradually gets slower and slower. Main thing I notice is the UI menus. They take longer and longer to open, and I hear several clicks and swishes instead of just one of each.

[soltangris 42]

The memory leak is a well-known issue with the game, and MC were aware of it for a long time. I guess they just couldn't fix it on time. Focus home claims now to have fixed it, though, so..... keep your hopes up guys!

[Winter Dragon 0]

Where does it say they fixed it? Yes, my hopes are high with 2011 on a number of things.

[Tobbsman 0]

I'm sorry to say this but 2011 feels no different to 2009, the memory leak is still there and no optimization as they claim. The menus are still bugged and broken. You might as well just play 2009 with all the mods, i do hope for continued support from Focus though.

//Tobbsman

[kingBosko15 1]

allways when i'm try to build an long road. the longer the road the more it lags. (before placing it ********). for me it start to lag at arround 50k peoples. And getting worser when my city grows.

[Overkast 2]

Yep, there's definitely a memory leak in this game. I only have 10,000 population in my cities but it makes no difference... seems like the longer you keep the game running the worse it gets. Plus couple this memory leak issue with the fantastic "Token Export to other city..." pop-up window glitch and it makes the matter even worse.

[bluespottedhorse 49]

Focus may have cleaned up the code but given the amount of code they would of had to go through may not have gotten it all. Thus, there would still be a memory leak but just not as bad as 2009. I would think that they will continue to clean it up as time goes by.

[Incognious 0]

Originally posted by: alaeldinbm

yes when city reach over 5 mill pop then the game completely hang. on other hand the traffic might take longer time to appear. my computer is really strong: core2duo 2.2Ghz, 4GbRam, 512mb dedicated graphic card.quote>

I must say that that is not that strong, but i know what you mean... i have i7 920, 6gb 1800 Mhz RAM, and a GTX470 (1280MB) and even then it sometimes just slows down to a ***** slow speed... i can play crisis at maximum settings, which concludes that this game engine is very poorly programmed and the memory leak most probably hasnt been solved... -.-

[City Planner 121]

I can not say definitively that the game has or has not a memory leak. As I understand memory leaks, a program will use memory and not return it to the memory pool, thus continually using memory until the user runs out of memory or the memory use is so high that the software can barely run.

Well, after 7 hours of playing, the game still does not exceed 1.4GB of RAM on my computer, this to me would normally tell me that the software does not have a memory leak since it's not exceeding a certain amount. Does the game slow down when people have 1,000,000 or 5,000,000 inhabitants? It should, that's a lot of processing that the game needs to do, if it didn't slow down then I would assume that there is something fudged in the record keeping of the game.

For some reason there are some people that think that if their computers can run the latest and greatest games that CXL should perform the same. There not the same game, and it may have nothing to do with optimizing code, it may simply be that the game is at it's limit for todays hardware. It does not surprise me at all that the game will slow down with 1 million residents or 5 million residents, that's a lot of stuff on the screen and it should slow down. One can not expect to get the same performance when you have no residents as when you have millions of them.

So, why does the game slow down for some people that only have 10,000 residents in their city, but they play the latest and greatest games on all high settings at 3580x2450 resolution? That's the million dollar question isn't it? The strange bit about it, is that I don't have the latest and greatest computer and yet the game plays at an acceptable frame rate and does not exceed 1.4GB of RAM regardless if I have only 10k residents or if I have 250k residents, sure it gets a tiny bit slower when my screen is full of buildings, but not to the point where I'd have to say something is wrong.

Could the game use optimizing? Sure, what game couldn't.

The bottom line is that I don't know if FHI fixed the reported memory leak or not, but the game is not showing signs of a traditional memory leak when I play it for hour after hour after hour.

[Ocram's Razr 963]

I upgraded my RAM for the original Cities XL 2009 and after a couple of hours, it would hog up almost 4 GB RAM (the most a 32 bit program can) but it did not bother me too much because I have 8GB RAM. Now, my computer uses less than 2GB RAM with Cities XL 2011, Task Manager, and iTunes up. There is a new problem, though: performance goes down worse (than in the original) in bigger cities. I will install the multi-core mod and see if performance goes up.

EDIT: EVERYONE THAT CLAIMS TO HAVE A SO-CALLED "MEMORY LEAK," PLEASE USE TASK MANAGER TO SEE HOW MUCH RAM IS BEING CONSUMED. If RAM is low but a single core is maxed out, it is not a Memory Leak.

[maimake 0]

The problem is not memory leak but the game itself consume only 1 cpu (100% used) even though you have more than 1 cpu (dual core ,quad core etc.) this will result in EXTREAMELY LOW FRAMRATES

[maimake 0]

The problem is not memory leak but the game itself consume only 1 cpu (100% used) even though you have more than 1 cpu (dual core ,quad core etc.) this will result in EXTREAMELY LOW FRAMRATES

[Ocram's Razr 963]

Thank you that is very helpful.

[Ocram's Razr 963]

Thank you that is very helpful.

[Ocram's Razr 963]

Thank you that is very helpful.

[Jesse Swiss 6]

is this only for windows 7 and vista because i cant set it to affinity on mind

[Jesse Swiss 6]

is this only for windows 7 and vista because i cant set it to affinity on mind

[Jesse Swiss 6]

is this only for windows 7 and vista because i cant set it to affinity on mind

[Screwballl 196]

Originally posted by: Overkast

Yep, there's definitely a memory leak in this game. I only have 10,000 population in my cities but it makes no difference... seems like the longer you keep the game running the worse it gets. Plus couple this memory leak issue with the fantastic "Token Export to other city..." pop-up window glitch and it makes the matter even worse.quote>

These are the only 2 hiccups I see with an otherwise great game.

For me, the game is playable for around 2-3 hours, then I manually save, go back to planet, and then load the city again and good as new for another 2-3 hours.

[princeblowfly 0]

Hi there,

I had no problems with 2009, the game was fast to me no matter how many citizens were living in my city. Smooth gameplay always. Now with 2011 it gets slowly after an hour, no matter how many citizens live in my cities. What I founf now is that, in some levels of zoom ( the ones that are farther away) gets full of poligons everywhere, as I can not see my city. I have to zoom in in order to see my city again, and if I zoom out same problem appears again. im am playing in a I7 930, 8GB MUSHKIN RAM, ATI 5870 1GB card, so I should have no problems with graffics, whether the game goes fast or slow. ANyone know about this problem???

Thanxxx

[YannickSHE 0]

Originally posted by: princeblowfly

Hi there,

I had no problems with 2009, the game was fast to me no matter how many citizens were living in my city. Smooth gameplay always. Now with 2011 it gets slowly after an hour, no matter how many citizens live in my cities. What I founf now is that, in some levels of zoom ( the ones that are farther away) gets full of poligons everywhere, as I can not see my city. I have to zoom in in order to see my city again, and if I zoom out same problem appears again. im am playing in a I7 930, 8GB MUSHKIN RAM, ATI 5870 1GB card, so I should have no problems with graffics, whether the game goes fast or slow. ANyone know about this problem???

Thanxxx

quote>

I have the same exact problem. All graphics are fine, everything go smooth for a while. Once I get to city population at around 1M-1.5M, when I zoom out, I have all those bleeps in the screen and the game is actually not moving. When I zoom in again, it runs, then zoom out, it bugs. Same with the postcard view, it is actually worse with the postcard view. I thought it was my computer, the graphics or any other thing, but now I think it's the game itself.

It got even worse in the last few days, no matter which zoom or whatver I do, everytime I load a big city, those bleeps and flashes arrive right away. I'm just clueless at what to do next.

[Ocram's Razr 963]

That is odd, I never experienced that problem with Cities XL but I have with other games. It [the random polygons] usually means that the graphics card is overheating.

[JohnTheMutt 3]

Originally posted by: Screwballl

For me, the game is playable for around 2-3 hours, then I manually save, go back to planet, and then load the city again and good as new for another 2-3 hours.

quote>

Yes. Thanks Screwballl.

From a similar post you made about this tip elsewhere...I can now at least play the game somewhat. Still slow but bearable. Also, I am only good for about an hour max before it becomes too slow and hangs constantly.

[eduardo1029 0]

same thing happenig to me (the BIG slowdown after a couple hours of playing)

i have a Pentium DualCore E5300 @ 2.60 4gb RAM, Windows 7 Professional  x64  and a Geforce 9600GT 512 256bit

when the game stars i can play it on maximum settings and 16xQSAA anti-Aliasing and it runs fine. after 1-2 hours the framerate drops dramatically and during all the time the game was running windows says that processor load was 100% ay  core 1 but the other one was idle most of the time the game was running...

[mk1974 0]

I'm new to Cities XL - just got 2011. For the most part I love it, but this issue - whether it's a memory leak or a core problem or whatever - makes the game descend into unplayability for me after a while. My computer should be able to handle the game fine, but when I start getting 5-10 second lags on anything I do and it hiccups a lot, I find it too frustrating to play. I can restart the game and have it work fine for a while before the issue crops up again.

[aranyimre 0]

First of all, Cities XL 2011 captived me! It's a great game. I have the same lage problem. I have a high-end configuration with core i7 980X CPU with 12 threads, 12 GB RAMS, and GTX 480 videocard.

I have 500.000 citizens, and the the frame rate drops dramatically, and it make the game unenjoyable.

I just share it for Focus Interactive guys, to make a patch, with that the game can use all the hardware resources.