To say that the rollout of Red Dead Redemption 2 on PC was tumultuous would be an understatement. The game, which received rave reviews on both PlayStation 4 and Xbox One has earned the ire of PC gamers with a buggy launch that left the game borderline unplayable.
Since then, game developer Rockstar has been working around the clock to improve the game’s overall stability and performance. Chief among gamer complaints has been a stuttering issue that impacts Nvida GPUs and both Four-Core and Six-Core CPUs. However, another issue seems to have arisen for players who have managed to get the game running, and it is tied up in the framerate.
People have started to notice that issues with the passage of time are directly connected to framerate. It’s much like a bug that plagued Dark Souls 2’s PC release. PC ports were running at 60 fps, while gaming consoles were using 30 fps. This caused weapon durability to degrade twice as fast for players of Dark Souls 2.
This same issue seems to be impacting Red Dead Redemption 2, but it mostly has to do with how time progresses.
A Reddit user going by Jimmyoneshot first noticed this, and his complaint has been echoed by scores of other PC players. The cycle of day to night seems to run much faster when played on a PC as opposed to a console. Long journeys through the game’s huge open world could span several in-game days on a PC, whereas on a console it might have only taken up one.
Weather also seems to be impacted by this issue, with rain and lightning coming and going very quickly.
While this could easily be seen as a non-issue or something that is purely cosmetic, the game’s core system, which keeps track of Arthur Morgan’s health, stamina, and Dead Eye meter is tied up in the passage of time.
If a player has Arthur pig out on food without engaging in exercise, their stamina will take a major hit. Alternatively, if the player exercises too much without eating, Arthur will thin out and have a hard time recovering health.
These core systems are draining much faster on PC, and Jimmyoneshot conducted a test to directly tie this problem to the system’s framerate.
He found that Arthur was losing weight four times faster when the game was played at the usual 100-130 fps settings. Rockstar has yet to comment on this discovery, but hopefully, they will release another update that corrects the issue soon.
Red Dead Redemption 2 is currently available on the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC.
