Is anyone encountering stuttering when it loads a new area or a large area or something? Like in the tutorial when I'm going up some ladders or that main strip of wood with all the sconces the game will get caught up for a little less than a second. It's minor, but it almost made me fall once. I was also curious if anyone finds the disc grinding a lot in their PS3? Every time an NPC has a new line of dialogue I hear it grind a little bit and I'm worried my PS3 is going to go out on me or something. I have a 250 gig slim, only about a year and change old.

If it's making a grinding sound, there's probably something wrong with your system. I reckon it's probably the sound of the disc being read though (or the harddrive? Im not sure). I've noticed that games with huge installs on ps3 are prone to causing my ps3 to make weird reading noises as well (GTA5 is a notable offender). Not sure about the weird loading issues.

The digital foundry analysis says the PS3 version suffers from framerate drops compared to 360, but it has no tearing whereas the 360 version does. That's all I know.

I remember people saying TLOU had a really long load time on the disc version, whereas I had the digital version and it was always super fast. Maybe a disc loading issue.

I remember hearing that as well. Last of Us was super quick for me on psn. Guess I'm getting the psn version of DS2 (having a 7200rpm HDD probably helps)

@cale: @narujoe93: I really hope it's just some kind of disc reading issue, cause if my PS3 breaks down during Dark Souls 2 I will be...quite unhappy...ugh. And I have TLOU on disc and that takes it's sweet time loading so maybe that's it. No stuttering on that game though *shrug*. And GTA5, I think I might remember that one being loud too...

Only jarring stutter I noticed was when the character creator first loaded up and I tried to spin my character. It jerked around for about 5 seconds and then was fine. Other than that it's running fine (digital copy).

I have the digital version and haven't had that issue. But I have had the grinding sound you speak of. It was my HDD. I replaced it and all was fine after that.

There are some hiccups. I've noticed texture flickering and popping. Also had an enemy fall through the world. So you know, normal dark souls issues. ;-)

No no problems here. I think the frame rate is a little suspect on the PS3 but not actual hitching.

It's mostly all negligible. I have too much love for this series to get mad at it for stuttering. As long as my PS3 holds up through at least this, Ground Zeroes, and whatever I have left of Assassin's Creed IV I'll be a happy camper.

Although seeing these responses has made me think digital is the way to go in the future.

The framerate is pretty bad...like across the board. Dark Souls was only bad really in Blight Town. No idea why the performance has taken such a hit.

I noticed this too, it never hits the lows of Dark Souls, but it seems to be constantly struggling in a way Dark Souls never did. That said, I went to Redbox and picked up the 360 version and woah! I'd swear the framerate is almost double what it is on the PS3 at all times. It sucks because I think the souls series works so much better on a Dualshock controller.

@kishinfoulux:

I have to agree. The frame rate is really bothering me right now, so many incredible environments sullied by a low framerate. I didn't have my hand on the controller when the game started, and I was just looking at the starting area when your character is standing in the pillars. "Woah, they've done some work with this new engine!" then I picked up the controller and moved the camera and was pretty surprised at how low the frames were. It may have also been worsened by the fact that I'd been playing Titanfall on my PC for a few hours with a silky smooth frame rate right before loading up DS2.

Too bad they had to push the PC version back, I just couldn't wait though. :(
(Playing on PS3 as well btw)

Hmm...I played the PS3 version for a couple hours and didn't see anything super noticeable in that department (I did see a little pop-in in that first grassy area, that's about it). Maybe I would notice the framerate if I was directly comparing to the 360/PC version though. I'd much prefer a lower framerate to screen tearing (which is probably the single technical issue that ever really bothers me), so I'm glad I got this over the 360 version.

I'm probably the worst person to ask about this, I seem to have a high tolerance for technical hiccups in comparison to others, and am really more concerned with art direction than the technical side of things, at least on the visual side. I come to games for mechanics, gameplay systems, all that good stuff.

This is what is bumming me out. I looked at several reviews and IGN said the framerate is a consistent 30. I call bullshit. The framerate is consistently bad. Like right from the get go.

I guess now that next gen is here and I've been playing a lot on PC that going back to games with framerate issues isn't as tolerable for me. Last of Us (my fav game last year) had a pretty crappy framerate as well.

I love Dark Souls too much to not play it because of that though and the game does look nice. However, playing on PC with high/smooth framerate would be quite appealing.

I'm not having any frame rate issues on ps3.

Can someone help me out I am having a Server issue, I have not been able to log into the Online portion of Dark Souls 2 for PS3. It tries to connect but fails,PSN and other internet runs fine and I pluged and unplugged the internet and still get the error any help is appreciated.

@artraider: Server is down for maintenance.

@artraider: There is a server status page on the Dark Souls 2 site, PSN is having issues.

http://farfire.darksoulsii.com/pc/

does the server side count for match making, I thought that was if people show up to your world or not. With me it had not straight up connected online all day.Thank you guys for a response, I tried to ask on gamefaqs but never a response.

@sterling: How? Maybe you're just not noticing it. I'm on the PS3 and the whole game runs at no more than 20 fps, dipping down and hitching up, with the exception of areas without much geometry. Looking at the Quick Look is really bothering me; it's buttery smooth in comparison. I don't have a 360, but now I'm thinking of hitting up eBay for a cheap one.

I'd take screen tearing over rancid framerates anyday.

Just pointing out how it is. Besides that I'm loving the game like crazy. But yeah, I wish they allowed you to turn off V-sync; shit's fucked.

Yeah it never gets truly awful like Blight Town did, but it happens way more often. The hub area is a good example of this. Maybe all the lighting and the water and stuff. I'm also on the PS3 and have heard that's the version with the frame problems, whereas 360 has worse tearing or something.

I can deal with it, but it also hurts my eyes for some reason.

@development: Mine looks just as good as the quick look. I can't tell you what the number is, but its been very solid. I have not had any slow down due to bad FR. But I am not as picky as everyone else seems to be about frame rate.

I can also confirm some stuttering a la Blight Town. It's only noticeable when I'm transitioning areas.

Oh, also once last night I was being summoned and it must have failed, because I never saw a loading screen to indicate I was about to appear in another player's world and then I could no longer drop a soapstone until I exited the game and logged back in.

How much is installed? Does it read from the BR while playing, loading?

GTA5 was a great demonstration in how different amounts of HD wear and tear (and luck of quality) affects gameplay, it was 100% not getting in the way of my enjoyment even online, until the last time I played it mid November when it got chugging and not loading parts of the map in time online, often locking on rendering frames.

I refurbished my old fatty PS3 and the bluray drive ain't workin these days, so it's fully installed from the digital download. I suppose it's possible the fat PS3s have crummier CPU/GPUs, but I never bothered to research it.

Its more or less not possible, actually. For games to work on consoles at all the hardware must be identical or damn near close (The newer 360s use a SoC with all the parts on the same die). You can make the items smaller or move them around, but you can't change what they are or risk low level programming failing to work entirely. That's why in order for old PS3s to run PS2 games they basically put a PS2 inside the case. At some point things can be emulated, but the process is very inefficient.

There are workarounds if you use the same architecture (PowerPC to PowerPC) you could use one core and change the clock speed to match the old system. Stuff like that can work with mixed results like the Xbox 360 running Original Xbox games.

Last gen and before (PS360) will run at full speed even when they get turbo hot while the new consoles can modulate speeds to keep cool if necessary like a modern PC so as the PS4 (less so on the Xbox One since that thing has cooling out the wazoo) gets older and runs hotter (thermal paste drying up and dust build up) it may chug up on a hot day, but that's a safety feature of these latest consoles, one I'm sure Microsoft wishes they put into the poor old original 360 model.

For some reason From Software decided to incorporate Vsync in the ps3 version, while they didnt in the 360 version. I think the hit on the framerate is way worse than screen tearing. They should give you the option to turn it off (bioshock infinite did). Turning vsync off would 100% guaranteed improve the framerate considerably. Maybe if people complain enough, they'll add an option in an update!

Jeez....if that's true (and it makes sense) that's....really odd? And yeah I'd definitely take some tearing over the constant frame drops. On the other hand, I'm really psyched to play this game on my PC. I really like the look of a lot of stuff w/ the engine changes they've made.

Oh please God let there be a patch to help with this framerate... like everyone else has mentioned, it's running at like a constant 20fps and it's just awful. It hurts my eyes for one thing and I'm finding it hard to concentrate on the actual game this shitty framerate is that distracting... Was so excited waking up today to find Dark Souls II, only to be greeted with this. Fuckin' depressing, especially at how comparatively smooth the 360 version is.

If it is down to the V-sync, I sincerely hope they'll at least give you the option to turn it off because it's pretty close to being unplayable for me. This is like Far Cry 3 all over again. If this doesn't improve then this'll practically be a complete waste of money.

I have a slim and also have stuttering in certain areas, sometimes even when just walking down a corridor with nothing happening.

Frame rate's kinda lame, but not unplayable or anything. For whatever reason, though, the character creation screen was horrible for me. Like, it took up to 10 seconds for changes to go through, and everything was running at what seemed like 1 frame per second at times. Really weird.

FROM really needs to patch the game on the PS3 if this happens to be true, I've just watched this video comparison between PS3 and X360, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdrAr2Q2dYQ, and the difference is quite noticeable, the 360 runs majula at what seems to be above 25fps, PS3 noticeably slower, also the guy mentions warping between bonfires to take almost 2min of the PS3 and 45sec on the 360? I hate loading times THAT long more than a few framerate issues.