Within the studio’s in-house testing, recreation load time, startup time, world and map technology, and common tick-per-second efficiency all noticed important efficiency enhancements. A stress check with a “late recreation colony” noticed a efficiency enchancment of two.2×, though the studio did not precisely share check parameters past that. Load occasions of a mod pack with 1,500 mods additionally improved from 14 minutes to six minutes. The studio notes that particular person efficiency enhancements on the brand new engine will rely on PC specs, however these are promising enhancements if scaling holds up.
The Waylith Engine is at present accessible for testing within the RimWorld 1.7 beta department, and Ludeon provides that the brand new recreation engine not solely performs the identical, however it also needs to require minimal intervention from modders and gamers. Save video games from 1.6 ought to load with out issues, and “the overwhelming majority of mods” will work with out adjustments. The brand new engine additionally guarantees further C# language options for mod builders and will make it simpler to write down complicated mods with out affecting recreation efficiency.
The one catch that Ludeon factors out is that older PCs could not assist the brand new recreation engine, however it encourages gamers to succeed in out through Discord for help, as “we could possibly make some adjustments to assist.”
That is solely the newest occasion that highlights the significance of customized recreation engines in an trade wherein we’re seeing increasingly more recreation studios move away from custom engine development in favor of the likes of Unity and Unreal Engine.