I work as a programmer writing APIs and firmware for embedded environments (right now I am working on chips that go into cell phones) and performance is one of the things we spend months of time getting right. Of course in my case the hardware, and to some extent the environment it is used in, is static. So designing worst case tests and tracking down performance glitches is significantly easier. We also do not get bug reports in the form of random internet fans/potential customers.

Then again at the end of the day you can point to a cool screen shot of a beach or a massive ship of the line and say “I helped create that”. It is a bit less impressive to explain to people that their Blackberry can save pictures faster because of some code I wrote that they will never see.

I have been running in the open beta with an old pc at home (1.6 ghz sempteron, 1 gig of ram, crappy 256 agp video card, 5400 highly fragmented hard drive) and I have to say I have been very impressed with the overall performance of PotBS. I do experience a slight loading lag when I zone, but once that has passed the framerate is nice and steady. The only time I experience any kind of slow down is in the open sea when there are dozens of ships sailing around but with my setup I expect such things.

I also have never had the game crash on me even once. I keep forgetting I am actually playing in a Beta.

Keep up the great work, both on the job side and on the blog side. The open communication is a breath of fresh air in this market.

Claaaaaag! I like it.

The thing is, “Hiiiiiiiitching!!” and “Pooooor Fraaaame Raaaaaaate!!” just don’t cut it when you’re whining quite like “Laaaaaaag!!” does :^) Your mission Joe, is to come up with some new words!