Bioshock Stuttering problems

s8n

Hi Folks,

Just wondering if anyone else here has experienced issues with stuttering graphics and freezing when playing Bioshock on the 360.
It's been fine up to level 11, when all of a sudden it keeps stuttering (graphics freeze for 5 - 10 secs, and the sound continues) and sometimes freezes. It has rendered the game virtually unplayable.
I have looked at the online forums and there are some other cases of this happening, but all 2K support have said is to clear the game cache and it should resolve the issue. Surprisingly, I did this but to no avail, anyone else got any suggestions, I also only have one saved game file, so it's not a problem there....

Riesen_Meal

Google is your friend :

Dunno if its much use without a mem card

Bioshock Stuttering Fix.
Friday August 31st 2007, 9:27 am
Filed under: Before & After, Games

Noticed on the blog stats that two people visited my page after searching for the Bioshock fix. I’m sure they found it after realizing all I did was rub my success in their faces (insane plot twist by the time you confront Andrew Ryan, by the way–compare to realizing Bruce Willis is actually dead in the Sixth Sense!). But for future reference–and because I like to ramp up my blog stats–I’ll include the fix here.

Even though the fix works, there’s a catch. You’ll need one of those portable Xbox memory cards. And at $30 a pop, you’re effectively paying over $90 to play Bioshock. Hopefully, you can put that memory card to good use in the future as a diagnostic tool.

Plug in the memory card, boot up the Xbox and transfer your Bioshock saved games and player profile onto the card. Turn off the box, remove the hard disk drive, and power the unit back on. Run the game, et viola. Bioshock runs smoothly, with no pauses or stutters in frame rate. The fix only works when the hard drive is removed, meaning you’ll be powering on and off every time you want to switch between Bioshock and another game.

The problem appears to be a bus error. Somehow the swap of cached information from hard disk to ram is bottlenecked, causing the hiccups. Maybe? Can only speculate. As for the washed out textures appearing throughout the game, it’s a problem native to the Unreal 3 engine. Sorry, no fix for that.

The memory card also severely limits your saved game options, as you can only have 3 or 4 before the space on the standard 64mb version is filled up. I suppose you could manually cycle out old saved games and save them straight to the hard disk, but who’s going to go through the trouble? Hopefully, there will be a patch available on Live soon, and I can get my $30 back

ShaneU

same thing happened to me and clearing the cache worked. have you downloaded the latest update for it?

s8n

Thanks folks, but don't really fancy purchasing a memory card that will never be used again.
I believe I have the latest updates and have also cleared the cache (using the method from the System blade in the dashboard).

ShaneU, can you let me know what method you used to clear the cache as there seems to be a few different methods.

ShaneU

I held down buttons as the game is loading up, i''ll find out which buttons now...

edit: hold down both shoulder buttons as the game is loading up until the red 2k logo appears.

okla

Hold down the RB and LB buttons as it loads up and this will sort it out, at least it did for me.

s8n

wonderful, will give it a whirl. Much appreciated folks. Great game, totally immersed in it and can't wait to finish it.

bucks73

Now this is a coincidence. Was getting the same problem all weekend and thought it was the disk. Tried cleaning the disk a number of times and thought I got it sorted until it returned later. Cheers for the fix...will try it later.

lafors

bucks73 wrote: »

Now this is a coincidence. Was getting the same problem all weekend and thought it was the disk. Tried cleaning the disk a number of times and thought I got it sorted until it returned later. Cheers for the fix...will try it later.

I had that problem the whole way through the game.
The cache thing didn't work for me.
I am convinced its the dvd drive, nothing to do with where the game is saved.

bucks73

Yeah I tried that LB and RB thing and it didnt work. Also tried clearing the cache through System blade on dashboard but that didnt work either....found that with a google.

Was trying to play last night and after stuttering for a while it completely froze. Tried three more times but froze after only a couple of minutes play. Very frustrating. Might try the memory card thing next week depending on how much trade in I get for a few games when buying COD4.

s8n

Clearing the cache using the LB & RB worked a treat for me, I help it from the 360 boot, right up to the main Bioshock screen.
Appreciate the help folks.
Haven't played Halo yet, but this is my game of the year so far.

Jack Sheehan

I know this is a wee bit off topic but just exactly what is a cache? And why does it need to be cleared?

Shryke

This is happening to me with Oblivion. I'll try out whats been said later.