The Ahra Prime Times — July 20: Optimization Report & Difficulty Selection Soon!

Hello everyone!

I’m preparing a new update that introduces selectable difficulty levels, but at the same time I’m working on improving Hiraeth’s performance in the current version of Unreal Engine — and that comes with a few challenges.

Also, a quick reminder: the -30% Hiraeth discount is ending soon, so if you haven’t grabbed the game yet, now’s the perfect moment before the promotion disappears.

Hiraeth Updated post and work as of July 22nd!

You can read about the challenges I'm facing in the next paragraph, but I've already resolved the FPS issues! Performance is now better than in the good and efficient December build! Performance on my RTX 2060 with DLSS visible. Without DLSS it's lower, but still very good. Steam post imageThe screenshot shows 12 AIs loaded—that is, ZEDs and other enemies. That's the number in this location near the player. There are > 150 AIs in total on Nesoi, but they're not taxing the GPU or CPU right now.

I still have a few changes left to make related to the Unreal Engine changes, but they're much easier than restoring, or even exceeding, good FPS. It'll take me a day or two. I expect the update with the new performance and difficulty settings to be released this week. End of post update

Performance Work on Hiraeth

Many of you have probably noticed (and I certainly have) that performance on Nesoi has dropped significantly in terms of FPS.

Back in December, the game was running at around 60 FPS on my RTX 2060 12 GB. Today… much lower. Here’s the screenshot from December 2025 for comparison.

Why did this happen?

Unreal Engine changed several core rendering systems in the latest versions — and they became heavier:

• Lumen (global illumination and world lighting)

• Nanite (high‑detail meshes like rocks)

• HLODs (Hierarchical Level of Detail — combining meshes into proxy meshes)

Nesoi is a well‑optimized map (see the earlier screenshot), but it uses all the top‑tier rendering features: Lumen, Nanite, HLOD, World Partition streaming. After the engine update, several of these systems became significantly more expensive.

The new gameplay features — vehicles, the new AI system, ZED Mode, new weapon systems — do not reduce FPS at all. The performance drop comes entirely from changes inside Unreal Engine’s rendering pipeline.

Why not stay on the older, faster version of Unreal Engine?

A very good question — and the answer seems obvious: “Just stay on the fast version.”

But it’s not that simple.

New engine versions, while heavier, fix many issues I’ve been struggling with:

• better stability

• better compatibility with new GPUs and hardware

• fewer random crashes

• fewer rendering bugs

• improved streaming

• improved world partition behavior

These are things I cannot fix myself — only the engine can. And since Early Access, Unreal Engine has solved many problems that used to slow down development or cause unpredictable issues.

The truth is: fighting the engine takes the most time. Without these engine‑related problems, we would already have new locations beyond Nesoi, language versions, and faster overall development.

Plans for Improvement

Right now I’m polishing new project settings focused on optimization. There is a good chance of success — I’ve identified the engine settings responsible for the FPS drop.

I hope you’ll see the difference in the upcoming update that introduces difficulty selection.

Difficulty Levels — Coming in Days

Difficulty levels are basically ready. I’m delaying the first release only because I want to ship it together with the performance improvements.

I expect the update to arrive this week.

Difficulty in Hiraeth has always existed behind the scenes, but until now it was a “medium DRIFTER” with mixed parameters.

The first version of difficulty selection will introduce many changes:

• movement speed

• stamina size and regeneration

• damage taken

• carry weight

• ease of performing certain tasks

• food spoilage rate

• and more

A full list will be included in the update announcement.

This first version is meant for basic testing and your feedback — values will definitely be adjusted later.

New Steam achievements will also arrive soon, tied to difficulty levels, vehicles, ZED Mode, and new weapons.

Item spawn rates will not change in the first version — but they will be adjusted in future updates. Testing of difficulty levels is ongoing.

Summary

Thank you for your patience — and keep your fingers crossed for my ongoing battle with Unreal Engine’s resource‑hungry rendering systems. Not everyone has an RTX 5090, so performance matters for all of us.

See you soon! Paweł