Valheim is a fantastic game but it could do with some optimisations, especially when you're building up a big castle and whatever else people come up with. Thankfully Iron Gate have put out some improvements.
Available now in their public Beta on Steam a patch has arrived for testing that optimises many parts of the game for worlds big and small, which should also result in better network performance, better loading times and smaller save file sizes.
However, as an important note, they say to backup your save files, as it's less backwards compatible than before. So if you're testing, be sure to make an extra backup first.
Highlights of Patch 0.216.5 (Public Test):
- Many performance, memory and networking improvements for both small and large worlds
- World save file size greatly reduced
- Fixed hitbox issue for close combat and spear throwing issue
- Minimap pin input fixed on steam deck & big picture mode
- Added "UI scaling" to settings on Xbox
- Fixed endless loading of save manager when switching tabs too fast
- World save files that are corrupt, have load errors or have missing meta files can now be restored from the most recent backup directly from within the Select World menu by pressing the "Start" button.
- Save file stability & issues fixed
- Decreased load times in the Manage Saves menu.
- Fixed a bug that would cause the GUI to not update when deleting the bottommost backup in the Manage Saves menu.
Great to see such upgrades being made, in addition to the new content teasers we've been getting.
Valheim is available to buy on Humble Store or Steam. It has Native Linux support and it is Steam Deck Verified.
I can see how their Xbox port has created them financial incentive and contractual obligations to improve performance because Xbox is not beefy like some expensive desktop PC. I feel that the performance optimization probably made towards Xbox also benefits the Steam Deck which is great.
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