purpleHorizons

Once again, a example of the developers using their resources (developer time) into features a small minority (that doesn't even play the game) asked for. Of course, one has to visit Discord to get this information... forums have been relegated into irrelevancy. Once again, the population is <200 players. Linux players make up <10 players. This is another example of a "(very) low priority" task taking precedence over much more major issues this game has. Why?

HB2 is 6STK in live right now. Yes, scoped NTEC always had a higher walk modifier.

Concept art example Why is this feature still not a thing as of 2026, ~14 years since the launch of this game? Why must someone still edit configs (bSmoothFrameRate) to use this limiter? In fact, while at it, why not implement a proper frame rate limiter that isn't native APB's UE2/UE3 engine build? Take a look at SpecialK I still can't believe that this miniscule feature takes this long to do... complete lack of care for the game.

That's a separate issue from what I'm referring to. The entire APB Launcher wasn't functional while trying to launch it. It would generate a "crashed, send log" message box while trying to launch it. This happened regardless of Steam version of APB or version on site.

I've had this happen before the update as well. Yesterday, to be specific.

I've tried 3 installations: Windows 10 Pro (22H2), Windows 10 Education (22H2), Windows 10 LTSC (21H2) I havent removed WebView2 The APB Launcher, upon starting it, instantly crashes with the typical "Send Log" window. Why is this a thing?

Let me get this straight: For 4 AMAs in a row, voice chat was labeled as "it's low on our priority list" and now suddenly it became the most important feature to be reintroduced into the game? Not only that, you're back to Vivox, which most people used to disable back in the day due to it being a CPU cycle hog. Amazing. Yet actual issues this game has still aren't solved: • The UI of the game is completely unusable on 1080p, 1440p and 4K displays due to the game using fixed size assets made for 720p screens. Using the in-game "UI scaling" option results in all UI elements being subjected to some form of bad software algorithm which lowers the total sharpness of the game's UI elements. (Solution? Create higher resolution assets. Anything else is a band-aid; Should take up same UI size, proportionally) • Mismatched UI frameworks (Scaleform & native UI) mixed together. Raw Canvas (for gameplay UI) & Dear ImGui is superior for pre-UE4 titles such as APB. Ditch Scaleform already. • Crosshair is still bound to UI scaling and doesn't reflect accuracy across the entire 100m distance range of the game. • UI bug, which completely disables the ability to swap to 2nd contact group, removes ability to see if you're resupplying something, removes ability to know if you've killed someone. • Visual fidelity took a nosedive since RTW with no signs for betterment. • Absolutely no sign of a new map (Midtown?), a new game mode (BR, racing district or something else) or something else which would freshen up the game. • Both maps have severe balancing issues for more than a decade with no changes significant changes to them. Even the ones from 2 years ago are borderline invisible changes. • Missions are still a unbalanced mess. • Clans are a forgotten feature since launch. • Griefing still exists in the game due to not segregating competitive & casual crowds in separate queues • (Clothing/Car/Music/Symbol) Designers are untouched since launch (no new instruments, no fix of long standing issues) • No weapon/modification/vehicle inventory changes in form of sorting, pre-made loadouts etc. • ARMAS, the only money source of the game, still isn't comprised of account-bound only items. Matt mentioned that it's their "vision" to turn JT store into character-bound only items and ARMAS for account-bound only items. Why is this still being relegated?.... The new UI "redesign" is absolutely dreadful in terms of a UI design perspective as well. • ARMAS also still has no way to properly inspect the item you plan on purchasing. • Many ARMAS items are still stuck within a pack (e.g.: TAS-20 with 2 mods from Rocker Bundle), with no signs of a debundle occurring any time soon. • No frame rate limiter in the UI since the inception of this game (It's 2026 already..) • No ability to adjust Garbage Collection & OneFrameThreadLag in the UI. • No map location pinging system akin to Apex, where during normal gunplay, you use a button bind & point to a location with your mouse, press the bind and a team/group marker appears, pointing out their location. • Mouse sensitivity issue is still a thing, as per this • Bullet holes cause stuttering, as per this (not fixed since 64-bit release) • Leaderboards, which no one asked for, still don't have a single reward attached to them. More than a year has passed already since their introduction. • MSI AB / RTSS & DXVK are blocked by GFAC for some peculiar reason. Heck, even Nvidia FrameView's overlay is blocked by GFAC... • FSE was killed off (likely unknowingly) and the "Fullscreen Windowed" setting results in a worse presentation model than was previously the case (before GFAC). • No new F2P clothing or hair styles since the inception of this. ...but Vivox, a "low priority task" took priority. I was expecting the PvE (FTUE) district to arrive in this patch, but apparently not... The cherry on top was this: The game designer definitely confirmed that he has no vision on how to balance guns in this game and it shows As per ("gatekept") extra information provided by the game designer, which he has written on Discord only, health damage per shot statistic looks like this for the ISSR-B now: 265 (for the longest time) → 315 (buffed pre-1.33) → 285 (this patch) Memes write themselves.

"True fullscreen" (HW: Legacy Flip) with a Bitblt or Flip swap effect isn't removed from any Windows release. It's not related to the Windows release. I can get other games into FSE fine using the above methods on both W11 and W10. APB, seemingly since GFAC got implemented, isn't able to be placed into the FSE mode. The game should be placed in HW: Independant Flip as soon as I use the "Fullscreen " or "Fullscreen Windowed" setting. The fact that GFAC broke MSI AB & other overlays also confirms this software regression somewhat.

https://wiki.special-k.info/Presentation_Model Tested on W10 22H2 and 2 different GPUs (Nvidia & AMD), each running on 551.86 and 23.8.2 driver versions respectively. Using the common methods of toggling True Fullscreen: 1.) "Disable fullscreen optimization" checkmark on APB.exe 2.) Finding the appropriate registry key in GameConfigStore (setting it to 211 hexadec) When setting the game to "Fullscreen", the game uses “Hardware: Independant Flip” (which shouldn't be the case, it should be Hardware: Legacy Flip) When setting the game to "Fullscreen Windowed", the game uses “Composed: Copy with GPU/CPU GDI” (which shouldn't ever be the case) This implies that APB is using the BitBlt swap effect, as per the sankey diagrams in the link above. I am very certain that pre-GFAC, this wasn't the case, as I have FrameView data of APB during SARD era where Hardware: Legacy Flip was working fine. FSE (HW: Legacy Flip) is still a desirable presentation model to include in D3D9 games such as APB, as it leads to less CPU overhead than FSO (HW:Independant Flip) on higher frame rates. As a side-note: I've also checked DGVoodoo2 compatibility with APB. Surprisingly, it works!... Sort of. I managed to play for 2 missions without an issue. Until GFAC decided to kick me out with the message “GFAC: Disallowed File Modifications” D3D11 works fine. D3D12 crashes on district selection (I am able to login however) Funnily enough, depending on which swap effect I choose in DGVoodoo, I can invoke FSE (HW: Legacy Flip) or FSO (HW:Independant Flip) just fine. Of course, since it's a translation layer, it's still less maximum performance than native D3D9. Practical implications: DGVoodoo2 translating APB into D3D11 would allow you to use Nvidia Smooth Motion UPDATE (September 2026): It seems that DXVK on Windows worked with APB at one point, as I've seen a user complain that GFAC blocks DXVK use as of the time of writing. I am unable to load into the game at all. Getting greeted with a exception handler message box whenever I place the d3d9.dll within the same directory as APB.exe

https://www.gamersfirst.com/apb/news/2026/8/22/summer-nights Premium code: Summer_Nights Once again, no new thread on the forums in regards to this event... one has to be in LO's Discord or find this information on the news page to be alerted. Why are the forums being relegated again?...

Well, at least one doesn't have to suffer through a dreadful AMA at 2x speed filled with "it's on our priority list". Now, one can CTRL+F through blog posts.

It's a mystery to me how this type of content is a bannable offense, while nude pornographic symbols, cars & clothing are prevalent in-game. “Specific historical symbol is where the lines are drawn, but porn? Sure, go ahead! Feast your eyes in degenerate media!”

This is hillarious. The same company that started advertising the game again to a newer, fresher audience... while repeating the same mistake the old management had. Comedy. UPDATE: From LO discord... Matt's reply:

Questions locked down to Discord only? Why is this forum being relegated to this extent?

Bump. Great post.