Construct WebGPU status thread

I have a function that updates UI texts, and an event that triggers that function every tick during specific conditions: in WebGL it runs at 60fps, in WebGPU runs at around 10fps. If i disable the functions, runs again at 60fps.

WebGPU is hella slow at rendering text objects.

There is a known issue with WebGPU that updating textures seems significantly slower than WebGL. In Construct, changing Text objects and a few other things require updating a texture, so these cases may be slower than WebGL for the time being. I filed an issue about it back in June but it hasn't been sorted out yet. As WebGPU is still pretty new I think there may be a few early issues like this to be sorted out, but I think it's likely it will end up as fast or faster than WebGL in the long run.

There is a known issue with WebGPU that updating textures seems significantly slower than WebGL. In Construct, changing Text objects and a few other things require updating a texture, so these cases may be slower than WebGL for the time being. I filed an issue about it back in June but it hasn't been sorted out yet. As WebGPU is still pretty new I think there may be a few early issues like this to be sorted out, but I think it's likely it will end up as fast or faster than WebGL in the long run.

Gotcha. I was suspecting it depended on chromium, hopefully they'll fix that soon enough. I'll stick to WebGL for now, although i've set up everything to transition to WebGPU (updating effects).

There is also a known issue with WebGPU that rendering fails on Intel Gen12 LP GPUs. See this issue.

There is also a known issue with WebGPU that rendering fails on Intel Gen12 LP GPUs. See this issue.

Interesting. The weird thing about my situation is that it was literally rendering just fine and then suddenly stop right during the dev session. However, it appears to still work just fine in FireFox and Edge. Is there a Chrome flag i need to turn on or something? I already turned on the 2 available WebGPU flags for it but still no go.

Right now it still depends on use case. So, experiment with your project, try both renderers and see the results. Look at both CPU and GPU usage.

That looks a lot like this issue that I filed back in March (and is noted under "known issues" in the original post here). I'll add a comment noting the device you mentioned.

I wouldn't put much faith in webgpu and nwjs. Coming from Babylonjs, I noticed massive slow downs when zooming into individual polygons, it seems like each pixel drawn incurs some large overhead, zooming out was 60fps zooming into the single polygon until it hit full screen dropped to 10fps. Getting perfect performance in edge then deploying with nwjs only to find these slowdowns was a let down. Given the neglect nwjs now has I don't see it improving.

I've been having problems with the webGPU for some time now, but I don't know why, it's getting worse and worse.

I honestly don't expect any solution either, but it's good to let you know.

From time to time, the Construct screen will flash, and all images will disappear. The program will still be functional, but without any images. The texts will still be visible and fully operational.

I've noticed that the problem is caused by switching between application windows. You don't need to alt-tab, just click on another program in the taskbar.

The problem is that this is completely random, but in previous versions this happened maybe once a day. Now it happens every 20 minutes.

The problem affects the entire construct, not just the editor. If I have a preview open it will disappear completely. The only solution is to save, close everything and open it again.

I use an NVidia GTX 1650 card, and the drivers are up to date.

The Construct editor still renders with WebGL by default. You can switch the editor to render with WebGPU in Settings. If you've done that and you experience regular crashes, you can change it back to revert back to WebGL rendering in the editor.

I would guess the editor is rendering with the default WebGL and the crashes are caused by your graphics driver crashing, and it started happening more recently due to a buggy graphics driver update. It's a common kind of problem unfortunately, and such issues are not actually Construct's fault, but there's not a lot we can do about it.

The Construct editor still renders with WebGL by default. You can switch the editor to render with WebGPU in Settings. If you've done that and you experience regular crashes, you can change it back to revert back to WebGL rendering in the editor.

I would guess the editor is rendering with the default WebGL and the crashes are caused by your graphics driver crashing, and it started happening more recently due to a buggy graphics driver update. It's a common kind of problem unfortunately, and such issues are not actually Construct's fault, but there's not a lot we can do about it.

Thank you, Ashley. I remembered that this option existed right after I made this post. Coincidentally or not, the problem has not occurred so far.

I appreciate your attention and I really respect your work. Let's move on.

Ashley, sorry for posting in sequence, but I was wondering, what if the failure is happening the other way around? The preview's webGPU fails and this causes a failure in the editor's graphics, is this possible to happen? And if it is possible, is it possible to prevent it from interfering with the editor? Because obviously it is easier to restart the preview than the entire project.

Thanks again.

Exciting stuff! Looking forward to seeing how WebGPU support evolves — big step for performance and visuals in Construct. Thanks for the continued work!