Beginner's Guide to PC Gaming

FPS

FPS (frames per second) is the measurement of how fast a game runs. A game is similar to a movie. What you see is made up of still pictures (frames) transitioning from one to the next at a rapid speed. 0 FPS means the game is frozen at that spot. 60 FPS is what most people aim for, as everything looks and feels very smooth. 30 FPS is still very playable for native games. Anything under 30 FPS may or may not be playable depending on the game. With some games, you can get away with 15 to 20 FPS, and still enjoy it. It just won't seem as smooth as 30 or 60 FPS. Anything under 15 FPS generally is not considered playable. Everything seems very slow and choppy. The higher the FPS, the better. Generally, lower visual quality will give you better performance, so if you want the game to run better, try lowering some settings and see what happens. You can always change them back if you need to. Some games will have a button you can click to revert to the default settings. But if you're playing a game that doesn't I recommend taking a screenshot or a picture with your phone before you change anything. Please note that when emulating, you will always want close to 60 FPS. Aim for no lower than 50 FPS. The reason for this is that when an emulator is running at 60 FPS, then the game is running at the speed intended on the original system. So the emulator might be running at 60 FPS, but the game could only be running at 30 FPS. So if you're getting 30 FPS in an emulator, and the game was intended to run at 30 FPS, then the game will only be running at 15 FPS, which is not good for emulating.