The sci-fi survival horror game The Callisto Protocol was hit with an avalanche of negative Steam reviews (open in new tab) due to stuttering issues at launch. User ratings dropped to 22% at one point, players called it a "mess," and it was renamed "The Stuttering Protocol."

This user rating began to rise after a post-launch patch dedicated to performance issues and now stands at 51% "mixed" rating. The official Twitter account for Callisto Protocol (opens in new tab) said, "Thank you for your patience." A patch has been released for PC that addresses the gameplay stuttering issue caused by shader compilation. After the update, you may experience temporary stuttering in the game menu when launching the application for the first time. We will work on further optimization in the future."

Glenn Scofield, CEO of development company Striking Distance Studios, explained the cause of the problem on Twitter (opens in new tab). "Wrong file patched." Just a freak mistake by someone in a hurry." He also called it a "clerical error," adding, "It's launch day, unfortunately these things happen. This is Krafton's 1st sp, a console game, so we basically do everything ourselves, like a startup. We apologize."

Given how quickly this issue was addressed, and that the stuttering was not as pronounced in the pre-release review builds, it puts a check on the claim that a mistake was made in the launch day patch for The Callisto Protocol. As our review states, "some stuttering was indeed present," but not as much as it was in the version of the game that was released.

If only it were always this simple: stutter issues in PC ports have plagued many games in recent years, usually thanks to Unreal Engine 4's well-known problems with compiling shaders and loading assets. final It has affected games ranging from "Fantasy 7 Remake" to "The Ascent". However, on-demand shader compilation is part of the roadmap for Unreal Engine 5.1 (opens in new tab).