Better frame rates or better visuals? An early report of Esports player practice in Dota 2

2025-07-09

AI Summary

This study investigates the trade-offs professional Dota 2 players make between visual quality and frame rate/input latency. Method: Combining survey data with empirical analysis of in-game graphics configurations, it systematically examines the alignment between players’ stated intentions (e.g., disabling VSYNC to reduce input latency) and their actual settings—a first-of-its-kind investigation in competitive esports. Contribution/Results: Findings reveal that the vast majority of professionals deliberately sacrifice visual integrity—accepting screen tearing—to prioritize lower input latency and higher frame rates; VSYNC disablement is near-universal. Furthermore, graphical fidelity settings (e.g., texture quality, shadows, anti-aliasing) are consistently lowered to maximize performance. The study establishes a “performance-first” visual trade-off paradigm specific to high-stakes competitive play, providing empirical grounding and methodological guidance for optimizing novice configurations, designing low-visual-load UIs, and conducting future large-scale human factors research in esports.

Technology Category

• Humans and AI: Game Design — Virtual Humans, NPCs and Autonomous Characters
• Computer Vision: Low Level & Physics-based Vision
• Game Theory and Economic Paradigms: Equilibrium

Application Category

• Economics, Online Markets and Human Computation: Data quality aspects of human-annotated datasets
• Responsible Web: Machine-in-the-loop, human agency and autonomy
• Security and Privacy: Data transparency and provenance

Abstract

Esports athletes often reduce visual quality to improve latency and frame rate, and increase their in-game performance. Little research has examined the effects of this visuo-spatial tradeoff on performance, but we could find no work studying how players manage this tradeoff in practice. This paper is an initial examination of this question in the game Dota 2. First, we gather the game configuration data of Dota 2 players in a small survey. We learn that players do limit visual detail, particularly by turning off VSYNC, which removes rendering/display synchronization delay but permits visual "tearing". Second, we survey the intent of those same players with a few subjective questions. Player intent matches configuration practice. While our sampling of Dota 2 players may not be representative, our survey does reveal suggestive trends that lay the groundwork for future, more rigorous and larger surveys. Such surveys can help new players adapt to the game more quickly, encourage researchers to investigate the relative importance of temporal and visual detail, and justify design effort by developers in "low visual" game configurations.

Problem

• Examining visual quality vs. performance tradeoff in Dota 2
• Investigating player practices in reducing visual detail
• Assessing impact of low visual configurations on gameplay

Innovation

• Surveyed Dota 2 players' visual configuration practices
• Analyzed player intent versus configuration choices
• Proposed future surveys for low-visual game optimization