Crusader Kings III vs Marvel's Midnight Suns

• API: DirectX 12 / DirectX 11 Fallback
• Combat Engine: Deterministic Deck-Building Tactical
• Game Engine: Unreal Engine 4.26
• Middleware Optimization: Proprietary 2K Launcher sunset in late 2024
• Platform Port Status: Nintendo Switch port officially canceled

• Court Physician: Diagnoses illnesses, performs experimental surgeries, and brews herbal remedies to save dynastic members from death.
  Human Companion (Medical Scholar)
• Master of Horse / Hunt: Oversees the royal stables and organizes expeditions, boosting court grandeur and hunting success rates.
  Human Companion (Equerry)

• Royal Court Pedestal Artifacts: Crafted by inspired artisans or looted from conquered enemy capitals; displayed in the 3D throne room to boost prestige and grandeur.
• Sacred Religious Reliquaries: Discovered on pilgrimages or awarded by religious heads; preserved in the dynasty treasury to generate piety and clerical favor.
• Dynasty Chronicle Epics & Legend Books: Commissioned from court chroniclers and poets; immortalizes the heroic deeds of ancestors and reinforces family legitimacy.

• Elemental Rods: Hidden across the map; required to repair Agatha's Altar.
• Glyph Sequences: Found on walls inside the Chapel, Agatha's Cottage, and Lilith's Garden for the Standing Stones puzzle.
• Hiram Shaw Journal Pages: Scattered deep inside Hiram Shaw's Church in the haunted woods.

• Medieval Feudalism
• Dynastic Legacy
• Court Intrigue
• Religion and Holy Wars
• Character Role-Playing
• Grand Strategy
• Genetic Inheritance

• Joyeuse (Charlemagne's Sword): Illustrious Ancestral Blade
  The legendary personal arming sword of Charlemagne, bestowing massive martial prowess, knight effectiveness, and prestigious standing upon its bearer.
• The Holy Lance (Spear of Destiny): Sacred Religious Relic & Spear
  A holy weapon believed to have pierced Christ's side, generating immense monthly Piety and boosting army morale during crusades.
• Reichsschwert (Imperial Sword of State): Ceremonial Imperial Greatsword
  The official coronation sword of the Holy Roman Empire, conferring supreme legitimacy and commanding respect from unruly feudal vassals.
• Mastercrafted Damascus Steel Longsword: Custom Forged Melee Weapon
  An exquisite folded-steel blade forged by an inspired court blacksmith, granting substantial combat prowess in battlefield duels.
• Concealed Assassin's Stiletto: Intrigue Weapon
  A slender steel dagger kept hidden beneath royal robes, utilized in high-percentage murder schemes to silently dispatch rival claimants.

• Fury Totem: Combat Item
  Allows the player to draw a card every time the selected hero KOs an enemy, facilitating infinite combo loops.
• Major Strength Tonic: Combat Item
  Grants a hero the Overpowered buff (100% damage increase) while simultaneously inflicting Vulnerable (50% incoming damage increase).
• Vampiric Essence: Combat Item
  Grants lifesteal to a hero's attacks, providing immense self-sustain during critical encounters.

• Imperial Gilded Crown & Regalia: Monthly Prestige +2.0, Vassal Opinion +10, Legitimacy Gain +15%; magnificent jewel-encrusted headwear worn during solemn court audiences.
• Mastercrafted Fluted Plate Mail: Prowess +6, Combat Injury Chance -40%; custom articulated steel armor forged by an inspired master armorer.
• Saint's Reliquary Chainmail Hauberk: Prowess +4, Monthly Piety +1.0; mail shirt blessed with sewn-in sacred relics that protect the wearer in holy wars.

• Ancestral Armor: Ultimate Abbey passive ability, acquired upon completing all Abbey puzzles.
• Legendary Combat Suits: Unlocked via Friendship Level 5 Midnight Suns Challenges; highly modifies core visual aesthetics.

• Byzantine Imperial Robes & Diadem: Ornate purple silk tunics lavishly embroidered with gold thread and pearls, denoting supreme Roman authority.
• Western European Royal Ermine Cloak: Heavy velvet mantle trimmed with winter ermine fur and fastened with a gold heraldic clasp.
• Viking Jarl Fur-Trimmed Tunics: Sturdy woolen garments lined with wolf pelt and secured with silver Norse brooches.

• Wolverine (Without The Hat): Popular community mod removing Wolverine's incongruous cowboy hat from his casual Abbey attire.
• Ms. Marvel Classic: Community mod porting Captain Marvel's traditional 90s leotard into the game.

Progression revolves around Five Core Lifestyles: Diplomacy (Family Hierarch, Diplomat, August), Martial (Strategist, Overseer, Gallant), Stewardship (Avaricious, Architect, Administrator), Intrigue (Schemer, Seducer, Torturer), and Learning (Whole of Body, Scholar, Theologian). Characters gain lifestyle experience to unlock powerful perks that drastically alter their reign. Additionally, dynastic Renown is spent on permanent Dynasty Legacies (such as Blood for genetic traits, Warfare for army strength, Guile for assassination success, and Erudition for cultural innovation), permanently elevating all future members of your family.

Character progression intertwines deck-building mechanics with an intricate Friendship system. The economy of a combat turn revolves around Card Plays, Redraws, and Heroism, with abilities categorized into Attack, Skill, and Heroic cards. Upgrades are synthesized at the Forge and Agatha's Cauldron, allowing players to craft limited-use Combat Items like the Fury Totem or Vampiric Essence to manipulate action economy. Furthermore, advancing hero Friendship to Level 5 unlocks the Forge's specific "Midnight Suns Challenge," a solo puzzle mission rewarding the hero's Legendary combat suit and Ultimate Heroic Card. Endgame leveling heavily relies on the T.H.R.E.A.T. Room, a virtual reality simulator where cards become Quick-enabled, demanding unending combo chains to maximize XP yield and combat efficacy for benched roster members.

The grand strategy map is one of the most comprehensive ever conceived, encompassing thousands of individually modeled baronies, counties, and duchies. Key geographical realms include: The British Isles (feuding Anglo-Saxon, Celtic, and Norse earldoms), The Holy Roman Empire & Western Europe (densely populated feudal realms with intricate succession laws), Scandinavia (rugged fjords and Viking raiding launchpads), The Mediterranean & Levant (the crossroads of Christian Crusaders and Islamic Caliphates), The Byzantine Empire (an administrative powerhouse of imperial intrigue), and The Indian Subcontinent & Steppes (vibrant Hindu/Buddhist empires and nomadic tribal hordes).

While tactical combat encounters occur in contained, highly interactive arenas across various global locations, the primary exploration space is the meticulously detailed Abbey. This expansive third-person hub functions as a sprawling pocket dimension littered with hidden secrets, resource nodes, and environmental puzzles. Exploration is strictly gated by "Words of Power" (Open, Reveal, Purify, Break), arcane abilities unlocked by completing Blood Gate trials. The Abbey encompasses distinct regions such as the Stone Terrace, Hiram Shaw's Church located deep in the haunted woods, Lilith's Garden, and Agatha's Altar. Each region holds intricate puzzles like the Standing Stones and elemental plinths, transforming the space into a rich metagame environment that rewards thorough exploration with crafting reagents, lore pages, and cosmetic upgrades.

• Viking Longship Raiding Fleet: Maritime Transport & Warship
  Shallow-draft clinker-built wooden vessels capable of navigating open seas and sailing up shallow river networks to sack inland monasteries.
• Royal Pilgrimage Caravan Carriage: Overland Travel Vehicle
  An escorted traveling wagon convoy utilized by rulers embarking on grand pilgrimages to Rome, Jerusalem, or Mecca.

• Noble Royal Destrier: Equine (Equus caballus)
  Armored warhorse ridden into battle and tournaments, providing high prowess buffs and injury protection.
• Trained Hunting Falcon: Bird of Prey (Falco peregrinus)
  Trained royal raptor taken on court hunts to reduce stress and unlock prestigious social events.
• Faithful Court Hound: Canine (Canis lupus familiaris)
  Loyal guard dog that sleeps beside the ruler's bed, providing protection against assassination attempts and offering comfort.
• Royal Palace Cat: Feline (Felis catus)
  Court pet that patrols palace pantries, catching plague-carrying rats and providing gentle stress relief.

• William the Conqueror: Duke of Normandy / King of England
  The formidable Norman military commander who launches a historic cross-channel invasion in 1066 to seize the English crown.
• Empress Matilda of Canossa: Margravine of Tuscany
  A brilliant and devout Italian ruler renowned for her diplomacy, scholarship, and alliance with the Papacy against the Holy Roman Emperor.
• Alexios I Komnenos: Emperor of the Byzantine Empire
  A shrewd military strategist and administrative reformer who ascends the imperial throne in Constantinople to rebuild the Roman legacy.
• The Custom Ruler: Player Created Dynast
  A bespoke nobleman or woman created via the Ruler Designer, customized with unique traits, culture, and heraldry to forge a new dynasty.

• The Hunter: Customizable Protagonist
  Resurrected child of Lilith capable of aligning with Light, Dark, or Power moral trajectories.
• Captain America: Frontline Tank
  Damage mitigation specialist utilizing Taunt and converting Block values into lethal offensive strikes.
• Iron Man: Burst Damage
  Action economy master who permanently buffs cards in his deck by utilizing the Redraw mechanic.
• Magik: Battlefield Control
  Creates Limbo Portals to infinitely manipulate enemy positioning across the arena.
• Deadpool: Post-Launch Hero
  Relies on the 'En Fuego' mechanic, stacking buffs through KOs that are lost upon taking damage.

• Restoring the Roman Empire: Grand Historical Decision
  Reconquer the historical core provinces of the Roman Empire across the Mediterranean to unify East and West and declare imperial restoration.
• Creating a Custom Reformed Faith: Religious Transformation
  Accumulate massive piety, control three holy sites, and establish a new theological doctrine granting custom tenets, sins, and virtues.
• The 1066 English Succession Crisis: Historical Conquest Campaign
  Invade and secure the Kingdom of England as William of Normandy or Harald Hardrada against King Harold Godwinson.

• Midnight Suns Challenges: Forge Trial
  Complete a highly difficult solo puzzle using a specific hero to unlock their Legendary suit.
• T.H.R.E.A.T. Room Simulation: VR Survival / XP Farm
  Survive endless waves of enemies for three turns using endless Quick-card combos.
• Investigate Hiram Shaw's Church: Abbey Exploration
  Utilize the Reveal and Purify Words of Power to bypass wards and uncover Shaw's bloody history.

The game features seamless online multiplayer supporting up to 32 players in a shared persistent campaign. Players can choose to cooperate as loyal vassals under an overarching emperor, marry into each other's dynasties to merge lineages, or wage covert cutthroat wars of espionage, assassination, and conquest against fellow human monarchs with drop-in/drop-out functionality.

Marvel's Midnight Suns is explicitly designed as a deeply deterministic, single-player narrative and tactical experience, eschewing multiplayer entirely. The absence of competitive or cooperative modes allows the mechanical design to heavily favor the player through overpowered abilities, extreme environmental manipulation, and character synergies that would instantly break a balanced PvP environment. Combos involving Magik's Limbo Portals, Iron Man's exponential Redraw buffs, and the Hunter's map-clearing Bladestorm are tuned specifically for power-fantasy scenarios against AI-controlled Hydra, Lilin, and Vampyre hordes. Furthermore, the massive amount of time dedicated to the single-player Abbey hub's social simulation, Friendship leveling, and environmental puzzle-solving cements the game as an isolated, solitary experience that focuses purely on narrative immersion and mechanical puzzle-solving over any form of multiplayer engagement.

Crusader Kings III retails at a base price of $49.99 USD across PC (Steam, Windows Store, GOG), PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S. Paradox Interactive supports the title through curated expansion chapters. Major released expansions include 'Royal Court' (introducing 3D throne rooms, artifact collections, and hybrid cultural divergence), 'Tours & Tournaments' (grand travel mechanics, jousts, and weddings), 'Legends of the Dead' (black death plagues and heroic legitimacy), 'Roads to Power' (landless adventurer roleplay and Byzantine imperial administrative bureaucracy), and 'By God Alone' (deep papal and religious reforms).

Marvel's Midnight Suns launched with multiple distinct editions, significantly impacting its pricing and market reception. The Standard Edition originally debuted at a premium full-price point of $69.99 for PS5 and Xbox Series X/S, later arriving on eighth-generation consoles. The premium tier was anchored by the highly comprehensive Legendary Edition, originally priced at $99.99, which bundled the base game with the expansive Season Pass. This pass introduced 23 premium cosmetic skins and four major DLC expansions featuring Deadpool, Venom, Morbius, and Storm. Due to initial commercial turbulence, aggressive discounting became a core strategy by 2024 and 2026, with the Legendary Edition frequently seeing discounts up to 85% off, dropping to around $19.99 on digital storefronts, effectively establishing it as the definitive way to experience the complete game ecosystem.

Paradox Development Studio has maintained an aggressive multi-year post-launch expansion cycle. Flavor packs like Northern Lords, Fate of Iberia, and Legacy of Persia introduced deep regional struggle mechanics to the Norse, Spanish, and Iranian spheres. Major expansions like Royal Court, Tours & Tournaments, Legends of the Dead, Roads to Power, and By God Alone have expanded gameplay with landless wandering knights, dynamic travel routes, deadly epidemic diseases, custom royal courts, and religious governance.

The post-launch roadmap was defined by a cohesive Season Pass comprising four interlocking DLC packs centered around a vampyre narrative. "The Good, the Bad, and the Undead" introduced Deadpool, utilizing the 'En Fuego' mechanic for escalating damage buffs. "Redemption" added Venom, functioning as a high-burst initiator with a replenishing 'Ravenous' meter. "The Hunger" brought Morbius, directly synergizing with Blade to dominate targets via Bleed and Bloodlust status effects. Finally, "Blood Storm" introduced Storm, rewarding tactical patience by enhancing cards held in the hand over subsequent turns. These packs also integrated new enemy types—parasitic Vampyres—and vastly expanded the endgame with the Enhanced T.H.R.E.A.T. Room, allowing up to three heroes to simulate battles against custom enemy waves and bosses for massive resource yields.

• Q: What is Crusader Kings III?
  A: Crusader Kings III is a medieval grand strategy role-playing game developed by Paradox Development Studio, where players guide a historical noble dynasty through generations from 867 or 1066 to 1453 AD.
• Q: How does Crusader Kings III differ from other grand strategy games?
  A: Instead of controlling an entire country, players roleplay as individual rulers within a family dynasty, navigating personal relationships, genetics, stress, religion, and internal feudal vassal politics.
• Q: What are the start dates in Crusader Kings III?
  A: The game features two primary historical start dates: 867 AD (The Viking and Carolingian era) and 1066 AD (The Norman Conquest of England).
• Q: Does Crusader Kings III feature multiplayer?
  A: Yes, seamless online multiplayer supports up to 32 players in a shared persistent medieval world with drop-in and drop-out capability.
• Q: What engine powers Crusader Kings III?
  A: The game runs on Paradox Interactive's proprietary Clausewitz Engine integrated with the Jomini toolset, supporting multithreaded simulation and dynamic 3D portraits.

• Q: Does Marvel's Midnight Suns run well on PC?
  A: Initially, the game suffered from severe micro-stuttering due to the proprietary 2K Launcher. However, as of late 2024, the launcher was completely sunset and removed, which boosted performance by up to 62% and resolved the stuttering issues entirely.
• Q: Is the game coming to Nintendo Switch?
  A: No. The Nintendo Switch version, despite being heavily marketed early on, was officially canceled in May 2023 due to the hardware limitations in handling the game's CPU-intensive tactical physics and enemy AI.
• Q: How do you level up benched characters?
  A: The most efficient way to level characters is using the T.H.R.E.A.T. Room in the Abbey yard. This VR simulator gives every card played the 'Quick' keyword, allowing players to orchestrate infinite combo chains to farm massive amounts of XP.
• Q: How does the Friendship system affect combat?
  A: Building Friendship through Hangouts, Havens, and precise Dialogue Choices unlocks passive combat buffs, combo cards, and eventually grants access to the Level 5 'Midnight Suns Challenge', which rewards the hero's Ultimate Heroic Card and Legendary suit.
• Q: Is there DLC available for the game?
  A: Yes, the Season Pass contains four interlocking DLC expansions featuring Deadpool, Venom, Morbius, and Storm. It introduces the Vampyre enemy faction and an Enhanced T.H.R.E.A.T. Room for endgame farming.

Built on the Clausewitz Engine with Jomini toolsets, the visual presentation combines a rich parchment map style when zoomed out with detailed 3D topographical terrain (rivers, snow-capped mountains, dense forests, and fortified settlements) when zoomed in. The fully animated 3D character models feature nuanced facial expressions and an advanced genetic inheritance algorithm that realistically blends parental facial structures, skin tones, and hair textures across generations.

Built on Unreal Engine 4.26, the game exhibits high visual ambition, particularly in its implementation of DirectX 12, ray-traced reflections, and complex environmental destruction physics. The tactical combat arenas are visually dense, filled with explosive hazards, shattering concrete, and detailed spell effects from the extensive roster. Character models feature highly stylized comic-book aesthetics combined with realistic materials for their customizable combat suits. However, this visual fidelity demands significant hardware resources, particularly CPU overhead for phasing enemy AI and rendering the physics interactions of kinetic knockbacks. To achieve a locked 60fps at 1440p on high settings with ray tracing, robust modern hardware is required. The game also extensively benefits from DLSS Quality rendering to stabilize frame rates during chaotic, highly populated late-game encounters with cloning Soulless enemies.

The musical score, composed by Andreas Waldetoft and Philip Wareborn, blends authentic medieval instrumentation—including hurdy-gurdies, lutes, psalters, and Gregorian choir chants—that seamlessly transitions into intense martial percussion during declarations of war. Sound effects include atmospheric parchment turning, seal-wax stamping, tavern clatter, and the somber tolling of cathedral bells upon a ruler's death.

The audio design of Midnight Suns plays a critical role in reinforcing the game's dual nature. In the Abbey, the ambient soundscape relies on a sweeping, orchestral score laced with eerie, supernatural motifs that echo the Salem witch lore and the looming demonic threat of Lilith. The voice acting is extensive and highly praised, bringing nuance to an immense script of dialogue trees, casual hangouts, and relationship-building sequences that define the social simulation aspect. In combat, the audio shifts dynamically to heavy, kinetic sound effects. Every forceful knockback, magical incantation, and environmental explosion is punctuated by impactful audio cues that satisfy the tactical feedback loop. Heroic card executions are particularly notable for their cinematic audio stings, elevating the superhero power fantasy when unleashing devastating ultimate attacks against elite supervillains.

The interface is celebrated for its revolutionary 'Nested Tooltips' system, allowing players to hover over any highlighted keyword, mechanic, or character name to open an interconnected chain of explanatory windows without leaving the screen. Beautiful 3D animated character models reflect age, stress, physical injuries, illnesses, and clothing styles directly in dialogue menus, accompanied by an intuitive realm overview and color-coded map modes.

The UI in Midnight Suns elegantly balances complex tactical information with accessible console-friendly inputs. During combat, the screen anchors the player's hand of cards at the bottom, clearly displaying Heroism costs, card types (Attack, Skill, Heroic), and associated keywords like Quick or Knockback. The top corners monitor action economy—available Card Plays, Redraws, and movement actions. Crucially, environmental interactions are highlighted seamlessly, showing precise trajectory arcs for knockbacks to easily calculate collateral damage against explosive barrels or adjacent enemies. In the Abbey, the interface shifts to a social management dashboard, tracking Friendship XP, Hero moral alignments, and Abbey resources (Gloss, Arcane Knowledge, Reagents). However, early PC UI experiences were heavily bogged down by the proprietary 2K Launcher, which caused severe micro-stuttering until its complete removal in late 2024.

Extensive accessibility options include: comprehensive nested tooltips, scalable UI scaling up to 150%, adjustable text contrast, colorblind-friendly political and diplomatic map modes, customizable game speed controls (from Speed 1 to Speed 5 with pause-at-will), configurable message notification popups, and full controller remapping on consoles.

While standard difficulty adjustments exist within the game, accessibility in Midnight Suns is heavily driven by its foundational mechanical design: deterministic, turn-based combat. Because actions do not rely on quick reflexes or real-time execution, players with motor or cognitive disabilities can dictate the pace of every encounter entirely on their own terms. Furthermore, the lack of RNG in hit probabilities ensures a transparent, predictable feedback loop where tactical choices always execute exactly as presented. Visual accessibility includes clear UI indicators for targeting trajectories and environmental hazards. Subtitles are fully supported for the game's massive amount of spoken dialogue during the Abbey's social simulation phases. The community also developed QoL mods, like "No Running in the Halls," which directly improve accessibility by reducing the repetitive mechanical friction of navigating the sprawling hub world.

• Developed on Paradox's upgraded multi-threaded Clausewitz Engine with the Jomini toolset. The simulation tracks tens of thousands of individual historical characters, lineages, and court relations simultaneously. Installing on a high-speed Solid State Drive (SSD) significantly accelerates monthly autosaves and rapid map zooming across thousands of European and Asian baronies.
• Laptop Performance Note: Crusader Kings III is predominantly CPU-bound, with heavy demands on single-core instruction speed and L3 cache during end-of-month and end-of-year game ticks when AI decisions across thousands of global characters are calculated. Gaming laptops should maintain at least 45W to 75W CPU package power and run in High Performance mode to prevent late-game simulation slowdown.
• Laptop Consideration: G P U T G P: A dedicated mobile GPU running at 50W-75W TGP easily handles the 3D animated character portraits, physical cloth shaders, and topographical map zoom layers at 1080p and 1440p.
• Laptop Consideration: Cooling Thermals: Prolonged high-speed campaign simulation generates sustained CPU heat; keeping laptop cooling intakes clear prevents clock throttling at Speed 5.
• Laptop Consideration: C P U Power Limits: Set Windows power settings to High Performance to ensure continuous high boost clocks for rapid day/month tick progression.
• Laptop Consideration: M U X Switch Optimus: Enabling discrete graphics bypasses integrated display bottlenecks, ensuring smooth panning and zooming across detailed terrain maps.
• Optimization Detail: Upscaling Tech: Native resolution scaling and MSAA anti-aliasing.
• Optimization Detail: Key Settings Impact: 3D Character Portrait Quality, Animated Water, Shadow Resolution, and Map Texture Detail have the largest impact on GPU framerates.
• Game Name: Crusader Kings III

• The game requires significant CPU overhead for processing complex physics interactions and enemy AI phasing during combat loops.
• Laptop Performance Note: Laptop users may encounter CPU thermal throttling during heavily populated combat encounters and when navigating the resource-heavy Abbey hub world.
• Laptop Consideration: G P U T G P: High TGP required to ensure sufficient VRAM headroom for ray-traced reflections and DLSS rendering.
• Laptop Consideration: Cooling Thermals: Robust cooling is essential as the heavy reliance on CPU-intensive tactical calculations generates extreme heat spikes.
• Laptop Consideration: C P U Power Limits: Avoid power saving modes; CPU-bound physics calculations will cause severe frame drops if the processor is starved of power.
• Laptop Consideration: M U X Switch Optimus: Bypassing the iGPU via a MUX switch is strictly required to prevent memory bloat and stabilize 1% low framerates.
• Optimization Detail: Upscaling Tech: NVIDIA DLSS Quality / AMD FSR
• Optimization Detail: Key Settings Impact: Bypassing the default 2K Launcher (which was sunset in late 2024) drastically increases framerate by eliminating CPU polling bloat.
• Game Name: Marvel's Midnight Suns

• Upscaling Tech: Native resolution scaling and MSAA anti-aliasing.
• Key Settings Impact: 3D Character Portrait Quality, Animated Water, Shadow Resolution, and Map Texture Detail have the largest impact on GPU framerates.

• G P U T G P: A dedicated mobile GPU running at 50W-75W TGP easily handles the 3D animated character portraits, physical cloth shaders, and topographical map zoom layers at 1080p and 1440p.
• Cooling Thermals: Prolonged high-speed campaign simulation generates sustained CPU heat; keeping laptop cooling intakes clear prevents clock throttling at Speed 5.
• C P U Power Limits: Set Windows power settings to High Performance to ensure continuous high boost clocks for rapid day/month tick progression.
• M U X Switch Optimus: Enabling discrete graphics bypasses integrated display bottlenecks, ensuring smooth panning and zooming across detailed terrain maps.

• G P U T G P: High TGP required to ensure sufficient VRAM headroom for ray-traced reflections and DLSS rendering.
• Cooling Thermals: Robust cooling is essential as the heavy reliance on CPU-intensive tactical calculations generates extreme heat spikes.
• C P U Power Limits: Avoid power saving modes; CPU-bound physics calculations will cause severe frame drops if the processor is starved of power.
• M U X Switch Optimus: Bypassing the iGPU via a MUX switch is strictly required to prevent memory bloat and stabilize 1% low framerates.