Hello,
This is the first time I've laid my hands on PoN, and what I experience seems to be the very old interface lag / FPS drop.
It can be observed as early as the game menu. Particularly if I get the statue of liberty. Whenever I hover over different new game scenarios or over flags in the grand campaign, the render rate of the torch flame tanks. Same is true of the flags on the map: whenever I hover the cursor over anything with tooltips / toggle info panels, their frame rate drops (I'm pointing at the flags here as at the visible indicator of the overall performance, and as such responsiveness). Interface responsiveness on zoomed out map and moving around the map is sluggish, as are all the data screens (with F6 province census being particularly bad).
Naturally, I've tried searching for a solution before coming here, but all I could find were 2011 threads suggesting to uncheck Limit Map Loading. I assume this option is no longer in the game? I've also tried reducing texture size and tinkering with AGESettings.exe (making the game fullscreen and such) to no avail.
The game itself is a Steam one, V1.03. I'm not sure if it matters, but a nearby topic makes me think it does, - the client still has Paradox logos on the launcher and during the loading sequence.
Is there anything else I could try to improve UI experience?
(AJE performs fairly well on this PC. The only thing that irks me with it is movement of the camera around the map not being smooth, but there it's more in the "irritating but bearable" category, not "I really struggle with this" as in the case of PoN.)