Animals not moving when out of player's field of view

[Drifter Man]

I've recently gotten back to TLD after a long break and noticed something I'm sure wasn't there before. Wildlife will not move when outside of player's field of view but well within sighting range. Wolves and deer that are not aware of the player just freeze in place in some default position. When you look back at them, they suddenly and visibly 'unfreeze' in a fraction of a second and get back to their normal routine. It looks unnatural - humans are good at extrapolating movement, so I can immediately see that something is wrong. In addition, it makes wolves easy to avoid - just don't look at them and they won't move. Something similar happens to rabbits: I've even been able to sneak up to a frozen rabbit and knock it out with a stone.

Bears don't seem to be affected, once they spawn, they follow their usual scripted routes regardless of what the player does. And I've yet to meet a moose in my new game.

Anyone else noticed this?

[odizzido]

I haven't in the way you describe, but it could be due to the fact that I haven't put in as much time as many others here have.

What I have noticed multiple times is animals will behave differently the moment they're off screen. In several older versions of the game animals would teleport around unless they're on screen so what you describe is something I could easily see being the case.

[Drifter Man]

Yes, it looks they keep tweaking animal behavior and movement but this time something went wrong.

Today I even noticed a wolf fleeing at full speed with my arrow stuck in one of his legs - I look away for half a minute and the wolf stops in place. I look back and the wolf resumes its flight.

[odizzido]

Yeah sounds about right. I haven't played much with the new version so I haven't seen that yet. It's like they try to optimise performance by making it so animals are only kinda simulated when you're not looking at them but they can't seem to get it working properly. Sometimes it's running too fast and other times it's running too slowly.

[Drifter Man]

Right, I've also seen deer "slide" - move without any running animation - on a few occasions when on the run.

Well, anyway - I just wanted to share the observation.