I added a new particle system to the game with new fire particles for explosions. (looks really good)
-got rid of "hovering" while firing missiles
-slight performance increase
-exterminated bugs
I also figured out why my old particle systems were so laggy! The problem was NOT the number of particles rendered to the screen at one time! (in fact that is really easy on the gpu), it's the fact that I was CREATING new sprites every time I needed one. Doing so takes about 50 milliseconds. When making one it's unnoticeable, but like 600. almost 30 seconds of lag time. YEAH OOPS
Instead of creating new sprites when I need them, I can create them at launch time, then RECYCLE them as I need new ones. (dead ones go to unused list, then when I need one, it grabs one from there)
I also need to put the games calculations and rendering into 2 separate threads, the calculation thread being timed. This would boost FPS by like 200. >_<