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Geforce FX and dx8 in HL2 at the Firing Squad
- Thread starter ^eMpTy^
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I thought this was let out of the bag by Gabe last year at Shader Day? He spoke then about the FX series being only able to handle "so much" in terms of HL2....
I dont think HL2 is gonna be out when they say itll be another 6 months before it is released then ID will finish Return to Castle Wolfentein Again yes that is the name of the next game there are making do some research and they are also doing Quake 4
The Batman
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Maybe they'll do a Steam release on Sept 1. I don't care either way, as long as the game is available. But yes, there's no way they'll make Sept 1 for an actual retail release. I'm betting Sept 30 for that.
Lord of Shadows
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So does this mean that there is no 32bit precision hdr and displacement mapping for the nv35?
chrisf6969
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It means, it doesnt matter. You can barely tell the difference between 8.0/8.1 & 9.0.
Granted 7.0 looks worse but not too bad considering how old DX 7.0 is.
Granted 7.0 looks worse but not too bad considering how old DX 7.0 is.
milling_hordesman
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well excuse me valve, but i wouldn't be running a dx8.1 PCX 5900 if you're close friends ATi released some of their x800's for PCIe. You want to help them out, get them to do that for me.
In most cases there may not be a noticable difference during gameplay, but for those instances where you stop and smell the roses it would have been nice to at least have the path available. The lack of support for FX series cards leaves a bad taste. . . . especially with the xchange of 6 million.
HDR (or at least its approximation) looks surprisingly good in DX7 mode. Its the same with GuildWars, I am impressed at how a DX7/8 fixed function emulation can end up looking so good.
Its good to see a game finally turn on and use some DX9 instructions though. Water especially looks good, I wonder how much better Nvidia could make their DX9.0c water effects by using even longer instructions, and/or if anyone would notice the difference.
Its good to see a game finally turn on and use some DX9 instructions though. Water especially looks good, I wonder how much better Nvidia could make their DX9.0c water effects by using even longer instructions, and/or if anyone would notice the difference.
It might be a comprimise. Its been suggested that if you did apples to apples, Nvidia would be slow on the HL2 engine, as it uses a lot of "standard" DX9.0 effects. HL2 being more of what like "nature" was in 3Dmark2001/3 IMO (and there are a lot of peeps who believe that benchmark was skewed to ATi)
Turning off a slow effect for one card is acceptable IMO as long as the gamers know that its being turned off or replaced with a lower precision or fixed function ability. I mean ATi has really slow fog and shadows, has been for ages. Nvidia seems to be lacking a little in compression quality/techniques, has been for ages... Will I knock either for trying to get around it? No, as long as they are upfront about it.
Turning off a slow effect for one card is acceptable IMO as long as the gamers know that its being turned off or replaced with a lower precision or fixed function ability. I mean ATi has really slow fog and shadows, has been for ages. Nvidia seems to be lacking a little in compression quality/techniques, has been for ages... Will I knock either for trying to get around it? No, as long as they are upfront about it.
CrimandEvil
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Anyone else perfer the way the 5950U looks? It looks better IMO except the water.
Its starting to come down to a matter of preference. I prefer the textures the way they are complex detail mapped on a DX9 renderer. Some people like the look of everything being slightly granularily mapped (sort of like how everyones face in Doom3 looked)
ATi put a lot of effort/speed into specialized bump/vertex mapping, like the wrinkles on the forehead of that guy in the Ruby demo.
Fire is getting better, but not perfect IMO. Water, other than having a physics engine can not get much better. As for true HDR lighting... Well, as long as the scene overall is bright enough, I don't see a problem with DX8 lighting honestly (it can only get as bright as monitor white)
ATi put a lot of effort/speed into specialized bump/vertex mapping, like the wrinkles on the forehead of that guy in the Ruby demo.
Fire is getting better, but not perfect IMO. Water, other than having a physics engine can not get much better. As for true HDR lighting... Well, as long as the scene overall is bright enough, I don't see a problem with DX8 lighting honestly (it can only get as bright as monitor white)
Silverghost
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^eMpTy^ said:
please learn to read.Firing Squad said:
edit: disregard. i now see that even with the commands the FX stays at 8.1. hmm, hopefully that will change.
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fallguy
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Shzitt said:Could be wrong, but forced 8.1 for FX cards just shows Valve is lazy. Could have at least added a mixed path for FX . . .
If Im not mistaken, Valve stated that they spent 6 months coding for the FX. Its been long ago I read that, but Im pretty sure it was from Valve, not some forum gibberish.
I remember the article as well. But with six months of coding couldn't they have added some 9 support to the FX? Not just forced 8.1. Also, I believe the coding they did was a result of shader day. In which case the FX performance is better, but still lacking dx9. which according to who you ask in not a bad thing. Personally I would prefer the option to sacrfice frame rates for the DX9 path. Not have it set in stone.
Brent_Justice
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^eMpTy^ said:
i know how to "benchmark" them, its real easy
just keep on doing it the way we've been doing it
finding out at what level each graphics card can play the game, and how the IQ compares, through that you can determine what kind of gampelay experience you'll have on each card
Shzitt said:
The problem with the Fx line when using the dx9 path if you force fp 16 path within dx9 it will crush them. Take a look at Far Cry when using the fp 16 path.
But now if thats not used heavy banding will occur. So maybe thats why Valve went with dx 8.1?
Brent_Justice
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rancor said:its not true HDR
dx9.0c adds interactive water at the vertex level, instead of the pixel level.
the point is it doesn't matter WHAT kind of HDR it is using, or how its accomplishing it, all that matters to gamers is the final output and how the image quality compares
CrimandEvil
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Thats was at the time of the Shader Day faux pas, things have changed since then.fallguy said:
Brent_Justice said:
True but you won't see that HDR in other parts of the game. Specially the outdoor scenes, at least thats just what I'm speculating unless they found a way around multiple passes to do it. (there is always a way, sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't)
Badger_sly
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CrimandEvil said:
I agree.
nVidia has a more sensible use of lighting and shadows whether it's with DX8.1 or DX9. It's most obvious when the same image is rendered side by side, one ATI and one nVidia, and it's even obvious in most screenshots. It's not really that nVidia's images are super great, but that ATI uses too much brightness which is not good, and therefore makes the nVidia image appear more realistic and better.
ATI with there last card series and their current series, whether it's hardware or driver related, seem to always go for the "Wow" affect similar to new televisions displayed in stores with the contrast and brightness cranked up to 100% to make the image stand out.
looking at HL 2's HDR and the glow effect.
I see a lot of similiarites.
In true HDR the entire scene is sent to a RT, then a composite of the scene is used for HDR (sm 3.0 takes 1 extra pass, any card less then sm 3.0 takes a minium of 2 extra passes, this is doable by any card with sm 2.0 and up, granted depending on how fast the card is can it be rendered at accepitiable speeds.
Now with the glow effect which is similiar to HDR but uses texture look ups for glow, any object that has the glow shader on it, will be sent to its own RT and then a composite is made. By doing individual RT's and using a texture lookup instead of calculating the glow amount, cards with sm 1.0 and up can be used. Now the next pass will go alot faster since the scene will be calculating alot less polygons. But end result not every object in the scene will be effected by HDR. Unless they all have a glow shader....
I see a lot of similiarites.
In true HDR the entire scene is sent to a RT, then a composite of the scene is used for HDR (sm 3.0 takes 1 extra pass, any card less then sm 3.0 takes a minium of 2 extra passes, this is doable by any card with sm 2.0 and up, granted depending on how fast the card is can it be rendered at accepitiable speeds.
Now with the glow effect which is similiar to HDR but uses texture look ups for glow, any object that has the glow shader on it, will be sent to its own RT and then a composite is made. By doing individual RT's and using a texture lookup instead of calculating the glow amount, cards with sm 1.0 and up can be used. Now the next pass will go alot faster since the scene will be calculating alot less polygons. But end result not every object in the scene will be effected by HDR. Unless they all have a glow shader....
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fallguy
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I believe they held the FX line to DX8.1, because they said it was too slow in DX9. NV said they could improve that, and they wanted DX9. Who knows for sure, if I still had my 5900NU, I would at least like the option to try DX9, and see if its too slow. Something like the new 3Dmark has in the option screen, the option to select PS2.0b, 3.0, etc. Its going to make reviews (yes people still lump then in with the new cards) hard to do apples to apples, when FX's use DX8.1, and 9500's on use DX9.
gumplunger
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1.) Sentences. They're good. Use them.rcf1987 said:
2.) 6 months is something you just pulled out of your ass.
3.) "Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Again" was the title of a few internet articles discussing the next Wolfenstein game. As of now, it's tentantively titled "Return to Castle Wolfenstein 2"
4.) The next Wolfenstein game, like Quake 4, is not being made by id. Q4 is being made by Raven and the maker of the Wolfenstein game isn't known, just that it's being shipped off to another developer.
5.) The next Wolfenstein game won't be out in the next 6 months.
6.) I think it's you that needs to do the research.
Badger_sly
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Agree. That post couldn't have been purposely made more difficult to read.gumplunger said:
True, he's incorrect. It's likely more than another year away.
Silverghost
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lolBadger_sly said:
please stop talking out of your ass.
I thought the coronas in Unreal Tourney 99 were awesome. They had this weird halo effect which perfectly mimic'd the halos I see when I first wake up in the morning
Other people complained that they were too bright, and they obscured the view of enemies... Well, yeah duh. That was the whole point, sort of like how I guess shadows in Doom 3 are supposed to make enemies harder to see.
Other people complained that they were too bright, and they obscured the view of enemies... Well, yeah duh. That was the whole point, sort of like how I guess shadows in Doom 3 are supposed to make enemies harder to see.
KayossZero
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ZenOps said:I thought the coronas in Unreal Tourney 99 were awesome. They had this weird halo effect which perfectly mimic'd the halos I see when I first wake up in the morning
Other people complained that they were too bright, and they obscured the view of enemies... Well, yeah duh. That was the whole point, sort of like how I guess shadows in Doom 3 are supposed to make enemies harder to see.
Yeah UT99 had great coronas, expecially in DM-Gothic, really made a diffrence having them on. Still such a beautiful game, loved the detailed textures too on DM-Agony when you looked at the two angels from afar just looked like stained glass, but when you got up close to them the detailed textures came alive and made them look almost like a giant tapestry.