Looks Like Far Cry will support 3dc, AMD 64, and HDR

[AlNom]

question about farcry right now....

does it use DXTC5?

 

[jpaana]

It might be possible if D3D allowed seperate alpha and color blending modes.

It does since 9.0, just use renderstates D3DRS_SEPARATEALPHABLENDENABLE, D3DRS_SRCBLENDALPHA, D3DRS_DESTBLENDALPHA and D3DRS_BLENDOPALPHA for the alpha operation, the defaults are then used for color only. You should check for D3DPMISCCAPS_SEPARATEALPHABLEND, but all (current) ps 2.0+ hardware supports it anyway.

 

[ERP]

It might be possible if D3D allowed seperate alpha and color blending modes.

It does since 9.0, just use renderstates D3DRS_SEPARATEALPHABLENDENABLE, D3DRS_SRCBLENDALPHA, D3DRS_DESTBLENDALPHA and D3DRS_BLENDOPALPHA for the alpha operation, the defaults are then used for color only. You should check for D3DPMISCCAPS_SEPARATEALPHABLEND, but all (current) ps 2.0+ hardware supports it anyway.

Shows how much I keep up with DX API developments

FWIW I'm still not certain that this is sufficient. I'd have to actually try and implement it.

 

[DeanoC]

You don't need that amount of precsion for convincing HDR and I'd imagine we'll see different framebuffer formats in future cards that are somewhat optimised for HDR purposes.

FP16 is overkill for lots of HDR, first saving is the sign bit (negative light makes no sense here). That leaves us with 45 bits, getting that down to 32 bit isn't that much of a stretch. Only 13 bits to lose, 4.33 bits per component.

 

[fallguy]

Does AA work with HDR? I thought I read somewhere (here) it didnt.

I believe nvidia's fp blending hdr will not function with AA. I don't know about the method they used for r3xx with hl2.

So you cant use it in the whole game? Or just certain parts of the game "wont work" with AA?

 

[KimB]

What would the difference be? FP framebuffer has better gradient/transitions? (BTW-Thanks for the AA/HDR info, I still won't give up AA until I get a monitor that can do 16x12@85Hz.)

No, because you if you don't have FP blending, you can only realistically do HDR rendering if:

1. Your rendering is all one-pass, which severely limits what sorts of lighting algorithms you can run on PS 2.x hardware, or
2. You sacrifice the quality of your HDR rendering when blending. This, in particular, may be a really bad thing to do because its output could potentially depend upon the order of rendering, the number of lights, etc.

 

[DeanoC]

No, because you if you don't have FP blending, you can only realistically do HDR rendering if:

1. Your rendering is all one-pass, which severely limits what sorts of lighting algorithms you can run on PS 2.x hardware, or
2. You sacrifice the quality of your HDR rendering when blending. This, in particular, may be a really bad thing to do because its output could potentially depend upon the order of rendering, the number of lights, etc.

3. Use flip-flop between 2 targets
Unreal Engine 3 and other do HDR without FP Blending with little speed reduction. The flip-flop technique isn't that slower in actual usage on current hardware.

 

[KimB]

I suppose that's true, but you still can't do any blending routines, which nixes any transparent objects (including smoke and fire, which would be very common....).

 

[jvd]

SHouldn't hdr have the side affect of smoothing edges anyway ?

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Something else I picked up on the XBit review of Farcry v1.2 NV40 vs X800

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/farcry30.html

On page 4 they bring up an issue with Shadows(at the bottom). Seems like the NV40 renders shadows incorrectly. Could this be one of the reasons for the performance increase?

Just a little above that, there is also something else I noticed.(pics path below)

http://www.xbitlabs.com/misc/picture/?src=/images/video/farcry30/archive_x800.jpg&1=1
http://www.xbitlabs.com/misc/picture/?src=/images/video/farcry30/archive_geforce6.jpg&1=1

If you look at the gun(halfway), there is a shadow that gets rendered on the X800 that doesn't on the NV40. Actually it seems the NV40 has cut it out completely.

Is Nvidia cuttings corners here to try get some performance increase back?

Someone should look at the older Farcry patches(v1.1) and have a look if the NV40 is rendering those scenes correctly.

US

 

[pino]

Something else I picked up on the XBit review of Farcry v1.2 NV40 vs X800

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/farcry30.html

On page 4 they bring up an issue with Shadows(at the bottom). Seems like the NV40 renders shadows incorrectly. Could this be one of the reasons for the performance increase?

Just a little above that, there is also something else I noticed.(pics path below)

http://www.xbitlabs.com/misc/picture/?src=/images/video/farcry30/archive_x800.jpg&1=1
http://www.xbitlabs.com/misc/picture/?src=/images/video/farcry30/archive_geforce6.jpg&1=1

If you look at the gun(halfway), there is a shadow that gets rendered on the X800 that doesn't on the NV40. Actually it seems the NV40 has cut it out completely.

Is Nvidia cuttings corners here to try get some performance increase back?

Someone should look at the older Farcry patches(v1.1) and have a look if the NV40 is rendering those scenes correctly.

US

nah, shots are just taken in different positions.

Also actually i think ATI cards don't render shadows at all on guns with Farcry 1.1 at very high setting, while Nvidia cards do it correctly.
(maybe that was fixed in one of lastest catalyst, not sure cause i don't have an x800 anymore )

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Well maybe those pics are shadows .. but the issue XBit brought up about the shadow on the gun(bottom of page 4) is an issue. Those shadows of the NV40 is all blocky(reminds me of the blocky shadows in DX7/DX8 games).

http://www.xbitlabs.com/images/video/farcry30/radeon_shadows.jpg
http://www.xbitlabs.com/images/video/farcry30/geforce_shadows.jpg

One has to wonder when/how this will get fixed.

 

[Cryect]

Umm assuming I'm looking at the right part (underneath that button and switches on the gun and above the hand on that indention) both the ATI and Nvidia card have a shadow. The Nvidia card seems to be drawing the gun what appears to be more correct (there is black that seems to fit in better than the gray ATI's is drawing) and due to the difference in it being black its harder to see the shadow but its there.

Either that or I don't know what you are talking about . (both seem to have shadows under the eye piece but I'm guessing those are really just part of the texture).

Its obvious the shadows though in those other pics.

 

[London Geezer]

Well, the shadows look MUCH better on my 5900U. Those are just awful compared to the IQ i get from my 5900U.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Well, the shadows look MUCH better on my 5900U. Those are just awful compared to the IQ i get from my 5900U.

So maybe it's a driver issue?

US

 

[jvd]

btw is the new patch out yet ? I went to the site to check for it and couldn't find it

 

[pino]

btw is the new patch out yet ? I went to the site to check for it and couldn't find it

no it's not.

 

[jvd]

Heh. Oh well

 

[Unknown Soldier]

It doesn't seem so. Last I read Crytek said they gonna update v1.2 since the patch seems to have some graphics issues with ATI cards.

 

[jvd]

It doesn't seem so. Last I read Crytek said they gonna update v1.2 since the patch seems to have some graphics issues with ATI cards.

thats why i wanted it. THe version i have has the problems. But i thought they told driverheaven it was fixed in the release coming on tuesday