Rage PC patch to improve 'blurry' textures

Rage's "blurry" textures got you down? Fret no more, for id Software's techno-wizard John Carmack says that a new option in the next PC patch "will help alleviate" the problem.

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Rage's "blurry" textures got you down? Fret no more, for id Software's techno-wizard John Carmack says that a new option in the next PC patch "will help alleviate" the problem.

"We have a bicubic-upsample+detail texture option for the next PC patch that will help alleviate the blurry textures in Rage," Carmack revealed on Twitter. It'll look prettier, you see.

Asked whether id would also be releasing higher-resolution textures, Carmack's reply made it look unlikely.

"Our first test of a higher res page file didn't help much, because most source textures didn't actually have any more detail," he responded.

There's no word yet on when this PC patch will arrive, nor what else might be in it.

From The Chatty
  • reply
    October 17, 2011 6:15 AM

    Alice O'Connor posted a new article, Rage PC patch to improve 'blurry' textures.

    Rage's "blurry" textures got you down? Fret no more, for id Software's techno-wizard John Carmack says that a new option in the next PC patch "will help alleviate" the problem.

    • reply
      October 17, 2011 6:19 AM

      Can't see this helping much- also, how the heck are detail textures going to be implemented in a megatexture without a ton of work? Procedural noise?

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        October 17, 2011 6:20 AM

        Carmack Magic (TM)

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        October 17, 2011 7:41 AM

        It's very easy to apply the same detail texture everywhere. This will look better than nothing, but it's limited.

        The problem is that you need different detail textures for different regular textures to look best.

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          October 17, 2011 10:06 AM

          They have a material buffer, no? Could that not be used to index into a set of detail textures?

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      October 17, 2011 6:23 AM

      Out of the blue Rage is freezing for a second every minute or so. It was working fine and i didn't change anything. Any ideas as to what happen and how to fix it?

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        October 17, 2011 6:30 AM

        mine did that after i applied the last patch. ended up restarting my computer and it hasn't done it since. no idea why it happened or how it got "fixed", though :/

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        October 17, 2011 7:13 AM

        What is your VSync set to? And is your graphics card trying to override it?

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        October 17, 2011 9:11 AM

        I got this when I had GPU Transcoding ON. Turn that off if you have a decent processor. That option is only if you have a slow cpu.

        What transcoding does is it uses a certain percentage of you GPU's cycles to compute texture swapping/ decompression into the GPU's memory (my knowledge of the exact wordage is blunted). If you've ever used Nvidia Physx in a game you know how your game can slow down because of this. Better to let your CPU do all the computational heavy-lifting and feed it to your graphics card.

    • Ziz legacy 10 years legacy 20 years
      reply
      October 17, 2011 6:24 AM

      And what's it matter PC gamers are the 1%

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      October 17, 2011 6:25 AM

      This is really unfortunate that it wasnt being implemented on release date. The blurry texture really detracts from the experience, especially since 70% of the gameplay would be spent indoor/outdoor 'corridors' where you can (or sometimes have to) get close to different objects. I already finished the game (about 14 hours not rushed and finished all quests + minigames) and I personally found it very weak in terms of replayability and story.

      Seems like the only thing that might bring this game back into my radar is either a long expansion, or a mod tools so modders can actually create something worthwhile playing.

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      October 17, 2011 6:29 AM

      This is another reason I don't buy games on release data anymore, more so lately it appears better to wait a couple months before you buy a PC game.

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        October 17, 2011 7:06 AM

        Agreed. Much cheaper too! I've got enough in my queue to wait for $20 or less

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        October 17, 2011 7:14 AM

        Are you buying Skyrim on launch?

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          October 17, 2011 7:20 AM

          Skyrim is going to be the first game that is at the top of my to-buy list but I won't purchase around the release date. I am going to wait for the inevitable big patches and user mods to streamline what will likely be a consolized interface. A high rez texture mod would be nice too; the ones done for Oblivion and Fallout were excellent.

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          October 17, 2011 7:23 AM

          I am, although I'm hoping my Dark Souls fever subsides a little by then. It isn't looking too likely.

          I'm also getting the mammoth hard-cover guide for Skyrim. Fucking 600 pages!

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          October 17, 2011 7:28 AM

          No, right now I'm gaming on a budget. ME3 will probably be the only game I get on release day for while. I want Skyrim for sure but it's gonna have to wait.

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            October 17, 2011 7:49 AM

            ...but you just said you don't buy games on release date anymore?

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              October 17, 2011 7:55 AM

              I said "probably" I really want to finish the ME series (great games).

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                October 17, 2011 8:10 AM

                So in other words you're just doing what everyone else does (hold off on buying a game on release unless it interests you) only you're presenting it in such a way that it implies that you're somehow doing something different than what everyone else does.

                id Software prior to RAGE had never bonered a game release on the PC. What's to say Bioware won't similarly boner ME3?

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                  October 17, 2011 8:13 AM

                  Fishing for an argument or what? I just posted a comment. Have a nice day.

                  • reply
                    October 17, 2011 8:20 AM

                    Nah, I'm just seeing a lot of people decrying preordering in the wake of the RAGE debacle and then talking about how they can't wait for Skyrim or Game X to come out so they can buy it as soon as it comes out. Just faulty logic is all, but no I'm not trying to get into an argument.

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                      October 17, 2011 8:28 AM

                      Oh I see, no I wasn't bashing RAGE, damn I still want to play it despite all the hate. I was just saying all the issues with PC games as of late your almost better off waiting for all the fixes and a better price.

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                        October 17, 2011 9:22 AM

                        The problem I had with buying RAGE when it came out is that I completed the game with blurry textures and bad performance, and then when the patch came out (and I added some cfg mods), the game ran perfectly and the textures were phenomenal. Had I waited a week I would have gotten the perfect RAGE experience, without a hiccup.

                        Nowadays you get penalized for being the first to play a game, or play on release. First-time buyers on the PC are what I call Beta Testers. Of course, there's no real way to protect against this, or to know beforehand what problems may occur (Radeon owners were surprised with RAGE, I hear).

                        I knew what I was getting into, and my anticipation of the game won out, but by a rule of thumb is it's probably better to wait until the first major patch, or at least give the smarter ones on the message boards time to come up with a workaround (which may take a day or two, at least) than to be the first to play a hobbled gaming experience.

                        Man, I hope that made sense - I haven't had my coffee yet today.

                        • reply
                          October 17, 2011 9:29 AM

                          When I use to buy games new that's how I felt a lot of the times.

      • reply
        October 17, 2011 8:31 AM

        Witcher 2, Portal 2, Deus Ex were all fine at launch for me. it's pretty random which company is going to screw the pooch next but not everyone is doing it.

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          October 17, 2011 8:33 AM

          That's good to hear, those 3 games are still on my to get list.

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        October 17, 2011 10:26 AM

        This is an even bigger problem on the on the PS3...

    • reply
      October 17, 2011 7:23 AM

      [deleted]

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      October 17, 2011 7:25 AM

      I don't get it, why weren't all these options available from day one?

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        October 17, 2011 7:39 AM

        because we're the 1%

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        October 17, 2011 8:54 AM

        As much as I love the game, the truth is they did not give a shit about the PC version what so ever.

        Console effort was number 1 mandate and the PC was lucky to even have been made.

        That's my take, its bullshit and whack the whole Rage PC launch.

        Having said that, I am weak and will take what I can get and am grateful that I can play it on the PC at all instead of say fuck you to Rage.

        • reply
          October 17, 2011 8:59 AM

          Lol from your post you make it sound like it's one of the worst console ports ever.

          It's nowhere near that bad, you should know better of all people.

          • reply
            October 17, 2011 9:25 AM

            :) I know but its freaking JC and id that made the game. You are 100% right its NOT the worst port by far, that is 100% sure there are way way worst ports its not even close to those levels of shit.

            I am only saying the launch was badly done that's all, and I think its safe to say most PC gamers expected more.

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              October 17, 2011 2:35 PM

              [deleted]

              • reply
                October 17, 2011 9:10 PM

                would you prefer if he qualified that by writing "for want of a better word"?

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              October 17, 2011 10:24 PM

              There was an article in where Carmack basically said it was a mistake to develop on the consoles and hes sorry. Some shacker linked to it a week or so ago.

              I guess this is id's way of saying we goofed up, sorry PC users :(

        • reply
          October 17, 2011 9:06 AM

          But you played it with a controllerrrrrrrr!!

          So did I, for the driving parts. Analog controls made that much better, and it worked very well for the 1 Road RAGE game I've played so far. \m/

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            October 17, 2011 9:12 AM

            I play the driving parts with mouse and keyboard. It's not Gran Turismo; you can e-brake turn anywhere if you get the timing right.

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              October 17, 2011 9:22 AM

              I played the first few hours sticking with M+KB for the driving as well as the FPSing. I'm not sure what made me bust out the controller (it may very well have been valcan_s's vid showing off his 3-monitor setup working properly), but it was much more natural to drive that way for me. They might have suckered me into trying a little bit of the shooting with the controller, too, if there separate invert controls for mouse and controller. But there aren't, and I need controllers to be inverted and mouse to be normal and that was going to be too much menu-hopping to bother with.

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            October 17, 2011 9:21 AM

            I played the whole game with a controller and it worked out lovely. I've got a GTX460 and at 1080 and everything maxed except for AA being at 8 instead of 16 and it is the best looking smoothest game I can think of.

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              October 17, 2011 9:24 AM

              Same, but I have a GTX 260. I wonder if the 460 is basically a 260 with more vRAM...

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              October 17, 2011 9:36 AM

              The smoothness of it really got me. I'm not one of those guys who turns everything down in order to get 1,000 fps, but I also never understood people who could stare at a 60hz CRT all day long without their eyeballs melting; I needed 85 to not get uncomfortable. I tinkered with the AA settings in RAGE (I usually force AA off in the driver) and hit a couple places where the fps would drop down to 50 or so and it was so immediately jarring that I went back and turned AA off to keep that silky 60 fps.

              • reply
                October 17, 2011 9:39 AM

                Refresh rate on CRT's is different, though. Low fps is crappy, but low refresh rate is a physical assault on your senses.

                Did you manage to get CSAA working? I like that one. Looks just about as good as regular multisampling but performs better.

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                  October 17, 2011 9:44 AM

                  I know, but I was trying to make the point that I can tell the difference between fps/refresh rates up to a point. Anyone who's played War for Cybertron on PC and used the FPS Unlocker has to be able to see the difference between 30/60.

                  Nah, I stopped bothering with AA altogether. Jaggies I can visually tune out much easier than I can fuzzy textures not that RAGE is innocent on that in many regards or AA-induced fps drops.

                  • reply
                    October 17, 2011 9:55 AM

                    I can tell the difference up to about 110. I think the Doom 3 engine took an unusually steep performance dive from AA, but I'm not sure if that applies to idTech 5.

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                      October 17, 2011 10:15 AM

                      I'll mess with it when I go for a Nightmare play through. I wanted to play it naively once, since I rarely do that nowadays, and then go for a 100% (minus the minigames, Five Finger can DIAF) with a wiki.

        • reply
          October 17, 2011 9:09 AM

          Blame Tim Willits for that; he was the one who was (figuratively, if not literally) slapping a developer's hand if they tried to play the game with a mouse.

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            October 17, 2011 9:28 AM

            Oh, probably because if you turn around too fast you'll see textures load. If you watch the demos they put out showing the 360 version, you'll notice all the turning is slow way-too-deliberate. Or not. Meh, it's a theory.

        • reply
          October 17, 2011 9:38 AM

          valcan, it pains me at how wrong you are.

          • reply
            October 17, 2011 9:53 AM

            I know they could of not bothered with the Cuda stuff if they really didn't care so maybe its a bit harsh but the game had a bad launch on the PC. I don't think I only feel this way.

            Until I mucked with the config files and really until the Oct 8th patch the game was in bad shape with the pop in textures and graphics in general, vsync, etc.

            You really think what happened at launch was no big deal, also considering their where no graphics options and the graphics where messed up pre patch?

            If you really want to get down to it try playing Rage on a nvidia system and do not force vsync and triple buffering in your nvidia control panel. Go ahead and see what happens, its brutal, you have to force these settings on or else the game chunks and is un playable. This is with the latest patch to btw and latest nvidia driver.

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              October 17, 2011 10:10 AM

              You play on an extremely non-standard platform. Do you know how many gamers I know of that have 3 screens and play at 5,760x1080? I'll spoiler it for you: one--just you.

              While I adore the fact that you're super into gaming, you've demonstrated time and time again that you don't understand that playing at a resolution that is that widescreen fucks up game logic unless the developers specifically decide to handle those cases. 5760x1080 is a 5.333:1 aspect ration. This is far, far away from the historical 4:3, nominal 16:10, and ubiquitous 16:9. A framebuffer that big also consumes a ton of video memory--anywhere between 200 and 300 megs of VRAM. This takes room away from the texture cache that is the heart of megatexturing.

              All of the problems that people had on ATI were because ATI released stone-dead broken drivers. There were tons of people--myself included--for whom the game played flawlessly on NVIDIA hardware. And for the record, I didn't touch a single setting in the nvidia control panel anywhere, the game worked with my vanilla r285 drivers and my 480. At 2560x1600, with 4xAA. I still stuck at 60 fps and experienced extremely little texture popping (no more than I expected).

              It's not id's fault that ATI botched their driver release. It's not id's fault that NVIDIA slipped the driver release which caused issues for some players.

              When PC gamers decry the efforts of developers like this, it's self-defeating. I'm gonna let you in on a little secret. The boys and girls at id spent literally months crunching to make sure that the game worked as well as possible on the PC, because for all intents and purposes the console was done.

              So please, please, please stop trying to read more into the debacle than was really there.

              • reply
                October 17, 2011 10:32 AM

                I don't think I am the only one, but fine if you say so. Those issues I mentioned happened on 1920x1080 in single screen mode as well. It was not just me with the graphical issues(obviously I tried single screen to see if it was a video mem was a issue like you have mentioned).

                Like I said the game still has vsync issues that force the user to have force triple buffering and vsync in your nvidia control panel(regardless the rez).

                I admit my comment was harsh and I took it back but to say that just the 5760x1080 config is what caused graphical issue and the ATI driver is not correct at all(from the Nets post, vids, and my experience with the game). Like I said I had these issues in one screen mode. Just look on youtube, and Steam forums there are a lot of users that had the issue(they where all single screen users).

                I think your a good guy I don't want any bad blood, lets just drop it. The current patch has fixed the main issues I had in 1920x1080 and 5760x1080 with the pop up and I can live with the vsync and triple buffering fix.

                I love the game I am not bashing it or nvidia, just the way the game was launched on day 1.

                Anyways I will not post about Rage launch anymore since its obviously offensive, I was only sharing my experience that others had as well.

                • reply
                  October 17, 2011 11:02 AM

                  http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey - 5760 x 1080 - 0.63%

                  Of all users in the world who have multiple monitors only .63% run that resolution. Unfortunately the stats don't list what percentage of users even have multiple monitors to begin.

                  • reply
                    October 17, 2011 11:07 AM

                    No need to get hung up on the Surround setup. The game lacked basic options and shipped in a state well below today's PC standards among developers of id's caliber. Those problems might've been easily and quickly fixed, but release is release.

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                      October 17, 2011 12:41 PM

                      This I don't know of for sure, so I'm neither representing id or nvidia when I say this.

                      My feeling is that what id was trying to do was bring the best part of the console experience to the PC--where you just fire up the game and everything just works. I think the goal was 60 Hz everywhere, and so they were basically going to tune for you, so there would be no need for settings (pretty much like the console).

                      If drivers and everything had been there, I think it would've been glorious.

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                        October 17, 2011 12:50 PM

                        If so, that should've been communicated well in advance. But isn't it true that a 1000 player closed beta test would've revealed these problems ahead of time? And yeah, given how "shallow" (i.e. not based on fundamentally poor tech or design) the problems were, it should've been glorious.

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                          October 17, 2011 1:06 PM

                          Well in advance? Try every time carmack opened his mouth to talk about the engine. It's been well communicated.

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                            October 17, 2011 1:24 PM

                            I mean more concretely. "If you are wondering about the lack of video options, it's because the game dynamically sets the detail levels in order to maintain 60 fps."

                            It's a very non-standard and un-PC way of doing things, and from id of all studios, so a quip like that might've saved some grief.

                • reply
                  October 17, 2011 11:37 AM

                  You can post what you want about RAGE, it's your right as a consumer. You laid down your money and was not happy with what you got. Plus I for one like reading both positives and negatives about a game because it lets me know what I'm getting into if I decide to get it. I do have a question for you about RAGE though, I play inverted/use the right mouse button "move forward", I also use the arrow keys instead of WASD, are all these re-mappable? This is always one of my gripes about a game that won't allow you to remap these keys.

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                    October 17, 2011 11:48 AM

                    I agree, some times I wish I was not so nice and would let out some of my other thoughts that I usually contain.

                    I will check this out when I get home and PM you, am at work right now.

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                      October 17, 2011 12:20 PM

                      Yeah I had a hard time containing myself with Homefront, in fact I don't think I did

              • reply
                October 17, 2011 11:55 AM

                Curious side note: why did you say "nominal" 16:10? Do you mean to infer that there are no true 16:10 aspect ratios or rendering options in games and that they're all made out to be either 4:3 or 16:9, or something else?

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                  October 17, 2011 12:39 PM

                  Whoops, I totally misused nominal. I just mean that it's a common, accepted aspect ratio, but not nearly as prevalent as 16:9. Apologies for the grammar fail confusion.

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                    October 17, 2011 12:44 PM

                    haha it's okay, I just thought I had missed something horrible and now I was in the twilight zone

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                    October 17, 2011 2:50 PM

                    I understood it in the context of the sentence.

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              October 17, 2011 10:16 AM

              The game was running fine on their end due to them having the proper drivers, which unfortunately were not released to the public.

              Also regarding the lack of graphics options, did you not hear how Carmack was parading 60fps? The idea was that you'd never need to mess with the graphics options because it would always set them to run at 60fps. Has nothing to do with consoles..

              I am running GTX 460s in SLI. SLI was causing issues (like it does in many other games) and I disabled it. Game runs fine now, rock solid 60fps and looks beautiful. I'm not forcing V-sync or triple buffering.

              Yes there are bugs and that sucks, but there is no need to go as far as accusing them of putting consoles first.

              • reply
                October 17, 2011 10:47 AM

                Did you try AFR 2? It helps sometimes.

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                  October 17, 2011 1:04 PM

                  I have not tried that - i will give it a go.

                  I also have a sneaking suspicion that there is something wrong with my 2nd card. I've seen some strange things happening, like parts of windows 7 UI drawing on top of itself (ie seeing windows behind other windows)

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                    October 17, 2011 2:41 PM

                    That is, "Force alternate frame rendering 2" under the SLI rendering option in nVidia Control Panel for exe-specific settings. I've used it to good effect in Doom 3, Quake 4 and The Witcher.

            • reply
              October 17, 2011 10:20 AM

              I played Rage at release on an nvidia system. Initially I did not force vsync or triple buffering.

              There was a lot of tearing and texture popping.

              The texture popping I fixed through editing a plain text configuration file. You know what games tend to be lacking when the developer literally does not give a shit about a platform?

              A plain text configuration file.

              Developers where the PC takes a back seat might have a plain text configuration file, but the options tend to be limited. id did what id does -- exposed every fucking variable they have. Literally thousands of cvars exist so you can modify to no end.

              You didn't have to mod the game. The term "mod" has been so bastardized over the past five years that it's lost all meaning. Dropping a text file with a few configuration settings is not a mod -- it's something the game already supports. You didn't have to bust open a binary editor and change the 53rd bit to 0x34 to get shit to work -- you just set a variable.

              Yes, the graphics options were somewhat sparse, but they were fine for most users. Power users were going to go elsewhere anyway.

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            October 17, 2011 10:06 AM

            Also I am curious was Cuda feature your guys initiative or ids?

            Also I take back this "they did not give a shit about the PC version what so ever" they did care just not enough.

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              October 17, 2011 10:24 AM

              The pc version is fine, it just sucks that they thought they could get away with not doing a pc specific pass on the interface. It would have taken a fairly junior dev a week to do, and would have made a huge difference to people's impression of the pc version. I love the game, but the interface constantly annoys me.

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                October 17, 2011 10:34 AM

                This is exactly what I posted before(totally agree), I have no idea why it was left out. For that fact I am not sure why so many companies leave it out the PC specific interface for graphic options, fov, etc.

              • reply
                October 17, 2011 12:43 PM

                If you're referring to graphics options, this is my take on that: http://www.shacknews.com/article/70635/rage-pc-patch-will-improve-blurry-textures?id=26913279

                • reply
                  October 17, 2011 1:12 PM

                  Why on earth would you ever want to employ such a feature for a PC game? Are you saying its a good idea or not, whats your opinion?

                  This feature has no place in a PC game that is not how the platform works.

                  To me this is the worst thing one could ever introduce for any PC game. My strong opinion is that if any one was a PC gamer, enthusiast and in the industry for a long time you would know to never ever consider such a design in a PC game.

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                    October 17, 2011 1:23 PM

                    I think it's a brilliant idea for the PC--if you can get it to work properly. If you decide that a p0 feature for your game is that you want 60 Hz always with the best possible settings that will allow 60 Hz, then what is there to tweak apart from resolution?

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                      October 17, 2011 3:33 PM

                      What if you don't like:

                      -AA
                      -Depth of Field
                      -HDR
                      - Bloom
                      -Motion Blur
                      -Want to sacrifice AF settings for better performance, etc
                      - Prefer huge LOD but will sacrifice other things
                      - Turn off Post effects
                      - Like a lot of particle effects.
                      - etc etc etc

                      And the list goes on and on and on. My point is that all PC gamers in my opinion want to be able to adjust these settings and want options. The whole point of playing games on a PC is that we have options and can play our games how we want.

                      I can play my games how ever I want its my choice not the dev or company.

                      If we are use a Dynamic setting feature you are basically telling the customer how they have to play the game and then its just like a console. You don't have a choice and for instance with Rage 60 FPS will be the key feature that sacrifices other things that the customer may not want or care about.

                      This is why I think its a terrible idea, it has no place in PC gaming.

                      If that is what PC gaming is going lean towards why bother, you might as well just play on on your 360 or PS3.

                      No this is a very bad idea, that's just my opinion, I really doubt many PC gamers would want to go this path of no choice.

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                        October 17, 2011 3:37 PM

                        Creating a comprehensive UI for all that shit would be unwieldy, and unused for everyone except you. And even if they went through all that effort to create a UI with a few dozen nobs and whistles, you'd just download a config file to use anyway.

                        id's solution was fantastic, except it was missing couple important options (vsync being the most notable).

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                          October 17, 2011 3:42 PM

                          It is not unwieldy at all and has been done for many years. I've done it myself. There's nothing to it. You just need a couple hours. People like to make up reasons not to have those options but they are all wrong.

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                            October 17, 2011 3:47 PM

                            He's increasing the normal number of options by quite a bit, and then leaving it open ended with "...".

                            WoW has most of that stuff exposed, and I'd say it's in the "unwieldy" part. Sure, you can parse it all, but I'd put money down that the bulk of those options go unused (or not even understood) by the overwhelming majority of players.

                            Also, keep in mind he's not just arguing for the ability to change them -- he's arguing for an in-game option.

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      October 17, 2011 7:39 AM

      guess I'll wait a bit for my second playthrough

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      October 17, 2011 7:45 AM

      [deleted]

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        October 17, 2011 7:53 AM

        Go right up to a bunch of different things in the game. Many things in the game look muddy up close, but great from a distance. It's either a glitch in the game engine (i.e., the crazy high texture that's part of that 23GB it takes up on your hard drive should be what's there) or they've just devised some method of making it look better. Or we'll have another 10GB or so to download next week.

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          October 17, 2011 9:30 AM

          I've noticed that 7 gigs goes to JUST the multiplayer portion. I wonder if I can safely delete that. The folder name is "mp". That's multiplayer stuff, right?

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        October 17, 2011 9:02 AM

        It looks fantastic on mine, too, GTX 560. I honestly haven't noticed anything worse than the majority of games, and most of the time the game looks incredible. I really think it's a work of art, it's got some of the absolute best visuals I've seen in any game ever. Some of the vistas are incredible, they look like concept art. Going up close to textures looks perfectly fine, about the same amount of detail as in any game, or at least nothing noticeably bad. I've loved the game since the moment I started playing it, the megatextures are fantastic, it's awesome not having tiled textures everywhere, everywhere I look I see a unique scene, it looks like an incredible amount of work has gone into it, I think the developers should be congratulated.

        And it's not just the textures, the geometry looks unique everywhere too, every building looks uniquely shaped inside and out, with terrific detail and very artistic execution. It's one of the most visually enjoyable games I've ever played, I spend long minutes just admiring the graphics, I'm totally blown away by it. The amount of work in the intricate level design and in the textures really blows me away.

        Yes, the textures aren't ultra-high resolution everywhere you look, but where they're not, they are still high enough not to mar the overall effect for me. I love the graphics in this game, they are a real achievement, well done id. I'm sorry for everyone who's had technical problems, I know that is a real pain in the ass, but at the same time it's clear a hell of a lot of work and effort and creativity has gone into this game, and it's really paid off, at least for me. Damn good game!

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          October 17, 2011 9:14 AM

          Non-tiling textures as such sounds very appealing, pity that they didn't get a better entrance.

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        October 17, 2011 9:16 AM

        I'm on a GTX 285 and it looks like Fallout 3.

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          October 17, 2011 11:46 AM

          OK, they're not as high as they could be, but I completely failed to notice that while playing, because there are plenty of good, detailed textures too, and lots of detail in each area, which distracts you from examining every tiny object and obsessing over them. I think some people are obsessing over perfection just a bit too much. In an ordinary playthrough you don't really notice those things, or at least I didn't, because there is so much else going on visually.

          I did notice some textures weren't brilliant, but I still felt they were good enough. They could have been better, but I don't think the game is a disaster on the PC, I've been very impressed by the visuals overall, particularly the design and art direction, the variety of textures and the detailed, varied modelling on buildings and interiors.

          Suggesting that id didn't put any effort into making the game look good is wrong, I think, it's clear they've put a huge amount of effort into the game, I think the visuals are incredible in most places, particularly the dead city, but elsewhere too. The amount of detail in the geometry (complicated, unique surfaces everywhere, particularly indoors) and the lack of texture tiling compensates for the occasional slightly lower-res texture most of the time, for me. I love the graphics, I think they're amazing, and easily up there with the best-looking games I've ever played.

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        October 17, 2011 9:35 AM

        lol, virtually everything except for player models look like GARBAGE up close - GTX 570 here too.

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        October 17, 2011 10:09 AM

        Rage isn't beautiful on any machine. Go fire up Metro 2033 and you can partake in realtime rendered beauty.

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          October 17, 2011 6:20 PM

          I was actually playing Metro 2033 right before Rage came out. Rage is a beautiful game, the vistas are generally rather stunning and the animation is absolutely fantastic. The only issue I've got with it is when you get right up close to something the textures look a bit muddy. Metro 2033 looks nice, but I really wouldn't call it beautiful.

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          October 17, 2011 11:06 PM

          Technical beauty, maybe. Rage will lose any comparison of raw resolution but its artistry is first-rate.

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      October 17, 2011 8:47 AM

      Hey Dognose have you played RAGE yet?

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      October 17, 2011 8:48 AM

      "Our first test of a higher res page file didn't help much, because most source textures didn't actually have any more detail,"

      well - that's really bad , come on !

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      October 17, 2011 8:55 AM

      Techno-wizard. Love it. Carmack's a real cyber-guru.

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      October 17, 2011 9:02 AM

      Okay, but are there any plans to overhaul the PC version UI? I don't know if "Press Enter" is part of the GFW technical requirements, but it's dumb, and anyone at Id who played Rage with WASD and mouse could have seen that it was dumb.

      ...oh wait, Tim Willits forced everyone at Id to playtest Rage with a 360 controller. Now that they know they can make a good controller game, can they please focus on making a good PC game UI again? They did a brilliant job with Doom 3's menu, and then threw that all away with Rage's menu.

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        October 17, 2011 9:37 AM

        That "Press Enter" crap gets on my nerves. Don't even get me started on non-skipable intros, GAH!

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          October 22, 2011 6:08 PM

          cant help you with the press enter bit but if you add the below command line to your launch options you will skip the intros.

          +set com_skipIntroVideo 1 +set g_fov 96 +set m_rawinput 1

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        October 17, 2011 2:39 PM

        I hate games that do this. Fallout 3 was a good example, while it was a good game (with mods) the PC ui was so stupid - fonts the size of my fist and 3 items at a time in my inventory? At a 2560x1440 resolution?

        Fucking assholes. At least take a week to make a proper goddamn PC ui. Fuck.

        • reply
          October 20, 2011 2:25 AM

          DarnifiedUI for Fallout 3 is all you need m8. Fixes that console interface nightmare made for people with 5 brain cells and gives you a nice, PC interface.

          Google it broheem, you won't regret it.

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      October 17, 2011 9:18 AM

      Does this mean stuff like the license plates in the garage at the beginning will be clearer?

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      October 17, 2011 10:12 AM

      Here is a great example of what detail textures are and how they can help:

      http://blog.wolfire.com/2009/12/Detail-texture-color-matching

      • reply
        October 17, 2011 10:44 AM

        Clever. Looks pretty good.

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      October 17, 2011 11:04 AM

      [deleted]

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        October 17, 2011 2:10 PM

        speak for yourself, Gabe is now going to get all my lovins.

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          October 17, 2011 2:43 PM

          sends viagra your way. You'll be needing it.

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            October 17, 2011 2:52 PM

            This one time while I was working at a hospital, one of the ward patients was so fat that she had mold in between her fat folds, and a friend of mine told me that when doing her morning rounds that there was a partial sandwich stuck in one of her fat folds.

            I dunno but I just remembered that

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              October 17, 2011 3:39 PM

              Did it get absorbed into her body? I read a story about that once, where the sandwich was actually absorbed through the skin and the doctors found it between layers of fat. Reminded me of Akira.

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      October 17, 2011 11:45 AM

      i "love" "unnecessary quotes"

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      October 17, 2011 11:48 AM

      I am just amazed that I get 60fps on my 4870 and it looks phenominal.

      I had to install the beta drivers, but they seem to work just fine for everything.

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      October 17, 2011 12:29 PM

      [deleted]

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      October 17, 2011 9:26 PM

      Can't wait to see what this engine can do in future id and bethesda games, the smoothness of all the animations are amazing... all it needs is lots more detail in all textures, not just in some of them.

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        October 17, 2011 10:05 PM

        That's not a good idea or realistic. Do you really want to waste 20 gigs of space and the associated processing on textures you'll never look at up close?

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          October 17, 2011 10:54 PM

          Well, you only need the high-res textures for those things you can get close to, which the designers and artists would know, so they could add the ability for the editor to tag surfaces as "approachable" or not, and cap the max resolution of those surfaces you'll never close to (like the rocks/cliffs in Rage). Could also look at the surface area (in world units) and decide on how much texel space to allocate.

          Virtual texturing is just getting started. There will be lots of optimizations made and new ways to use it.

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          October 17, 2011 11:52 PM

          Disk space is a non-factor these days.

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        October 17, 2011 10:18 PM

        Bethesda has shitty animators and character artists. No engine will help that.

    • reply
      October 19, 2011 12:23 AM

      "Kola-Kong"? Wow, real original.

Hello, Meet Lola