. You know, being a pirate is not bad,
And if there is no money, then good.
Watch a new movie at home,
You’ll download more music later.
I’m proud of my country. For Russia
What is prohibited is allowed.
Our Russian can steal beautifully,
What I couldn’t do was stolen long ago.
©Heliney
Hello everyone who clicked on this material! I am especially happy for those who can afford ports without improvements at almost full price. If you are one of those, contact me and give me some coffee. This way, you’ll be making a much wiser investment by supporting a struggling author rather than a greedy publisher.
Others can familiarize themselves with this material. In it I tried to give Bloody Atonement the appearance of a restored version, and from, perhaps, the weakest current console – Nintendo Switch (everything was implemented on the Ryujinx emulator version 1.1.999).
First, it’s worth deciding what a “remaster” is, otherwise what’s the point of doing anything if it’s already been released by an AAA publisher??
Remastering a video game involves taking an old game and bringing it up to modern standards. Remasters typically release consoles at least one generation later to take advantage of newer hardware.
Translation of an article from a foreign publication about technology
A remaster usually means that the original game has been visually enhanced and adapted for modern platforms. In this case, graphics, sound and possibly controls can be improved, but the main plot and gameplay remain unchanged. Remasters usually retain the original feel and style of the game, but make it more appealing to modern audiences.
ChatGPT
As we can see from the wording, the latest release of RDR 1 on consoles cannot be called a full-fledged remaster due to the small number of improvements. This is confirmed by experts from Digital Foundry:
This is a game that doesn’t really need an overhaul to run properly on modern systems, but even so it’s a very bare bones effortwork with minimal effort).
There are no improvements to textures, models, high frame rate options. The interface still consists of 720p assets, there is no updated version for Xbox and PC, no new post-processing effects and the game now suffers from serious animation issues during some cutscenes.From DF technical analysis
After such a conclusion, it is easy to wonder: “what was done then?”?"and in response we have two points – increased resolution (2160p on PS5, PS4 Pro and 1080p on PS4) and a new type of anti-aliasing – FSR 2. Yes, it’s anti-aliasing, not upscaling, because rendering is in honest 4K. And if everything is clear with the first one, then what is hidden under the three letters – FSR?
FSR 2 – is a multi-frame upscaling technology for restoring fine geometric and textural details. It creates a smoothed image from the input data. Depth buffer required for operation (it stores the object’s distance from the player’s camera) and motion vector (history of an object’s change in space over a certain period of time)
Pictures with comparisons
How are things going with this on PC?? And here the first difficulty arises – due to compatibility problems, emulator developers had to cut out FSR 2, leaving players with only SMAA, which already works with a single ready-made frame and cannot demonstrate an equally smooth picture.
This needs to be solved using methods that do not require intervention in the executable code, that is, post-processing (like the aforementioned SMAA). And the most powerful application will help us, including a sea of post-effects – ReShade. I’m sure many of you have at least heard about this program or even tried to customize the game’s color palette using it.
An example of the effect on the image of the most used set of Reshade libraries for working with the image "SweetFX".
But Reshade is not the only one who lives by SweetFX. Even if all the data we have is just a rendered frame, fortunately the algorithms do not stand still and we can also take a lot of information from it.
But first you need to install the above software. Everything here couldn’t be simpler, although there are still a couple of nuances, so I’ll show you all the starting steps.
We put the installer in a convenient folder, because everything is downloaded for each game separately (you can create a shortcut and transfer it to your desktop)
The next step is to select the render API. For the emulator you need to use Vulkan (after setting it in the settings)
I won’t go into https://fruityvegascasino.co.uk/bonus/ details about what it is, because it’s enough to put the appropriate item in the settings (options -> settings -> graphics -> graphics backend:Vulkan)
To remove monitoring, close the program by clicking "cross"
We wait until everything is downloaded (literally a few megabytes), and then we go here and here, add the contents of the archives according to the instructions in the repository. These libraries add motion vectors (cm. about them in the spoiler about FSR) and TAA, smoothing out "ladders".
Those who are lost after seeing the contents of the Github pages can download the archives by clicking here and here (direct links from the site), move the files to the Shaders folder (emulator directory-> reshade-shaders -> Shaders)
Now it’s important: due to the nature of the algorithms, you need to put exactly the same emulator resolution that your monitor has. Without this, everything may not work/work incorrectly. Configured in the same place as the render API. At the same time, set SMAA to high or ultra.
Just in case, let me remind you that RDR 1 works with a resolution of 720p in portable mode and 1080p in docked mode. Based on this, you need to select the appropriate scaling value.
After these preparations, we can launch the game (preliminarily dumped from your console:), enter full-screen mode (F11 or Options -> Enter Fullscreen) and press the button Home (on the right side of the keyboard). Activate DRME And TFAA. Be sure to check that the first is higher than the second in the list, but both of these effects are at the very bottom.
If you did everything correctly, you should see an inscription at the top. To activate anti-aliasing, check the boxes as in the screenshot.
Yes, it may have become a little soapy, but the iridescent aliasing does not hurt your eyes, the difference will be clearly visible in motion.
Soft picture is good. But RDR 1 came out 13 years ago, and then we could only dream of believable lighting.
And here it’s not just anyone who comes into play, but the whole ray tracing, that is, a method for processing honest GI. However, there are nuances everywhere, and in our case, it lies in the fact that the algorithm only works in screen space, so all objects that we cannot see cannot affect the image. However, even with such a limitation, this feature can significantly transform the graphics in a not-so-recent project. Take a look for yourself:
How to install this miracle? Just like everything else – transfer the archive files from the Textures and Shaders folders to the corresponding Reshade directories. (see spoiler with TFAA installation, readme and license files can be ignored). You can download the archive, it’s good searching😉
Even the gamma of the scene has changed a little and we can enhance the effect by using HDR (creates dynamic contrast that changes from frame to frame) and bloom (blurs the light on the bright edges of the scene). For my taste, the picture turns out prettier this way.
Now let’s look at the whole picture:
Well, in my opinion, the result is extremely good. Yes, perhaps stale textures and models are still striking, but you must agree that learning the story of John Marston in this form will be much more pleasant.
In addition, the Ryujinx developers are already testing the replacement of textures at home and soon our hand-made remaster can be well supplemented.
And of course, all this is not given for free. My RTX 3060 has difficulty showing 30 fps at 1440p, when without all the effects we get an almost stable 60. But for me such sacrifices are justified.
By the way, here is a link to a preset with ready-made settings
Just place .ini file to any directory and specify the path to it in the running Reshade
A short afterword
And again, what happened more than once is repeated – players complete projects for the developers, making not just super improvements, but adding basic things that, in an amicable way, should already be on release. At the same time, others continue to take the bait, maintaining about zero efforts from their wallets.
There is a strong feeling that if you refuse to buy such “remasters”, you can buy a full-fledged PC, which will improve any project for free, and at the same time make it clear to the creators of dubious products that ordinary players have no interest in such lazy work. I hope someone does this.
And also me highly recommend like blog, subscribe at me, leave a comment and stay tuned for updates. If such reading captivates you, I’m sure you won’t be disappointed. Thank you for your attention!
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Best comments
So I’ll fit into the graphon Old Believers and earlier grass-greening.
I had minor experience with the reshade of Gothic 1, Obla and Skyrim. Feelings are polar. I’ll try to describe in my own words, purely on emotions (which is of course bad, but I’m not a real welder)
Well, like a reshade – in Gothic, enthusiasts rewrote the dx7 render for dx11. Even without having the source code, we organized the interception of drawing commands, and after tinkering with the settings, the game becomes even cooler: the color range increases (dark darker/light lighter), shadows became clear and dynamic. Descending into the dungeon of the crawlers with a torch or the Temple of the Sleeper with its orange-blue lighting conveying notes of plot madness is simply mind-boggling. The artistic style has been preserved, as well as the general color scheme – the atmosphere of the game has only benefited from this.
Reshade was massively replicated during the time of Skyrim – it was some kind of crap. Maybe everything is fine there now, but then I remember strangely “sparkling” textures and an unnatural shift in the color palette (as if Hue had been turned into filters). Like, technically, it’s also probably normal, but Skyrim is like a gloomy Nordic RPG and all sorts of “shiny things” hurt the eyes. Perhaps I still had to find some correct texture pack, but Kamon, the game still looks good. “Improving a Legendary” is not a rewarding task in itself.
So in general, yes – I’m for the original. Or for mods that very slightly (almost imperceptibly) improve the graphics without interfering in any way with the vision of the developers. And there are quite a few of them, I suppose.
Just a byte for comments, downvote for that, guys?
I’m more than fine and on default graphics in all games.
Sorry for the multi-post. I can’t say anything about RDR itself. Don’t play games.
I’m surprised that half of the voters think that the original game doesn’t need graphical modifications. I wonder if this is just a small percentage of the sample or is it true that this is normal for many?
Come on, it’s also interesting to know about Skyrim. Now, of course, this is not the case, if everything works correctly. Maybe then the depth was poorly determined and therefore similar artifacts appeared, but specifically with RDR everything is fine.
Bro, people buy Series C, which is not exactly a modern gene. And sometimes they play at 486r. What graphic modifications are best?? Humanity is sometimes misunderstood
I didn’t have enough of the “too lazy to bother with installation” option there, so I clicked on this one . ♀️
Unfortunately, there is no one-button installation yet (or I haven’t found it). But it seems that everything is described in the blog as accessible as possible, so I recommend trying to play with a reshade, which can significantly transform the picture)