- description

Bound by flame a third person rpg light by spiders the same
devs that would later create greedfall.
It's a bit chunky in all aspects, gameplay, level design
and narrative structure but still enjoyable.

Typical for games released in that time there is a lot of
bloom, fog, godrays and excessive contrast which, rather
obscure much detail in the game so to resurrect some of this detail
this package contains some tweaks realized with helix
(a precursor to 3dmigoto, works exclusively with dx9) and reshade.

Also added are some optional game tweaks which are:
library_camera.sli      - modifies the camera to more over the shoulder
game_components_pla.sli - makes combat much easier

update 31/07/2024 v1.1
- set shaders to full precision (remove _pp)
  clothes npc
  weapon
  environment and structures
  skin body npc and avatar
  full precision gives a bit more accurate color
  and definition to textures, etc.
- reduce glow glow map ice shards
- added ao (ambient occlusion) shader
- added curve shader

Helix tweaks contain:
- reduce bloom, vigenette and white clipping
- reduce hdr
- reduce excessive glow lamps and mist banks
- reduce fog brightness in distance
- reduce halo sky
- reduce vignette
- reduce overbright sky

Further a reshade tone map re-balances brightness, plus removes a slight
yellow tint and a 'poor mans form of tessellation' gives the assets
(cars, environment, etc) a bit of relief and more definition.
Also added smaa (so disable in game AA).

The screenshots contain AO (ambient occlusion) this is applied by
a slightly tweaked shader made by Pascal Matthäus aka Euda.
AO works rather so-so, and is quite expensive gpu wise.

Just in case you are wondering why I am using the ultimate asi loader
in this case without it the game crashes on startup, due to reshade
and a similar attempt with sweetfx, causes the game to crash on shut down.

The ultimate asi loader allows reshade to function without a hitch.

- uninstall

if version 1.0 is installed remove the following folders and files:

dumps
shaderoverride
sweetfx

d3d9.dll
d3d9.dll.hxdb
d3d9sfx2.dll
dx9settings.ini
SweetFX_preset.txt
SweetFX_settings.txt

- install

Copy the contents of the zip file to the install folder of
bound by flame, the folder which contains BoundByFlame.exe
with exception of the folder original and datalocal.

The folder 'datalocal' contains a camera mod and and a gamplay mod
if you want simply copy the folder 'datalocal' to the install dir
of bound by flame. (see further tweaking for more info)

- optional install

The following instructions are only needed
if you do not like using unverified dll's you can:

download helix from
http://helixmod.blogspot.com/
and place following file in the install dir of Bound by flame
d3d9.dll

Note:
This package contains a 'd3d9.dll.hxdb' this is the debug version
which allows shaders to be found in game, usage rename d3d9.dll to
d3d9.dll.o then rename d3d9.dll.hxdb to d3d9.dll and in some cases
set UseEndScene = false to UseEndScene = true in the dx9settings.ini

download the 'ultimate asi loader' (32bits) from:
https://github.com/ThirteenAG/Ultimate-ASI-Loader/releases

then copy the dinput8.dll 32bits version to the install dir
of bound by flame.

download reshade from
https://reshade.me/  (preferably version 4.9.1)

Note:
Because this package uses the 'ultimate asi loader' take care and
first rename the existing d3d9.dll (helix) to d3d9.dll.hx then
install *only* d3d9.dll (32bits) to the install dir aka folder
of bound by flame.

Rename:
d3d9.dll
to:
reshade.asi

Rename:
d3d9.dll.hx
to:
d3d9.dll

Then copy the reshade folder plus ReShade.ini and reshadep.ini
contained in this package to the install dir of bound by flame.

Note:
dx9settings.ini of helix contains the name of the linked proxy dll
in this case leave it empty ultimate asi loader chains reshade.

- verify

To test the shaderfixes you will have to start and the restart
the game without the d3d9.dll example rename it to d3d9.dll.o
and restart the game.

For reshade simply press 'F1' in game to toggle
the shaders on or off.

- tested

Tested with version 1.0.0 of Bound by flame on win 7 and win 10(1903)
/ nvidia 1050gtx ti

- performance

reshade / helix / usage 1080p@50fps*
without - clock 1000Mhz gpu usage ~98%
with       - clock 1392Mhz gpu usage ~98%
approximately 8% increase (1050gtx ti on win 7 / win 10)
max gpu: 1772Mhz gpu usage 100%
*) vsync forced off framerate capped at 51.2 fps
*) Game is capped to 60.7 with fast sync through nvidia inpsector
   ao adds roughly 20%

- further tweaking

The folder 'original' contains the original .sli files
of the game if you like you can compare them to the files
library_camera.sli      - modifies the camera to more over the shoulder
game_components_pla.sli - makes combat much easier
contained in the folder 'datalocal' of this package to tweak
if wanted.

By deleting the files in datalocal the mods can be switched of,
normaly datalocal is empty the modding of files is very similar
to greedfall, see the nexus page of greedfall if you would like to
know more.

If you like you can compare the modified shader(s), Dumps contains
the original shader, to alter values. The folder 'shaderoverride'
contains the modified versions.

Note helix works differently then 3dmigoto please search for a
tutorial or start looking here:
http://helixmod.blogspot.com/2010/12/how-to-guides.html

Specific shaders can be disabled by simply removing them
from the sub folders contained in 'shaderoverride'.

Most shaders <shadernumber>.txt have
a descriptive remark at top of the file (see shader list).

- tips

https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/bound_by_flame