Progress/Updates: - No one posting issues? Everyone busy or content? - If that is the case then I will begin shifting focus to individual cell editing, (ie changing caves/tunnels/subways/apartments) So that all (or most) of every light source is dynamic - Will be releasing patches on a 'as I go' basis
I will now listen for request for this mod since my work is slowing down.
Remember: If you have an issue state: GPU, CPU, and location in game and what you are doing.
Feel free to post your screen shots.
EDIT: Got a full and a half time job now, mod won't be updated anymore. Mod still works well for a lot of people. Feel free to rip assets from mod and make your own. Peace.
I can't help you if all you say is my frames are bad. I read all comments if you have a problem and no response from me then you are being ignored on purpose for not reading.
Post information so that I can recreate it.
Otherwise if it is a complement/concern/ or non-issue comment the feel free to post.
This mod was made in 2016, so it was very likely that the mod author wasn't playing the game with the max lighting settings. The max lighting settings sets the shadow map resolution to 4k, godrays on, etc. This will be very performance intensive if you intend to use this mod with those settings. Also keep in mind this mod will be performance intensive either way, so don't expect a healthy FPS.
I recommend changing your Fallout4Prefs.ini (Found in Documents\My Games\Fallout4) to these settings:
iVolumetricLightingQuality=0 (Edit these two if you want to turn off godrays, I recommend this because it's performance intensive) bVolumetricLightingEnable=0
iDirShadowSplits=3 (Lower this value down to 1 if you want better performance, it will affect shadow quality substantially though) fBlendSplitDirShadow=256.0000 fMaxFocusShadowMapDistance=450.0000
If you have an NVIDIA GeForce GPU, I recommend opening your NVIDIA Control Panel and then go to Manage 3D settings - Program Settings - Then search for Fallout 4 in the dropdown menu or add the game .exe - Then set the "Texture filtering - Quality" to performance or high performance. If you have an AMD Radeon GPU, open your Radeon Settings - Gaming - Fallout 4 or add the .exe - Then set "Texture Filtering Quality" to performance. This should improve performance quite a bit with this mod because shadows maps should be affected by the texture filtering.
You can also get performance enhancing mods, here's some I recommend: https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/20713 https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/46403 https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/9835
i recommend this performance enhancment mod https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/63482 it adjusts (reduces/increases) shadow distance automatically in-game session up to your target fps (framerate per second) value.
This is the year 2025 and I've been playing fallout4 for over 2000+ hours before I found this must-have mod. Feels like a huge loss. Image shows how it looks now and it's beautiful indeed. Evening and interior looks fantastic now, using drawing distance fps boost mod + priority mod. FPS still good.
Never understood people complaining about performance with this mod. Tested it years ago on a toaster and there was no noticeable impact on fps in most situations, only noticed one spot in the FH bar where it dropped fps and it was still playable. Obviously because there was a lot of overlapping lights.
Now in 2025 i have a decent pc, nope, zero performance impact anywhere still. Weird thing is this mod hardly touches lights at all. Even lights you'd expect it to touch like the dangling fluorescents.
RTX 3070ti user here. This mod makes the game look so much better depending on where you're looking. It definitely hits performance wise though. It gave me a 10-15% spike in GPU usage depending on where I was standing, with the higher end of those hits being when I stood in largely shaded areas.
It also spiked my VRAM usage from roughly ~5.5gb out of 8 to 6-6.4gb. I'm using 2k and 4k texture mods for nearly everything in the game along with ENB and a decent photorealism preset, hence the already high VRAM usage.
So yeah, if your GPU can handle it and you don't mind the extra usage, this is well worth it to download. Even better is if your GPU can handle 4k shadow resolution along with it, making all the shadows a lot crisper.
EDIT: Don't forget your standard issue performance mods! Shadow Boost, Buffout 4, High Physics FPS Fix, PRP, Unofficial Fallout 4 Patch, etc. Just some advice if you have a similar or worse GPU than mine but still can't get this mod running smoothly.
EDIT 2: I've been testing it out for a while and the VRAM hit has gotten bad. After an hour of play I easily hit ~7.2gb of usage, and sometimes when loading in and out of in interior or fast travelling the textures can go all blurry, which I think means I ran out of VRAM while loading the space. So word of advice, don't use this if you don't have 10+ gb of VRAM! (or if you aren't using 1k or lower sized texture overhauls).
I am not expecting a fix but I must state that it hits performance hard. My rig consist of a Sapphire RX580 8GB VRAM + Ryzen 3 3200g + 16GB Ram and it lags consistently in Corvega Power Plant. I thought it was because of the EnhancedLightFX but after an hour of diagnosing the lag in Corvega I gave up and disabled True Shadows to face the hard truth that it is indeed the culprit of lag spikes.
Though this is the case, I still loved your mod and it definitely enhanced my 3rd Person gameplay. I will download this again once I get my hands on a 3080ti.
356 comments
- No one posting issues? Everyone busy or content?
- If that is the case then I will begin shifting focus to individual cell editing, (ie changing caves/tunnels/subways/apartments) So that all (or most) of every light source is dynamic
- Will be releasing patches on a 'as I go' basis
I will now listen for request for this mod since my work is slowing down.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Remember: If you have an issue state: GPU, CPU, and location in game and what you are doing.
Feel free to post your screen shots.
EDIT: Got a full and a half time job now, mod won't be updated anymore. Mod still works well for a lot of people. Feel free to rip assets from mod and make your own. Peace.
WHEN YOU HAVE AN ISSUE:
Post:
- Screen shot of issue
- Location of issue
- Description of issue
- CPU and GPU
- fps before and during the issue
Post (for more advanced help)
- VRAM usage
- CPU usage (per core)
- GPU usage
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I can't help you if all you say is my frames are bad.
I read all comments if you have a problem and no response from me then you are being ignored on purpose for not reading.
Post information so that I can recreate it.
Otherwise if it is a complement/concern/ or non-issue comment the feel free to post.
I recommend changing your Fallout4Prefs.ini (Found in Documents\My Games\Fallout4) to these settings:
[Display]
fDirShadowDistance=16000.0000
fShadowDistance=16000.0000
iShadowMapResolution=1024 (1024 = 1080p screen res, 2048 = 2k screen res, 4096 = 4k screen res)
iVolumetricLightingQuality=0 (Edit these two if you want to turn off godrays, I recommend this because it's performance intensive)
bVolumetricLightingEnable=0
iDirShadowSplits=3 (Lower this value down to 1 if you want better performance, it will affect shadow quality substantially though)
fBlendSplitDirShadow=256.0000
fMaxFocusShadowMapDistance=450.0000
If you have an NVIDIA GeForce GPU, I recommend opening your NVIDIA Control Panel and then go to Manage 3D settings - Program Settings - Then search for Fallout 4 in the dropdown menu or add the game .exe - Then set the "Texture filtering - Quality" to performance or high performance. If you have an AMD Radeon GPU, open your Radeon Settings - Gaming - Fallout 4 or add the .exe - Then set "Texture Filtering Quality" to performance. This should improve performance quite a bit with this mod because shadows maps should be affected by the texture filtering.
You can also get performance enhancing mods, here's some I recommend:
https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/20713
https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/46403
https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/9835
https://www.nexusmods.com/fallout4/mods/63482
it adjusts (reduces/increases) shadow distance automatically in-game session up to your target fps (framerate per second) value.
This is the year 2025 and I've been playing fallout4 for over 2000+ hours before I found this must-have mod.
Feels like a huge loss. Image shows how it looks now and it's beautiful indeed.
Evening and interior looks fantastic now, using drawing distance fps boost mod + priority mod. FPS still good.
Now in 2025 i have a decent pc, nope, zero performance impact anywhere still. Weird thing is this mod hardly touches lights at all. Even lights you'd expect it to touch like the dangling fluorescents.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Jp25L4Z3nlYkILsI_nZC2ju1mY_FFtUZ/view?usp=drive_link
hello. Glitching shadows without gun equpied. When moving aroung without gun equpied there are wierd shadows. RTX 3060. Not much performance drop.
It also spiked my VRAM usage from roughly ~5.5gb out of 8 to 6-6.4gb. I'm using 2k and 4k texture mods for nearly everything in the game along with ENB and a decent photorealism preset, hence the already high VRAM usage.
So yeah, if your GPU can handle it and you don't mind the extra usage, this is well worth it to download. Even better is if your GPU can handle 4k shadow resolution along with it, making all the shadows a lot crisper.
EDIT: Don't forget your standard issue performance mods! Shadow Boost, Buffout 4, High Physics FPS Fix, PRP, Unofficial Fallout 4 Patch, etc. Just some advice if you have a similar or worse GPU than mine but still can't get this mod running smoothly.
EDIT 2: I've been testing it out for a while and the VRAM hit has gotten bad. After an hour of play I easily hit ~7.2gb of usage, and sometimes when loading in and out of in interior or fast travelling the textures can go all blurry, which I think means I ran out of VRAM while loading the space. So word of advice, don't use this if you don't have 10+ gb of VRAM! (or if you aren't using 1k or lower sized texture overhauls).
Though this is the case, I still loved your mod and it definitely enhanced my 3rd Person gameplay. I will download this again once I get my hands on a 3080ti.