What's the point of this mod exactly, when you can force HBAO+ which is better than HBAO through Nvidia Inspector instead (and you're probably aware of that as we've talked about SGSSAA in one of your MGR mods' comments section before)? An improvement for AMD and Intel users or simply people who don't use NPI? Or maybe just a direct improvement to the vanilla game? Not complaining, just genuinely curious.
Good question indeed. The short answer is: forced HBAO is not desirable in FC3. The entry on the PCGW is incorrect.
The DMC4 DX10 flag will actually produce inferior results to the native HBAO implementation in many ways - and that's with hex-editing the flag itself (which will revert each time you update your drivers). Even with a hex-edit, it tends to bleed, flicker, and doesn't have any form of normal smoothing. It's also pretty demanding, whereas the native implementation is fairly cheap. If you're using driver-level HBAO w/hex editing, you'd be better off using Reshade's MXAO/SSDO really - same issues, namely bleeding, but without flickering, with normal smoothing, you can tweak it to your liking, no need for a driver hex edit (which I wouldn't recommend under *any* circumstance anyways tbh).
If I'm being completely honest though - the purpose of this mod is just that Scubrah found the values for HBAO in the dll, and that got me thinking hey I could tweak it a little bit so that it's less awful, that'd be neat. It eventually turned into Better HBAO. There was no purpose really - just tinkering around. I suppose one could argue that it somewhat preserves the "intended experience", too.
Interesting. I did use injected HBAO+ for a short while and didn't notice any bleeding or flickering... to be honest I didn't notice it being too demanding or anything you've said at all, really. That's not to say I don't believe you, that was many years ago actually, and I'm much more likely to notice those issues nowadays than back then.
I must say I do think the general look is still far better than the game's native HBAO implementation with it's horrible haloing and worth it even with some bleeding or flickering though. As for higher performance cost or the constant need for hex editing with driver updates, that's not an issue, at least not to me personally (considering I already do hex edits for different HBAO+ flags in other games anyway). It's not like you're gonna break something with simple hex edits in this particular case, if you know what you're doing it's totally fine. I do wonder about the normal smoothing though, that could be bad, did you test and notice that for yourself I wonder?
I just disagree with saying you would be better off using Reshade's MXAO/SSDO at that point, because the severe bleeding through absolutely any and all transparencies alone is too big of a downside so I wouldn't go that far (unless you've made or found a REST ReShade preset for the game of course, maybe that already exists, who knows). Either way, I do appreciate your mod, and I'll likely try it once I play the game again. I think having a direct improvement to the vanilla game rather than relying on external tools is always more than welcome, and as I've said not everyone uses an Nvidia GPU either so that's a huge point for the mod, so thank you very much.
FC Mod Installer is very janky and does not like modified original files. I'm trying to install manually, but am not sure what .fat files I need to unpack. I have tried common and patch but can not find the original file that I need to replace with your loose mod.
The mod installer worked fine for me last time I used it, but if you want to install it manually you'll need to grab the loose files, and read this. If you want to add this to your own patch, the file you want to replace is worldsettings.obj which is located in"generated\databases\generic\renderworldsettings_render. I hope that helps!
Hey there, Thanks for bringing this issue to my attention. Apparently MI (aka Rakyat mod) was removed from Nexus for no reason. I edited the hyperlink in the description, or you can head there to get it: Far Cry Modding - Far Cry 3 Mod Installer (fcmodding.com)
You can still install it manually if you so wish, the required files are in the Optional section of the Download tab, and check out the Articles tab for instructions. It is far less user-friendly though, I would recommend using MI.
Thanks again, wouldn't have noticed if it wasn't for you. Have a good one ;)
11 comments
The DMC4 DX10 flag will actually produce inferior results to the native HBAO implementation in many ways - and that's with hex-editing the flag itself (which will revert each time you update your drivers). Even with a hex-edit, it tends to bleed, flicker, and doesn't have any form of normal smoothing. It's also pretty demanding, whereas the native implementation is fairly cheap.
If you're using driver-level HBAO w/hex editing, you'd be better off using Reshade's MXAO/SSDO really - same issues, namely bleeding, but without flickering, with normal smoothing, you can tweak it to your liking, no need for a driver hex edit (which I wouldn't recommend under *any* circumstance anyways tbh).
If I'm being completely honest though - the purpose of this mod is just that Scubrah found the values for HBAO in the dll, and that got me thinking hey I could tweak it a little bit so that it's less awful, that'd be neat. It eventually turned into Better HBAO. There was no purpose really - just tinkering around. I suppose one could argue that it somewhat preserves the "intended experience", too.
I hope that clears things up, have a good one :)
I must say I do think the general look is still far better than the game's native HBAO implementation with it's horrible haloing and worth it even with some bleeding or flickering though. As for higher performance cost or the constant need for hex editing with driver updates, that's not an issue, at least not to me personally (considering I already do hex edits for different HBAO+ flags in other games anyway). It's not like you're gonna break something with simple hex edits in this particular case, if you know what you're doing it's totally fine. I do wonder about the normal smoothing though, that could be bad, did you test and notice that for yourself I wonder?
I just disagree with saying you would be better off using Reshade's MXAO/SSDO at that point, because the severe bleeding through absolutely any and all transparencies alone is too big of a downside so I wouldn't go that far (unless you've made or found a REST ReShade preset for the game of course, maybe that already exists, who knows). Either way, I do appreciate your mod, and I'll likely try it once I play the game again. I think having a direct improvement to the vanilla game rather than relying on external tools is always more than welcome, and as I've said not everyone uses an Nvidia GPU either so that's a huge point for the mod, so thank you very much.
Thanks.
If you want to add this to your own patch, the file you want to replace is worldsettings.obj which is located in"generated\databases\generic\renderworldsettings_render. I hope that helps!
Thanks for bringing this issue to my attention. Apparently MI (aka Rakyat mod) was removed from Nexus for no reason. I edited the hyperlink in the description, or you can head there to get it: Far Cry Modding - Far Cry 3 Mod Installer (fcmodding.com)
You can still install it manually if you so wish, the required files are in the Optional section of the Download tab, and check out the Articles tab for instructions. It is far less user-friendly though, I would recommend using MI.
Thanks again, wouldn't have noticed if it wasn't for you. Have a good one ;)