Odd graphical glitches in some of the player-created levels?
Posted: Sat May 05, 2018 8:25 am
I've been randomly browsing through some of the player-created levels recently, and noticed some recurring patterns - none of which appear in the stock levels.
For an example, let's refer to "DRAKAN C", where all of these issues manifest at various points:
1. Bizarre, glitchy "lenticular tiles" which drastically vary their appearance depending on the viewing angle; alternating between their correct appearance, and a weird dark "flowing" texture - or sometimes just between two different (but still wrong) "flowing" textures.
Examples: along the river at the very start, just after exiting Rynn's house. Also where you use a key to unlock the portcullis at the harbor.
It appears to be somehow caused by the adjacent water somehow "leaking" onto the afflicted areas?
2. Z-fighting on some of the terrain faces. I also have some screenshots for this, but this shouldn't require a picture to explain.
Very obvious with at least one tile on the snowy mountain path, several steps after exiting the first cave (near where the scavenger is), not long after the start of the level.
3. Extremely bland-looking textures on some objects. It looks like some small items (such as single planks) have been scaled up to gargantuan proportions - which resulted in stretching the already low-res texture to such a level, that it makes even Tomb Raider 1 look extremely detailed in comparison.
4. Severe performance issues in some areas due to CPU bottlenecking (not GPU, I checked that).
For example, around the castle - this is, by far, the worst offender. Standing before its front door, I get ~18FPS with fog distance set to minimum, and ~12FPS with fog distance at 100%.
Of course I understand that this particular level appears to be relatively recent, but that's just nuts.
Interestingly, I've also noticed a few graphical oddities in Ruined Village - mostly just a few glitchy tiles, which sometimes would appear almost pure black. But quitting and restarting the game usually resolved that.
So here's a question to seasoned veterans: how much of this is actually more or less "normal"?
For an example, let's refer to "DRAKAN C", where all of these issues manifest at various points:
1. Bizarre, glitchy "lenticular tiles" which drastically vary their appearance depending on the viewing angle; alternating between their correct appearance, and a weird dark "flowing" texture - or sometimes just between two different (but still wrong) "flowing" textures.
Examples: along the river at the very start, just after exiting Rynn's house. Also where you use a key to unlock the portcullis at the harbor.
It appears to be somehow caused by the adjacent water somehow "leaking" onto the afflicted areas?
2. Z-fighting on some of the terrain faces. I also have some screenshots for this, but this shouldn't require a picture to explain.
Very obvious with at least one tile on the snowy mountain path, several steps after exiting the first cave (near where the scavenger is), not long after the start of the level.
3. Extremely bland-looking textures on some objects. It looks like some small items (such as single planks) have been scaled up to gargantuan proportions - which resulted in stretching the already low-res texture to such a level, that it makes even Tomb Raider 1 look extremely detailed in comparison.
4. Severe performance issues in some areas due to CPU bottlenecking (not GPU, I checked that).
For example, around the castle - this is, by far, the worst offender. Standing before its front door, I get ~18FPS with fog distance set to minimum, and ~12FPS with fog distance at 100%.
Of course I understand that this particular level appears to be relatively recent, but that's just nuts.
Interestingly, I've also noticed a few graphical oddities in Ruined Village - mostly just a few glitchy tiles, which sometimes would appear almost pure black. But quitting and restarting the game usually resolved that.
So here's a question to seasoned veterans: how much of this is actually more or less "normal"?