Widescreen Gaming Forum

This is the final phase in my graphics settings tweaks for Crysis, but I need help from someone whom really understands the e commands. Basically what I want to do is keep the rocks on the ground from popping into view right in front of me without draining the FPS too much.

I know it involves the Objects Quality setting because when I bumped it up from Low I noticed the rocks don't appear in front of me anymore. At High I don't see them appear at all and at Medium just barely now and then in the distance, which is tolerable.

The problem is even at Medium it makes me have to drop the res down and the FPS is fairly low, so I want to pick only the commands that effect the rocks popping into view and change just those.

Here is the list of commands from the sys_spec_ObjectDetail.cfg file listed as level 2 or Medium:

e_obj_quality=2
e_lod_ratio=4
e_lod_min=1
e_view_dist_ratio_detail=19
e_view_dist_ratio_vegetation=21
e_vegetation_min_size=0.5
sys_flash_curve_tess_error=4
e_decals_life_time_scale=1
e_max_view_dst_spec_lerp=0.5
e_vegetation_sprites_distance_custom_ratio_min=0.75
e_vegetation_sprites_distance_ratio=1
es_DebrisLifetimeScale=0.6
e_cbuffer_resolution=128
e_dissolve=0
ca_AttachmentCullingRation=120
e_terrain_occlusion_culling_max_dist=130

Please tell me if it's one or more of these commands that has to do with the rocks appearing in front of me and advise what to set them at. If it's some other command not listed here please let me know which one to use and what to set it at.

I thought it might be e_Terrain_Lod_Ratio, but at Med and High it's set at 1, so that may not be it. As far as I know from having played with the editor a bit these rocks are actually considered part of the vegetation, so perhaps it's e_view_dist_ratio_vegetation?

One thing I DO know is that going from Med to High Objects Quality results in e_Lod_Ratio jumping from 4 to 6. Any help would be appreciated. Rocks appearing in front of you is one of the single most annoying things about trying to get max visual quality on a mediocre rig.

e_view_dist_ratio_detail=19
e_view_dist_ratio_vegetation=21
e_vegetation_min_size=0.5

e_max_view_dst_spec_lerp=0.5
e_vegetation_sprites_distance_custom_ratio_min=0.75
e_vegetation_sprites_distance_ratio=1

e_terrain_occlusion_culling_max_dist=130

Just taking a wild guess, I'd say it's one of these. occlusion culling isn't likely, but I included it just in case the CryEngine2 deals with rocks as terrain etc.

Might help if you include what the settings for all of them are at low/med/high so a better estimate can be made. ;)

That was my one question to as to whether the engine sees these rocks as terrain. In the editor you place, remove and move them via Terrain> Vegetation, so hopefully they are. However I do not want to make any blanket vegetation changes, I only want to change the lod ratio for the ground.

I just got an answer to this question from a mod at CryMod and he thinks the main thing that makes rocks not appear in front of you is the e_lod_ratio part of the above list I posted. I suspected this too but we both agree it drops FPS too much as it affects ALL lods, not just terrain.

He suggested it may be solved by finding the lua file specifically for rocks and changing just that, which he said would probably be hard to do. I don't even know where to find it, what to edit it with, or what commands I might find in it. I may have a much simpler solution though that could be just as effective and very easy to do.

There is a cvar called e_terrain_lod_ratio in the cvar list but I've yet to see it in the cfg files. I'm going to type it into the console while at Low Objects Quality then do the same while at Medium Objects Quality. If the values change I'll try putting the Medium values for it in my System.cfg file.

(EDITED)
OK, I had forgotten I already tried the e_terrain_lod_ratio command before. It's a value of 1 for all Objects Quality levels so it doesn't work. Thus I stuck with trying the commands contained in the above list. I think I have an acceptable solution now.

I used values for e_view_dist_ratio_vegetation and e_view_dist_ratio_detail that are right in between their Med and High values, 26 for veg and 22 for det. The rocks are holding pretty steady now except for an occaisional 1 or 2 off in the distance popping in.

I had to forego the 8x AF I was using dropping Anisotropic down to 1x but It's not really that noticable on my mediocre spec anyway. I was able to keep the res at 1200x900 with about the same 35 FPS average. I added these two changes to my System.cfg as well as deleting the 8x AF contained in it so it was pretty easy to do.

Maniac - what are your system specs? I might want to try out your config ... I'm getting murdered frame rate wise in the second level.

I have a P4 3GHz, X1950Pro 512MB AGP, 2GB RAM with XP Home SP2. I run Crysis at 1200x900 averaging 30 FS in 1st level while on foot with no action.

In game settings:

High
Physics Quality
Volumetric Effects Quality
Game Effects Quality
Particles Quality
Water Quality
Sound Quality

Medium
Shadows Quality
Shaders Quality

Low
Post Processing Quality

Custom
Texture Quality...(Above High by turning off texture streaming, much sharper peaks/cliffs with no FPS drop)
Objects Quality...(Above Low by view distance & detail tweaks {High OQ peaks/cliffs}, 5 FPS gain vs High OQ)

Tweaks:
1) r_TexturesStreaming = 0
2) e_view_dist_ratio_vegetation = 31
3) e_detail_materials_view_dist_xy = 2048

1) Turns off texture streaming which makes the rocky peaks noticably less blurry. Can be done with no FPS drop if you have enough RAM.
2) Keeps the nearby beach rocks from popping in and out of view when using Low Objects Quality (31 is the High value for this command).
3) Keeps the rocky peaks looking very detailed when using Low Objects Quality.

I know what you mean by the stuff that comes after the 1st level, it gets kinda resource intense. I'm up to the part where you meet back up with Prophet in the frozen tundra that the island has become. There's been a few places where the lag had me thinking I need to take some settings down a bit. I haven't tried the patch yet though. I'll probably play all the way through once then give the patch a go to see if I can eek out a few more frames with it.

/salute Maniac
Way too lazy to tweak it myself atm; I'll probably give your settings a run soon. I currently have it on 1280x800@High, with a few dips here and there but avg 20-40 in Contact (iirc).

Use this guide, helped me alot:

http://www.tweakguides.com/Crysis_1.html

You can get ideas like the ones I ended up using via that guide, but note that some of the thngs claimed in it are not possible. For instance he says you can completely turn off DOF and AOL (ambinet occlusion lighting) effects that Medium or higher post processing and High or higher shaders add, not so. Nor can you completely remove radial blur as he suggests. He also says using the command to disable fog will remove all fog from the terrain and ocean, which is not the case. It is also not possible to remove all clouds as he claims.

Note as well that he doesn't go into enough detail to tell you how best to add FPS without noticable drop in image quality, it takes a lot of trial and error testing or recommendations by those whom have already done so. Also, you will not likely get any FPS gain using the performance tweaks he mentions on page 10.

Bottom line it's a good start for developing your own tweaks but involves a lot of your own personal testing. The guide was released rather quickly, almost immediately after the game's launch. It needs a lot of fixing, just like the game does.