FlightEngine.ini ignored ?

[+Gunrunner 314]

Has TK hard-coded graphics parameters relating to horizon distance, clipping etc... since the May-2011 patch ?

 

I can't seem to change these parameters at all, I used to be able to have skyscrapers showing on the horizon while flying at 10k ft or more, now at less than 1k feet, right on top of the city I can't get them all to show, whatever settings I try.

 

Any clue ? It's extremely irritating after getting used to having good (if somewhat unrealistic) viewing distances to suddenly be reduced to being a myopic flying mole.

Edited October 1, 2011 by Gunrunner

[+Spillone104 553]

It seems that now many parameters are locked. Just as the cloud height that can't be lowered under 10.000ft.

[+streakeagle 871]

The user setting for horizon distance does vary the view distance, but even at the max horizon distance setting, you will probably be less than happy.

[+Gunrunner 314]

Damn, and all that thanks to the whiners modding and breaking and then blaming TK rather than themselves...

 

Thanks for the confirmation.

 

Well, I'll survive, but that's a disappointment in 3 major cases :

1) Mipmap distances leading to a sensation of crappy graphics

2) "cheat" buildings in cities (true buildings can be seen from farther)

3) large structures composed of a lot of small structures (most airfields disappear beyond 8nm because of that even though they should still be visible)

 

I guess he'll gradually push the limit further to follow hardware replacement and his own code optimizations, as usual, it's just tedious to be held back because of people not understanding that using their own settings is their own responsibility.

Edited October 1, 2011 by Gunrunner

[+streakeagle 871]

There is one other option. There is now a flag that enables or disables the new view system fade-in. If you disable it, you are supposed to get the old system back, but that means you also lose some of the other improvements. I tried both ways, and I have learned to live with the new way to stay compatible with the future of SF2.

[Lexx_Luthor 57]

^^

What streak says. streak poasted that one of the recent Patches put back horizon distance accessibility. I have not got back into SF-2 since I slapped up a new box, but when I load out my SF2 again, and confirm this, I'll owe TK a big thanks.

 

I simply cannot use the game without at least 200km horizon distance, minimum. I play my fantasy game at 50,000 feet -- average -- so this is a deal maker or breaker for me. Right now I'm doing 300km horizon distance in SF-1 2008, with...

 

(0) 60fps in 3 mirror cockpits.

 

(1) ATI 4850, stock clox -- stock Win7Pro ATI drivers on the Windows install disc. Believe it or not, every Catalyst install I tried slows the game down. Maybe I need just the drivers and dump the Cat, or stay with the disc drivers since ATI probably has long since stopped developing improvements to the 4000 series.

 

(2) enbseries -- for SF-1 ONLY!

 

(3) Mirrors ON

 

(4) A minimum of ground objects and not very dense tga forests.

 

(4+n) ...a number "n" of other tweaks in Flightengine and TerrainData.

 

+

 

(4+n+1) 5km terrain tiles, instead of stock-size 2km tiles, which means I draw 25/4 times fewer tiles -- much faster. This along with enbseries is the key. At 50,000 feet, 5km tiles show the same detail as stock 2km tiles seen from way down there at 20,000 feet which was a common altitude in the "real lifedeath" wars, where most normals play. I am not normal.

Edited October 1, 2011 by Lexx_Luthor

[+Baltika 85]

Gunrunner, relax, the "modders and whiners" ( ) successfully persuaded TK to enable .ini settings which removes the limited draw distance.

 

First. go to your options.ini in the main game mod folder, so User\Saved Games\Thirdwire\StrikeFighters2\, then set "ObjectsFade=FALSE" under [GraphicsOptions] heading.

 

Next, extract your Flightengine.ini and drop in mod folder\Flight folder.

 

Set these settings as follows:-

 

[LowDetailOption]

HorizonDistance=60000.0

DetailMeshSize=4

DetailLevel=0

WaterEffect=0

NoiseTexture=0

MaxTextureRes=128

 

[MedDetailOption]

HorizonDistance=84000.0

DetailMeshSize=8

DetailLevel=1

WaterEffect=1

NoiseTexture=0

MaxTextureRes=256

 

[HighDetailOption]

HorizonDistance=100000.0

DetailMeshSize=12

DetailLevel=2

WaterEffect=2

NoiseTexture=1

MaxTextureRes=512

 

[unlimitedDetailOption]

HorizonDistance=124000.0

DetailMeshSize=16

DetailLevel=2

WaterEffect=2

NoiseTexture=1

MaxTextureRes=-1

 

 

 

What I have done is doubled the stock Horizondistance= figure, and increased the DetailMeshSize= by a factor of about 4 (the stock is something like, 2, 2, 3, 4).

 

Those settings correspond to your in-game menu graphic settings options.

 

Et viola:-

 

 

 

 

 

Running on SF2 with Sept 11 patch installed, mostly High settings in-game, with Very Far horizon distance.

 

 

Cheers to Stary who worked this out and posted about it somewhere round here.

 

And, I do like the new fade effects, but I am not a fan of the short fade distance, so . . . I push the above settings as far as my system can go.

 

Slainthe!

 

Baltika

Edited October 2, 2011 by Baltika

[+Gunrunner 314]

Oh, shiny !

 

Thanks a lot Baltika !

The only thing I missed was "ObjectsFade=FALSE" as it's not a line in the original FlightEngine.ini and I couldn't find the parameter name on TW's forums.

 

And yes, the fade effects are nice and a quite elegant solution to the problem, but the distances are far too short especially with modded installs (skyscrapers).

 

P.S. : Oh, options.ini, damn, I'm an idiot. -_-

Edited October 2, 2011 by Gunrunner