Even though texture resolultion is set to "Ultra", the scene looks flat. This is because the Starcraft textures are intended to be used with bumpmapping. The bumpmappig technique uses a so-called normal map which contains angles instead of colors. This allows per pixel lighting: The angles from the normal map are compared to the angle of the directional light source to create light and shade effects. This requires and additional texture access (for the normal map) and some pixel shader calculations to perform a 'dot product' of the normal map's angles and the angle of the directional light. The result is a value which is used to be multiplied with the color from the base map's texture. Values below 1.0 darken the pixel's brightness, values above 1.0 make the pixel brighter. The new "low" mode looks as if bumpmappig is performed:
What you see however is rather static bumpmapping. The new alternate texture set was created with the assumption a particular angle for the directional light. The bumpmapping calculation was performed and the result was rendered into the resulting texture which is now used as the new base map. (Thanks to TL-user Existor who found that these textures are provided with patch 1.5 and not created during the map loading screen.)
Let's compare the difference to real bumpmapping. This is the new "low" setting in from another angle:
If you compare the images carefully, you see that the shiny and the dark areas stay where they are. They don't change in spite of the image rotation. In reality, they should change because the angle of the directional light is the same while the virtual camera (to record this image) has been rotated.
This is how the medium detail setting looks:
The bumpmapping effect seems to be much more subtle. The reason is that the medium details setting performs dynamic bumpmapping, it actually shades every pixel in real time considering the angle of the directional light source and the normal map which stores angle information for the according base map. On this angle the directional light source hits the surface in a way which does not produce too much shiny pixels, hence the subtle effect.
Also, "mid" uses per-pixel shading for minerals instead of just a base map, and shadow mapping is used. (Objects cast shadow, shaped by their own shape.) For shadow mapping, the client renders an additional depth buffer from the view of the light source and transforms it into screen space. Now the renderer can detect if a pixel is hit by the directional light and therefore fully lit, or not, and therefore just got the so called "ambient light" value.
Want the old mode back?
To restore the old mode for "low", change the Starcraft graphic option to "low", apply the change, then close Starcraft. Go to your documents folder and open the "Starcraft II" subfolder and look for the Accounts folder and then go into the subfolder (a long number) and edit "Variables.txt". The new low mode is active with the line
alternateLowTextures=1
To restore the old mode, set it to 0 (zero).
alternateLowTextures=0
Save and close the file and launch Starcraft.
File format differences of the texture sets
The new low textures with included static bumpmapping only support low, medium and high texture resolution which can be set independent of the other settings. For ultra texture resolution you need to use at least "medium" graphics setting because only those textures support resultions of 1024x1024 per tile. The new alternate textures just offer 512x512 resolution per tile at maximum. For the default camera angle, 512x512 is good enough and you will notice no differences.
The new alternate low textures also come without an alpha channel while the standard textures come with alpha. The alpha channel is usually used for transparancy effects, but the alpha value for ground textures seems to be used for some lighting calculations and not for transparancy effects.
Benefit of the new mode
It is now possible to get at least static bumpmapping without an addtional texture access during the actual rendering of the game. On most low-end GPUs, texture access is quite costly because texture access requires precious bandwidth and video memory (while pixel shader calculations only require GPU-internal bandwidth.) While "low" also skips on shadow mapping and other neat technologies, the bumpmapping was the most obvious one. Patch 1.5 now allows graphics roughly comparable to "mid" because it uses textures which include a pre-made (and therefore, static) bumpmapping-like effect.
You actually get more details / content with the new low mode because the premade bumpmapping effect hints the non-uniform height of the surface.
What are the differences of high, ultra and extreme?
With "high", local light sources are supported. Any object which is rendered has a triangle shape, a square consists of two triangles. Since it would be quite an effort to consider each possible light for any processed triangle, a technique called "deferred lighting" (or "deferred shading", as a broader term) is used. In a nutshell, this reduced the lighting calculation to one combined pass (instead of one pass per light source) for the cost of some additional calculations for an additional buffer which stores the lighting information. With "high", vespene carrying worker units create a glow.
"Ultra" uses high dynamic range rendering. Instead of using a framebuffer target with 8 bit for each color component (red, green, blue) a target with 16 bit per component is used. To show this frame, it is converted into an 8-bit-per-component target, but until then, all lighting information is stored in higher precision. This allows a more accurate final image. Also some additional features like colored shadows are enabled. "Ultra" also enabled Parallax Mapping, an addition to bumpmapping which changes texture coordinates on a per-pixel-basis to create an apparent dent in the ground after a nuke hit.
"Extreme" does not affect actual ingame graphics beside single player 3D cutscenes and the 3D background of the main menu. With "extreme", indirect shadows are rendered with a trick. The cost to compute actual indirect shadow casting is unacceptable, so the game performs a check of the pixel's depth value (z-value) compared to it's neighbor's depth values. If a pixel is within an edge (surrounded by pixels which are closer to the camera) it is considered to be in an indirect shadow and therefore darkened.
Nice post, I think this is definitely part of the myriad of performance increases they mention in the patch notes. The game definitely feels a little different for some reason, fog of war was the first thing I noticed.
With that said is there any method of reverting the lowest settings to the "old" lowest settings/look ? It's quite another feelign playing the game now and i get distracted quite often
On August 02 2012 02:28 Enemyy wrote: With that said is there any method of reverting the lowest settings to the "old" lowest settings/look ? It's quite another feelign playing the game now and i get distracted quite often
Yup. That's what i want to know too. New low seems like Medium from previous patch and I hate the glossy effects.
I don't know if its in my head that I'm getting lower FPS on low settings now than I was on low settings pre-1.5... But it definitely feels like my FPS drops lower, more often. Anyone else notice this?
On August 02 2012 02:31 Enzymatic wrote: I don't know if its in my head that I'm getting lower FPS on low settings now than I was on low settings pre-1.5... But it definitely feels like my FPS drops lower, more often. Anyone else notice this?
Yup, it feels like I have a slightly -but not by much- FPS, though I haven't played enough to see how often it drops.
On August 02 2012 02:28 Enemyy wrote: With that said is there any method of reverting the lowest settings to the "old" lowest settings/look ? It's quite another feelign playing the game now and i get distracted quite often
Yup. That's what i want to know too. New low seems like Medium from previous patch and I hate the glossy effects.
Go to your Variable.txt file (usually found in the Starcraft II folder in your documents folder that also has replays and stuff).
Change "alternateLowTextures=1" to "alternateLowTextures=0"
I think that should revert the terrain textures back to the old style. At least that worked on my computer.
If alternateLowTextures doesn't show up, try changing all the settings to low and look for it again.
On August 02 2012 02:31 Enzymatic wrote: I don't know if its in my head that I'm getting lower FPS on low settings now than I was on low settings pre-1.5... But it definitely feels like my FPS drops lower, more often. Anyone else notice this?
Mine got very unstable. During small fights my fps would go from a stable 70 and drop to a really unstable 20-40
On August 02 2012 02:31 Enzymatic wrote: I don't know if its in my head that I'm getting lower FPS on low settings now than I was on low settings pre-1.5... But it definitely feels like my FPS drops lower, more often. Anyone else notice this?
Mine got very unstable. During small fights my fps would go from a stable 70 and drop to a really unstable 20-40
I also notice a stutter whenever a new unit is built for the first time. Like, the game would stutter for a second when my first Corruptor pops out, but it stabilizes shortly after that. It's pretty annoying.
On August 02 2012 02:28 Enemyy wrote: With that said is there any method of reverting the lowest settings to the "old" lowest settings/look ? It's quite another feelign playing the game now and i get distracted quite often
Yup. That's what i want to know too. New low seems like Medium from previous patch and I hate the glossy effects.
Go to your Variable.txt file (usually found in the Starcraft II folder in your documents folder that also has replays and stuff).
Change "alternateLowTextures=1" to "alternateLowTextures=0"
I think that should revert the terrain textures back to the old style. At least that worked on my computer.
If alternateLowTextures doesn't show up, try changing all the settings to low and look for it again.
OH MY GOD. THANK YOU SO MUCH. THIS WORKS and im back to the old LOW setting. There's a lot of ppl looking for this answer. Unfortunately, this does not fix fps issues.
On August 02 2012 02:28 Enemyy wrote: With that said is there any method of reverting the lowest settings to the "old" lowest settings/look ? It's quite another feelign playing the game now and i get distracted quite often
Yup. That's what i want to know too. New low seems like Medium from previous patch and I hate the glossy effects.
Go to your Variable.txt file (usually found in the Starcraft II folder in your documents folder that also has replays and stuff).
Change "alternateLowTextures=1" to "alternateLowTextures=0"
I think that should revert the terrain textures back to the old style. At least that worked on my computer.
If alternateLowTextures doesn't show up, try changing all the settings to low and look for it again.
The new fog of war border is mandatory. The new fog is rendered in higher resolution to provide a more accurate border. This also means that the edge of the border is much sharper.
You're a bit wrong about special low textures. There ARE new SPECIAL low-textures dds-files. They are sharpened that regular textures and have some lighting on it already.
Here are some examples. See, that textures are like high detalized textures, but it's only flat one layered texture without any special effects on it
And here are screenshot from ingame resources, where we can see, that they added special low textures, that has no special effects, because those effects already "Photoshoped" to those textures. And those files are smaller, that means you're using less RAM when using these textures.
On August 02 2012 03:22 eviltomahawk wrote: So the new low textures in 1.5 are actually less performance-intensive than the old low textures before 1.5? Huh. That's pretty interesting.
can someone please confirm with some benchmarking?
The new textures dropped my fps down to 70s early on, edited that line in variables.txt and the old textures give me 120 fps+ early on the same map when im the only player in the game. Results might be different for others though.
Am I the only one getting significantly more lag now? My graphics are set in the low/medium range, and I'm getting really bad lag spikes when I get into big battles (especially in team games). It's incredibly frustrating because I had perfect performance two days ago.
You're a bit wrong about special low textures. There ARE new SPECIAL low-textures dds-files. They are sharpened that regular textures and have some lighting on it already.
Here are some examples. See, that textures are like high detalized textures, but it's only flat one layered texture without any special effects on it
And here are screenshot from ingame resources, where we can see, that they added special low textures, that has no special effects, because those effects already "Photoshoped" to those textures. And those files are smaller, that means you're using less RAM when using these textures.
I edited the OP to reflect your finding. Thank you!
You're a bit wrong about special low textures. There ARE new SPECIAL low-textures dds-files. They are sharpened that regular textures and have some lighting on it already.
Here are some examples. See, that textures are like high detalized textures, but it's only flat one layered texture without any special effects on it
And here are screenshot from ingame resources, where we can see, that they added special low textures, that has no special effects, because those effects already "Photoshoped" to those textures. And those files are smaller, that means you're using less RAM when using these textures.
I edited the OP to reflect your finding. Thank you!
The new textures dropped my fps down to 70s early on, edited that line in variables.txt and the old textures give me 120 fps+ early on the same map when im the only player in the game. Results might be different for others though.
It drops your FPS only because you're loading it first time.
Every game resource when loaded first time, causes FPS drops.
They added some new graphics tweaks in the variables.txt. This new texture setting is the unlikely culprit, only one new variable is on by default I believe. They are : bakeTerrainLighting= ambientenvironmentmap=
one of these might be causing the FPS drops (yes I believe my FPS is even worse now).
The new textures dropped my fps down to 70s early on, edited that line in variables.txt and the old textures give me 120 fps+ early on the same map when im the only player in the game. Results might be different for others though.
It drops your FPS only because you're loading it first time.
Every game resource when loaded first time, causes FPS drops.
Those new textures have smaller file size.
No I don't think you understand what I mean by that. I said that the newer textures gave me less fps than the older ones and reverting it back using variables.txt made it better and also gave me less delay lag that I was experiencing with the new ones. Might be placebo though.
Great writeup, I didn't even know! : D so many hidden updates in this patch, I feel a bit of jitters in the game still though, also I dislike how everyones text is the same color in chat channels : ( but that's offtopic, good job.
On August 02 2012 04:24 schlamp96 wrote: Is there a way to go back to the old graphics/texture settings on the higher graphic settings? I don't like the new one as much.
Good lord that's an ugly fog of war. Did anyone really have a problem with not being sure if a unit you couldn't see was a centimeter from where you thought it was?
On August 02 2012 04:24 schlamp96 wrote: Is there a way to go back to the old graphics/texture settings on the higher graphic settings? I don't like the new one as much.
That is exactly what this thread is about...
He's talking about the high quality graphic settings... This is for low, not for medium and high and whatnot.
On August 02 2012 03:17 Existor wrote: You're a bit wrong about special low textures. There ARE new SPECIAL low-textures dds-files. They are sharpened that regular textures and have some lighting on it already.
Here are some examples. See, that textures are like high detalized textures, but it's only flat one layered texture without any special effects on it
And here are screenshot from ingame resources, where we can see, that they added special low textures, that has no special effects, because those effects already "Photoshoped" to those textures. And those files are smaller, that means you're using less RAM when using these textures.
So if i want to take use of the texture that uses less ram i must have "alternateLowTextures=1" in my variables.txt? It doesnt apply when im using "alternateLowTextures=0"?
I would like to increase my performance, so i like the low ram usage, i dont like how the new low graph (that looks close to previous mid graph) looks though. All in all though, i only want what gives the best fps.
On August 02 2012 03:48 DarKcS wrote: They added some new graphics tweaks in the variables.txt. This new texture setting is the unlikely culprit, only one new variable is on by default I believe. They are :
bakeTerrainLighting= ambientenvironmentmap=
one of these might be causing the FPS drops (yes I believe my FPS is even worse now).
thank you very much to the OP for the really interesting thread!!!
Now can anyone test & explain what are the new lines indicated above adding???
For what concerning the alternateLowTextures=0 thing , it is curious how Blizzy says that it uses less memory and we all get performance problems ... !!??!?!
On August 02 2012 03:17 Existor wrote: You're a bit wrong about special low textures. There ARE new SPECIAL low-textures dds-files. They are sharpened that regular textures and have some lighting on it already.
Here are some examples. See, that textures are like high detalized textures, but it's only flat one layered texture without any special effects on it
And here are screenshot from ingame resources, where we can see, that they added special low textures, that has no special effects, because those effects already "Photoshoped" to those textures. And those files are smaller, that means you're using less RAM when using these textures.
So if i want to take use of the texture that uses less ram i must have "alternateLowTextures=1" in my variables.txt? It doesnt apply when im using "alternateLowTextures=0"?
I would like to increase my performance, so i like the low ram usage, i dont like how the new low graph (that looks close to previous mid graph) looks though. All in all though, i only want what gives the best fps.
Theoretically yes. Those low-textures have smaller sizes, so you should try to stay with standart low settings and allow game to load all content.
Probably you will have lags only 1st time, when you're loading these textures.
You're a bit wrong about special low textures. There ARE new SPECIAL low-textures dds-files. They are sharpened that regular textures and have some lighting on it already.
Here are some examples. See, that textures are like high detalized textures, but it's only flat one layered texture without any special effects on it
And here are screenshot from ingame resources, where we can see, that they added special low textures, that has no special effects, because those effects already "Photoshoped" to those textures. And those files are smaller, that means you're using less RAM when using these textures.
I edited the OP to reflect your finding. Thank you!
Thanks a lot for this, back to my standard low settings, unfortunately this did not remove the 3 sec freeze at the start which has never happened to me before the new patch
On August 02 2012 06:35 syriuszonito wrote: Thanks a lot for this, back to my standard low settings, unfortunately this did not remove the 3 sec freeze at the start which has never happened to me before the new patch
Why you think low sized textures can cause freezes for you? If they take less memory than previous textures. Turn on your logic please. It's not terrain texture at all! -_-
On August 02 2012 06:35 syriuszonito wrote: Thanks a lot for this, back to my standard low settings, unfortunately this did not remove the 3 sec freeze at the start which has never happened to me before the new patch
Why you think low sized textures can cause freezes for you? If they take less memory than previous textures. Turn on your logic please. It's not terrain texture at all! -_-
well something causes it, new textures sounded more likely than new ui
So basically old low textures had no values for different effects and depending on your settings the card computed a list of the information on the fly. Now the textures come with default information, so if settings are set to low the card doesn't compute much since the information is already present?
Damn, people on TL are so smart! I don't know a lot about graphics, but I found this really interesting to read. Is this discussion over dynamic lighting / buffers common knowledge among video game developers?
Completely enamored by the details. I really take all of this for granted.
So all in all, which one does give the best performance? The old or the new. I prefer the old one in termes of looking but if the new low graphic settings give better performance i'm gonna stick to them.
On August 02 2012 07:00 NiKoJa wrote: So all in all, which one does give the best performance? The old or the new. I prefer the old one in termes of looking but if the new low graphic settings give better performance i'm gonna stick to them.
Depends on your system. If your system is ancient and low budget, the old new is prob better.
You can still get that look. It didn't go anywhere. But you might have to dig for it in config files. Also there are instructions on how to use the alternate low textures on TL already.
you can still get the textures at least as they were before morrow, that's something, but all the units look like they have a some sort of lamp carrying around >,<
The new low is great. It gives you the texture sharpness/lighting of Medium, without taxing your system. My framerate hasn't changed all that much, but the game looks much, much better. I am happy about the changes.
When I got my new PC I still used the low settings although the new one could handle ultra easily. It was just to distracting and I hated the glossy effect, therefore I also dislike the new low look somehow. I will try your method reverting it to the old look, thx @op.
So theoretically this patch improves performance but In late game 200/200 battles I used to maintain above 30 fps, now it's a slideshow. Anyone else have this issue?
Very interesting post... saved me a good amount of FPS. Thanks! This change doesn't affect the new 'flashlight' fog of war at all does it? It doesn't seem like it does, but I could be blind.
its as if blizzard thinks every single person wants to run sc2 on as high graphics as possible, when in actual fact basically ever pro runs it exclusively on low.
On August 02 2012 07:00 NiKoJa wrote: So all in all, which one does give the best performance? The old or the new. I prefer the old one in termes of looking but if the new low graphic settings give better performance i'm gonna stick to them.
Depends on your system. If your system is ancient and low budget, the old new is prob better.
On August 02 2012 07:56 L3g3nd_ wrote: its as if blizzard thinks every single person wants to run sc2 on as high graphics as possible, when in actual fact basically ever pro runs it exclusively on low.
Eh, I wouldn't say every pro. I've seen some Korean streamers play on medium or higher.
Ideally, they would've made the graphics better without reducing performance, perhaps even increasing performance, and that was definitely their purpose with this patch. However, they definitely failed in getting good performance.
I wish they could lodge these new low terrain textures as a new graphics option, not completely replacing the old one. Maybe make the old textures be a "very low" setting with the new textures just be a normal "low" setting.
Loving the new changes. I play on Low (with models on high) and it looks better and runs at a similar frame rate. I really like the new light radius too; very sharp and smooth.
Normal mapping wouldn't have anything to do with the camera, it would only affect how the light reacts on the texture, and in most cases is used specifically to alter the way geometry works, not to handle lighting at all. They might be reacting to lighting, but the light source it's all mapped to (I assume the light box, which is how I assume SC2 gets it's universal lighting).
Normal maps also, in most cases, are considerably easier on resources when done correctly, but ridiculously terrible on resources when done poorly. For example, the Call of Duty games use Normal Mapping to enhance the geometry of their assets. If you've played a Call of Duty game for the PC, you'll notice that they load really fast compared to other games with similar looking graphics either because of the lack in polygons to load or because they don't rely on as many different maps to make the game look as they need it to. If you ever watch someone use Sculptris or zbrush (I highly suggest youtubing some of that because it's awesome) adding those updated meshes to their original would be done with normal maps.
Whenever you see baked textures or lighting or whatever, that's always going to be good for performance. Essentially that means that all the lighting or textures used would be... well "baked", finished, completed. It would no longer be affected as highly by whatever dynamic lighting there is, but would have a general lighting scheme set in place.
It's possible this stuff has changed since 2009, and to be fair I was an abysmal student, but iirc this should all be accurate.
I think that this is going to be a good thing, but a thing that will need some, "getting used to" time. Though the new UI is much, MUCH better. I am willing to let this new mode of texture sink in for sure .
Argh. My SC2 runs worse than before, in particular bigger battles. Major fail from Blizzard. What can we do about it except OP's suggested change? It didn't fix my problem.
However, they definitely failed in getting good performance.
Low perfomance because streaming system, not because new textures on low. When you will understand that -_-
True , for me you get TWO ! TWO extra fps if you switch to "old" low . So imo better graphics > 2 fps any day . Game got clear look still , like in "old" low.
You can do what you wanna ... but nothing will help you for now , this new streaming system is fail , not new textures.
However, they definitely failed in getting good performance.
Low perfomance because streaming system, not because new textures on low. When you will understand that -_-
True , for me you get TWO ! TWO extra fps if you switch to "old" low . So imo better graphics > 2 fps any day . Game got clear look still , like in "old" low.
You can do what you wanna ... but nothing will help you for now , this new streaming system is fail , not new textures.
If you actually get extra fps, don't you think it means the "new" low has reduced performance?
Some computers can't handle the "new" low properly. I switched it off because it was causing fps drops for me, and they were pretty severe.
On August 02 2012 07:00 NiKoJa wrote: So all in all, which one does give the best performance? The old or the new. I prefer the old one in termes of looking but if the new low graphic settings give better performance i'm gonna stick to them.
Depends on your system. If your system is ancient and low budget, the old new is prob better.
Im sorry what?
Haha took me a couple reads to figure out what your problem was, I meant to say the old LOW is probably better.
On August 02 2012 11:05 EleanorRIgby wrote: why cant we just have an actual "low" graphic setting like morrow said
If pro players had access to an ultra low graphics setting that made the game nothing but boxes and wireframes the pro's would probably pick that as well. The line has to be drawn somewhere.
I cant find variables.txt There isnt any .txt in my sc2 folder. The new low setting has MAJOR lag issues and this patch is making my fans work overtime.
On August 02 2012 12:06 CounterOrder wrote: I cant find variables.txt There isnt any .txt in my sc2 folder. The new low setting has MAJOR lag issues and this patch is making my fans work overtime.
On August 02 2012 12:06 CounterOrder wrote: I cant find variables.txt There isnt any .txt in my sc2 folder. The new low setting has MAJOR lag issues and this patch is making my fans work overtime.
On August 02 2012 06:52 tehemperorer wrote: So basically old low textures had no values for different effects and depending on your settings the card computed a list of the information on the fly. Now the textures come with default information, so if settings are set to low the card doesn't compute much since the information is already present?
I edited the OP because thanks to user Existor it's now clear that the alternate textures – with premade bumpmaping – are delivered with the patch files.
On August 02 2012 08:50 Noobity wrote: I don't know if I understand this completely.
Normal mapping wouldn't have anything to do with the camera, it would only affect how the light reacts on the texture, and in most cases is used specifically to alter the way geometry works, not to handle lighting at all. They might be reacting to lighting, but the light source it's all mapped to (I assume the light box, which is how I assume SC2 gets it's universal lighting).
Specular lighting (for the small, but very bright spots) depends on the camera angle. Diffuse lighting however should be independent of the camera and only follow the light source. Common bumpmapping solutions calculate both parts.
On August 02 2012 07:00 NiKoJa wrote: So all in all, which one does give the best performance? The old or the new. I prefer the old one in termes of looking but if the new low graphic settings give better performance i'm gonna stick to them.
Depends on your system. If your system is ancient and low budget, the old new is prob better.
Im sorry what?
Haha took me a couple reads to figure out what your problem was, I meant to say the old LOW is probably better.
On August 02 2012 11:05 EleanorRIgby wrote: why cant we just have an actual "low" graphic setting like morrow said
If pro players had access to an ultra low graphics setting that made the game nothing but boxes and wireframes the pro's would probably pick that as well. The line has to be drawn somewhere.
On August 02 2012 14:09 Incanus wrote: Solid post. How did you isolate what each setting does?
Before SC2 was released, there was an ATI paper about some SC2 rendering techniques available. SC2 mostly uses common techniques, so I knew what I have to expect as the game was launched. I tested different settings and made comparison screenshots for further investigation. Also the last Blizzcon panel about SC2 technology gave some bits of information.
Before 1.5.0, i have always used low settings for all settings.
1. In that thread , people here say that the new "low" graphics is actually as good as the old "medium". Can you confirm this?
2. So, do you think the new "low" is better than the old "low"? Because Even though mine is on low, it looks......better, I guess, compared to the old low.
3. Lastly, does thie affect my CPU performance etc? Maybe the new low actually uses less memory/performance?
On August 03 2012 12:58 dynwar7 wrote: Few questions about this issue.
Before 1.5.0, i have always used low settings for all settings.
1. In that thread , people here say that the new "low" graphics is actually as good as the old "medium". Can you confirm this?
2. So, do you think the new "low" is better than the old "low"? Because Even though mine is on low, it looks......better, I guess, compared to the old low.
3. Lastly, does thie affect my CPU performance etc? Maybe the new low actually uses less memory/performance?
Thanks everyone
The new low mode is not really as good as medium, but it is much closer to medium than before.
Unless you are really used to the old low mode with flat ground texture appearance, you should like the new low mode better.
I don't have solid information about the CPU performance, so please take the following with a grain of salt: The CPU performance is now a bit higher for the sake of new 3D rendering features, most of them however are not visible to us now. The engine underwent quite a rework under the hood for better data management, which increases CPU load, and also probably for some new graphical updates we will get with HotS, also the fog of war is now rendered in finer detail and needs a fine-grain visibly check for the engine to decide which units are hidden in the fog and which are visible.
But the new low mode itself does not increase the CPU usage. It just uses an alternate ground texture set.
On August 06 2012 03:23 G00NER wrote: How do you DO this on a MAC??? please help
Your Variables.txt is located in [YOUR USER]/Library/Application Support/Blizzard/Starcraft II/ Once you've found the file, just edit it with textedit or whatever program you have available as per OPs post.
It doesn't seem to work for me after 1.5.1 patch (reinstalled the operating system). My video card is alergic to the change Blizzard put and altering the values of the alternateLowTextures does nothing. Does anyone have another workaround?
On August 22 2012 06:00 Yrr wrote: Does that mean framelimits are not possible any more?
No, it means that people who's computers could barely run the game on low before are essentially being hung out to dry by Blizzard for no apparent reason. It's so stupid that a company that doesn't even sell hardware would be this stubborn about "improving" the lowest quality settings of a game. The old system requirements no longer apply. If you buy the game today and try to run it on a computer that meets the minimum system requirements you will get a message that your computer cannot run the game well because it doesn't meet the minimum requirements. Great philosophy Blizzard. Why don't they just dig a massive hole and bury themselves before they kill this game?
On August 22 2012 05:41 dUTtrOACh wrote: I suppose it would break the game or make it really angry if you modify Variables.txt and then switch it to "Read Only"?
Nothing happens if you set it to read-only. 1.5.2 was fucking retarded because people who had to have the game running on the bare minimum settings in order to get decent performance are not screwed.. Because it is now impossible to set it to the "true" old low settings.
Setting "alternateLowTextures" to 0 in the Variables.txt file is no longer possible after the patch. Now I'm stuck having to play with lag.
I made a post on the General Forums explaining how they botched patch 1.5.2 by no longer allowing variables.txt to be edited by people who required having the "true" low settings in order to run the game without lag. If this affects you also, feel free to reply in my thread to get some attention to this.
Sure, topic is about Low settings. Even if terrain textures looks better at low after that, the fps is same. I noticed my graph's temperature is bit higher, was constant 63, now its constant 70 in stress.
On August 22 2012 20:42 Existor wrote: 1) Go to C:\Users\<ur_ame>\Documents\StarCraft II\Accounts\<numbers>\variables.txt
2) Open it
3) Add alternateLowTextures=1
4) Make this variables.txt read-only
Wow, this solution wins! Tested and works like a charm. TY Existor!
Also note that if you want to change any of your graphic settings in the future, you will have to disable read-only for this file while you get the changes in effect, then re enable it.
On August 22 2012 20:34 Ksis wrote: Sure, topic is about Low settings. Even if terrain textures looks better at low after that, the fps is same. I noticed my graph's temperature is bit higher, was constant 63, now its constant 70 in stress.
For a lot of people (like myself), the FPS was NOT the same.
Same problem here, without the alternateLowTextures=0 I can't play at all. It just looks TERRIBLE and makes me go asleep during games. I never had any FPS problems whatsoever(300+ at start of 1v1 games), so why does it get edited? In 1.5.2 patch notes I see: "Variables.txt will now automatically recover from invalid combinations that could lead to performance issues.", but I have no FPS troubles. Holy shit....
it's obvious that Blizzard doesn't want people to mess with variables.txt cause it MAY decrease performances if poorly edited.
However most of us knew how to edit it and had found a good compromise for fps/look.
In my case I just need to use Alternatelowtextures=0 simplifiedcloack/shaders=0 and hdr=1 .... everything else on low... unfortunately I cant use them anymore and I'm really angry right now. I tried the "only read" thingy but the game kept resetting the variables file returning to default settings.
Is there a CERTAIN way to use at least the alternatelowtextures=0 ???? the new low textures have horrible palette I really don't like it.
Is there a CERTAIN way to use at least the alternatelowtextures=0 ???? the new low textures have horrible palette I really don't like it.
This. I hate the "new low textures" colorful palette. Anyone knows a way so set the old low textures back???
Already writen some posts above. But old low settings requires more memory than new ones
Indeed, there are bugs causing slowdowns in 1.5 but I don't think they're anything to do with low textures. They've made low look more like medium while using less resources. It's a win, while many got used to the way it looked the old low was a compromise and not how the game was supposed to look. I'm pretty sure blizzard weren't happy with the idea that turning down the settings was potentially giving advantages beyond keeping frame rates up. And they probably don't want screenshots kicking about of the game looking as rough it did with the old low settings.
On August 23 2012 22:25 mirkz wrote: it's obvious that Blizzard doesn't want people to mess with variables.txt cause it MAY decrease performances if poorly edited.
However most of us knew how to edit it and had found a good compromise for fps/look.
In my case I just need to use Alternatelowtextures=0 simplifiedcloack/shaders=0 and hdr=1 .... everything else on low... unfortunately I cant use them anymore and I'm really angry right now. I tried the "only read" thingy but the game kept resetting the variables file returning to default settings.
Is there a CERTAIN way to use at least the alternatelowtextures=0 ???? the new low textures have horrible palette I really don't like it.
Yes, modify the variables.txt found in the document - Starcraft II - Account - (long number) subfolder.
For those who have the issue where you start 5 or 10 seconds late at the beginning, I have added bakeTerrainLighting=0 into the Variable.txt in the Account (Number) and this fix my problem.
With the new patch the system doesn't accept HDR=1 with low settings anymore .... HDR is just for medium settings and more... but i love it cause the palette with hdr are more real and less strong and pesky than in normal low
anyone tested and found how to put back HDR=1 without getting resettings or conflicts?? I've tried to put it in the /numbers/variables like alternatelowtextures but for some strange reasons it gives conflicts and everything turn pink....
I was used to play with hybrid mode High ground/LOW settings/hdr enabled to get a very good compromise but now I can't do that anymore ... any ideas ?
On August 24 2012 01:02 mirkz wrote: Ok guys we got the alternatelowtextures fix....
With the new patch the system doesn't accept HDR=1 with low settings anymore .... HDR is just for medium settings and more... but i love it cause the palette with hdr are more real and less strong and pesky than in normal low
anyone tested and found how to put back HDR=1 without getting resettings or conflicts?? I've tried to put it in the /numbers/variables like alternatelowtextures but for some strange reasons it gives conflicts and everything turn pink....
I was used to play with hybrid mode High ground/LOW settings/hdr enabled to get a very good compromise but now I can't do that anymore ... any ideas ?
Check hybrid settings thread. It was updated for 1.5.2
EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/m4Gpr.png)
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? It's quite another feelign playing the game now and i get distracted quite often 
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