Fog problems in Thief 2 with Radeon cards

Aja · Jan 12, 2005, 07:13 AM

Hello, sorry if this has been posted, I did a search but couldn't find anything.

On the TTLG forums, there is much discussion about problems related to fog in Thief 2. Here's a prominent thread, with pictures detailing the problem.

http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=91820

As you can see, the difference is fairly noticable, particularily in some of the OMs which take place outdoors, and the fog has a bad tendancy to simply disappear rather than blend smoothly.

The problem seems to be universal, at least with Radeon 9800s, and any of the recent drivers (haven't tried it below 4.xx, but I wouldn't want to anyways).

Some people are actually going as far as buying Nvidia cards to remedy the problem (we're big thief fans over at TTLG

). I had heard somewhere that the ATI guys actually browse these forums, so I thought I'd plea to them. You guys can't let a small problem like this sway customers! Any chance of getting a quick fix in the next release?

Spyre · Jan 12, 2005, 09:34 PM

Send me a savegame from that level and I will have a look at it

The_Neon_Cowboy · Jan 13, 2005, 01:22 AM

Hmm... Game Released: 2000
Last patched/updated Apr 2000
4-5 year old game

My reccomendation move on to Thief 3

j/k

Na really if it turned out o be a "game bug" you probubly out of luck...
Have you tried any other driver sets to see if the issue changes

The 6600GT image in that thread looks really dark... other wise it looks
the same doesnt help that guy took shots from diffrent positions and in
diffrent areas...hard to compair....

I'd try to look at it but I don't have the title anymore I tossed Thief 1 & 2 in the trash years ago...

Aja · Jan 13, 2005, 03:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Spyre

Send me a savegame from that level and I will have a look at it

It's a fan-made mission, so you'd need Darkloader (the program to run FMs). If you already have it, you can just download the mission yourself - it's very small, and the screenshots are from the very beginning of the level.

If you don't feel like setting up Darkloader, I can send you some savegames from Life of the Party, a Thief 2 level with fog.

Cowboy - you just threw out Thief? I can't imagine disliking it THAT much... I don't think I've ever thrown any games out. And as for Thief 3... well... That's probably best left for another discussion

Aja · Jan 14, 2005, 08:42 AM

I made a quick comparision to illustrate the problem. The first shot of each pair is on a Voodoo 3 2000, the second is on a 9800 Pro.

I should also mention that the 9800 fog does NOT work off the bat, you have to install Radlinker and enable Table Fog and Z Fog, while disabling W Fog.

Anyways, the differences are subtle, but present, particularily in the first two sets of shots. On the Voodoo the fog just looks more thick and natural, whereas on the Radeon, it's very unnatural and abrupt looking.

The_Neon_Cowboy · Jan 14, 2005, 12:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aja[b

]It's a fan-made mission,[/b] so you'd need Darkloader (the program to run FMs). If you already have it, you can just download the mission yourself - it's very small, and the screenshots are from the very beginning of the level.

Wonder how mich that has to do with it

?

Shuflie · Jan 14, 2005, 01:15 PM

It's probably more likely that the engine uses a fog lookup table, nvidia cards have a fog table emulation mode which may explain why they can display the fog better that radeon cards. Does the game have an ini file similar to the one used in doom3? If it does than it might be possible to modify this in the same way that doom 3 can be made to run better on ATI hardware.

Aja · Jan 14, 2005, 11:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by The_Neon_Cowboy

Wonder how mich that has to do with it

?

Very little. All Darkloader does is unpacks the files and lets you play them. Plus, the third set of shots I posted is from a Thief 2 original mission, no Darkloader.

Aja · Jan 14, 2005, 11:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shuflie

It's probably more likely that the engine uses a fog lookup table, nvidia cards have a fog table emulation mode which may explain why they can display the fog better that radeon cards. Does the game have an ini file similar to the one used in doom3? If it does than it might be possible to modify this in the same way that doom 3 can be made to run better on ATI hardware.

No ini file that I could find. Lots of cfg files, but I wouldn't know where to look. Enabling the fog at all took a bit of tweaking (with Radlinker).

Jan 12, 2005, 07:13 AM	#1
Aja DriverHeaven Newbie Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Edmonton Posts: 6 Rep Power: 0	Fog problems in Thief 2 with Radeon cards Hello, sorry if this has been posted, I did a search but couldn't find anything. On the TTLG forums, there is much discussion about problems related to fog in Thief 2. Here's a prominent thread, with pictures detailing the problem. http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=91820 As you can see, the difference is fairly noticable, particularily in some of the OMs which take place outdoors, and the fog has a bad tendancy to simply disappear rather than blend smoothly. The problem seems to be universal, at least with Radeon 9800s, and any of the recent drivers (haven't tried it below 4.xx, but I wouldn't want to anyways). Some people are actually going as far as buying Nvidia cards to remedy the problem (we're big thief fans over at TTLG ). I had heard somewhere that the ATI guys actually browse these forums, so I thought I'd plea to them. You guys can't let a small problem like this sway customers! Any chance of getting a quick fix in the next release?

Jan 12, 2005, 09:34 PM	#2
Spyre DriverHeaven Senior Member Join Date: Mar 2003 Location: England Posts: 240 Rep Power: 62	Send me a savegame from that level and I will have a look at it __________________ ATI Beta Tester game.AMD.Moderator

Jan 13, 2005, 01:22 AM	#3
The_Neon_Cowboy HardwareHeaven Extreme Member Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: U.S.A. Posts: 16,009 Rep Power: 92 System Specs	Hmm... Game Released: 2000 Last patched/updated Apr 2000 4-5 year old game My reccomendation move on to Thief 3 j/k Na really if it turned out o be a "game bug" you probubly out of luck... Have you tried any other driver sets to see if the issue changes The 6600GT image in that thread looks really dark... other wise it looks the same doesnt help that guy took shots from diffrent positions and in diffrent areas...hard to compair.... I'd try to look at it but I don't have the title anymore I tossed Thief 1 & 2 in the trash years ago... __________________ Last edited by The_Neon_Cowboy; Jan 13, 2005 at 01:38 AM.

Jan 14, 2005, 08:42 AM	Thread Starter #5
Aja DriverHeaven Newbie Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Edmonton Posts: 6 Rep Power: 0	I made a quick comparision to illustrate the problem. The first shot of each pair is on a Voodoo 3 2000, the second is on a 9800 Pro. I should also mention that the 9800 fog does NOT work off the bat, you have to install Radlinker and enable Table Fog and Z Fog, while disabling W Fog. Anyways, the differences are subtle, but present, particularily in the first two sets of shots. On the Voodoo the fog just looks more thick and natural, whereas on the Radeon, it's very unnatural and abrupt looking.

Jan 14, 2005, 01:15 PM	#7
Shuflie DriverHeaven Addict Join Date: Jun 2003 Location: Belfast Posts: 269 Rep Power: 0	It's probably more likely that the engine uses a fog lookup table, nvidia cards have a fog table emulation mode which may explain why they can display the fog better that radeon cards. Does the game have an ini file similar to the one used in doom3? If it does than it might be possible to modify this in the same way that doom 3 can be made to run better on ATI hardware.