I have two 6600GT cards and will definitely test those. And of course I will do some comparisons between modern graphics cards (this time I will also do AMD and Nvidia).

PS: Found another tiny bug in the launch driver (the one mentioned in the readme). In mission 6 when you disable the bomb the bomb and a few other objects have flickering textures. This is resolved with the driver I recommend in my video 😀

I've been following this thread with interest, today I tried out SC (never played it before) on my "fastest" retro rig because it has a GeForce Ti 4600, which should run the game acceptably fast, right?

A few seconds into the tutorial I came to this spot:

Sixteen FPS? Aww, come on!

Will there be many spots like this later in the game, bogging the framerate down like that?

The game is a good candidate for 640x480 or 800x600 on a CRT, then 😉

Good idea d1stortion!
Also, for those daring ones, overclocking the Ti 4600 will definitely help push those framerates a bit hehehe

Dropping the resolution did not really work for me, there were only minor improvements in the framerate (800x600: 18 FPS, 640x480: 20 FPS in the same spot as shown above). Besides, it made the game look a lot worse, even on the CRT.

However, I think I found the solution: Setting the "Shadow resolution" to "Medium" instead of "High" yielded 24 FPS at 1024x768 in the same spot, and I couldn't really notice the difference in the graphics. I think I can live with that...

I believe the readme actually mentions that resolution doesn't have that much impact on performance and to play with the quality options 😀

But yes, plenty of demanding areas like that.In general in-door scenes are quite smooth, but when you step outdoors the situation is different.

This benchmark will scale in a radically different way than previous fillrate limited benchmark released by the industry. Resolution is not the only important factor limiting performance. Shadow Resolution and Effects Quality are just as important if not more.

More details about Shadow Resolution:

Why does Splinter Cell have a special mode for NV2x/NV3x graphic chips?

Splinter Cell was originally developed on XBOXTM. Features only available on NV2x chips were used and it was decided to port them to the PC version even if these chips would be the only one able to support them. Considering the lighting system of XBOXTM was well validated, it was easy to keep that system intact.

Splinter Cell Dynamic lighting system

Splinter Cell shadow system is a major part of the game. On NV2x/NV3x hardware, it runs using a technique called Shadow Buffers. This technique is rendering the scene from every shadow casting light and store a depth buffer that represent each pixel viewed by this light source. Each pixel has an X, Y, Z coordinate in the light system and these coordinates can be transformed, per pixel, in the viewer coordinate system. It’s then easy to compare with the actual depth stored in the Z buffer to figure out if the pixel viewed by the camera is the same or is occluded by the pixel viewed by the light. If they are the same, it means the pixel is lighted, if the light pixel is in front of the viewer pixel, it means the pixel is in the shadow. On all other current hardware, the game is using another technique called projected shadows (shadow projectors). The technique is somewhat similar, we render the scene from the light point of view but instead of storing the depth, we are storing the color intensity in a texture. That texture is then mapped per vertex on each object that is going to receive the shadow. To be able to have objects casting shadows on other objects that are themselves casting shadows, Splinter Cell is using a 3-depth levels shadow casting algorithm. In general, the first level is used to compute the shadow to be used on the dynamic actors like Sam. The second level is used to compute the shadow used by the static meshes like a table or boxes. The final level is used for the projection on the BSP. This system is allowing Sam to receive the shadow of a gate on him, then Sam and the gate can cast on a box and finally all three objects can cast on the BSP (ground). This system also has a distance check algorithm to determine if Sam’s shadow should be projected on a static mesh (like a box) or if it shouldn’t base on their relative position. Both systems have their own strength/weaknesses. The main advantage of the Shadow Buffer algorithm is how easy it is to work with. Shadow Projectors are tricky and difficult to use.

Shadow Resolution […]
Show full quote

Shadow Resolution

The Shadow Resolution setting represents the size of the texture render targets where the scene objects are rendered from the shadow casting lights point of view. The determining factor that allows a graphic card to render the shadows at a higher resolution is the “fillrate” of the card.

Shadow Resolution Shadow Projector Shadow Buffer
LOW 128x128 1024x512
MED 256x256 1024x1024
HIGH 512x512 2048x1024

More details about Effects Quality:

Effects Quality […]
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Effects Quality

The effect quality setting mainly determines how powerful and how expensive the special effects inside the game are going to cost. In addition, this setting also has an impact on the size of the filtering kernel of several post-rendering filters in the game. Fillrate is the characteristic that governs this setting.

Class 0 HARDWARE

Effects Quality LOW MED HIGH VERY HIGH
Rain layers SOME LOT LOT LOT
Thermal Vision Quality NOMINAL GOOD BETTER EXCELLENT
Night vision Render Target 512x256 512x512 512x512 512x512
All Actor rendered NO YES YES YES
Light beams NO YES YES YES
Shadow Filtering kernel 2x2 2x2 3x2 3x3

Looking at this, it seems that you should be able to set shadow resolution and effects quality to high (from very high) with little visible difference. But then I don't know what most of these numbers actually mean 😀 I guess the shadow resolution of 1024 x 1024 should be plenty. But not sure how much of a difference Shadow Filtering Kernel makes. I might do some A-B screenshots and you guys can see if you can spot a difference 😀

I've attached the readme document (this is from the GOG.com version which is patched to 1.3 with the 3 bonus levels) for further study.

It looks for some settings you probably won't be able to tell "Low" from "Medium" and others "Medium" from "High."

On the GeForce 4 I'd try setting the shadow/lighting resolution to lower levels - this is based on other games (like FEAR or Oblivion) where dropping the lighting effects usually yields better performance without dramatically impacting gameplay (e.g. you aren't sacrificing draw distance or LOD). Kind of surprised that lowering resolution did nothing for performance though; disagrees with my experience with other games, and given that this game definitely fits into the "weird" category, for all I know setting everything to Very High and putting it at 1600x1200 might yield better performance. 🤣

Thanks for posting the readme FAQs! 😀

Ok so I took a look at the details options first.

The readme mentions this:

In addition, this setting also has an impact on the size of the filtering kernel of several post-rendering filters in the game.

And has various levels going from low to very high: [img]Shadow%20Filtering%20kernel 2x2 2x2 3x2 3x3[/img]

Apart from this, the only other difference between high and very high is the thermal vision. And boy does it make a difference. You can triple your frame rates 😲 Quality does go down noticeably, meaning you can actually tell the difference (compared to the shadows), but it's not a big deal IMO.

Working on a quick video...

More videos 😀

Phil's Splinter Cell Retro PC Walkthrough - Part 6: Kalinatek - Geforce4 Shadow Buffers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=duKij-Ql9Sc

Splinter Cell (2003 PC version) Effects quality comparison: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kqnJkLLqQTw

Holy crap! How's the framerate without thermal vision? Does it take just as much of a hit when going from High to Very High?

Funny thing, I've never really played any Splinter Cell games other than Conviction (which was pretty lame to be honest), but I remember seeing a friend, or rather a friend's much older brother, play the first one 12 years ago (insane to think it was that long ago...).
He had a Northwood 2.0 and a Ti 4200 back then. I seem to remember that he had to wait for a patch to come out, because it would always crash when using Thermal Vision! Possibly a driver issue or just the game acting weird, but I remember that he was searching for a patch, he couldn't get past the tutorial level hehehe

I couldn't find any other aspects of the game that show a visual or performance difference. Fire for example is the same. But according to the readme file, thermal vision is the main area with changes.

Regarding other performance relevant settings, I'm currently uploading my next 2 videos. One covers display resolution and the other one shadow resolution.

But to spill the beans, what do I recommend as a good performance / quality compromise?

Resolution: 1024 x 768
Shadow resolution: Medium
Effects quality: High

This should give you 30+ fps in most areas on a GeForce4 4400/4800 SE/4600/4800.

Cool, I'll watch them as soon as they finish processing!
All of this has got me going somewhat. I feel like playing this game. I've always wanted to play it and I guess now is as good a time as any!

F2bnp wrote:

Cool, I'll watch them as soon as they finish processing!
All of this has got me going somewhat. I feel like playing this game. I've always wanted to play it and I guess now is as good a time as any!

The game is awesome 😀

Very hard though. Quick Save is your friend. And it's not a game that allows you to sneak past everything. Lots of scripted action events but they are a lot of fun too 😀

Funny thing I noticed when reading the information on the DVD version of Pandora Tomorrow. It does list the Geforce 6, 7 and 8 as supported!

Splinter Cell (2003 PC version) Shadow resolution comparison: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nkJLcYMPbZY&feature=youtu.be

Splinter Cell (2003 PC version) Display resolution comparison: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y366rXhNN40&feature=youtu.be

As always, great work! You should put all of these in a playlist to keep things organised!

F2bnp wrote:

As always, great work! You should put all of these in a playlist to keep things organised!

Done!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ip_TqzwSjhA&l … cK01gpqyngoHFRU

Might update the links tomorrow so that the playlist shows up when clicked.

But I think I'm done in regards to the technical aspects of the game. I could do a video on EAX and CMSS (Virtual surround over headphone) but that's all I can think of.

Why hasn't anyone fixed the shadows in this game yet to work like they should on modern hardware? What an oversight...

Normally, I'd consider this reason enough to consider swapping out my GeForce 6800 Ultra for a GeForce FX 5950 Ultra in my retro box, but given the driver issues and how it's too new to work with the correct driver version, it's probably not really worth the overall performance downgrade right now.

Trying to get the most out of the original Splinter Cell would also cripple Chaos Theory, which needs SM3.0 for maximum image quality, HDR and all that, if I'm not mistaken. Been a while since I've played it thanks to bloody StarForce.

NamelessPlayer wrote:

Why hasn't anyone fixed the shadows in this game yet to work like they should on modern hardware? What an oversight...

Normally, I'd consider this reason enough to consider swapping out my GeForce 6800 Ultra for a GeForce FX 5950 Ultra in my retro box, but given the driver issues and how it's too new to work with the correct driver version, it's probably not really worth the overall performance downgrade right now.

Trying to get the most out of the original Splinter Cell would also cripple Chaos Theory, which needs SM3.0 for maximum image quality, HDR and all that, if I'm not mistaken. Been a while since I've played it thanks to bloody StarForce.

My guess is things would work with Shadow Projectors enabled, per the readme/FAQ docs. It's actually not surprising that a console-centric feature isn't available on mainstream PCs - just like there's features from GTA games that work on PlayStation 2 but not on PC versions of the game.

obobskivich wrote:

NamelessPlayer wrote:

Why hasn't anyone fixed the shadows in this game yet to work like they should on modern hardware? What an oversight...

Normally, I'd consider this reason enough to consider swapping out my GeForce 6800 Ultra for a GeForce FX 5950 Ultra in my retro box, but given the driver issues and how it's too new to work with the correct driver version, it's probably not really worth the overall performance downgrade right now.

Trying to get the most out of the original Splinter Cell would also cripple Chaos Theory, which needs SM3.0 for maximum image quality, HDR and all that, if I'm not mistaken. Been a while since I've played it thanks to bloody StarForce.

My guess is things would work with Shadow Projectors enabled, per the readme/FAQ docs. It's actually not surprising that a console-centric feature isn't available on mainstream PCs - just like there's features from GTA games that work on PlayStation 2 but not on PC versions of the game.

Like the co-op missions in San Andreas? Other than that, I can't think of anything that PC versions of GTA III/VC/SA were missing out, other than the enhanced Xbox assets for the first two.

In Splinter Cell's case, this just smacks of lazy porting to me, especially considering how Chaos Theory looked so much better on PC than Xbox; on the flip side, that was years later, with newer generations of graphics cards available. Pretty sure the GeForce 6800 had just debuted around that time and SM 2.0 was pretty established then.

In any case, designing for very hardware-specific features like this tends to break compatibility with later hardware, and it reminds me a lot of ATI's TRUFORM, early Ageia PhysX implementations that don't run on NVIDIA cards (GRAW 1 comes to mind), and maybe even the old 3dfx T-Buffer on the VSA-100 cards. It bugs the hell out of me, just like not being able to enable full A3D 2.0/3.0 on certain old games without an Aureal Vortex2 card.

P.S.: Do old PC sound cards and that Koss ESP/950 setup of yours make a good mix, especially with proper headphone A3D, or is it just too revealing of the crappy DAC stages of the cards available at the time?

NamelessPlayer wrote:

Like the co-op missions in San Andreas? Other than that, I can't think of anything that PC versions of GTA III/VC/SA were missing out, other than the enhanced Xbox assets for the first two.

Motion blur in GTA Vice City (and if I remember right 3; it's been YEARS since I've played 3 though) are unavailable on the PC versions, but exist on the PS2 version. It also exists on the PS2 version of Vice City Stories, but I haven't seen that game on any other platforms so I don't know if that's a PS2 unique feature.

It doesn't really make or break gameplay, but it was another example of a graphics feature that exists for console hardware but wasn't enabled or supported fully for PC.

In Splinter Cell's case, this just smacks of lazy porting to me, especially considering how Chaos Theory looked so much better on PC than Xbox; on the flip side, that was years later, with newer generations of graphics cards available. Pretty sure the GeForce 6800 had just debuted around that time and SM 2.0 was pretty established then.

In any case, designing for very hardware-specific features like this tends to break compatibility with later hardware, and it reminds me a lot of ATI's TRUFORM, early Ageia PhysX implementations that don't run on NVIDIA cards (GRAW 1 comes to mind), and maybe even the old 3dfx T-Buffer on the VSA-100 cards. It bugs the hell out of me, just like not being able to enable full A3D 2.0/3.0 on certain old games without an Aureal Vortex2 card.

P.S.: Do old PC sound cards and that Koss ESP/950 setup of yours make a good mix, especially with proper headphone A3D, or is it just too revealing of the crappy DAC stages of the cards available at the time?

GeForce 6800 and Chaos Theory sound about right age-wise; Wikipedia says Chaos Theory was early 2005, which puts it kind of in-between GF6 and 7. SM2.0 was certainly mainstream by then; easily onto 2nd/3rd generation DX9 hardware. I'd agree with "lazy porting" - my point about GTA was yet another example more than anything else. Personally my "answer" to porting concerns is to try and get the game on whatever is the "best" platform as opposed to trying to fight with it. The only real downside is that it requires more platforms. 😊

I don't know a whole lot about TruForm (as far as I'm aware very little officially supported it - both in terms of hardware devices (isn't it pretty much only available on R200?) and software implementations (I think there's a Morrowmind mod that can use it, but that's all I can think of)), but with PhysX I know there's actually types of calculations that GPUs cannot do, that the PPU can. And that's where the compatibility is "broken." You can read more than you probably ever wanted to know about it from PhysX Info Wiki:
http://physxinfo.com/wiki/Ageia_PhysX_PPU (they claim it's possible to run a PPU and GPU together for maximum compatibility, but I've never bothered with it (I own a total of I think 4 games that use PhysX, only one of them can do hardware accelerated modes)).

I don't think T-Buffer actually changes software support; afaik it's hardware effects made possible by SLI, similar to what nVidia and AMD offer with their multi-GPU solutions today. Here are the two Beyond3D articles about it from years ago:
http://www.beyond3d.com/content/articles/66/
http://www.beyond3d.com/content/articles/67/

Is the ESP/950 question directed at me? If so - let's not derail this thread with it; I have no issues talking audio, but PM me or take it to the audio thread. 😀