Blurry Graphics

[kgrogfefji82]

GTA IV looks amazing.. But it has pretty blurry graphics, ps3 being even blurrier than the 360..

 

From a distance things look pretty messy.. The old Grand Theft Auto game always looked really sharp.. I hope they manage to get rid of the blur type of graphic style in the neXt game.. I mean I realize how hard it is to handle this game on these consoles.. But I mean look at Assassins Creed... That game looks mindblowing and there's no blur effect at all.. I mean I have no idea how they did it but they manage to keep a higher framerate and look way better than GTA IV (atleast it looks better on most parts, gta iv has some things that look better like super sick details on the car tires and stuff like that)

 

I'm not bashing IV here.. GTA IV is about 90 million times better than Assassins Creed and it's my favorite game this generation.. But I hope they manage to get rid of that blur effect in the next game.

[Omnia sunt Communia]

The graphics were good enough in GTA IV. Grand Theft Auto has never been about state of the art graphics and never will be. As long as I can play the game without squinting my eyes to make out what's what then I'll be happy.

[ScratchCard]

He's talking about the blur. I agree, it's pretty annoying sometimes, when I see Niko's detailed face, and in the background a very blurry skyscraper.

[Pr0xy_fl00d3r]

What blur? GTA IV's graphics are damn near perfect, I have no trouble playing that game. Who cares anyway, its not about the graphics, its about the game play.

[CharmingCharlie]

I imagine they mean this blur :-

 

 

This is the same screenshot with no blur :-

 

[El Jefe]

yeah but that blur can be switched on or off so why complain about it?

[CharmingCharlie]

That's the thing it can't be turned off on the console version. You can only turn it off with the PC version.

[K^2]

I was wrong. It's not the blur that makes it looks so dull. It's all the shades of brown. I'm starting to get why Niko is so homicidal. He's just trying to add some color to the world. Too bad the blood is also kind of brown.

 

I really think they need to diversify their palette the next time. If they don't want to do Vice again, SoCal is nice. And even if they have some sort of a paranoid fear that bright colors will ruin realism, I'd settle for some pastels. Because, seriously, even the real NYC isn't as brown as GTA IV was.

[BigAmericanTitties]

i never really noticed the blur until i saw that screen

[K^2]

It is fairly subtle, but if you've seen this technique used elsewhere, you immediately recognize it. It tends to be used to hide the fact that the textures aren't anisotropically filtered and there is no AA.

[SyphonPayne]

Well for the PC version IMO I prefer the blur that makes the jaggies not quite so sh*tty than that jaggy no-AA sh*t without the blur.

 

If the game supported AA, hell yes I would not want the blur. Trees and shadows look like total sh*t without the blur.

[K^2]

It's a matter of taste, I suppose, which is why developers really need to learn to make it an optional effect on all platforms.

 

On the PC, however, it's best to simply allow players to enable AA and AF. 2xAA will already get rid of any jagged edges that the blur would have, and it's not such a big hit, if you have descent hardware.

[IJM]

This points to a feature that we'd all like to see in GTA:NeXt: some level of proper anti-aliasing.

 

All modern games have this basic feature. We have come to expect it as standard. GTA:IV has stood out like a sore thumb for omitting it. I should imagine it may not have been included because of the formidable demands already being made by the graphics.

 

Hopefully, this will be something they address.

[jplip]

In the PC version i think that is the DETAILS toggle on/off.

I dont know about PS3 and 360.

But that looks one annoying blurry image

[K^2]

All modern games have this basic feature. We have come to expect it as standard. GTA:IV has stood out like a sore thumb for omitting it. I should imagine it may not have been included because of the formidable demands already being made by the graphics.

2xAA quadruples the size of frame buffers, required fill rate, and nearly quadruples the fragment processing load. On the other hand, it has no impact on memory used for textures, the load on the main system bus and CPU, or any of the geometry operations. I'd estimate that a pair of cards on SLI would give roughly the same frame rate with 2xAA as a single card with no AA. So it would have been entirely reasonable, even during release, to expect a large number of machines that could handle it, and that number would grow with the age of the game.

 

Maybe the real reason why AA is not supported in the PC version is because it was not supported on the consoles, and the devs simply did not bother to fix that. I'm fairly certain that the PC version was a port of the 360 version. Since the 360 already runs essentially on DirectX 9c, rendering system would require very few modifications. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if DX portion of the code could be simply re-compiled for Windows PC, and it would run. I'm sure they adjusted some things, but if AA was not planed for from the start, it might have been seen as something not necessary to add during the port. At least, they added a menu option for the blur enable flag.

 

I'm going to see if it would be possible to force 2xAA on GTA IV using advanced settings for the graphics drivers.

[SyphonPayne]

The 360 version actually has 2xAA. As well as the blur filter.

 

BTW, the option is called "definition" on the PC version. "Off" turns on the blur, "On" turns off the blur.

 

As for forcing AA on the PC version, I'm 99% sure that people everywhere have tried all possible ways to force any form of AA into GTA IV, and were unsuccessful. I highly doubt you will succeed.

[K^2]

I noticed already, but it was worth a shot.

[super_slav]

can this so called blur be turned off on the xbox 360 version?

[CharmingCharlie]

I will repeat myself shall I

 

 

That's the thing it can't be turned off on the console version.  You can only turn it off with the PC version.

 

Not quite sure what you meant by "so called" blur did you not see my comparison screen shots, if that isn't blurred then I don't know what is.

[K^2]

I'd be willing to bet that it is a square blur, performed by convolution of the image data with a 3x3 matrix kernel. It is fast, can be performed by a shader, and multiple applications of this technique are typically used to approximate Gaussian blur.

[bobgtafan]

You all have said so many terms I don't understand....Anytways i noticed the blur when I loaded up the lost and Damned and the screen was fuzzy. But i don't care because either way the graphics will get better. Also I'm sure it's an effect to make sure the consle can keep up.

[Starion]

I like the blur filter that the console versions have. I think that GTA IV without the blur filter looks strange, especially the trees.

[Wolfmight]

the blur hides imperfections, but I wish the draw distance were higher on the PS3.