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Missing shadows?

By Lukyz

Enabling anti-aliasing disables shadows, HDR, bloom and many other subtle touches that enhance graphical quality.

If you like this guide or find it anyhow useful, please take a second to rate it or write me a feedback. THX!

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Created by

Lukyz
Online

Category: Modding or Configuration

Languages: English

Posted

Updated

6 Jan, 2016 @ 1:57am

5 Jan, 2018 @ 3:47am

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Guide Index

Overview

Disable AA in config tool before launching game

Comments

Disable AA in config tool before launching game

Credits for this goes to Steam user XenoBrain which mention in discussion but in my opinion its very important information so I decide to post it here.

It's been mentioned here that enabling anti-aliasing disables shadows. It feel it's important to draw attention to this--in fact, it does more than that--it reconfigures the entire rendering pipeline. You'll miss HDR, bloom and many other subtle touches that enhance graphical quality.

Essentially the differences that have people complaing that the 360 version looks better than the PC version, this is rectified by disabling anti-aliasing.

Do it in the config tool before you boot the game.

If you want anti-aliasing, it can't be forced in the control panel but a tool such an NVInspector is capable of forcing it with right configuration, otherwise you'll have to use FXAA/MLAA etc either from your graphics card's control panel or your favorite injector such as SweetFX.

But I would recommend to use downsampling[www.neogaf.com] e.g. set your resolution higher than standard 1080x1920.

11 Comments

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Anabanana 21 Oct, 2024 @ 8:05pm

Heyy, i need help with my game it won't lauch

StixsmasterHD4k 19 Oct, 2024 @ 7:40pm

I fixed all graphical issues with the game by just inserting dgvoodoo2 and running it threw DX11

anthropocide 21 Aug, 2022 @ 3:45am

Shadows look broken in this game so it's not a deal breaker to disable them completely.

floydmw 24 Jul, 2020 @ 7:41pm

Well I tested it both ways, and you're right that enabling AA disables shadows for some reason, but I didn't notice any difference in those other effects you mentioned. So it basically comes down to whether you prefer to have shadows or AA in the game. Once I realized that "shadows" essentially is just Lara's shadow and not environmental (well, maybe the enemies might have them too but are you really going to be looking at their shadows while they're trying to bite your face off?), it was an easy choice. Personally I thought the game looked noticeably better with AA enabled.

Oh also, you can adjust those settings at any time while in the game so you can directly compare which you prefer.

^7R4^2Z^70R 20 Oct, 2019 @ 11:29am

Very interesting thanks!

Vidik 7 Jul, 2018 @ 11:22am

Thanks!

💗Blaaashyyy💗 21 Apr, 2018 @ 5:38pm

@Kobi Blade i thought so, because I saw some shadows here and there, so I left aa on. But in the Croft Manor, while walking through the hal with windows and moonlight I noticed that Lara's shadow is missing, even tho she stood right in the moon light going through the window, it's strong light. Earlier while walking through some other place i noticed that Lara's shadow appears for a moment close to lamps and then is gone very fast, clear glitch. So I switched off aa and went to those places again... yes, aa ducks up your shadows for sure. I am necroing this for future generations that might be decieved by Kobi's comment. Have a GG.

Lukyz [author] 29 Aug, 2016 @ 8:59am

Ok, so I reinstalled the game just to be sure and its still true.
I made some quick comparison screenshot with max. settings and enabled shadows in both cases, only difference is anti-aliasing. http://imgur.com/a/zuTDu

Kobi Blade 29 Aug, 2016 @ 7:24am

I use Anti-Aliasing and doesn't disable any of the options you state.

BMtK Ender 8 Mar, 2016 @ 6:02pm

Thanks for the tip. I was wondering if this game just didn't have any shadows haha. Doesn't make sense, but it works!

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