[Possible Bug] GUI Scaling and user controlled zoom - double influence of Visual Quality!

IkonNavros

Hey there While i do not own the game anymore, a friend of mine has decided to order it now from the Beamdog site.

And since that guy is no fan of board writing and after a long discussion about graphic - and comparing at his place the "Big Screen Beta" with the "normal EE version without Big Screen BEta usage", comparing it with the original Baldur's Gate, various screenshots, Baldur's Gate with widescreen Mod, i think that post is justified, and perhaps is helpful

To come to the point, Could it be that both the GUI Scaling/The amount of zoom which is set to a fix constant always there-value by the Devs and the user controlled zoom do affect each other in a not planned/not intentioned way?

Current Behaviour:
Without the Bigscreen Beta (when using user controlled zoom, maximum value possible) The graphic becomes incredible big, but blurry

Behaviour as it should be:
When activating Big Screen Beta Mode and doing the same like before (using maximum User controlled zoom with mouswheel) The Graphic is maybe a little bit smaller - same when starting/loading a game - But the Quality instantly becomes so much more crisp and clear, no matter if maximum zoom level user controlled, or letting the game load zoom/starting a new game standard zoom level intact.

Testmachines have been 2 Bigtowers with Nvidia Graphics and one Laptop with some unknown not too old ATI graphic Chip. Testing Resolutions have been: 1280x720 and 1920x1080

Conclusion: The user controlled zoom level is working beautiful, you can have all at a very large size. But when it is used with the normal game mode (Non-Big-Screen-Beta-Mode) not only the maximum zoom graphic is way worse, but also the standard setting of user controlled zoom when starting/loading a game looks way more blurrier.

Important Note at the end: When not using the GUI Scaling things DO get a bit smaller, but not really much.

Test it out for yourself, compare maximum zoom in Big-Screen Beta and normal mode, compare loading game/starting game zoom in Big-Screen-Beta and without - the difference in size is small, but there is a big rise of general Visual Quality when comparing Big Screen Beta and Normal Mode

There should really be a button in the Game Settings which disable GUI Scaling - since it only enhances the Visuals, while making things only little bit smaller, when not zooming out completly

Both a bug report and feature Request

agris

Post some screen shots man, it would help. I don't fully understand your issue here- is it that the fully zoomed in, scaled game window is more blurry than fully zoomed in unscaled game window? Are both zoom levels equivalent? i.e. is any given object rendered with the same amount of pixels in both? I thought that the maximum zoomed in view in the unscaled game was LESS zoomed in than the scaled, and it would account for the behavior you're reporting.

IkonNavros

Well, since that friend of mine has the game and i do not anymore, i can not make a screenshot sadly .

But to explain in short words: Big Screen Beta Mode in Combination with mousewheel controlled zoom makes the Sprites and general sizes a BIT smaller as the game without that Big Screen Beta Mode. But it looks way much better with maximum zoom.

Big Screen Beta with maximum zoom looks much more clear and less blurry as maximum zoom without that Baldur.ini Option line.

So, the Mouswheel controlled zoom is quite a good feature, But that always in background gui scaling makes the picture more worse as it is necessary, Visual runs 2 times trough zoom/scaling filters = double negative influence.

One time is enough, it looks way better and is only a little bit smaller in size

@agris try it out by yourself, compare 2 times the maximum zoom - one time with that ini option and one time without. you will see what i mean

Hope that this post is a bit helpful

IkonNavros

Simple Calculation

Lets say Zero is best and 5 worst

Lets label Vanilla with Widescreen Mode 1 - Sharp but not useful because its so damn tiny. It hurts the Eyes, fur us people with eyglasses as same as mad as blurry graphic

Zoom of the EE Version - which uses that Catmull Filtering Stuff adds another 1. Quite Simple, 1+1=2

And now lets introduce the Scaling which is useful on Tablets, smaller screens need more zoom - Adds another 1 into that simple calculation. But let us "port" that situation now to a bigscreen, like a full HD TV - the more you increase Scaling as a whole, the more it affects the visuals.

In the end we have simple 1+1+1 which is 3 as a whole

It is like i would download a software from the web to enlarge pictures. Picture is a Low Res one, which may look in 100% best, 150-200% also perhaps still acceptable. But that software adds to that user stated value another one, which i will label x - i do not know the size.

Instead of 200% i have now 200 + x

The fact is simple that that additional Scaling is not only hardcoded to the GUI, it is visible in the Visuals too. And who needs "200+x" size of sprites, when "200" is still large enough and the sprites look even better there

As said, i do not know the exact number, but it was also stated that some "hardcoded zoom feature is there" - works perfect for Tablets, but not so good for pc

PC EE and Tablet Versions share more or less the same code, to make adding features both easier. As stated by the Devs in one or more different threads here on the Board.

This is no critical post, Its a simple matter of calculation, and the truth can easily be prooved by trying out Scaling off - Maximum Zoom and then Scaling on - Maximum Zoom.

At least it looks that way. And i guess such an issue should be watched a bit more close