Gamma issue with Quake 3 (and old OpenGL games) [FIXED]

[Lumberjack [FR]]

Hi !

To start, I just want to precise that I haven't the Steam version of Quake III Arena, because I still have the original CD. I still hesitate to buy it on Steam, because I heard that some people have issues to launch the game.

But I want to talk about my gamma issue here because there still are lots of people and maybe somebody will be able to help me ;-)

In fact, at the beginning, everything was fine ! But I wanted to try the 3dfx graphics with nGlide.

On the nGlide website, it's written :

"To play in Glide mode extract '3dfxvgl.dll' into game directory from here and set 'GL Driver' to 'Voodoo' in game options"

Source : http://www.zeus-software.com/downloads/nglide/compatibility

So I copied the "3dfxvgl.dll" file into the game directory and choose the Voodoo graphics in-game. I set up the settings in nGlide and it worked great !

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2065896974

(It's strange, this screenshot looks brighter than the OpenGL one whereas it looks originaly identical... But when we download them it's fine !)

The problem was when I wanted to come back to the OpenGL graphics. First, when I wanted to choose OpenGL, each time the setting came back to Voodoo. So I deleted the "3dfxvgl.dll".

And so, from this moment, I got a gamma issue ! The result is that everything looks dark !

The first 2 seconds, it looks normal like this :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2065898457

And then, it switches to a darker picture :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2065900166

It's very strange !

So I tried to change this line in the "q3config.cfg" file and put the value to "1" :

seta r_ignorehwgamma "1"

But it still doesn't look as it should :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2065901460

I tried to uninstall the game and reinstall it, but it's still the same !


Does somebody have an idea how to fix this please ?

Thanks for your help ! :-D

[Lumberjack [FR]]

I did a video to better see what is the problem :

https://youtu.be/WVQDGlrh4Og

[Lumberjack [FR]]

It's strange, because if I changed this line to this... :

seta r_gamma "0.5"

...I get this :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2067267968

And then my gamma comes back to this :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2065900166


But if I put a value higher than "1.0" for the "r_gamma" (with seta r_ignorehwgamma "0"), nothing changes, the gamma doesn't switch and I constantly have this (the same result than the previous picture in fact) :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2065900166

But still the wrong gamma !

[Lumberjack [FR]]

If I put these values for these functions... :

seta r_gamma "1.5"
seta r_ignorehwgamma "1"

...I get this :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2067315491

But still not the good gamma !

Please help me ! It drives me nuts !

[Lumberjack [FR]]

I think that something was written in the Windows registry concerning the gamma of some OpenGL applications since I tried the 3dfx graphics. Or maybe it's something else...

By the way, I have some other strange things, because you can see that there is no aliasing on my pictures whereas I haven't force the AA in the Control Catalyst Center (I have the same issue with the ATI GLRage version of Tomb Raider I and I never created a profile in the CCC for it).

I forced MSAA before, but when I deleted the profil, everything was fine ! But as I said, since I tried the 3dfx graphics, something looks a bit broken.

I will try some other games with an OpenGL renderer and maybe try to install Quake 3 on my laptop, to see if there are differences, because it has a Nvidia GPU and I noticed that I have more troubles with my ATI GPU and some OpenGL games.

It's the last time that I bought an AMD graphic card !

[Lumberjack [FR]]

The problem is clearly with the OpenGL renderer, in general !!! (it's why I changed the title of the thread too)

I tested Unreal Tournament with the OpenGL renderer and the gamma changed too :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2067964104

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2067964826

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2067965776

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2067967018


But I hadn't this issue some years ago. Here is a screenshot of UT99 taken in 2015 with the OpenGL renderer (I always played in OGL because the colors are better) :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2067968167

Here is a screenshot taken today :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2067970038


And in fact, I had the same problem with Tomb Raider I some weeks ago when I tested different solution to play the game. I noticed this sudden change with the gamma too in OpenGL mode.

Tomb Raider with DOSBox and dgVoodoo :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2067970972

Tomb Raider with DOSBox and nGlide :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2067972032


So how can I do to solve this issue with the OpenGL renderer ?

[Ze]

Gamma may be tricky, I suggest you download CNQ3 or ioquake3

[Lumberjack [FR]]

Thanks for you help ! :-)

But the problem is that this gamma issue is with all the OpenGL games... And it didn't exist before ! :-/

[Lumberjack [FR]]

There must be a solution, because I swear I didn't have this issue 2 or 3 years ago on the same computer !

I don't know when and how it appeared, but I'm only sure about one thing : if this issue wasn't here at the beginning, it may disappear too !

This is just logic !

But I need help please !


I noticed one thing too. If I'm in a OpenGL game and then switch to the desktop ("Ctrl + Escap" for example), the wrong gamma appears on the desktop too for 1 or 2 seconds (but in this case it's brighter than it should be, whereas it's as it should be in the game in this moment) and then switch to the good one (darker).

So it's a thing that is changing in real-time, like a sort of post-treatment ! It must be a way to disable it !

If we can disable this thing for one game, we can disable it for every OpenGL games !

An other thing that I noticed : if we put one on these games in the windowed mode, the wrong gamma stay, but it's correct on the desktop :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069126286

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069128538

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069129747


The gamma is correct for 1 or 2 seconds, so we just need to find how we can disable this...

And as I said (a lot), if it was correct 2 or 3 years ago, one thing changed and I'm sure that this thing can be disable !

[Lumberjack [FR]]

I solved the problem !

It's curious, because I saw on the internet that lots of people have this issue with the gamma and the OpenGL games, but no one talks about the ICC profiles...

I fixed the problem deleting the calibrated ICC profile that I created one year ago with my calibration display and DisplayCAL. But not only...

Because, after that, the issue didn't disappear... It's the strange thing !

So I tried to create a new basic color profile with Windows, without touching the different settings.

For that, I went in the "Color Management" of Windows and in "Display Color Calibration" :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069193017

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069193662

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069194628


So, a ICC profile was created :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069195617


You can delete it after that ! It was just to reset all these strange f****** things ! ^_^

But as I said, it's strange, because deleting my old profile should have been enough...!


But I will have to explore all of this the next time I will calibrate and create a new ICC profile for my screen, because this was strange !


The important is that now everything is fine !

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069196530


But the curious thing is that even if the gamma doesn't change in-game when it's fullscreen, it changes in windowed mode and affects the desktop too (I only could capture this with Fraps, not with Windows) :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069197732

We can see the difference with here (when there was the gamma issue) :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069129747


OK ! Now it's perfect again ! :-)

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069198808

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069199845


Last strange thing ! I understand now why some of my games have the anti-aliasing forced ! But I think it's exactly only the games which are using the OpenGL renderer...

If I created a profile for these games in the Catalyst Control Center, it doesn't work ! But if I just apply the settings, it works in general :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069201190

It's a curious behavior and I think it's idiot ! Because I need to put the settings to the default one when I don't want AA...

[Lumberjack [FR]]

In fact, the problem comes from "DisplayCAL Profile Loader", a program that load my color profile.

But it's strange (one more time), because as I said (one more time again), I saw lots of people have this issue with the gamma in the OpenGL games, but I don't know if they have a calibrated profile, so maybe it is still a different problem...

But for me, it's the profile and more precisely when it's loaded from "DisplayCAL Profile Loader".

To avoid this gamma issue, I can add an exception for some applications :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069292749

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069294651


But I can delete the association with my profile too :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069295989


And then completely delete my profile in the Color Management of Windows :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069297533


It's possible to "let the OS handle the calibration loading" too in DisplayCAL instead of using DisplayCAL Profile Loader :

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2069298724

OK. I have finished !

Maybe it will be useful for someone ! :-)

[Neumond]

I have similar issue with Quake III Arena. I'm using ioquake3 source port, also tried Quake3e, but all of the source ports has same issue for me (OpenGL and Vulkan renderers). Visually when I play all colors are ok, but the problem appears if I record my screen with OBS or GeForce Experience. The recorded video is always pretty dark.

I've seen on YouTube a lot of videos of Q3, and more than half of videos has this issue, but nobody talks about it. I tried this ICC thing, Color Management on Windows 11, but I have no ICC profiles at all set. I see there is "System default (sRGB IEC61966-2.1)" profile set for my device.

Does the dark colors appears only in recorded videos and screenshots for you, or is it happening while playing as well?

[Unaimed Player]

This has nothing to do with the icc profile of your monitor. Of course you can work around the issue with the icc profile, because you can change gamma settings with it.
This is a gpu driver issue. This video offers a viable solution without messing with your monitor on a global level (and other fixes on modern systems)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F84u1nRCrX4

[Lumberjack [FR]]

Originally posted by 4n43m14:

This has nothing to do with the icc profile of your monitor. Of course you can work around the issue with the icc profile, because you can change gamma settings with it.
This is a gpu driver issue. This video offers a viable solution without messing with your monitor on a global level (and other fixes on modern systems)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F84u1nRCrX4

I didn't try to change the gamma of the game with an ICC profile.

I just have a calibrated profile for my monitor, which was loaded by the loader of DisplayCAL, the software that I used to calibrate the screen with a calibration probe.

In this case, I had the problem with the image in the OpenGL games, because I think that a change with the contrat is applied to them and the desktop at the same time, but that the DisplayCAL Profile Loader canceled it.

https://youtu.be/WVQDGlrh4Og

But when I chose to use the calibrated profile with the Color Management of Windows instead of DisplayCAL, the issue disappeared.

I tried some changes in the "q3config.cfg" file, but the colors were never correct.

But thanks for the video! There are great things in it! ;-)

By the way, I will answer to Neumond too ;-)

Originally posted by Neumond:

I have similar issue with Quake III Arena. I'm using ioquake3 source port, also tried Quake3e, but all of the source ports has same issue for me (OpenGL and Vulkan renderers). Visually when I play all colors are ok, but the problem appears if I record my screen with OBS or GeForce Experience. The recorded video is always pretty dark.

I've seen on YouTube a lot of videos of Q3, and more than half of videos has this issue, but nobody talks about it. I tried this ICC thing, Color Management on Windows 11, but I have no ICC profiles at all set. I see there is "System default (sRGB IEC61966-2.1)" profile set for my device.

Does the dark colors appears only in recorded videos and screenshots for you, or is it happening while playing as well?

In fact, yes, the issue is still there when we are capturing videos, because the change in the image that OpenGL games apply are not captured.

But in the Quake 3 case, it's not a gamma issue, but a contrast issue.

It's easy to recover the correct colors with VirtualDub. You just have to apply a contrast of 200%.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3021213475

But if I remember, it can be other settings with other OpenGL games. But with a screenshot which has the correct colors, it's easy to find the correct settings with a comparison.

[interactivprimar]

Originally posted by Lumberjack FR:

It's easy to recover the correct colors with VirtualDub. You just have to apply a contrast of 200%.

Thanks, man, you are my savior! That's all what I need. Change in gamma make game looks pretty bad. But if you just add 2 color correction filters in OBS and the game looks fine. In my situation x4 was too dark. Than in second color filter just add +2 and now in looks good.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3112202067

[Lumberjack [FR]]

I'm glad I could help you! ;-)