GUI scaling for high dpi screens

[TRIP]

👉UPDATE: Paradox patched in a GUI scaling option. It's still a work in progress but most, if not all menus are working fine now. 👈


Thank you Parodox for hearing our prayers!


There is one mod pack that greatly enhances the experience for upscaled UI


https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1623423360

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Original post:

For everyone who needs to scale their GUI here's a little trick.

1. Goto C:\Users\YourUsername\Documents\Paradox Interactive\Stellaris and open the settings.txt

For Linux users the file is located in
/home/<yourloginname>/.local/share/Paradox Interactive/Stellaris

2. Now change the line "gui_scale" to anything you want. Got it at 1.500000 right now on a 2560x1440 resolution.


There are some issuses coming with it but it's still playable:

- A lot of graphics on the empire creation screens are not in the correct location (planets for planet preferences, ships for ship type prefefence etc.)

- The context menu shifts to the far right from where you click.

- A small number of tool tips are off screen

I created some mods that will fix the main menu and context menu. They are not nearly perfect but it's at least better playable for now.

You can find them here:

(Removed cause of ingame UI scaling option added by paradox afterwards. If you still want them, just send me a message.)

1440p version
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=683833264
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=683122343

4k version
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=683848621
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=683122722

[Devilizer]

Yeah, all I want is a few dpi bigger fonts so I don't have to strain my eyes so much or having to lean forward.

[alexnode]

Hey 4K people i am on 1080p on a tv 3 meters away playhing with blutooth mouse and keyboard and the font is really small had to use 1.4 scaling to play and ruin the whole interface, the whole game . In this day and age you design interfaces with % of screen space that can fit all requirements. The PC market is so diverse in screen resolutions and viewing distance. I will wait another week to write a review in hope that this could be fixed.

[deadsanta]

Because I have a stuttering issue, I have to run the game in windowed mode, and that means it is running at 4k resolution, as a 1920x window is a 6" box on my monitor-- equally illegible. Until this game gets a graphic fix, I cannot play as I cannot read anything that small, it is near 0.5-point font.

[epmode]

Originally posted by alexnode:

Hey 4K people i am on 1080p on a tv 3 meters away playhing with blutooth mouse and keyboard and the font is really small had to use 1.4 scaling to play and ruin the whole interface, the whole game . In this day and age you design interfaces with % of screen space that can fit all requirements. The PC market is so diverse in screen resolutions and viewing distance. I will wait another week to write a review in hope that this could be fixed.

I seriously doubt it'll be fixed. Not in Stellaris, anyway. Paradox has been ignoring complaints like this for years.

[DasUnding]

Absolutely fail! How could they not have a simple function for that scaling?
4k and I need a loupe I am not even on my couch.

I would pay 10€ more if they dont make such a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥!
I could not belive that scaling at 24zoll@4k such a fail and that makes me angry.

[Phaz]

Originally posted by walkerinthemist:

The font size is now good, a couple of side effects
- A number of tool tips went off screen

I've only noticed this when the mouse cursor is near the right edge of the screen. In most cases, moving your view so the object generating the tooltip is moved (a little bit) towards the center of the screen, solves this. This doesnt work for some of the menu buttons on the right edge of the screen, but isn't really an issue.

Did you notice any other tooltips missing?

[TRIP]

Originally posted by PhasmaNL:

Originally posted by walkerinthemist:

The font size is now good, a couple of side effects
- A number of tool tips went off screen

I've only noticed this when the mouse cursor is near the right edge of the screen. In most cases, moving your view so the object generating the tooltip is moved (a little bit) towards the center of the screen, solves this. This doesnt work for some of the menu buttons on the right edge of the screen, but isn't really an issue.

Did you notice any other tooltips missing?

There is also one that I encountered with the observation outpost. I can't read the infiltration requirements. (You'll need the unrestricted studies policy and you can only do it with a race that's at least in the industrial period)

[eddieballgame]

I am using - 1.500000 - on a 17" laptop...works great.

[Bansheedragon]

I came to the forums here looking for a way to increase the UI and found this thread.
Its great that its possible to increase the UI, because for me the 1.0 scale is just a little too small for me to see properly, I had to increase to 1.3
That its not possible to do this properly ingame, has to be done by editing game files which in turn can actually cause problems what playing the game is poor design at best.

[micpo]

Devs - please issue an official patch for this please.

[deadsanta]

This doesn't work on my 4k native screen, monitor size is only 17', I lose around 1/3 of my screen, everything gets shoved to the lower right corner and the GUI is a mess.

[--Fride--]

Originally posted by PhasmaNL:

Originally posted by walkerinthemist:

The font size is now good, a couple of side effects
- A number of tool tips went off screen

I've only noticed this when the mouse cursor is near the right edge of the screen. In most cases, moving your view so the object generating the tooltip is moved (a little bit) towards the center of the screen, solves this. This doesnt work for some of the menu buttons on the right edge of the screen, but isn't really an issue.

Did you notice any other tooltips missing?

Yeah this only becomes an issue with the far right interface. Cutting off a few tooltips. I've kidna worked around a few like that where as you mentioned you move the item further in the screen or if its like a planent and you need to read it for the detials you can get those detials elsewhere instead of from that tooltip

[--Fride--]

Originally posted by epmode:

Originally posted by Cryoned:

Paradox is not gonna fix this as they didn't fix it on any other game.

Also they said on the official forums that they made the fonts and UI bigger for stellaris but they will not support official scaling nor they will add it to the engine in the future.

I understand why they might not want to support it today but not adding it to the engine in the future is insane. Why is it so difficult for the developers to commit to the feature, especially now that >1080p monitors are so common? Other strategy games manage to include the option just fine.

This is the first Paradox grand strategy game I'm playing, and it's only because Stellaris isn't *completely* unreadable at 1440p. I had to give up on their other games because they were giving me headaches (and 1080p upscaled on a 1440p monitor looks terrible).

Really, i'd be buying Distant Worlds : univierses if it didn't have this issue. I'll put off buying that intill a get a second 1080p screen setup

[--Fride--]

SOLVED :: :: ::

Yay. So while browsing around the interweb looking a 4k screen info with 1080 scaling issues i've managed to fix this problem.
Going into the atcual monitor menu, you know, when you press the buttton on the monitor to setup color and whatever, if i go into it there is an option AV/PC MODE
with that option i set my DISPLAY PORT (using display port cable to get 60hz at 4k resolution, hdmi would only give 30hz at 4k..) so switch DISPLAY PORT from AV to PC and i can now set my desktop resolution to 1080p without it being streched further than the edges of the screen.
So i can set Stellaris to 1080p and switch the scaling in the settings file mentioned BACK to 1.0000 and its all fine. Text is readable and no issues with ♥♥♥♥ being outside the edge of screen. Yay.

Ofcourse, with the desktop at this resolution its a little, only tiny, bit blocky since the monitor itself is 4k with more pixels that 1080p so...But i'd only be playing this and maybe a couple other games at 1080p if they have the scaling issue. I can now go ahead and buy Distant Worlds: Univierses as i put that off incase it had the same scaling trouble and its 70bucks which isn't cheap...

Thanks!

[Naroc]

I´m somehow lucky I didn´t spent the money on the game yet. It is reallydisappointing that an appereantly greet game gets ruined by something like that. Technology and also gamers getting older requires scaling UIs.