Horrible Graphics

[Pocahawtness]

Why are the graphics in this game so bad?

High setting looks good. Very High looks better, but seems to consume a lot of processing power. The Remastered is ridiculous. It looks blurry and generally worse than the Very High, and consumes even more power. Switching on AMD Upscaling is horrific, it's kinda weirdly laggy although I have to say that Remastered and AMD Upscaling does work in that it's less demanding, But either way the graphics look poor, consume tons of power won't run at decent refresh rates without setting fire to my GPU.

[Vault Hunter 101]

It's not upscaling, it's downscaling. Both "Upscaling" and "FSR 1.0" actually make the game render graphics at lower resolution than chosen, they are there to get more FPS not to look better.

[Pocahawtness]

Originally posted by Vault Hunter 101:

It's not upscaling, it's downscaling. Both "Upscaling" and "FSR 1.0" actually make the game render graphics at lower resolution than chosen, they are there to get more FPS not to look better.

What? No, I was using Upscaling. I know what it does. Let me explain! I was complaining about the processing power required for the graphics at the higher "Quality" settings. It seems to require far more than other games to achieve an acceptable quality, and any attempt to reduce that, ie using Upscaling, seems to introduce some weird graphical effects that are not present in other games. All in all, whatever you do, the result in poor to say the least. I don't think I have any other game where the graphics are so poor at all settings ( either poor quality or poor performance).

[dollars202]

might be time for a new potato.

[Torinux]

TL;DR "I have a potato for a PC..."

I have an actual Potato PC and it can run this game with medium settings and it looks beautiful and I have had zero graphic issues other than the classic hair or clothes clipping.

Ps. I see, you are using an AMD... lol.

[Pocahawtness]

Well, to me, compared to other games, it not only doesn't look beautiful, it runs badly too. I mean there are worse games around, but BD seems poor. I seem to find the best answer is to run it on Very High using NIS. The PC can do remastered and using AMD Upscaling at about the same loading but the quality is dreadful. Maybe I need to experiment more with that one. All in all, though, I am not impressed.

[Karna5]

Originally posted by 👻Pocahawtness:

Well, to me, compared to other games, it not only doesn't look beautiful, it runs badly too....

As what makes something gorgeous or horrible is subjective, I not only don't have a problem with your post but welcome it as a delightful difference we humans have in how we see the world.

There are some games, like Red Dead Online, which at higher graphical settings are like playing in the real world with an amazing sense of the majesty one could experience exploring a 1902 barely settled world.

And there are other games, like Fallout 4, which have fairly terrible graphics with 0.5k or 1.0k textures and low polygon counts compared to Red Dead Online, but Fallout 4 supports complete overhaul modding with replaced animations, idles, meshes, textures, lighting, etc. to the point where it rivals and in some ways surpass RDO even though it's 7 years old.

Next there are stylized games like RAGE or Borderlands which make no effort at all to look realistic but which are in their own ways as beautiful as RDO (though nothing is as beautiful as modded Fallout 4 *laughs* but I'm biased as I mod it).

Into that world entered Black Desert Online. It doesn't go for the pure realism of RDO, and it doesn't go for the pure artsy style of RAGE. It walks a careful and I believe successful line between surrealism and art.

BDO does an amazing job of making low resolution textures look gorgeous (way, way better than Bethesda does).

I don't care for all the stylistic decisions BDO makes, like non-feminine walk animations or all those blasted lights and smoke when we fight, covering the beauty of the battle. But I recognize those stylistic decisions are deliberate and a matter of taste, and I accept that.

I'd like the BDO skin textures to be increased to at least 2k and preferably 4k or 8k (with 2k face), but I also recognize PearlAbyss is trying to keep BDO accessible to millions of people across the world.

But those are minor wish list items. I in fact adore the style and beauty of Black Desert.

I play with a good Nvidia graphics card (on a 6 year old PC) at 4k resolution and Remastered quality settings and a steady 60 FPS, so I recognize if I had to play at lower resolution with lower settings I may not be playing BDO at all. I may not find it beautiful.

But I do play on those settings, and I do find it both beautiful and stylish. And I admire what the PearlAbyss developers have done with BDO and continue to do.

For outright sheer amazing beauty I still think RDO and modded Fallout 4 win. But I'm not playing RDO anymore, and I'm still playing BDO. So BDO has done something both right and better :)

In short, I accept, appreciate and am happy for your different sense of aesthetics, Pocahawtness. I honor thee.

[Karna5]

Follow up to Pocahawtness. I'd like to use this BDO film I recorded a few weeks ago to illustrate that BDO's beauty isn't the same to all players. There's a scene at the 4 minute 33 second mark in which another player walks up to me while I'm fighting Garmoth and starts swinging at me, seemingly trying to attack me.

https://youtu.be/K1W6cufr5dQ

But as I was playing with my GUI disabled, I neither saw who it was nor saw any comments anyone may have been making to me.

But a week or two later I was at another boss battle, and somebody ran up to me and did the same thing, but this time I saw the name and recognized it as a friendly person I'd been running into everywhere for several weeks. Whatever server I visited, whatever boss battle, whatever bank, somehow that person was always there, and he/she always commented: "I see you everywhere!" and then says hi and chats a bit.

So I realized the person at the 4:33 mark of the film was that BDO friend, and I sent her a message saying I captured her in a film and asked if she'd like to see herself in it. She did, so I sent the link, and she watched it, and right away she said to me:

"Your BDO looks so much more beautiful than mine!"

Same game, different experience. Maybe it really doesn't look good on everyone's PC and settings. But I don't really see that as a fixable or even a bad problem :)