Pixelated light / shadow issue (SS2 on olddark)

[66488964271acvorob]

So I've got retro laptop for retro games, and I play System Shock 2 2.3 without newdark or anything else, complete vanilla. The laptop have geforce 5600fx, os is XP (but I've tried 98 too). The problem is that I saw pixelated light \ shadow while was sitting in the corner. Now i see these pixels everywhere. I can't unsee it I rushed to test Thief II and didn't saw this. At least it is not so obvious.

My main question - is it normal? What's the story behind it?

If it's important, i didn't install game on this machine, i've copied it from another computer.

Also i've tried game on another retro laptop, with ati x1900, and saw pixels there too.

In cam.cfg i noticed these two lines:

game_hardware 1
d3d_driver_index 0

What's their purpose here? When I changed them the banding / pixelate issue got even worse.
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[66488964273d1voodoo47]

they are not to be touched, iirc. oldDark mileage may vary on a non-3Dfx card, a bit of blockiness wouldn't be the worst thing that can happen.

that machine really should be running ND, imho.

[664889642750eZylonBane]

You're running a display driver that doesn't do 16-bit dithering.

[6648896427627vorob]

I do have dithering That’s the purpose of these retro laptops for me. Thief II looks perfect. More then this, I see dithering pattern in these pixels in ss2 🤣

[664889642775cvorob]

I’ve been comparing old dark with new dark and I think it maybe location related. But I don’t have save for hydroponic level on new dark  and don’t wanna play right now. I’ve tried googlong but didn’t find level skip command or map load function. How can I get to hydroponics fast?

Nevermind, saves from olddark work in newdark.

[6648896427858vorob]

Nope, not location related. Took theese from ati x1900 and newdark. Same place, same camera.
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[6648896427a46vorob]

Okay, i've tried comparing gf 5600 and ati x1900, they both have pixel banding, but on geforce it's more obvious:

https://cdn.knightlab.com/libs/juxtapose/latest/embed/index.html?uid=5288ce40-e1b4-11ec-b5bb-6595d9b17862

[6648896427c92voodoo47]

yeah, that's how things were back in the day (trying different gpu drivers may make it better, or worse). as I've mentioned in some other retro stuff topic, a xp computer with the last gen DX9 hw is a very good choice for retro gaming, as it will run a lot of fairly modern stuff, as well as a lot of fairly old stuff, and almost everything inbetween. didn't say it will run absolutely everything, or that the stuff that runs will run perfectly though.

so for example, while dx8/dx9 radeons run oldDark better than dx8/dx9 geforces and the games are playable without major issues, voodoo3/4/5 will still give them both a middle finger, especially when fog is involved.


so yeah, if the computer has xpsp3, you should just use ND to make all problems go away. else you are your own worst enemy.

[6648896427d89vorob]

I was so dedicated to this issue so I even built a voodoo 3 pc. Took a photo of the same place.
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[6648896427e80voodoo47]

which driver? post filter enabled or disabled?

[6648896427f51ZylonBane]

Looks like typical gamma posterization.

[66488964280cfChandlermaki]

This is just what I recall the game looking like prior to ddfix/newdark.