OldUnreal (Engine)

I found some settings which I don't fully understand yet:

ShadowDetailRes which currently defaults to:

64 (for decorations)
128 (for pawns)
32 (for projectiles)

I guess that these are the visible shadows and higher values makes them sharper?

...


By the way: I love those shadows, just go to SpireVillage, take a good dinstance, shoot the titan and watch the rocks casting shadows as you dodge them.

yes, exactly. While maybe not directly sharper. Lets call it more accurate.
Although higher needs up even more CPU. Since all projectors are handled in the engine, unlike as in newer engines where usually the GPU does this work we have to rely on CPU here. Be very careful with increasing these values.
However, since we added shadow smoothing even the low res shadows with 64/128 look very well already.

CPU power shouldn't be too much of a problem here. I doubled the default values for my client and it still performs nicely.

its best noticeable with a bunch of monsters, maybe > 10, then it starts to eat CPU for breakfast -while your CPU should give you some reserves

Indeed, in my map I have a room full of Lamp1's (around 20), each of which have shadows, and my framerate drops to ridiculously low values.
I wonder if they can't be optimised for repeating static objects, like static meshes are?..

they are already optimized like that, while I'm not sure if you have the latest version yet..?

I'm running g_30 right now.

up to g33

Still the same. Without decoration shadows I get 60 FPS, with them I get 15, running AMD Phenom II X4. I can send you the map file if you want.

don't think it'll be of any use. We pretty much maxed it out already. Unfortunately there is not much left to do except rewriting big parts to make usage of GPU but that's entirely out of question (at least for now and not sure if it'll change one day)
What resolution do you have it at?

Decoration shadows have only one resolution from what I know? Pawn shadows are set to Low.

well, that makes them default probably. They can be set in advanced options also

its best noticeable with a bunch of monsters, maybe > 10, then it starts to eat CPU for breakfast -while your CPU should give you some reserves

Wow, I just noticed this when testing at my server. I summoned a cloud of flies and they killed my FPS. My Core 2 Extreme did not save me this time.  :)

hahaha, I told you

summoning lots of barrels and boxes and blowing them all up at once is also a good way to kill fps

I have everything set to 128 and it runs pretty good for me....minus when i do the above