FFXIV Reshade
Overview
Since Q4 of 2023, I have worked on the development of a performance-friendly graphics shader for the 2011 massively multiplayer online role-playing game, Final Fantasy XIV - in which I have resumed the project and finalized for a university course.
The project initially started to make some "aesthetic alterations" to the original game. I began by identifying elements of the base game that I looked to enhance:
Desaturated
Not vibrant
“Consistently grey”
Outdated light/shadows
After outlining these elements, I drafted a "goal" plan to seek a resolution to each issue:
Colorize
Revamp lights/shadows
Smooth out object edges
Add “atmosphere”
Performance for gameplay
I utilized ReShade, a third-party, open-source injector that enhances the graphics and applies post-processing effects to games and applications. Given that most of the post-processing effects within ReShade are "film effects", I used my knowledge of film (one of my studies focuses) to create a cinematic-like tonality to the game while still retaining the look and feel of the original game.
I chose ReShade for the following reasons:
Filmic effects // It contains film-based effects that I easily apply to the game with my knowledge in VFX
Controllable levels // Every effect is adjustable and controllable in every aspect.
“Lightroom for Games” // The injector is essentially a "Lightroom for Games", making it the easiest alternative to injecting modernized graphics into an old game.
Uses 3D space instead of overlay // This injector uses DirectX to analyze the 3D space of the game environment to apply the effects appropriately instead of acting as an overlay mask. This allows for a significant amount of customizations.
The ReShade effects I used are as follows:
Filmic Pass // Applies some common color adjustments to mimic a more cinema-like look
Tint // Added a “sepia” effect for warmth
Deband // Reduced color banding from other effects
MagicHDR // Applies Bloom and Tonemapping with fake HDR effect
Blooming HDR // Applies fake HDR with bloom
Radiant GI // Applies Global Illumination with Subsurface Scattering
Volumetric Fog // Simulates physical aspects of fog and adaptively changes its color to match the tone of the scene
LumaSharpen // Blurs the original pixel with the surrounding pixels and then subtracts blur to sharpen the image
ADOF // Applies an Advanced Depth of Field
Reversed Depth Input // Flips/reverses the Depth Buffer/z-buffer to represent depth information of objects in 3D space (used for the new 7.0 version of FFXIV)
