MAMEWorld Forums - EmuChat - Re: Why are the graphics on most MAME emulated games so... poor?

> i think he's upset cause mame don't make use of the gpu, so the graphics looks plane
> compared to the original games running on their respective arcade boards.

What on earth are you talking about? What MAME outputs (bugs in the emulation notwithstanding) will be EXACTLY what the games on the respective arcade boards output. So if you remember it as better, then it's all due to the filtering effects that a CRT compared to an LCD does.

For what it's worth, the way I translated what you said is "I want MAME/emulators to make the games look BETTER than they did on the originals by using my 3D GPU", which isn't happening, buddy. We're not ePSXe.

> btw how can i make use of that HLSL option? i would want to play around with some
> mame filters...

Easiest way is to enable HLSL in your MAME ini and then configure the global HLSL.ini, I believe.

You can also do it from the command line:
Code:


-hlsl_enable         enable HLSL post-processing (PS3.0 required)
-hlslpath            path to hlsl files
-hlsl_ini_read       enable HLSL INI reading
-hlsl_ini_write      enable HLSL INI writing
-hlslini             HLSL INI file name for this game
-hlsl_prescale_x     HLSL pre-scale override factor for X (0 for auto)
-hlsl_prescale_y     HLSL pre-scale override factor for Y (0 for auto)
-hlsl_preset         HLSL preset to use (0-3)
-hlsl_write          enable HLSL AVI writing (huge disk bandwidth suggested)
-hlsl_snap_width     HLSL upscaled-snapshot width
-hlsl_snap_height    HLSL upscaled-snapshot height
-shadow_mask_alpha   shadow mask alpha-blend value (1.0 is fully blended, 0.0 is no mask)
-shadow_mask_texture shadow mask texture name
-shadow_mask_x_count shadow mask width, in phosphor dots
-shadow_mask_y_count shadow mask height, in phosphor dots
-shadow_mask_usize   shadow mask texture size in U direction
-shadow_mask_vsize   shadow mask texture size in V direction
-curvature           screen curvature amount
-pincushion          pincushion amount
-scanline_alpha      overall alpha scaling value for scanlines
-scanline_size       overall height scaling value for scanlines
-scanline_height     individual height scaling value for scanlines
-scanline_bright_scaleoverall brightness scaling value for scanlines (multiplicative)
-scanline_bright_offsetoverall brightness offset value for scanlines (additive)
-scanline_jitter     overall interlace jitter scaling value for scanlines
-defocus             overall defocus value in screen-relative coords
-converge_x          convergence in screen-relative X direction
-converge_y          convergence in screen-relative Y direction
-radial_converge_x   radial convergence in screen-relative X direction
-radial_converge_y   radial convergence in screen-relative Y direction
-red_ratio           red output signal generated by input signal
-grn_ratio           green output signal generated by input signal
-blu_ratio           blue output signal generated by input signal
-saturation          saturation scaling value
-offset              signal offset value (additive)
-scale               signal scaling value (multiplicative)
-power               signal power value (exponential)
-floor               signal floor level
-phosphor_life       phosphorescence decay rate (0.0 is instant, 1.0 is forever)

-yiq_enable          enable YIQ-space HLSL post-processing
-yiq_cc              Color Carrier frequency for NTSC signal processing
-yiq_a               A value for NTSC signal processing
-yiq_b               B value for NTSC signal processing
-yiq_o               Outgoing Color Carrier phase offset for NTSC signal processing
-yiq_p               Incoming Pixel Clock scaling value for NTSC signal processing
-yiq_n               Y filter notch width for NTSC signal processing
-yiq_y               Y filter cutoff frequency for NTSC signal processing
-yiq_i               I filter cutoff frequency for NTSC signal processing
-yiq_q               Q filter cutoff frequency for NTSC signal processing
-yiq_scan_time       Horizontal scanline duration for NTSC signal processing (in usec)
-yiq_phase_count     Phase Count value for NTSC signal processing

And also see mame/docs/hlsl.txt.
http://mamedev.org/source/docs/hlsl.txt.html (also on your hard drive)

Interesting forum links:
http://www.mameworld.info/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=266432
http://www.mameworld.info/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=255547
http://www.mameworld.info/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=270919
http://forums.bannister.org/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=75464&page=1

There's forum threads discussing ideal settings all over mameworld.info and bannister.org

- Stiletto