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XSEED: Trails of Cold Steel PC Blog #2 (feat. Durante, talks PC enhancements)

D

Dragoon En Regalia

Member
ffLf3BC.gif


Click here for juicy details!

tl;dr Durante's been working on XSEED's PC release for Cold Steel (he didn't make the initial port, but has extensively overhauled it). This blog's about the game's launcher and customizable graphics options, plus various fixes he's introduced to the game's rendering engine which players can enjoy on anything from a high-end machine to a toaster, or even a GPD Win!

z8XeprA.png


You can read the previous blog detailing performance and technical changes here.

ixioBAO.png


Durante said:
I've also added an option for adjusting the Field of View (FoV). While not as important as in first-person games, playing close to a large monitor often makes a larger Field of View desirable. Here you see a comparison between the default FoV (left) and a very high setting (I wouldn't personally choose one this high, it's just for illustration):
Click to expand...

9Jcq8ba.png


Durante said:
The entire launcher you see here can be navigated just using a gamepad (actually, I made a tool for this that allows natural 2D-navigation and changing options in arbitrary C# WinForms dialogs using Xinput, and XSEED has graciously agreed to allow me to open source it, so look for that on my blog when things are less hectic)
Click to expand...


Video showing off the greatly improved draw distance vs. console
 
D

Dragon1893

Member
I don't know if I'll ever find the time to replay these and experience these improvements first hand but kudos to Durante for the fantastic work he's doing.
 
B

Brazil

Living in the shadow of Amaz
I'm not going to play this again on PC (I haven't even beaten the first one on PS3 yet), but I'll pick it up just to show my support for XSEED.

Good stuff, Durante.
 
O

Oreiller

Member
There is an option to change your button inputs, so I guess you can switch to PlayStation buttons. That's neat.
 
S

sandpiper

Member
Really looking forward to seeing Heimdallr's main street, Legram, and the festival with unlimited draw distance not running at 5fps.
 
N

Novel Mike

Member
The draw distance comparison really makes me happy, its not something that bothered me all that much but it was certainly noticeable and I'm glad to see I can play the game without worrying about that or FPS drops.

Can't wait until next week!
 
D

Dragoon En Regalia

Member
Some speculation on my part:

  • This release might have some kind of modding capacity, which would qualify as part of the "non-graphical features" Durante mentions for the next blog
  • We could get added fast-travel options, or at least the ability to mod that in for areas like Nord Highlands
  • Maybe there's a chance for new mouse controls? They wouldn't work the same as in the Sky games, but it ought to be an option

Now I can't wait for next week's blog.
 
Danny Dudekisser

Danny Dudekisser

I paid good money for this Dynex!
Super informative blog, and holy hell is Durante doing excellent work. Honestly love to see this -- this game deserves a great PC release, and it's clearly receiving one.

Do we know the price tag on it yet? I'm in on day 1, regardless, but yeah.
 
O

Oreiller

Member
Dragoon En Regalia said:
Some speculation on my part:

  • This release might have some kind of modding capacity, which would qualify as part of the "non-graphical features" Durante mentions for the next blog
  • We could get added fast-travel options, or at least the ability to mod that in for areas like Nord Highlands
  • Maybe there's a chance for new mouse controls? They wouldn't work the same as in the Sky games, but it ought to be an option

Now I can't wait for next week's blog.
Click to expand...
Don't forget that the game releases next week as well! Can't wait.
 
A

Ascheroth

Member
Chacranajxy said:
Super informative blog, and holy hell is Durante doing excellent work. Honestly love to see this -- this game deserves a great PC release, and it's clearly receiving one.

Do we know the price tag on it yet? I'm in on day 1, regardless, but yeah.
Click to expand...
40$ with 10% launch discount.
Wish it would have been 30, but seeing all those improvements I don't feel too bad about it.
 
P

Psxphile

Member
I hope my old rig can play this as well as that video looks, it runs the Sky games fine but achieving perfect in-engine 60FPS seems to be beyond it, you can see the frame skipping when scrolling. I see 60fps videos on youtube of the games during overworld and battle scenes and there appears to be a marked difference. Probably has to with the graphics card being a Radeon and Windows 10 bringing its own issues.
 
D

Durante

Member
I'm most happy about the draw distance increase and the shadow casters and shadow distance increases, simply because I think far too few games do anything like that.

(For example, shadows coming into existence a few meters in front of you was something that really annoyed me in Berseria, which was really quite a nice port other than that)

Of course, it also feels nice to have implemented TRSSAA natively in DX11, which I don't think much of anything outside of some Crytek games actually does.
 
G

GhostTrick

Banned
Durante said:
I'm most happy about the draw distance increase and the shadow casters and shadow distance increases, simply because I think far too few games do anything like that.

(For example, shadows coming into existence a few meters in front of you was something that really annoyed me in Berseria, which was really quite a nice port other than that)

Of course, it also feels nice to have implemented TRSSAA natively in DX11, which I don't think much of anything outside of some Crytek games actually does.
Click to expand...



Drawing distance is something that is too often overlooked.
 
Danny Dudekisser

Danny Dudekisser

I paid good money for this Dynex!
Ascheroth said:
40$ with 10% launch discount.
Wish it would have been 30, but seeing all those improvements I don't feel too bad about it.
Click to expand...

Seems high, given the relative age of the game and that it's so niche.

But again, I'm in, regardless, so maybe that's fine. Gotta have my Falcom.
 
E

Eylos

Banned
That 60fps comparison Its so good, i already have the Vita version of both games and this made me want to play again.

Hope It sells Well, i dont have a gaming pc, unfortunately. If xseed is Reading this, If Its worth It and not that hard, release this pc Port to PS4, would be a great warm up to CS3.
 
D

Dragoon En Regalia

Member
Durante said:
rad stuff
Click to expand...
Quick question: how well do you think this can run on WINE? I hear DX11 support isn't too advanced on that platform yet.

Also, will you be able to comment on how Cold Steel PC's DLC scheme/bundling/pricing will work, or is XSEED waiting to talk about that?

Eylos said:
If xseed is Reading this, If Its worth It and not that hard, release this pc Port to PS4, would be a great warm up to CS3.
Click to expand...
XSEED's interested, but right now they're still looking for programmers who both have one or more console SDKs who might be interested. No one at XSEED can do console ports anyway, not even their main programmer Sara, so we need to hope they get in touch with some people about porting CS (II) from PC to PS4 at some point.
 
J

Jampsuliini

Member
Durante said:
I'm most happy about the draw distance increase and the shadow casters and shadow distance increases, simply because I think far too few games do anything like that.

(For example, shadows coming into existence a few meters in front of you was something that really annoyed me in Berseria, which was really quite a nice port other than that)

Of course, it also feels nice to have implemented TRSSAA natively in DX11, which I don't think much of anything outside of some Crytek games actually does.
Click to expand...
Durante does what otherdevsexceptCrytekdon't.

I already said this in the last blog thread, but pop-in is THE biggest thing that takes me away from the game and in most cases, there's no settings you can change to improve it. Thanks for the hard work.

And that tease at the end :0 Can't wait to read the next blog post.
 
C

chrominance

Member
That launcher is sexy. I generally prefer having graphics options in the game because having to quit just to tweak settings is annoying, but the one Durante's made is more informative and seemingly intuitive than anything else I've ever seen.
 
D

Durante

Member
Dragoon En Regalia said:
Quick question: how well do you think this can run on WINE? I hear DX11 support isn't too advanced on that platform yet.
Click to expand...
I really think you'd need to try, but I fear some of the more advanced features I've implemented would make that less likely to work. In particular, TrSSAA requires all affected shaders to be shader model 5 (without that, SM4 would be fine).

Dragoon En Regalia said:
Also, will you be able to comment on how Cold Steel PC's DLC scheme/bundling/pricing will work, or is XSEED waiting to talk about that?
Click to expand...
I don't have all the information about that - I do know from the implementation that there are both free included DLCs and some paid ones.

chrominance said:
That launcher is sexy. I generally prefer having graphics options in the game because having to quit just to tweak settings is annoying, but the one Durante's made is more informative and seemingly intuitive than anything else I've ever seen.
Click to expand...
Thanks! I'm quite happy with the level of information, and it's also fully usable with a gamepad.
 
mejin

mejin

Member
Congratz, Durante. Draw Distance convinced me in a heartbeat. Really nice.

Dragoon En Regalia said:
XSEED's interested, but right now they're still looking for programmers who both have one or more console SDKs who might be interested. No one at XSEED can do console ports anyway, not even their main programmer Sara, so we need to hope they get in touch with some people about porting CS (II) from PC to PS4 at some point.
Click to expand...

Would be really nice if they could reach Giocorsi... dunno Third Party Productions Team to talk about it.
 
E

Eylos

Banned
Dragoon En Regalia said:
Quick question: how well do you think this can run on WINE? I hear DX11 support isn't too advanced on that platform yet.

Also, will you be able to comment on how Cold Steel PC's DLC scheme/bundling/pricing will work, or is XSEED waiting to talk about that?

XSEED's interested, but right now they're still looking for programmers who both have one or more console SDKs who might be interested. No one at XSEED can do console ports anyway, not even their main programmer Sara, so we need to hope they get in touch with some people about porting CS (II) from PC to PS4 at some point.
Click to expand...


Thats interesting, thanks for the Heads up, never knew Its hard to find people to do this kind of Port (pc-console), Hope they find someone, would be Sweet.
 
D

Dragoon En Regalia

Member
mejin said:
Would be really nice if they could reach Giocorsi... dunno Third Party Productions Team to talk about it.
Click to expand...

Eylos said:
Thats interesting, thanks for the Heads up, never knew Its hard to find people to do this kind of Port (pc-console), Hope they find someone, would be Sweet.
Click to expand...
Remember, this is just what Tom @ XSEED knows off the top of his head. I think Ken Berry has more to discuss about finding PC port partners, which seems to be working out for them when doing console-to-PC releases. Marvelous JP ported Fate/EXTELLA to Switch without hassle, but XSEED has to find its own solution in case the parent company doesn't want to help.
 
D

Durante

Member
KainXVIII said:
Yeah, every dev should add changeable button prompts to their games instead of relying on wonky controller detection
Click to expand...
I actually explicitly did not implement automatic button prompt selection and rather made it a user option - also because I personally get annoyed when I'm using a hybrid controller/mouse Steam controller configuration and the game can't decide which prompts to show ;)
 
M

Mivey

Member
Incredible to see a publisher give a JRPG port an actual marketing campaign like this.

Well, the only thing to make it perfect now, would be an in-game speed-up button.
It's nice that CE does this for essentially any game, but it can be hassle to start it up every time separately.
 
A

Ascheroth

Member
Mivey said:
Incredible to see a publisher give a JRPG port an actual marketing campaign like this.

Well, the only thing to make it perfect now, would be an in-game speed-up button.
It's nice that CE does this for essentially any game, but it can be hassle to start it up every time separately.
Click to expand...
Maybe that will be part of the next blog-entry.
 
D

Dragoon En Regalia

Member
Since some have asked elsewhere: are menus and assets ready for 21:9, and can you work around how the launcher auto-populates resolution based on the monitor specs it detects?
 
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