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The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay is 10 years old.

Ragnarok

Member
Game might actually look better than Wolfenstein lol. Although looks like wolfenstein has more enemies on screen with more hectic battles. Still, it's a bummer they were saddled with id tech 5.
 
This game is kicking my ass on Hard right now. Still as fun as I remember though.

I've always really liked Riddick, he's a fun character IMO.
 

Scrabble

Member
Game might actually look better than Wolfenstein lol. Although looks like wolfenstein has more enemies on screen with more hectic battles. Still, it's a bummer they were saddled with id tech 5.

Id tech 5 would be amazing if we weren't burdened by storage size. I have a feeling 5-10 years from now we'll be looking back at it being way ahead of its time. I still think Rage is one of the best looking games ever made. Probably the closest a game has come to looking like concept art.
 

Ragnarok

Member
Id tech 5 would be amazing if we weren't burdened by storage size. I have a feeling 5-10 years from now we'll be looking back at it being way ahead of its time. I still think Rage is one of the best looking games ever made. Probably the closest a game has come to looking like concept art.

maybe if it wasn't plagued with laughable textures and horribly distracting pop-in.
 
Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay is perhaps the best movie in the series. And it just happens to be an amazing game too...possibly the best "movie game" ever made.

For me Pitch Black just edges it out for being the original, but you have to admit Butcher Bay tells a better story than the first actual movie sequel. That said, I still haven't seen the latest installment "Riddick" yet. Life and such. Shame on me.

Ok, thanks OP. It's settled. I've been piecing together a new little HTPC/light gaming rig. The second its done I'm going to marathon all the movies including the latest installment. Then the first game I fire up is gonna be Butcher Bay. Oh yes, its goin down.
 

MormaPope

Banned
Better than Half Life 2, both came out that year, and in hindsight Escape From Butcher Bay feels like it didn't get enough attention. The gameplay matched the environments and tones perfectly, prison is terrible, inmates vs. guards when it comes to firepower will always be skewed towards the guards. For the majority of the game you use your fists or a shiv, combat is personal, you stalk targets in the dark and then dispose of them brutally. The dialog and personalities of the prisoners almost felt welcoming, that you yourself are in a fucked up situation and there are other people with a similar fate.

Loved how the game progressed as well, moving up the security clearance food chain until you reach something extremely peaceful, yet hellish.
 

Grief.exe

Member
Chronicles of Riddick: perhaps the best movie in the series. And it just happens to be an amazing game too...possibly the best "movie game" ever made.

For me Pitch Black just edges it out for being the original, but you have to admit Chronicles tells a better story than the first sequel. That said, I still haven't seen the latest installment "Riddick" yet. Life and such. Shame on me.

Ok, thanks OP. It's settled. I've been piecing together a new little HTPC/light gaming rig. The second its done I'm going to marathon all the movies including the latest installment. Then the first game I fire up is gonna be Chronicles. Oh yes, its goin down.

Chronicles of Riddick is considered the worst in that movie franchise, it's not even close.
 
Chronicles of Riddick is considered the worst in that movie franchise, it's not even close.

I was referring to Chronicles of Riddick: Butcher Bay as the best "movie" in the series. ;) Given that the first actual movie sequel also uses the "Chronicles" moniker I probably could have been more clear about that. I remember when Butcher Bay was first released thinking, "This would make a great movie." And when the Chronicles movie came out I thought, "This would make a fun action game...but as a movie sequel to Pitch Black...its kind of meh." One of the rare instances when the film would have been much better off borrowing the superior plot of the game.

Edit: previous post fixed to clarify.
 

Kydd BlaZe

Member
This is one of my favorite games of all time. It literally came out of fucking nowhere back in 2004 and blew my goddamn socks off. Was instantly a fan of all Riddick lore, as a result of this game.
 

Grief.exe

Member
In what ways is the Dark Athena version better than the original?

I loved the original to death but I never did finish it.

They upgraded the engine and all of the in-game textures and assets.

I didn't realize just how substantial of a remaster it was until I saw a video on it the other day.
 
So the GOG link in the OP is the one to go with, correct? And I don't need to have any real knowledge of the series before jumping into Butcher Bay? I've never played it and really want to after Wolfenstein and because this summer is pretty quiet.
 

bengraven

Member
"The darknessss...I can hide the bodies here..."

God damn I love this game and the voice acting is as commendable as the graphics - Diesel's best acting ever, Rooker, Perlman, other deep-voiced male actors.

Fucking loved it. I wish THIS had been Pitch Dark 2.
 

Valtýr

Member
I've recently started to play the Riddick games on PC. Butcher Bay has been amazing so far, but I haven't played it in a month due to Dark Souls II consuming my life lol. I'll beat Wolfenstein before I get back to Riddick.

Has anyone tried GeDoSaTo with Riddick? Do the extra features like HDR bloom and Bokeh DoF work with it?

Doesn't seem to work. Well it works in that it allows a higher res as an option but when you select it, it doesn't downsample it. it simply renders the game at the res.

Can someone link me to an ENB mod for this? I'd like to try it out.
 

Grief.exe

Member
Valtýr;113983441 said:
Doesn't seem to work. Well it works in that it allows a higher res as an option but when you select it, it doesn't downsample it. it simply renders the game at the res.

Can someone link me to an ENB mod for this? I'd like to try it out.

ENB isn't available for every game, you may want to try out SweetFX.
 

Grief.exe

Member
I can't stress how great the graphics were on the Xbox. It might as well had been a launch 360 title.

I'm running this on PC at extremely high resolutions, but this game gives current-gen games a run for their money.

Taking into account considerations for textures and geometry of course.
 
Picked it up and played an hour or so and have enjoyed it thus far. The game sure does look good, especially at 4K, runs at about 40fps too.

iblxZnrbY5d6qX.png
 

Grief.exe

Member
In that screenshot I don't think so, I had SSAO and in game AA forced on through the console. I know now that I should disable in game AA and force it because MSAA seems to be horrendously optimized.

I was just thinking you might be able to push 60 FPS if you turn off in-game AA. To be honest, downsampling from 4K should take care of aliasing naturally.

I've also noticed the game doesn't have great edge detection.
 

Dave_6

Member
I haven't bought this yet but probably will very soon. It says in the OP to force AA with Nvidia Inspector yet I have a 7970. I'm guessing RadeonPro will work for me?
 
Assault on Dark Athena, no question.

PC version is recommended if possible.

I got it from gog. Installed it, but the game runs in what I believe 720p in a small box with the rest of my 1440p screen in black. To make it worse, it doesn't even show the whole image, just the upper left corner so I can't even go into the settings and set things straight.

pls help
 

Grief.exe

Member
I got it from gog. Installed it, but the game runs in what I believe 720p in a small box with the rest of my 1440p screen in black. To make it worse, it doesn't even show the whole image, just the upper left corner so I can't even go into the settings and set things straight.

pls help

  • %LOCALAPPDATA%\Atari\The Chronicles of Riddick - Assault on Dark Athena.
  • Alternatively, search your C drive for Atari and it will be in the AppData/Local folder.
  • Access the configuration file which is titled, 'Environment.'
  • Change the line VID_MODE to the following: VID_MODE=2560 1440 32 60
 

jamsy

Member
I should really play this again.

I rented the game when it came out and got pretty far but had to return it before I could finish it. Absolutely loved it at the time though. The game still hold up by today's standards? Also, wondering how the sequel turned out...
 
  • %LOCALAPPDATA%\Atari\The Chronicles of Riddick - Assault on Dark Athena.
  • Alternatively, search your C drive for Atari and it will be in the AppData/Local folder.
  • Access the configuration file which is titled, 'Environment.'
  • Change the line VID_MODE to the following: VID_MODE=2560 1440 32 60

Thanks, I changed it, the game is now full screen atleast. But it's still showing the top left only, the whole game image doesn't fit on the screen. :(
 


  • Ok I got it to work somehow! Messed around with the disable high dpi settings stuff and brought back the zoom level to 125 percent (had it at 150pct because it's much more comfortable on 1440p).

    So I go to to a mp map to see how well my system runs it, I put everything to high, there is surprisingly 32x msaa option, is this a first? It didnt ran in any higher AA settings other than 8x msaa, even then I get about ~30-40fps on average. Too bad I cant run in 16 msaa, it looks glorious. But then I looked at the op and saw this:

    I recommend turning off AA as the in-game implementation seems to be very unoptimized, I currently have 4xMSAA forced through Nvidia Inspector. Edge detection seems to be hit or miss with either set up. Force V-sync through drivers as well, as the in-game setting seems to cause some mouse lag. If you follow these steps, then the game should run on a toaster.

    So what is nvidia inspector and why haven't I heard about it before? How do you force v sync through the drivers?

    here are some screens (will be posting more in the screenshot thread)



 

i-Lo

Member
Makes me wonder if we shall see another Riddick game as an interstitial prior to the release of the next Riddick movie.
 
For a dramatic increase to shadow quality bring up the console with Ctrl and ~ and type xr_softstencil 1 to enable soft shadows. They look stunning and are a massive strain on performance but modern hardware can get around that with brute force.

You can also add xr_softstencil=1 to the environment.cfg file in Appdata.

I'm having a bug where I can't play the Steam version in 1080p no matter what I try.
 

Grief.exe

Member
So what is nvidia inspector and why haven't I heard about it before? How do you force v sync through the drivers?

here are some screens (will be posting more in the screenshot thread)

Its an essential program for Nvidia users. Allows you to tweak settings at the driver level and force them in-game. Also a great way to get SLI working for a game that doesn't have native support.

  • Download Nvidia Inspector.
  • Open it and access the game menu system.
  • Find The Chronicles of Riddick:DA page.
  • Turn antialiasing to override application.
  • Choose MSAA or CSAA x8 (other types of AA require a bit).
  • Turn Vsync to force on.
  • Change setting from standard to adaptive

For a dramatic increase to shadow quality bring up the console with Ctrl and ~ and type xr_softstencil 1 to enable soft shadows. They look stunning and are a massive strain on performance but modern hardware can get around that with brute force.

You can also add xr_softstencil=1 to the environment.cfg file in Appdata.

I'm having a bug where I can't play the Steam version in 1080p no matter what I try.

I'll have to check that out. I'm all over the place with games right now and I need to finish Riddick.
 

eshwaaz

Member
One of my favorite games of all time. I'd love to replay the original Xbox version, as I still prefer its look over the remake in a lot of ways, but it's not backwards compatible on 360.
 

Grief.exe

Member
One of my favorite games of all time. I'd love to replay the original Xbox version, as I still prefer its look over the remake in a lot of ways, but it's not backwards compatible on 360.

I still have the original Xbox game. It's honestly difficult to get ahold of the PC version of Dark Athena right now due to Atari going under, let alone the original release.
 

epmode

Member
I have the original PC release. I think I prefer the look of the original versus the crazy color changes of the remake but it's not easy to get running on modern computers. Not to mention that it's on CDs for god's sake. No digital releases anywhere as far as I can tell.
 

Grief.exe

Member
They have a perfect blue print to follow with Escape From Butcher Bay.

Just follow that and you are guaranteed to create a good game.
 

BouncyFrag

Member
Vin confirmed that another Riddick game was entering development... but unfortunately it's going to be "more of an MMO".
Gaf thread on this which produced this nugget:
I imagine him going to various states and countries, walking in on his team doing something other than programming and being like, "Yo. I need you." then the person nods, they both leave, and move on to the next one. In the end the whole crew is slow walking towards a building where the game will be made.
 
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