FIFA 15 Graphics Optimization

[riesscar]

Greetings,

I have been testing out various graphics settings for FIFA 15 (PC) and have arrived at what I consider to be the best combination of in-game and driver-level graphics settings... and a little help from two mods.

*Note*

These settings are applicable to those who have a relatively powerful Nvidia GPU and a rudimentary understanding of how to change driver settings.

Goals:

- To remedy the pervasive aliasing in FIFA. The native 4x MSAA is simply not sufficient to deal with the geometric and transparency aliasing in the game; therefore, it is necessary to force additional enhancements through the Nvidia control panel.

- To enhance the graphics of the game without the use of shader injectors (i.e. Sweetfx). While I find such post-processing shaders to be great in theory, I find the implementation to be tedious... and - more importantly -- they lead to artifacts and micro-stuttering in-game (at least they all did for me).

- To find a balance between optimization and overkill.

Before I begin, please be aware that I went through a lot of trial and error before arriving at the following configuration. It was actually quite an educational endeavor, as I learned about the limitations and functionality of modern anti-aliasing, AF filtering and Ambient Occlusion techniques. I therefore am aware that I may have some superfluous tweaks, and some of the effect I observe could be the ol' placebo... so, please don't hesitate to correct or disagree with any of my suggestions.

These settings are pretty demanding, so if you cannot achieve +100fps with all in-game settings maxed out, you may experience frame rate issues.

1) Set the game to run at high quality rendering, and set MSAA to 4x.

2) Download a program called Nvidia Inspector. Launch the program, and launch the application profiles (google it if you don't know how). Navigate to FIFA 15 in the drop-down menu. Next, click the green '+' button and navigate to your FIFA 15 .exe in the installation folder in order to assign it to the profile. In this software, we can enable advanced AA and other graphical enhancements, but it is here that was the most misguided before doing my homework.

I used to think that's could just choose some extra AA settings and apply them, yet I never noticed any improvements. It turns out that the reason for this is that with DX11 games (of which FIFA 15 is one), it is necessary to utilize compatibility flags in order to instruct the driver as to how the AA, AF or AO should be implemented.

Although there are many such profiles available online and within the Nvidia Inspector (which I will refer to as NI from now on), flags for FIFA 15 were nowhere to be found. I decided to test just about every profile and setting I could, and I finally found working flags and effective settings.

Starting from the top, the settings are:

Ambient Occlusion compatibility --------- 0x00110000 (Titanfall)
Antialiasing compatibility ----------------- 0x00100000 (Far Cry 2)
SLI compatibility bits (should be already selected)

Preferred refresh rate -------------------- Highest available if you've got a 120-144hz monitor, or just leave it and cap the fps at 60 if you've got a 60hz display
Vertical Sync Tear Control --------------- Adaptive (I have a G-sync monitor, so I'm just assuming this would be optimal)
Vertical Sync ------------------------------ Force on

Antialiasing - Mode ----------------------- Enhance the application setting
Antialiasing - Setting --------------------- 8xQ [8x multisampling]
Antialiasing - Transparency MS ---------- Enabled
Antialiasing - Transparency SS ---------- off/multisampling
Enable MFAA ------------------------------ On

Anisotropic filtering mode --------------- User defined/off
Anisotropic Setting ---------------------- 16x
Texture Filtering - Negative LOD bias -- Clamp
Texture Filtering -Quality---------------- High Quality

Ambient Occlusion setting -------------- High Quality
Ambient Occlusion usage --------------- Enabled
Power Management Mode -------------- Prefer maximum performance

That's it! Now hit apply, and close the program.

3) Go into your Nvidia Control Panel, and navigate to Adjust Desktop Color settings. Increase the digital vibrance of your primary display (this is a personal preference thing).

4) Finally, download two mods online: Fidel's FIFA 15 LOD Tweaker Tool & Mortal's Ultra PostFX for FIFA 15(Google them). First, extract Mortal's UltraPFX mod into your FIFA 15 install folder, overwriting any files that are already there. Then, install the LOD Tweaker tool according to the instructions, and then use the app to select 'ultra' graphics. Once it regenerates the files and you've closed the program, navigate to FIFA 15 install folder ----> Data -----> Fifarna ----> lua----> settings.lua (open with notepad). Edit Line 38, by changing the '1' to a '0' ... right after "PostFX_MotionBlur".

That's It!!!!

Keep in mind that if you have other mods installed, you will need to regenerate the db after adding or removing files... oh, and only move the postfx.lua file within Mortal's mod if you have other mods installed, as overwriting the 'data_startup.bh' file will negate the already installed mod and break your saved career if you've got one going.

I hope that you all find these settings to be as excellent as I do, and please let me know if you'd like clarification or if you feel that I am misguided in any way.

EDIT:

Here are some screenshots (sorry for the lack of variety, but I am exhausted)























Still Not Perfect Though ;(



Regards,

Carson

[riesscar]

After looking at the game from different camera angles, I have decided that forced AO was washing out the colors on overcast days.

Therefore, change Ambient Occlusion Usage to Disable in Nvidia Inspector. I'll keep looking for an alternative flag.

Carson

[TeamHappyUK]

any progress on this? I'm trying to get the best available AA Settings possible, as I have a high end rig.

I'm been playing on 8xMSAA w/ 8x Supersampling.. I don't think I can get any better than that.

Is that AA compatibility code working?

[erman1453]

Quote: Originally Posted by riesscar

After looking at the game from different camera angles, I have decided that forced AO was washing out the colors on overcast days. Therefore, change Ambient Occlusion Usage to Disable in Nvidia Inspector. I'll keep looking for an alternative flag. Carson

please help me.
Why does not the above settings to me?
my sys:2600k+gtx670(352,86driver)+8gb ram+win7 64bit