Best CRT Shaders for PS1 - DuckStation Settings

[@ggdeku]

UPDATE (8/23/24): 1. Duckstation's UI has been updated. The "Enhancements" tab in the video is now the "Graphics" tab. 2. There is another version of the shader that also works but does not need the Preshader to be included in the post-processing menu. You can find it here: CRT-Guest-Reshade github.com/HelelSingh/CRT-Guest-ReShade 3. Some commentators said it didn't work until the files were put in "Duckstation/resources/shaders". If you are having problems, try putting the files there. 4. I missed a setting in the video. For the very first shader option "NTSC Custom Artifacting Value," I recommend turning it all the way down. 5. In Final Fantasy 7 I noticed a strange red line going down the middle of the screen. Increasing the setting "(Transform to) Shadow Mask" to 0.5 fixes the problem.

[@giovannigiorgio2262]

its not work

[@isayasbashiri5371]

Something has occurred. Your settings no longer work for me even before I updated

[@SP-vl1jh]

Oh, god. If it wasn't for this video I'd never know this shader was also made for Duckstation. This shader was the only reason I ever used retroarch for ps1 games. Thank you so much.

[@rockapartie]

I avoid Retroarch as much as possible - it needs a major UI overhaul before I ever touch it again.

[@kirbyhater1115]

Kirby? Lmao, grow up.

[@SP-vl1jh]

@@kirbyhater1115 *Does the Kirby dance on your hate*

[@kirbyhater1115]

@SP-vl1jh I hope all your emulation goes terribly wrong.

[@frozencold199]

Thanks a bunch for this, im playing through castlevania for the first time after watching the anime,

[@ggdeku]

Thanks! I actually just pinned an update comment for another setting change, so check it out if you are interested.

[@Jacksaur_]

These look great! Perfect mix of retro style, but without obscuring too much of the graphical improvements from upscaling.

[@dreamerofapast]

I'd like to have some crt filter for some games, and yes - your option is very light, but in the same time so effective, i like it, thanks dude. I wish one day they will make overlay masks for black borders as in retroarch, which i don't want to use either :)

[@bacontater1664]

These settings and a couple more tweaks to reduce the blur gets it looking 95% the way there. Running FF7 next to each other, my 20" crt still looks more crisp and vibrant than the 20" oled space of the monitor. I tried lowering the saturation a bit, but the colors are just a bit off. Duckstation is a little more green in areas like the battle area floor in reactor 1, and the menus aren't the same blue. Anyway. Thanks for this. It helped a lot.

[@ggdeku]

@@bacontater1664 I'm curious as to what other tweaks you've done. I'd love to try them too.

[@bacontater1664]

@@ggdeku Nothing crazy. Literally just a couple. lol. guest-hd horizontal blur sigma .025 vertical blur sigma .025 guest-ntsc FS sharpen Deblur Strength 7 I changed a few more that deal with color, but I still can't get it right. The colors look most correct with the crt filters off. The crt still has sharper text. Not sure at what points its just never going to be exactly the same. lmao.

[@NinjaRed5000]

@@bacontater1664 I just added these settings that you had, with guest-HD over guest-ntsc, and honestly? I like the look of it even if the colors are a bit off and if text is a bit blurry. Tested it out on SotN and Silent Hill.

[@bacontater1664]

@@NinjaRed5000 Since I made that comment, I realized the color issues I was having were due to using any renderer other than software. Software actually makes the games look as close to possible in terms of color. The only extremely minor differences can be due to having an oled monitor vs OG hardware on a crt. Still using shaders for CRT effect, but since I care more about playing the games as they originally were, not having PGXP or any advanced features doesn't bother me.

[@NinjaRed5000]

@bacontater1664 interesting I'll try that out. Though have you figured out the sharpness?

[@Lex_Hausens]

This is really nice! They've included CRT Royale too, which looks great also.

[@radiantansel202]

>I don't want to use RetroArch Exactly the same reason I'm searching for alternatives, thank you so much for this shader! My OLED is on it's way, which a lot of people raves in how much these get better, can't wait to try it out with it!

[@M3n747]

I tried putting them in ./Duckstation/Shaders, I tried putting them in ./Duckstation/Resources/Shaders, but still nothing - I only see CRT-Guest-HD [Reshade] on the list.

[@iksdistek]

Thanks for the vid bro. Finally gave up on trying to find an easy solution that’s fault-free for all my hardware needs regarding ps1/ps2 games - so I’m defaulting to emulation.

[@93vincentvalentine]

heya, would you be able to help me? I put the shaders in on the post processioning menu but I get an error message telling me that the shaders failed to be compiled whenever I boot up a game.

[@Huginja]

For 3D games i really like the crisp raw image duckstation provides, but for 2D sprites the crt filter looks really good as well

[@NicolasSilvaVasault]

crazy to think that duckstation was capable of getting rid of the warping effect in playstation emulation, while others couldn't decades ago

[@arandomkaz]

for me the scanlines are really strong and it's not what i need and i cannot figure out how to lower their intensity... ill try again some other time

[@BrandydocMeriabuck]

Hey I'm having some issues with this. I just started using duckstation today so I don't really get it either haha. I put the shaders in the resources > shader folder, nothing seems to have changed in game. Now I'm in the duckstation settings in-game, in the post processing tab, when I'm enabling/disabling post processing it's saying "failed to compile post processing shader CRT-guest-preshader". Any ideas what I'm doing wrong?

[@tomornnuanprasert6680]

Got same issue and then I switched Graphics > Renderer : from Automatic to Vulkan and it works fine. M1 Mac here btw

[@93vincentvalentine]

@@tomornnuanprasert6680 Hi could I have your settings please? I still get the error of failed to complie shaders for some reason

[@coolen]

I've looked all over and can't find a way to make Duckstation even see the .fx files, all it recognizes is the .glsl ones

[@ggdeku]

Maybe you are using a slightly older version? Duckstation was recently updated to support .fx files. You should be able to put the files in the folder: Duckstation/shaders/reshade

[@coolen]

@@ggdeku that folder didn't work for me, but I put them in resources/shaders instead and then it worked just fine, also had no idea you had to download the textures too, I thought that was something different

[@WrestlingFace]

@@coolenthanks that worked for me too

[@alexhesder7801]

@@coolen wanted to thank you too, was tearing my hair out trying to figure out what I was doing wrong until I read your comment, a thousand thanks

[@xianlee]

@@coolen mine doesn't work, it says 'failed to load preprocessed shaders' everything is in the correct folder and I tried different renders like dx11, 12, vulkan etc. same error.. I noticed the download says dx9 in the title, maybe that's why, but no DX9 option exists in duckstation

[@ivyblue4874]

Could you make one but with pcsx2?

[@striker3727]

I'm new to DuckStation and i'm having trouble making it work with the .glsl shaders. I just got the file from the libretro/glsl-shaders and put it in the same folder where the built-in .glsl shaders are, but it shows failed to compile shader. What am i doing wrong? I want to try the crt-aperture shader from the libretro's crt docs.

[@ggdeku]

I've only looked into adding these .fx shaders to duckstation. I'm not sure about the the glsl files. Sorry!

[@realunderdawg]

i tried downloding both reshaders but its still no reflectng in my duck station

[@lern2swim]

You have the top of the window cut off. Is post processing done in the display tab or internal tab? What's the difference?

[@Isa-vi5rt]

Has anyone managed to get it running on Duckstation Android? I've followed everything on the video and description to a T, but it unfortunately comes off with a terrible lag.

[@eslammohey2327]

how i add shaders to duckstation? i try drag theme but nothing happend !

[@dizh2581]

Can someone pls explain how to add these shader to duckstaion i aded to duckstation/resourses/shaders but nothing appears

[@ggdeku]

Try Duckstation/shaders/reshade. That's where it should work.

[@gamefox1987]

hey thanks for the tutorial! I am using mac m1 I was able to run CRT-Guest-NTSC but the CRT-Guest Preshader fails to compile. the CRT-Guest-NTSC on its own looks pretty good but my mac was running so slow and the fans are getting loud any idea how to fix it ?

[@ggdeku]

I don't know, sorry! I've linked the libretro thread in the description if you want to learn more from the creator of the CRT-Guest for reshade port. They may be able to answer your question there.

[@evilnightmare1276]

I have the Duckstation for Xbox series, and when applying any shader, it does not undergo any change, there is no effect.

[@Uhfgood]

One thing that always gets me about "scanlines" is the fact they never seem to change. The fields are alternating, so I feel that scanlines should as well. But that's probably just me since no one seems to have the scanlines shift/animate.

[@eyeball226]

The systems that we associate scanlines with had scanlines because they were outputting 240p. 240p works by not alternating the position of the fields, the dark scanlines are the lines that aren't being used. Later consoles like the PS2 and Gamecube used 480i (or 480p if your TV could do it), so they didn't have any unused lines. Hope that makes sense.

[@Uhfgood]

@@eyeball226 - It does make sense. I just never really remember seeing any absolute scanllines, at least on a regular crt tv. Whenever I looked at a screen close I could see the scan lines alternate between fields. Of course this could be JUST on a tv signal, I don't remember. I do have a 13inch crt tv, but I don't have any old game systems so I could observe it, at the moment.

[@eyeball226]

@@Uhfgood I suppose you could say that 480i has alternating scanlines, but it's masked by the fact that 60/50 times a second is much too fast to see, and the phosphor carries on glowing for a little while after the electron hits. Whatever you saw alternating wasn't a scanline. Not sure what it could have been to be honest - to be slow enough to see maybe it was some kind of interference?

[@haydenmarte2000]

Not sure why but whenever I add the "CRT-Guest Preshader" into the post-processing chain in duckstation it seems to cancel out whatever CRT filter i add (NTSC/HD/Advanced). The filters seem to work fine when I don't add the Preshader but stop working as soon as i do. Any reason I can't just have the NTSC reshade filter in the post-processing chain without the Peshader above it?

[@ggdeku]

If it works for you it's all good. I have no idea why that would happen, but hey, if it works it works.

[@caslloveer]

do u know a good crt reshade for SNES and GameCube games

[@Paulo.y7]

Thank you very much, great help

[@triggerpigking3741]

This creates an amazing look but has anyone had luck running it with Xenogears?. I'm specifically on steamdeck but the game will run fine for a bit before going into a white screen(Which also oddly tilts the filters menu white in the settings too), i think with specific triggers throughout the game. Seems to happen with default settings on the filters as well. Really hoping i can make it work because i've not found a crt filter to look this good before.

[@ggdeku]

I don't have a Steamdeck, so I'm not sure about this problem, but does it work well for other games on Duckstation? Is it just Xenogears giving you this problem? I'm really curious if it worked well on steamdeck.

[@triggerpigking3741]

@@ggdeku I don't have any other psx games on the deck rn aside from pandemonium which seemed to run fine with limited testing(only noticed this yesterday). But i'm gonna DL Crash Bandicoot 2 tonight to test a play-through of it, so I'll get back to you after trying that. My current theory is that it might be something to do with bright flashing lights on screen, it usually sets it off when a healing spell or item is used or there was one consistent moment were a pendant flashes that seemed to cause it. Deleting the filters or turning the game on and off again(not resetting but quitting out), seemed to be the only ways i could find to fix it. I've posted in the reshade devs thread bout it too in case they have any answers, also i should note I'm not using the full settings from the vid, i only turned on the hd scanlines and set the res to 2.

[@triggerpigking3741]

Ok can confirm it happens with Crash 2, like i didn't even get past the intro cutscene lol, it seems to consistently change white whenever it goes from the transition between cortex saying an enemy and the scene cutting to Crash and coco. I'll try it on desktop as well, see if it is a problem with the deck. edit: worked fine via desktop so yeah i'm guessing it's a deck problem sadly.

[@triggerpigking3741]

last update on this but with help from the shaders creator I managed to fix it via changing Vulkan to OpenGL. Haven't had any issue since.

[@Combo7-y2h]

Thanks for this. If one were to try this on a 1080p display, would it be necessary to lower the internal resolution scale value to 5x (the value for 1080p)?

[@Moonwalker86]

How much in numbers that 5× value?

[@edoteeeensei]

thanks bro i had no ideia how to activate this

[@Exmotable]

i feel like an idiot and i usually have this issue with github links but, i don't understand how to download the shaders

[@ggdeku]

Click the green Code button, then select "Download ZIP"

[@eslammohey2327]

can i make post processing for every game separated??

[@MVP.113]

Thank you for making this video. This CRT stuff is pretty hard to get into with so many different options, and the curveball for how different it looks on every monitor, but you did a great job making this manageable. I had a question and a tip for others: Duckstation now has the shader by default in their post processing menu (besides the preshader). It looks like it has all the same settings as you showed in the video and description. Do you know or recommend if there's a difference between the download and the one that's pre-installed? And for anyone else, the CRT Mask 6 option looked really bad on my monitor... something wrong with the colors. Looked completely different than what's in this video. If you try out this shader and think it looks off, try messing with the CRT Mask. It's a pretty big difference between the options.

[@ggdeku]

This video was made before the Duckstation update, but all of the settings should be exactly the same. Thanks for the heads up!

[@docenji]

I was looking for it but sadly the shader (and others) have been removed since the october update (v0.1-7675) for license incompatibility...

[@MVP.113]

@docenji you can follow what's in the video, then. No problem

[@docenji]

​@@MVP.113 Yeah this is what i have done, working great (trying Resident Evil 1 and Parasite Eve 2 right know !). It was just to provide information.

[@Moonwalker86]

I'm really struggling to download them from the links, no download option and when I click on the shader it just opens a long text file, any help will be appreciated.

[@ggdeku]

on the github page, click the green "Code" button and select "Download ZIP" Then all you have to do is unzip the files, and put the two folders "Shaders" and "Textures" in your folder path: Duckstation/shaders/reshade. (you can make the folders if they aren't there already.)

[@Moonwalker86]

@@ggdeku Thank you so much.

[@ggdeku]

@@Moonwalker86 yeah, no problem! I should have described that more clearly in the video, so I've updated the description with some more detail as well.

[@sengan2475]

what about CRT guest HD?

[@PonD0809-ug1dg]

Thanks 🎉

[@Yasorry93]

where to find enhancement tab?? I don't have it

[@ggdeku]

Duckstation's UI has been updated. The "Enhancements" tab in the video is now the "Graphics" tab.

[@Yasorry93]

@@ggdeku oh! thanks

[@Zetchzie]

As a Sonic Fan i find it surprising how many youtube vids use Sonic music in the background

[@Pan_Z]

Can also use ReShade to inject CRT Royale from Retroarch. It requires a somewhat decent gaming GPU, but it's *very* accurate and customisable.

[@mlgcactus1035]

And what settings do you recommend with it?

[@WithoutNumbers]

Lol why this so heavy? This CRT-Guest effect drop my FPS from 60 to 50 on GTX 950M on Silent Hill Origins PCSX2, but another 10 fx did absolutly nothing, 60 is still 60.

[@DOCTOR_DEWEY_HILL]

megaman legend legit almost looks like a 2d anime in crt TV's

[@elia0162]

6:58 game name?

[@ggdeku]

@@elia0162 Vagrant Story

[@dedykurniawan354]

vagrant story

[@elia0162]

@dedykurniawan354 omg thx bro I searched it for days

[@RyonTeachesMugen]

PGXP is by far one of the greatest inventions to PS1 emulation!

[@isayasbashiri5371]

How did you add that to your duckstation?

[@joelrosario9407]

You are a literal life saver. A hero, Question though, I downloaded the CRT guest reshade but I don't see the preshader. Only HD and advanced.

[@ggdeku]

Looks like I linked the wrong one! I'll update the description with the right link. Here's the version you should be using: github.com/HelelSingh/CRT-Guest-DX9

[@joelrosario9407]

@@ggdeku thanks a lot! I have it all setup now. Makes these PS1 games look like remasters, I actually played RE2 back in 1999 butnever finished it because I felt the graphics were a little outdated since I first played RE3. But I've always regretted that as I would come to learn of it's legendary status. Finally playing it and ironically, with these settings and filter, I think the graphics are great. I have a bunch of PS1 games including this one, and a PS2to play it on, but I can't stand the way it looks on an LCD. I even bought a 27" TV so that the display would be smaller and it still looks bad. I was heavily considering buying a CRT but don't have the space for it. When I finally decided to give emuation another shot after building a PC, this video was the only place I could find a tutorial on shaders for duckstation. Anyway, it really does mean a lot. Thanks!

[@bryantmoses3909]

is it not applicable for android?

[@eraneranera]

if you're still looking for an answer, then it is applicable on android! under the post-processing tab, it'll tell you the directory to put the shader files in and they pop up no problem afterwards. i just did it myself lol!

[@nobody-qs1eh]

what's the best shader for a low end machine?

[@KingLich451]

Try CRT-Guest-HD, it's already in emulator.

[@AF-vd8dd]

Hey man, great video, unfortunately the CRT Guest its a lot to my machine 😂, do you know if there is a port of the CRT Geom for Duckstation?

[@ggdeku]

I'm not sure about Geom. Guest was ported to Reshade, which is why it works here. I'm not sure if Geom has been. I've linked the libretro thread in the description if you want to learn more.

[@OiseauRavage]

Thanks a lot! I'm using an iGPU and adding this shader makes the game really stutter. Is the shader GPU heavy and it's normal or is there a wrong setting you think?

[@ggdeku]

I'm not sure exactly, but I think you've got it right. If it's giving you problems, it must be a bit heavy on the GPU. I'm not sure of any settings in duckstation that could help with that.

[@worldogameplays]

CRT shaders are usually heavy. There are some light ones but they are very simple.

[@Flackon]

Retroarch is great, and duckstation exists as a core in it

[@GhostLinx]

I can't wait to put Res scaling 2 on mgs1 with hd textures and widescreen fix in 4k

[@jameswolf93]

i prefer res scaling 1, it look more nostalgic tbh

[@lostsektor]

About PGXP not being acurate to real psx tbh when i was a kid playing ps1 the wobblying graphics never was a problem or i never cared about , plus playing in low resolution with composite in a crt tv makes this much less noticble vs playing in a LED monitor with internal high resolution. so PGXP just make us see the game how we used to see as a kid.

[@rockapartie]

Lucky you, I noticed them very much, like the Tomb Raider games flickered and wobbled so much that you had to stand still for a couple seconds and wait for it to stop to actually see where you should go in some levels (the start of Tomb Raider 2 is downright ridiculous when it comes to flicker and wobble). Die Hard Trilogy was absolutely extreme in terms of wobbling and generally, none of the games - bar some 2D ones - were particularly nice to look at.

[@Swadaable]

I never knew that it was a thing until I used emulsion on lcd. Maybe different TVs produced different results?

[@jhna314]

Yeah, it was the same for me. A lot of games handled the wobbling well through software, so it wasn’t really an issue. A bit of flickering was just normal back then - it made everything feel more alive.

[@DoubleSpy]

Curious why you avoid using Retroarch. I use it myself but have never been as satisfied with it as stand alone emulation programs. Just wondering if there is more to it

[@ggdeku]

I think it has really bad usability as a front end and overcomplicated the emulation process. I've always had a significanty better experience using the emulators directly. There are also other controversies due to the people behind RA that I find very off-putting.

[@caslloveer]

I dont really wanna use retro arch too this video is peak

[@Paulog2003]

I could kiss u ! Looks so good in game

[@wingedhussar1453]

res scaling 2 looks like gamecube

[@matthewmcdonald9107]

FF7 original is best played with mods on PC. Playing the PS1 version is so outdated.