DOS - VGA & PVM CRT Shader Presets - RetroArch DOSBox Dithering Filters

[@DuoDynamo]

Came for the filters; stayed for them and the music.

[@RetroCrisis]

@@DuoDynamo 🤣 Can you guess where it's from?

[@HeffKael]

@@RetroCrisis Sonic 3 ! :)

[@javimetalrf79]

You have no idea how grateful I am to you. I've been away from home for a few days and hadn't seen this lovely surprise. I'm feeling 11 years old again this weekend, thanks to you! XD

[@RetroCrisis]

This one’s for you bro. I hope you enjoy. Feel free to feedback if you need changes

[@megabyte01]

neat! you can really see the difference between high-rest and low-res filters. They bring out different colors in the games too

[@RetroCrisis]

@@megabyte01 hopefully something for everyone

[@the1ucidone]

I could just watch this entire video on loop for 10 hours. Absolute perfection.

[@Melsharpe95]

Proof that games were written with these screen limitations in mind. They look MUCH better with these filters.

[@zummone]

First of all, screen has literally nothing to do with it, and I can give you the benefit of the doubt for CGA/EGA games at worst since they at least had a composite output, but VGA as a signal was always meant to be as crisp as it got. It's a line-doubled (31KHz minimum, so only "DOS high res" is accurate) RGB signal in DOS games that far surpassed even the home console counterpart in definition, since it has both horizontal and vertical syncs. The dithered patterns are only an approximation of what you can do to display more colors. Sure, it looks better when you apply an NTSC composite sort of filter, but it was never intended by the developers who worked on it, for VGA games.

[@V3ntilator]

You are probably thinking about console games, because PC used VGA monitors.

[@ghost085]

@@zummone agreed. I remember my VGA monitor being pretty sharp. Do people really think we did office work on blurry screens back in the day?

[@Domarius64]

That GDV-NTSC definitely looks more nostalgic, that comes from someone who has a CRT monitor from back in the day and usually isn't happy with most shader attempts at recreating this. I think the heavier scanlines version will be good for people who grew up with single scan line EGA monitors.

[@RetroCrisis]

Installation Guide - kzbin.info/www/bejne/fWWVmGVphLOMqas

[@guybrush3000]

it’s like playing a DOS game on a TV instead of a monitor

[@RetroCrisis]

@@guybrush3000 I think you're spot on... I see you're a Monkey Island fan

[@guybrush3000]

@@RetroCrisis what gave it away?!

[@seventy5plays]

I love your channel and your work, such a fun age to be a gamer in. :)

[@AbcDef-cs3bq]

That "PVM clean" shader looks awesome! Cool Sonic The Hedgehog music btw ;-)

[@RetroCrisis]

@@AbcDef-cs3bq ah I'm glad you like it. I didn't think anybody would lol

[@CyberLabStudio]

@@RetroCrisis Are you serious, even I was impressed by the music! Thought it sounded familiar. Was thinking it was from a Capcom composer or at least inspired by one.

[@Jackfromshack]

It wasn't fair to use this Sonic music. Now I have to play this game again. Thanks a lot

[@ClosestNearUtopia]

Hydro city 2, S3. In case you only want to listen😊

[@RetroCrisis]

@@ClosestNearUtopia Sonic Mania in this case 🍻

[@iwantagoodnameplease]

Sophia lost her green eyes, but the fisher man gained some glasses! Nice.

[@RetroCrisis]

@@iwantagoodnameplease 🤣🤣🤣 that was unexpected

[@camaxide]

she lost her ear-ring too - I'd say they didn't draw the graphics with the "filter" effect on old crt in mind, that just happened as there was no other way... but graphics was drawn how they intended.. So in a way it's first with new screens we can see the correct pixel art - but there is certainly an aesthetic to the old crt way also, it does hide harsh pixel edges and is how people remember things looking - but at the cost of smudging the graphics killing the smaller details

[@KasumiRINA]

@@camaxide PC games always had visible pixels, there's no way around it... And they often looked worse than console games on big TV too. Where do I insert a composite cable inside PC anyway? It was VGA before that CGA and EGA... DOS shaders are just one step away from adding scanlines and curvature to LCD handheld games lol. Even though this pack is far less intrusive than these weird emulator lines other CRT shaders add (which look nothing like a TV).

[@bundjohn]

Awesome! Wasn't expecting Sonic music to DOS games!

[@terrybogard916]

Please please please make a GameBoy shader, with the lovely green nuances 😁

[@gardhul]

The third one is very nice!

[@AccountName-gv5ie]

Nice will look into these!

[@ericmunoz3349]

Incredible job, as always

[@marcgoesblindgaming2076]

Looks beautiful ❤

[@Dwedit]

On a real VGA monitor, the 200 line video modes are implemented by using a 400 line mode where each line repeats twice. Thick scanlines with no black gaps and well-defined pixels are the reality for VGA graphics. So using a shader which simulates a TV and removes the duplication of each line is not going to accurately reflect how VGA graphics look.

[@CyberLabStudio]

Accuracy is not always the point. These tools allow us to be creative and synthesize a wide variety of looks that in some ways can even surpass or enhance the original experience. This can be done while a more accurate experience might be just a few clicks or key presses away.

[@petr79]

The Dosbox Staging shader is the closest to a real VGA monitor and you could not tell the difference from afar. I also have an old CRT VGA monitor and an IPS monitor and aside from the better colors of the latter, the games look the same.

[@bubu5908]

Why is the title “VGA Style” when all the shaders shown do not show what you can actually see on a VGA CRT? Since all VGA monitors had at least 31 kHz, low resolutions could only be displayed via double scan. This means that the black gaps between the actual scan lines were only visible every second line.

[@CyberLabStudio]

Why do some folks have to be so nit picky? There are both hi-res and low-res looks being showcased here. Doesn't that mean that the glass is at least half full?

[@bubu5908]

@@CyberLabStudio "There are both hi-res and low-res looks being showcased here" -- And they're both wrong. That's not what low resolution games looked like on a VGA CRT. If you put hours of work into those shaders, why not do it the right way?

[@Uhfgood]

The music sounds like it's from some Sonic game, I like it pretty good. And no I don't know what Sonic game if it is indeed from Sonic. I notice whenever anyone does scanlines they seem static. My memory (probably completely faulty) feels like they weren't as noticable, and that they tended to alternate fields alot, so they seem to switch position.

[@kayzzen]

How cool! Finding a safe place for abandoned and forgotten DOS games. An easier way, that way I can buy some games from GOG and run them that way?

[@eyeball226]

DOS games from GOG come with a preconfigured DOSbox, but there's absolutely nothing stopping you from running them through a DOSbox core in Retroarch, which will allow you to easily use these shaders. Same for GOG games that use ScummVM.

[@kayzzen]

@@eyeball226 Thanks! I'll try to find out more about how to do it.

[@AFourEyedGeek]

Quake doesn't look authentic for the time, it is running at more than 13fps.

[@eyeball226]

Amazing! How do these handle the various display modes that DOS games might use? 320x200, 320x240, 640x400, 640x480 etc? Do these give the correct number and density of scanlines for each based on the resolution coming from the core, or is that something that we'd have to set up manually?

[@ClosestNearUtopia]

You set those up manually, choose a filter, and the matching display resolution. Then choose the one saying like 600x800 if thats what u use. Changing resolution means changing filters. Use the 4k map for 4k displays, 1080p for, well, 1080p displays.

[@ClosestNearUtopia]

He had a guide btw how to “install” them, which basically is extracting a zip, place it in a specific folder, and tell retro arch to check for new shaders and to update to list. Bjam, your the boss.

[@eyeball226]

That's great. Unfortunately, some DOS games changed display modes all over the place, but that's not a problem for him to solve.

[@CyberLabStudio]

@@eyeball226 These shaders can do switch to hi-res mode automatically. They can also switch to interlaced mode automatically as well. In fact the default behaviour is for them to automatically determine the number of scanlines based on the input resolution of the source.

[@eyeball226]

@@CyberLabStudio Oh, that's good!

[@notbobbypropes]

Do you think a raspberry pi would be able to run your shaders smoothly? Thinking about loading them into my retropi arcade (uses RetroArch for emulation).

[@noahzahradnik9973]

Hey there! I’m running RetroArch through Batocera on a RPi5 and it does not feature an “online update” or “update slang shaders” option. Is it possible for you to share the perimeters of your shaders so folks like me can use the “create custom shader” option in Batocera? Now that I’ve seen what your shaders can achieve, I don’t ever want to play games without them!

[@hippocrates72]

*the only way to enjoy the games the way they were meant to look*

[@aleperbo]

Impressive!

[@HelpTheWretched]

Some of those examples look great, but for me, it's the wrong nostalgia factor. Even my old VGA monitors never had *that* level of CRT blur, they were always much sharper than console games. Can't complain about having options, though!

[@RetroCrisis]

@@HelpTheWretched totally understand. The download has sharper variants too, without the blur 🍻

[@HelpTheWretched]

@@RetroCrisis Nice!

[@henriqueap3730]

Great!

[@nifftbatuff676]

PCs were commonly used with hi-res VGA monitors. These are TV filters. Completely different.