Source Engine configuring

[pejsaboy]

I was just reading over mantaphor's sticky on configuring the source engine and was wondering if doing any of that is still necessary, or even beneficial. Basically, if I were to set all of the launch options and make an autocfg with every option at its highest quality number, would it increase the quality over what the game automatically gives you with it's best in-game options?

If so, will those same options work for all games that use the source engine? I'll set the options and make autocfg's for every source game in my steam list if so :)

[redrumy3]

with counter-strike source i have a few commands to make it look better but some servers have it disabled and if you play in leagues most are disabled by zblock

there should be a couple more you just need to make an autoexec.cfg and put all the commands in there and put it in the cfg folder and it will autoexec when u start up the game, im sure these will work on other source games as well since its the source engine :)

i will look for more commands in a bit

mp_decals "4096"
cl_ragdoll_collide "1"
cl_c4dynamiclight "1"
r_lod "-5"
r_propsmaxdist "5000"
r_rainradius "2500"
r_rainsplashpercentage "100"
r_avglight "3"
r_decals "4096"
r_DispFullRadius "1000"
r_DispRadius "1000"
r_maxmodeldecal "100"
voice_dsound "1"
jpeg_quality "100" now for TF2 users theres a ultra quality lol i will post it soon im adding them to my autoexec :D

r_lod 0
mat_picmip -10
mat_parallaxmap 1screenshot of it

http://i240.photobucket.com/albums/ff144/derFeef/Screenshots/Team%20Fortress%202/Team_Fortress_2_20080421214821.jpg (http://i240.photobucket.com/albums/ff144/derFeef/Screenshots/Team%20Fortress%202/Team_Fortress_2_20080421214821.jpg)

[pejsaboy]

I downloaded a list of all the cvars for the source engine from tweakguides.com, and holy hell batman, there are a ton. Is there an easy way to identify by name which ones relate to graphical quality? Most of them don't have a description in this particular file, and I'm not going to google every command just to see exactly what it does :)

[Hitbox]

screenshot of it

:drool:
TILDA NOW!

That looks absolutely amazing. Do you have a source for this or is it just messing around?

[pejsaboy]

I've been skimming over the hl2 & source engine tweak guide from tweakguides.com, and I found it too:

mat_picmip [-10-5] - This variable is the same as the Texture Detail in-game setting, and hence controls how detailed textures appear in Source games. However depending on the game, you can raise this value to further reduce the quality of the textures and possibly improve performance (and more importantly reduce stuttering), or you can use negative values to provide increasingly sharper textures. In HL2: Ep 2, a value of -1 equals Very High, but in games like Team Fortress 2 you can use -10 to get the absolute highest quality textures possible.

I wonder if setting beyond -1 would do anything better the HL2 series or CS:S...

[redrumy3]

:drool:
TILDA NOW!

That looks absolutely amazing. Do you have a source for this or is it just messing around?
its on the tf2 forums

http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=674001&highlight=higher+quality

its mostly the 3 i posted other ppl posted stuff but its for tf2 to use more of your cpu etc =]


I've been skimming over the hl2 & source engine tweak guide from tweakguides.com, and I found it too:



I wonder if setting beyond -1 would do anything better the HL2 series or CS:S...
-10 works great for TF2 i havent tried other games

[pejsaboy]

Ok, it looks like these ultra quality tweaks only work for games using the source20007 engine- CS:S [I think], Portal, EP2, TF2 are basically it. Here's what I'm going to drop into mine, lemme know if there's anything obviously wrong. It's a combo of Redrumy3's example, and some of the options from the TF2 thread on steampowered forums.
mp_decals "4096"
cl_ragdoll_collide "1"
cl_c4dynamiclight "1"
r_propsmaxdist "5000"
r_rainradius "2500"
r_rainsplashpercentage "100"
r_avglight "3"
r_decals "4096"
r_DispFullRadius "1000"
r_DispRadius "1000"
r_maxmodeldecal "100"
voice_dsound "1"
jpeg_quality "100"
r_lod 0
mat_picmip -10
mat_parallaxmap 1
r_threaded_particles 1
r_threaded_client_shadow_manager 1
cl_threaded_bone_setup 1
cl_threaded_client_leaf_system 1
r_threaded_renderables 1
mem_max_heapsize 1024
mp_usehwmmodels 1
mp_usehwmvcds 1
echo Custom config loaded

[WonderingSoul]

Ok, it looks like these ultra quality tweaks only work for games using the source20007 engine- CS:S [I think], Portal, EP2, TF2 are basically it. Here's what I'm going to drop into mine, lemme know if there's anything obviously wrong. It's a combo of Redrumy3's example, and some of the options from the TF2 thread on steampowered forums.


The CS:S engine is based off the original HL2 engine. The new (update that went live last week) Day of Defeat: Source is now based off of the EP2 engine.

[pejsaboy]

Having some trouble getting the autoexec.cfg to load. I have the file made, it has the .cfg extension, I did the 'save as...' and chose All Files, and it's in the right directory. Is it a problem that the icon still looks like a text document as opposed to the CFG icon like config.cfg has?

[redrumy3]

Having some trouble getting the autoexec.cfg to load. I have the file made, it has the .cfg extension, I did the 'save as...' and chose All Files, and it's in the right directory. Is it a problem that the icon still looks like a text document as opposed to the CFG icon like config.cfg has?
k i added this in the autoexec

mp_decals "4096"
cl_ragdoll_collide "1"
cl_c4dynamiclight "1"
r_propsmaxdist "5000"
r_rainradius "2500"
r_rainsplashpercentage "100"
r_avglight "3"
r_decals "4096"
r_DispFullRadius "1000"
r_DispRadius "1000"
r_maxmodeldecal "100"
voice_dsound "1"
jpeg_quality "100"
r_lod 0
mat_picmip -10
mat_parallaxmap 1
r_threaded_particles 1
r_threaded_client_shadow_manager 1
cl_threaded_bone_setup 1
cl_threaded_client_leaf_system 1
r_threaded_renderables 1
mem_max_heapsize 1024
mp_usehwmmodels 1
mp_usehwmvcds 1
echo Custom config loadedtry mine make sure u put it in the cfg folder

[pejsaboy]

that's a good sign... yours looks like the cfg filetype :) I'll let you know how it works out, thanks!

EDIT: That did it... how did you create it that automatically gave you the CFG icon? I followed directions exactly like in the sticky here and in the tweakguides steps, but still got the notepad icon.

[Goateh]

Not sure if it should go in here or not, I've often used the command to help boost my FPS in TF2; as far as I can tell this isn't present in normal HL2 or CS or anything. From what I've read about it it allows the source engine to use multi-core CPUs more effectively, unfortunately I've also read its not exactly the most stable command in the world to use...

mat_queue_mode "2"

(At least i think thats it)