The Big Ol' Retroarch Shader Thread

[anontsuki]

Ah yeah, I've tried just scanlines before, never a pretty solution. The blending and bluring and all the other stuff a crt shader does is what makes it so pretty.

Shame, thanks for looking into it, Zomb.

[Lordmonkus]

So I was poking around in the Slang shaders and noticed a new variant of Kurozumis Royale shader, one that had mdapt in it's name. Mdapt is generally a shader pass that makes dither transparency act more like it would on a CRT instead of the "checkerboard" effect you get on modern displays. For those of you that aren't aware of the Kurozumi shader, it is an edit of the Royale shader which makes it look extremely close to a high quality PVM so it has thick scanlines.

Here are a couple of screenshots to show the difference, view them full size to see the effect better.

First is the regular Kurozumi shader preset, notice the lighting and how it has the "checkerboard" effect.

Next is the mdapt version of Kurozumi, notice how it "appears" more transparent, this is more inline with how it would have looked on a CRT using RF or composite connection.

If you are interested in trying this shader out you will need to be using one of the video drivers that support Slang shaders. Vulkan, DX11 and DX12 all support them I believe, I have been using Vulkan. You can find the preset under the \shaders_slang\presets folder. I did not see this modified version in the GL or CG shader folders though it is possible I just missed it.

[kmoney]

@Lordmonkus Thanks for pointing out the new kurozumi shader. I am excited about trying it out as that scene from SOR 2 up above looks way better. There is a few scenes in Streets of Rage 2 that can benefit from this.  

[neil9000]

6 hours ago, Lordmonkus said:

So I was poking around in the Slang shaders and noticed a new variant of Kurozumis Royale shader, one that had mdapt in it's name. Mdapt is generally a shader pass that makes dither transparency act more like it would on a CRT instead of the "checkerboard" effect you get on modern displays. For those of you that aren't aware of the Kurozumi shader, it is an edit of the Royale shader which makes it look extremely close to a high quality PVM so it has thick scanlines.

Here are a couple of screenshots to show the difference, view them full size to see the effect better.

First is the regular Kurozumi shader preset, notice the lighting and how it has the "checkerboard" effect.

Next is the mdapt version of Kurozumi, notice how it "appears" more transparent, this is more inline with how it would have looked on a CRT using RF or composite connection.

If you are interested in trying this shader out you will need to be using one of the video drivers that support Slang shaders. Vulkan, DX11 and DX12 all support them I believe, I have been using Vulkan. You can find the preset under the \shaders_slang\presets folder. I did not see this modified version in the GL or CG shader folders though it is possible I just missed it.

Hmm, strangely i don't have that shader available. I updated all my shaders through the UI and it doesnt show for me.

[Lordmonkus]

Here's the preset file, drop it in

RetroArch\shaders\shaders_slang\presets

mdapt-royale-kurozumi.slangp

[Lordmonkus]

Here's a couple of comparison screenshots from MegaMan X4 on the Saturn:I have noticed though that it is not perfect because when the character is behind the light it becomes slightly distorted, I assume this is because of the mdapt shader effect.

Here is a screenshot from the PS1 version of the game using the regular Kurozumi shader preset in comparison.

 

[anontsuki]

Oooooooo, I read what you posted several days ago, thought that was neat.....

Then I actually read what you posted and had an epiphany.... Vulkan! Slang! Oh sweeeet! Although the CRT shaders don't really compare to Zomb's creations, they do give a good CRT blending effect of pixels and oh my sweet goodness, high resolution and CRT can kind of work!

And confirmed! High resolution for games that use hybrid 2d/3d look beautiful, Final Fantasy 9's backgrounds gain detail due to CRT magic, and high resolution makes things look sharp and pretty! Woohoo.

Thanks for the post, Lord Monkus, Vulkan is now my bestest friend.

[mlsaunders1985]

Zombeaver - I've been using your Netrunner shader for a while now, but I've just switched to the new Snow Crash shader, and it's amazing. Best shader set I've ever seen, so thanks for making these!

Edited March 4, 2019 by mlsaunders1985

[Zombeaver]

Thanks! Glad you like em! ?

[Zombeaver]

For the past week or so I've been obsessively working on these again. I basically reworked everything, fixing a ton of stuff and reorganizing so that it's not just a bunch of arbitrary version numbers.

Things have now been boiled down to Neuromancer, Snow Crash, Razorgirl, Decker, and a new shader called Ghost. There are several versions of each of these as well as alternate scaling versions. For Neuromancer and Snow Crash there are also alternate "bright" versions that are slightly brighter. I still have all the old stuff included in a folder called "old" if there's something from that that people would still want, though I don't really recommend it.

For the most common scenarios, the normal shaders in the base folder are what you will want. The SVGA and Vertical shaders are only for those types of content and won't look right otherwise. The SVGA stuff I don't anticipate most people using as it won't look right on content that's lower than 640x480. The example I use it on in the screenshots is Dark Seed II, which is a Windows 3.1 game. Vertical is obviously for vertically rotated arcade games.

The 5X Scaling folder is alternate versions that are specifically for 5X integer scaling. Custom is the same idea but for custom scaling - your mileage will vary on this however, as it's going to depend on the scaling numbers you used. I use it primarily for some PSX games that use somewhat non-standard resolution modes that I've done some custom scaling on.

You can download the set here: Zombs Shaders 4-23-19.zip

I still need to make the non-vignette versions of these. I will be doing that and posting an update, but my eyes were seriously starting to bleed from working on this, so I wanted to get these out there and come back to it in a few days.

I have a screenshot comparison folder available for download here that will give you a more in-depth look, but a few highlights below:

No Shader:

Ghost:

Ghost-Clear:

No Shader:

Neuromancer:

Neuromancer-Sharp1:

No Shader:

Ghost-Vertical:

Neuromancer-Vertical:

Snow Crash-Vertical:

Razorgirl-Vertical:

No Shader:

Ghost-SVGA:

Neuromancer-SVGA:

Snow Crash-SVGA:

Razorgirl-SVGA:

No Shader:

Ghost:

Ghost-Clear:

Neuromancer-Sharp1:

Neuromancer-Clear:

Snow Crash-Sharp1:

Snow Crash-Clear:

Razorgirl-Sharp1:

Razorgirl-Clear:

[dov_EL]

On 12/6/2018 at 8:17 PM, Lordmonkus said:

Here's the preset file, drop it in

RetroArch\shaders\shaders_slang\presets

mdapt-royale-kurozumi.slangp 13.53 kB · 25 downloads

This shaders is amazing. 
Any "Light Version" for Intel HD 5 ? 

[dinoscom]

Hello eveyone! I just started using Retroarch and i would like to try your shaders Zombeaver.
Could you please provide some instructions. Your zip file contains a lot of stuff inside and i'm not so sure how to use them.
Thanks again.

 

[Lordmonkus]

Just drop Zoms shader folder in your \Retroarch\shaders folder and load his presets like any other. It's a self contained pack, it doesn't require any other files from the default RA shaders.

[dinoscom]

Thanks for the clarification!
Another question though. The .cgp shaders need a specific driver to work? I know .slangp is for vulkan for example.

 

 

[Zombeaver]

You need to use the gl driver.

[Lordmonkus]

5 hours ago, dinoscom said:

Thanks for the clarification!
Another question though. The .cgp shaders need a specific driver to work? I know .slangp is for vulkan for example.

 

 

Actually the slang shaders now work with Vulkan, DX11, DX12 and the new GLcore video drivers, not sure if they work with any others or not though.

[dinoscom]

Thanks for the replies guys.
I'm also battling with the Retroarch UI. I hope i can figure it out in the end but its testing my patience. haha?

 

[Gravious]

Some awesome screenshots on the shaders, i'd really like to try the ghost one, but the download is broken?  is there an updated home for it?

 

Thanks

[Fablog]

Thanks a lot @Zombeaver, your shaders are my favourites now!

Edited July 22, 2019 by Fablog

[CybeREX]

On 4/23/2019 at 6:44 PM, Zombeaver said:

I still need to make the non-vignette versions of these. I will be doing that and posting an update, but my eyes were seriously starting to bleed from working on this, so I wanted to get these out there and come back to it in a few days.

Hello @Zombeaver! Nice shaders pack! Any news about non-vignette versions?

Edited September 9, 2019 by CybeREX