Games just...don't look too good?

[hell321]

8bit will not rape your GPU
computer GPU already surpass Ps2 GPU unless you use outdated GPU(cannot support HD1080p)

[Hellraiseradio]

8bit will not rape your GPU
computer GPU already surpass Ps2 GPU unless you use outdated GPU(cannot support HD1080p)

This is not necessarilly true at all. 8 bit textures can hurt speed on some games that use them because some modern gpus are just optimized for larger textures.
You should go back to the thread where I already said comparing PS2 console tech to new PC tech is a foolish thing to do at the very least.

[Squall Leonhart]

8bit will not rape your GPU
computer GPU already surpass Ps2 GPU unless you use outdated GPU(cannot support HD1080p)

the 8bit texture option is a conversion shader that reduces the frame buffer load in exchange for higher GPU shader load. Games that repeat many textures often but do not completely fill the VRAM do not benefit from the setting but can suffer from overloading the shaders.

Mihen highroad in FFX for instance repeats a simple set of textures with little VRAM load, but converting the textures with shaders results in enough shader usage that the GPU becomes a bottleneck.

[miseru99]

Why always somebody want to speak aloud his "truth" about 8 bit textures saying it's mostly slowing down or speeding up games(not even counting GPU rape, as they are build to be raped - 3 to 6 places to plug a cable does speak for it), not only it affects games differently, it also have different results on different GPU's and ending it can even work differently in different scenes/effects of same game. For example to the last case couse it's maybe a bit rarer a rather simple 2D game - Disgaea 2, allowing 8 bit textures on this game is a killer can easily decrease max usable internal res from like x6 to x3, but in the same time, without this option, some heavier(tera magic) attacks can slow down the game below max speed even at x3 while with it, those effects feel much lighter and allow a constant max speed without a problem.

Anyway on-topic, the games "don't look good" couse they're from over 10 yo console, even some enhancing graphics from GSdx features will not make them look anywhere close to modern games. Emulation is always for people which feel some nostalgia towards gameplay and beauty of graphics in artistic way, as low res, grainy, blurry can still be called beautiful in compare to hi res when it's often plain, simple and repetitive stuff that's made of lazyiness/lack of time in modern games.

[Squall Leonhart]

Why always somebody want to speak aloud his "truth" about 8 bit textures saying it's mostly slowing down or speeding up games(not even counting GPU rape, as they are build to be raped - 3 to 6 places to plug a cable does speak for it), not only it affects games differently, it also have different results on different GPU's and ending it can

40fps at 99% gpu usage is considered GPU rape. the gpu is being overloaded and bottlenecking the game.

Disgaea 2, allowing 8 bit textures on this game is a killer can easily decrease max usable internal res from like x6 to x3

thats simply because the engine reuses simple textures frequently with which the shader is invoked more then necessary.

The shader benefits LARGE textures the most, its the small tiled/repetitive textures that hammer the shaders during conversion.

Large textures(the culprit for XS2/3's high vram use) converted a few times and then warped around their mesh boundaries are less intensive on shaders, but a massive difference in vram fill occurs as a result.

First, it's not so obvious. 8-bit textures are always rendered.

The difference is that typically GSdx converts 8-bit textures to 32 bit textures internally, which bloats the texture memory usage when they're uploaded to your video card memory. But it's faster for the video card to render from 32 bit textures, because 8-bit textures require an inline shader decoder.

So if a game uses a lot of 8-bit textures, it can flood video memory and run very slow; such games will run much faster with allowed 8-bit textures because extra shader work is less invasive than running out of video memory. But if a game only uses a few 8-bit textures and you allow 8-bit textures for use, it can slow things down because of extra shader work.

[miseru99]

Thanks Squall for sharing your dedicated knowledge and commenting half of my example touching something else than "why it happens" which your answer is, similary to commenting what GPU rape is as an answer to my joke about GPU's being build to be raped. Or did you took it literally:X? When humans are tired, they should go and sleep off instead of using more energy drinks.

[Squall Leonhart]

actually, i just updated my post, i was half asleep earlier and mixed up the values

[miseru99]

Still didn't see a reason to quote what I wrote by completely different reason than asking why it happens or what it is(actually even if it would be an answer for it, that part of my post was trully rather a rant and wasn't really awaiting any answer), but even if you're just trolling normally, thanks for quoting Air as his post actually explains how GSdx works normally, and what it does with this option.

[rama]

The games I was attempting to play were Suikoden V, Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne, and Tales of the Abyss. All of these from DVD.

These games all have post process blur filtering so they don't look as sharp as we'd want them to.