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Lossless scaling

Barbalos

Savant
Joined
Jun 14, 2018
Messages
200
I just read about this:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/993090/Lossless_Scaling/?beta=0

It's a steam app that scales lower resolution games using something called Integer Scaling.

From the Steam description:

"
Lossless Scaling scales any game up to your native display resolution correctly without blur.

When you run the game at a resolution less than the native display resolution, the graphics driver uses bilinear or bicubic interpolation of the image resulting in blurring and loss of quality. For example, when you play old games on a 1080p display or modern games at a 1080p resolution on a 4k display, the result will be a blurred image.

Lossless Scaling solves a problem using integer scaling. In the case of scaling 1080p images to 4k, it simply doubles the pixels horizontally and vertically so the output image maintains its original clarity and integrity. Additionally you can enable fullscreen anti-aliasing in the app even if the game has no such option. Unlike anti-aliasing in the game itself, the app smooths already upscaled image.
"
 

Sentinel

Arcane
Joined
Nov 18, 2015
Messages
6,633
Location
Ommadawn
What the fuck does "1920x1080p game" even mean? The games the guy mentions all scale to 4K perfectly without any external software.
 

Barbalos

Savant
Joined
Jun 14, 2018
Messages
200
I'm not sure how useful this will actually be, on closer inspection. I was hoping there could be some application for retro games on my 1080p, but now I'm not sure.

ss_3d6ec1c07b420f7beb165cc964f244e305e0d586.1920x1080.jpg


Doesn't seem worth it at all.

Ah I guess it does look more the same at a higher resolution, which is the point. Maybe it could be worth old games like MM3 or such? I'm not sure.
 

Barbalos

Savant
Joined
Jun 14, 2018
Messages
200
The developer posted on reddit and said it works on any game. How true that is, I don't know. It's about $5 to buy, I might try it out.
 

Deleted Member 16721

Guest
The developer posted on reddit and said it works on any game. How true that is, I don't know. It's about $5 to buy, I might try it out.

Let us know how it works with games like Morrowind and what not.
 

Daemongar

Arcane
Joined
Nov 21, 2010
Messages
4,706
Location
Wisconsin
Codex Year of the Donut
I'd only buy it if it works with DosBox type games (The Summoning, MMs, some of them there Goldbox type games.) Then again, Wizardry 7 is on Steam - I wonder if that would work... Ok, now I have to try this tonight.

Edit: I see his note. Attention! Windows 7 is not supported I know this is a beta, but it appears the solely for Windows 8 and 10. I think I can wait on this.
 
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Deleted Member 16721

Guest
This thread needs feedback, keep us updated guys. :brodex:
 

Barbalos

Savant
Joined
Jun 14, 2018
Messages
200
The developer posted on reddit and said it works on any game. How true that is, I don't know. It's about $5 to buy, I might try it out.

Let us know how it works with games like Morrowind and what not.

I will, though I don't play games too much atm and I'm using OpenMW for Morrowind which supports higher resolution. But if and when I use it, I'll let you know.

I'd only buy it if it works with DosBox type games (The Summoning, MMs, some of them there Goldbox type games.) Then again, Wizardry 7 is on Steam - I wonder if that would work... Ok, now I have to try this tonight.

Edit: I see his note. Attention! Windows 7 is not supported I know this is a beta, but it appears the solely for Windows 8 and 10. I think I can wait on this.

Right, this is the type of stuff I'm wondering. Please keep us updated.
 

Raghar

Arcane
Vatnik
Joined
Jul 16, 2009
Messages
22,505
Why didn't he release it for free? ENB graphic enchancments are free of charge, and I remember NVidia had an option to double resolution in drivers. So old games are not forced to run at unsupported 600 resolution but at better supported 1200.

Edit: But it was in old drivers under W7.
 

Zenith

Arbiter
Joined
Apr 26, 2017
Messages
296
UI screenshots show it just having a single scale factor. So it doesn't correct aspect ratio, meaning no advantage over unmodified DOSBox. What's the point then? Where it matters non-DOS you'd probably launch the game through emulator/source port anyway, with either higher render res or proper scaling by default. I can only see this applying to relatively recent pixel art indie games that didn't bother supporting contemporary resolutions. For me this category is pretty damn small.

To be quite honest, the app looks low effort and aimed at plebs. I'm fairly sure Durante 's GeDoSaTo has the same functionality purely as a side effect - and can do the same, with more flexibility, with one hand tied behind the back. It's also free.
It was called nearest neighbour interpolation before it was cool.

Hipstards, hipstards never change...
Fucking hipstards.
Not necessarily true.
Even for uniform rescale, "integer scaling" is expected to turn every pixel into equal NxN pixel field of the same color, while "nearest neighbour" isn't as rigid and can produce non-square same-color fields. Depends on implementation though.
For upscaling it's barely noticeable, but the real downside is that after Nearest upscale you can't reliably downscale it back to original res without data loss. Integer scaling would preserve everything and scale both ways losslessly, always.
This isn't to say I'm somehow certain that thing in OP does integer scaling. For all I know it just does some bad form of Nearest anyway. Their logo sure isn't convincing.
 

Astral Rag

Arcane
Joined
Feb 1, 2012
Messages
7,771
I'd only buy it if it works with DosBox type games

https://blog.yesterplay80.net/dosbox-ece-en/

Currently, DOSBox ECE differs from normal DOSBox in these features:

 

Vicissitudes

Augur
Patron
Joined
May 31, 2011
Messages
158
bought it since there are so many old games that are blured to shits when scaling 1080p to 4k. app's just convenient as fuck.

so far tested with dragon age origins and dark sun shattered lands.
dark sun looks great and works a bit faster since this is external scaling (out of dosbox) - i had a tiny tiny blur on mah pixels when fullscreen now it's gone. before the duck-scale-app i was using normal x3. screen with windowed normal x3 with the app to 4k.

0Jc64Dl.jpg


when it comes to da:origins - you can play it in 4k from the settings but i hated what happened to the font sizes when you did. this does exactly what you expect it just scales the image x2 and that's it. some aliasing pops up but nothing jarring. fonts are eligible again.
next up: fallout
 

Vicissitudes

Augur
Patron
Joined
May 31, 2011
Messages
158
fallout nevada in 4k. good enough for me
yRX8Wno.jpg


side note: mouse behaves exactly like in the windowed mode, it's mapped to the window size - so in my case of dosbox games much better than dosbox's full screen (lag is gone) but the sensitivity is high.
 
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Deleted Member 16721

Guest
That Fallout screenshot looks great! The Dark Sun one too. With DA:O, unfortunately some games the text doesn't scale right so going to higher res makes the font smaller. I noticed this in Piranha Bytes' engine for Risen and Gothic.
 

J1M

Arcane
Joined
May 14, 2008
Messages
14,616
The value of something like this may be hard to discern if you are using a 72dpi monitor to look at the sample screenshots.
 

Vicissitudes

Augur
Patron
Joined
May 31, 2011
Messages
158
Probably doesn't work with older games like MM6.
i just tested it out on random stuff and it works on any window it's not executable related at all - you can do fullscreen on random apps, folders, steam window, etc. so if you can get a game to run in window you can make it full screen and borderless.
 

Sratopotator

Savant
Joined
Sep 21, 2016
Messages
149
While I know shit about actually using a 4k display, the author of this app is still :retarded:.

He's showing 3 games on the store page as examples. Both HL2 and Shadow Tactics have native 4k support. ???
He uses re-scaled pictures in those screenshots, or some other fuckery. HL2 for sure:
Notice holes in the cables on the left?
ANTIf0.jpg
His algorithm does some silly things to the image (I'm not saying that making such stuff work is easy):
His own FTL screenshot. Native version (1):
ANTJKx.jpg

2x scale, without AA (2):
ANTQfH.jpg

Notice the artifacts? Both images are taken from the same screen, so it's not from compression (or he fucked up when making the screen).
Anti-aliasing method he uses in the app is shitty, at least on the screens (I'm not going to install steam just for checking this shit out). Image visibly loses definition - everything is rounded a bit or even looks cartoony, it reminds me of HQ2/3 scaling from scummvm. Depends on personal preference but i dislike it, and from what I've seen on config screenshot you cannot change AA method in any way.

Last thing i don't fucking understand is this: Isn't this method of scaling exactly the same as going pixel perfect? 1 pixel is displayed as 4 in both cases.
Followup question: Isn't 1080 on 4k pixel perfect?????
If that's the case, then anything 1080 will NOT look blurry on 4k if no unnecessary upscaling is forced (like when using TVs or specific displays), and the author of this app is a fucking moron.

I may be speaking out of my ass about pixel perfect, not 100% sure, but recent upscaling/resolution/post-processing illiteracy is driving me crazy. The guy wants money for this shit so it triggers me even more.

TLDR:
This app may still be useful for games that do not handle 1080p or custom resolutions (Fallout does! Pixel perfect is the way! agris can confirm :cool:), but it's always better to go as much 'native' as possible, so the app can be considered as a last resort tool when there are no alternatives.
 

Deleted Member 16721

Guest
Can someone test it with Serpent in the Staglands and Arcanum and post screenshots?
 
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