QW-Group
REQ: Make shader-based gamma the default in new configurations
Is your feature request related to a problem? Please describe.
The default method of gamma control is hardware gamma. While it's fast, it has its share of problems:
- It interacts poorly with night modes/blue light reduction software.
- It doesn't play well with multi-monitor systems or windowed mode.
- If the game crashes, gamma can become stuck until the system is rebooted.
- It's overall unreliable on Linux, and may not work at all there on some graphics drivers.
See https://github.com/ezQuake/ezquake-source/issues/178 for more information.
Describe the solution you'd like
Enabling vid_software_palette 1 and setting vid_hwgammacontrol 0 by default in new configurations would resolve all the above listed problems out of the box for new players. Shader-based gamma has a performance cost, but it's likely not too noticeable on most modern machines. This is why all modern games are using shader-based gamma now – it's just more reliable :slightly_smiling_face:
Describe alternatives you've considered
Keeping the status quo wouldn't be too friendly to people wanting to get into QuakeWorld in 2021, and having to deal with the game being too dark.
Additional context
N/A
Impact on server or mods
None.
See also the recent tweaks to hardware gamma tied to polyblend in issue #538 (vid_hwgamma_fps).
One extra little bonus for vid_software_palette 1 is that people don't need to add a color correction filter to compensate for the HW gamma when capturing the game with OBS for example. I believe some modern source ports used for SP do it in a shader by default as well, although I can't check right now.
Folks on ATI+windows always seem to struggle with anything opengl (see #538 ), it might be worth seeing what kind of numbers they're getting with GLSL color correction in classic/modern - probably with and without polyblend too.
Sign me up for this as a default- came to Issues list looking for possible help with the fact that my Twitch stream of Quake is way too dark and in-game gamma settings didn't do anything to help (they changed my view, but stream looks dark regardless of gamma setting).
