Mega Bezel Reflection Shader! - Feedback and Updates

Let me explain my thoughts here.

My thoughts were to have a minimum frame count (Or seconds?) before the cropping changes.

This combined with the already present “CROP BLACK ONLY” and “Black Threshold” should solve the issue without any need to set parameters for each game. (Some systems need consistent cropping across all games, but a few like the Atari Jaguar and Amiga are all over the place.)

Maybe there is a way to get a sample of the game (In the code/background) with higher gamma, to make the Threshold setting more accurate?

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Hello HSM, Duimon and many friends :slight_smile:

I have a doubt, look this project that use Retroarch Shaders but this method is a overlay to work in Any / Every PC Software like VMWare, PCEM, VBox…

Do you think it would be possible to add Overlays like Duimon’s incredible Presets to this Software?

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Hello, is there a way for me to fix Anti-flickering not working? I tried enabling it with multiple presets, but nothing seems to work. I also tried switching between Vulkan and GLCore video rendering to see if it’d make a difference, but nothing came of it.

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HI all . Thank you for the shaders I am on win 11 rtx 4080 and 2k display . How do i make this shader not have the monitor curvature and maybe be a bit bigger in full screen ? I use retro arch and vulkan and i play SNES and PS1 games

Unfortunately no, I realized sort of recently that it’s been broken for a while

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That would be a sad no. :frowning_face:

The shaders are hard coded in to the software. Even if the Mega Bezel and all of it’s base presets were integrated, there would be no way to load one of my reference presets on top of them.

AFAIK there aren’t any border shaders integrated, I assume for good reason. (Most likely the bloat caused by additional LUTs.)

The Windowcast core is your best bet ATM.

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The whole purpose of my autocrop attempt is to completely automate the process, so maybe it will fit your needs even if the user have no control on when it will kick in.

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Ah, I see; that’s really unfortunate to hear. So is there no workaround at all for this, like perhaps using an older version of either Retroarch or the Mega Bezel shaders? And if that’s not possible, may I ask if there will be new updates tackling this specific issue? The shaders you and the community have made are great, and despite this minor issue, I’ve been using them for years and will continue to do so. Thank you for the effort you’ve put into this; it really changed the way I enjoy retro games.

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Hello my friend, how are u?

Yeah that’s right, I imagined that in this case, the work to adapt/implement this feature must be something collaborative between HyperspaceMadness, you and the creator of Shaderglass Mausimus.

PS: Unfortunately, Windowcast (I don’t know today, but in the first versions) didn’t allow me to use it with Mouse/Keyboard, only tabletop Console Emulator games using Joystick worked…

So Shaderglass with the help of the Feature (Click trought) allows you to overlay any window and use M/T perfectly for Games, which works majestically in old PC games.

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Thanks for the very kind words!

I’ll take a look at what’s wrong with it and try to get it fixed in a future version :).

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Look how wonderful it is, all thanks to the work of HyperspaceMadness with Duimon’s Presets, which are incredible, allowing me to relive all the PC classics of my life. I can’t post them all because there are thousands of PC games from the past, but I’ll leave some demonstrations here…

Remember that the ideal, and the solution, after some problems, is to maintain a Core resolution of 480p, anything above that can cause problems with the Scanlines…

Look how wonderful, all thanks to HyperspaceMadness’ work with the Duimon Presets, which are incredible, allowing me to relive all the PC classics of my life. I can’t post them all because there are thousands of PC games from the past, but I’ll leave some demonstrations here…

Remember that the ideal, and the solution, after some problems, is to maintain a Core resolution of 480p, anything above that can cause problems with the Scanlines…

In my case, since I love PC games such as Simulators, Strategy, 4x, FPS, RPG, Adventures, etc., I spend most of my time trying to find better ways to extract the maximum potential to increase the experience in PC, Amiga, MSX, Sharp x68, ZX etc. games, considering that the Presets in general are aimed at Table Consoles and their emulators.

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How wonderful! Thanks always to all those who made this possible! @WaffeSS please I have some curiosities to know since these shots are wonderful. As of now I’m only using Retroarch for console emulation. I would like to point out that my passion was born years ago thanks to a PC, that’s where I come from, I was a happy owner of a 386. Do you use the HSM Smooth Advance preset with Duimon for your games? Are there any particular changes to the shaders or core that you have set to obtain this? Usually PC monitors used the Double Scan system. What maximum resolution do you use to emulate the PC and stay in 480p? If you can please share in detail what you use and how you use it I would be grateful. I saw some shots of HOMM 2 and I was getting emotional. Thanks

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Wow, that’s really cool, my friend. I’ll be happy to help you with my limited knowledge…

PS: True, HoMM is one of the most amazing games ever created. I really love this game. I’m a huge fan of the genre. Whenever I can, I play a bit of it and many others like Lord of the Realms, Hammer of the Gods, etc.

First of all, the first tip I can give you is to try running these games with DosBOX_pure. You can download it from the Retroarch Cores Repository. So, if it’s a DOS game, you can run it using CORE itself or install an operating system to run it inside CORE (I personally have three installations: Dos 6.2, Win 3.1 and Win 98SE with DirectX9).

First of all, DosBOX_pure CORE should run at 640x400p if you are using SVGA Video Graphics mode by default (instead of Tandy, Hercules, etc.) with the “S3 Graphics”, but when you enter the game, this resolution should change automatically, and then you need to check if it is correct by enabling the “Detailed Performance” information in the Core Options, which will be displayed at the top of the screen, as shown in the screenshots below…

InGame

Note: The advantage of installing Windows is that you can always set a native resolution, such as 640x480p, which works wonderfully with the Duimon presets.

PS: Here’s a tip, maybe Duimon can help us, maybe by creating presets for his Pack based on other resolutions, like 800x600 and even 1024x768, who knows…

Anyway, at first there’s not much of a secret, everything is very interactive, you can make adjustments if you feel the need with Retroarch’s Desktop Mode, which allows you to watch the changes in the Shader parameters in real time by pressing F5 on the keyboard. Personally, I don’t like to change things too much, you know, I trust and really like the adjustments that Duimon has already made in the Presets that he kindly offers to all of us via Github, look some others awesome presets from Duimon

That’s it for now, if you make any cool discoveries, share them with us, I’ll be very happy to test any improvements you have to share, my friend :slight_smile:

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Grazie mille, non sò come ringraziarti. Mi hai dato un bel “input” per cominciare. Sulla parte Shader di Duimon giá sò benissimo come impostare con i boilerplate gli HSM Smooth Advance. Adesso devo passare a cercare sulla rete alcune guide per DosBox Pure, in particolare quelle relative all’installazione d Windows e delle DirectX e programmi vari. Adesso piano piano mi ci metto e avrò il piacere di condividere, intanto il tuo “starter” per me è un ottimo spunto. Grazie di cuore.

PS. Oh my god you reminded me of Lord Of The Realms - 2 in particular was a great love of mine. Another one I want to pick up is the first Diablo Anthology - what a wonderful time we had.

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I am afraid I won’t be much help there. Any expertise I have is in creating graphics, not using screen parameters. I am fairly fluent in all the graphics related Mega Bezel parameters, but an amateur when it comes to scanline and mask stuff. :innocent:

BTW. Thanks for showing off the Ambassador 26 preset, it is near and dear to me. The TV is historically significant in a surprising number of ways.

Looking at the shots, it occurs to me that I need to update the graphic so that the channel number is 3. (The knob is in the correct position but the number is wrong. :grin:)

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This is one of my favourites as well.

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Are you using Windowcast core for the Windows games? Or are you actually booting into a sandbox for Windows 95 within Retroarch?

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Hello my friend, it’s always a pleasure ^.^

Watch Diablo on Doxbox_pure with Duimon preset :slight_smile:

For me it’s the best way to play the original versions, because everything works magically and looks really nice with the HSM Shader, you can easily adjust bright if you want, i like a dark aspect, that match perfect with vibe of this PC title.

About installing Windows, it’s actually quite easy, fast and intuitive, just load a Bootable Disk Image, DosBOX_pure will automatically detect it and a new option will appear in the Start Menu [Boot and Install New Operating System] this will start the Installation and from there just follow the step by step on the Screen like a normal Windows Installation on an old PC :slight_smile:

PS: A cool option for everyone, which makes everything much easier, would be to use a Frontend, like Launchbox… Basically it would be a Frontend (Launchbox) on top of another Frontend (Retroarch) ^.^

Which is very useful, because it allows you to play all Games with a simple click of the Mouse, loading all the content auto, and with the help of “additional parameters” and arguments in the “command line” the sky’s the limit ^.^

@Duimon That’s right my friend, you did a wonderful job, it’s one of my favorite Presets too, the whole visual of the device creates a unique feeling.

The Scaled version is the one I use the most, because the content being played on the device has a good coverage area of ​​the screen, which is perfect :slight_smile:

Edit: @MrBlastman

The screenshot above were captured using Retroarch with Dosbox_pure, this Core allows you to boot native DOS games and install a copy of Windows too, to play old games that don’t run natively in DOS, such as Incoming, Age of Empires, Caesar, RCT, Sid Meiers Railroad, Deadlock and many others… As it is a Retroarch Core, you can run it with the amazing HSM MegaBezel along with the wonderful Duimon Presets.

PS: For me this was the best way to run old games, with similar performance to an old PC (I have an old Compaq PC with a CRT monitor, with SB and 3dfx, but due to space constraints they are not accessible to me at all the time) In fact, this way, with Emulation is even better, because everything is on my PC, that I use every day, you know, with a simple click and voila, you play a game!

With good extras, such Soundbanks with different Audio Cards and Synthesizers like Roland’s MT-32, which are very rare and expensive too…

For VMs like Pcem, 86box, xVirtualBox, VMware, QEMU the solution I can suggest is that you try Shaderglass and Reshade, which allow you to apply Filters to Windows…

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Mamma mia what a show, you made me emotional! What memories even with the first Diablo. You were very clear on everything, I only have one question left for you: to install DirectX or other drivers for Windows 98SE what is the procedure with DosBox. I saw that HOMM 2 also runs on both Dos and Windows, today I already got what I need, so I will directly install Windows 98SE on DosBox Pure. Thanks for sharing your experience and for your advice.

For me, the easiest method is to create a ZIP file with all the Drivers and Redist you need for “one-time run” after installing the OS… This is an awesome feature, Dosbox_pure has a cool feature to read ZIP files and mount them as a disk drive, the easiest way is to download the S3, 3DFX, SoundBlaster and DirectX9 drivers and then install everything :slight_smile:

PS: With DosBOX_pure you can even compress disk images inside a ZIP, be they BIN, CUE, MDS, ISO, etc., which can be read and mounted automatically inside the operating system as an optical or hard disk drive.

The PhilsComputerLab website (he also has a Youtube channel) has everything you need to config a perfect OS for old PC gaming.

PS: PhilsComputerLab has a vast knowledge of old PCs, I really like his videos of him, because there is a lot of knowledge being shared.

I really like his videos, because there is a lot of knowledge being shared. Another really cool channel is LGF (LazyGameReviews).

Windows 3.11, for example, can be used in two ways: a custom installation or a ready-made version. All you need to do is compress a ZIP with the OS files and insert the game image or its files into this ZIP, as you can see below :slight_smile:

Below is a really cool link, the user The Fifth Horseman made to a portable version of Win3.11 created for Dosbox

http://www.abandonia.com/vbullet/showthread.php?t=27770

You can DL it to run some old Win Games! This compact version of Win3.11 comes with several pre-installed fixes and drivers, making it easier to use :slight_smile:

Other useful sources for finding tips, drivers, etc. are Vogons.org and Archive.org

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