As all of you know RTW is quite an old game by the video game standards. It was released back in 2004 – almost 6 years ago. Even though it was revolutionary by the standards of the day, nowadays many people have machines which can squeeze the engine to its limits. EB did a great work on improving the visual aspect of RTW, but it’s still based on the same engine and I am one of those many people who can run EB on max settings. However it is possible to achieve even more. This guide will let you customize your EB to your liking (and your machine capacity). For the stronger machine owners this will let you push your EB further than the max setting you already have. So let’s start!
First let’s take a look how unmodified EB looks on max settings:
Notice these extremely ugly green triangles underneath your troops? Completely ruins the beauty of these Agrarians. The other thing that you can notice is the Macedon banner in the distance. Some people prefer to have those, but I don’t. Mainly because they look unrealistic and they move up and down when you select the unit. The other annoying thing is sparkles on your units when they gain experience. You can’t see them in the screenshot above, but I find them too arcade so they are gone from my EB too. So let’s get rid of these three things first.
Most of you probably already know how to get rid of these things, so you can simply skip this step. For those who don’t – follow me. 1. Open your preferences folder which is located C://place where you have your RTW installed/EB/preferences 2. Look for the file named “preferences” and open it with notepad 3. Find these lines and make appropriate changes:
SHOW_BANNERS:TRUE change to FALSE and you will get rid of the banners
UNIT_EXPERIENCE_UPGRADE_EFFECT:TRUE change to FALSE and sparkling stars are gone
DISABLE_ARROW_MARKERS:FALSE change this to TRUE and the ugly green triangles are no more.
Looks much better, doesn’t it? Ok let’s move on to the more interesting stuff. The above image is probably what you know as EB on max settings, however now we are going to push the limits.
The following steps apply to Nvidia graphic card users, but ATI users should be able to find similar options available to them as well. So let’s start!
1. Open you graphic card settings window. (Now I don’t know where yours is as it depends on graphics card and operating system. I have Nvidia card and use Windows Vista, so if you have the same follow these steps, if not they might help you to figure out how to open your own settings):
Press right mouse button on your desktop and choose Personalize
Select Display settings
In the window that opened select Advanced Settings
Now it should show your card, so select the tab with your cards name on it
You are given the option to Start the NVIDIA Control Panel, choose it
Here you go! You can close the rest of the windows now.
2. In your graphic card setting window choose Manage 3D settings 3. Choose the tab with Program settings 4. This will give you the list of programs installed on your machine, find Rome – Total War 5. Now we are going to change some settings here:
Set Anisotropic filtering to 16x
Set Antialiasing – Gamma correction to On
Set Antialiasing – Mode to Enhance the application setting
Set Antialiasing – Setting to 16xQ
Set Antialiasing – Transparency to Multisampling
Set Comformant texture damp to Use hardware
Set Texture filtering – Anisotropic sample optimization to On
Set Texture filtering – Trilinear optimization to Off
Leave the rest of the settings on Use global setting
(Optional) Set the same settings for Alex.exe and BI.exe if you have them installed
6. Apply the changes and close the window
You should see a change in quality now. This might affect your fps, but it didn’t affect mine (at least not noticeably), so you should be fine. So let’s take a look how EB looks now:
The changes might not be very obvious from a screenshot, but if you look carefully you’ll see that unit details are much better now. Here is a direct comparison:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
Before:
After:
In-game it is much clearer: just look at the engravements on the armor and details on the shields and you’ll see the difference.
However this is not it. I personally think that RTW looks a bit pale and lacks contrast and some darkness. However there is a way around this. Follow me:
1. Download this free tiny program from here: http://wareseeker.com/free-gapa/ and install it 2. Open it and adjust the settings to your taste. For EB I use:
0,90 Gamma
-3% Brightness
1,10 Contrast
3. Save the color profile and assign it a hotkey. Also set the hotkey to return to normal settings. 4. Now every time before you play EB, launch this little program, press the hotkey you assigned for the adjusted settings and start EB.
Here is the brand new looking EB!
Direct comparison:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
Vanilla max:
Max with graphic card setting changes:
Max with above changes and gamma changes:
Optional changes
There are some other things I have changed for my EB, but they are completely optional as they will depend on your taste and machine capabilities.
1. Grass distance.
I hate when the grass simply disappears a few meters in front of the unit. So if you want to see more grass change this in your preferences:
GRASS_DISTANCE:75 to a higher number. I use 500 as it covers about half of the battlefield. You can of course use higher or lower number, just test what you like and can run. Warning: this will be a great hit on your fps, so you need a strong machine to enjoy the full grass.
Here is a comparison:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
2. City labels
Second optional change is for the campaign map. I like it when the settlement names and all the income, recruiting, etc. info is not visible. Here is how it looks:
So if you want the same effect, change this line in your preferences:
LABEL_SETTLEMENTS:TRUE change it to FALSE.
3. Event scenes
The third change is quite a minor one. I don’t like the even scenes – when general dies, gates are taken, etc. so I disabled them. If you want them gone too, go to preferences and change:
EVENT_CUTSCENES:TRUE to FALSE.
That is it! Hope you find this guide useful and enjoy an even more beautiful EB than before!
Your first set of maxing changes is excellent , but your city labels and event scenes change will made most who like to roleplay (especially the important label-where should we build or train), and the cutscenes is important because EB doesn't have the backsound... "The enemy general is flee like a frightened goat!!! Hunt him... goat makes good eating!!!" or "The roman leader is fallen! made sure his corpses won't poison the carrion birds!"... and sometimes, when your own is dead, you'll have annoying breakdown, especially when you turn the banner off...
Thank you for the tipps. I just saw, that in the preferences file you find this:
EDIT_SETTLEMENT_NAMES:FALSE
If I change it to "true" i can edit the settlement names? how does it work?
That will be available on BI engines only I think.... but that way will also screw the EBBS, because naming of the cities are included in determining homeland, troop control, and much more scripts...
Yes, if you set it to TRUE then you can change settlement names.
Just open settlement information and click on the settlement name and that's all.
But you shouldn't change the names of settlements because this might screw up your game 'cause EB script uses those names as well.
Edit: Cute Wolf - It's possible with RTW engine as well if you enter EDIT_SETTLEMENT_NAMES:FALSE line to prefrences text file.
Your first set of maxing changes is excellent , but your city labels and event scenes change will made most who like to roleplay (especially the important label-where should we build or train), and the cutscenes is important because EB doesn't have the backsound... "The enemy general is flee like a frightened goat!!! Hunt him... goat makes good eating!!!" or "The roman leader is fallen! made sure his corpses won't poison the carrion birds!"... and sometimes, when your own is dead, you'll have annoying breakdown, especially when you turn the banner off...
Your first set of maxing changes is excellent , but your city labels and event scenes change will made most who like to roleplay (especially the important label-where should we build or train), and the cutscenes is important because EB doesn't have the backsound... "The enemy general is flee like a frightened goat!!! Hunt him... goat makes good eating!!!" or "The roman leader is fallen! made sure his corpses won't poison the carrion birds!"... and sometimes, when your own is dead, you'll have annoying breakdown, especially when you turn the banner off...
Thank you! As for the optional changes - that's why they are called optional These are just to suit my taste.
Originally Posted by SwissBarbar
Thank you for the tipps. I just saw, that in the preferences file you find this:
EDIT_SETTLEMENT_NAMES:FALSE
If I change it to "true" i can edit the settlement names? how does it work?
You can change this so that you can edit your settlement names, but as others already said - this will screw up the script and thus your game, unless you already own the map and want to name all the cities after yourself
I did not know about the settlement names thing! Top gun there, mate! However, did you forget about minimal UI? I find that makes a much bigger improvement in my eyes than even the removal of the bumping flags or green arrows could compete with. The default is just too big and in the way, and only serves to distract me now that I've grown used to the minimal version.
Last edited by The Celtic Viking; 03-25-2010 at 23:34.
I did not know about the settlement names thing! Top gun there, mate! However, did you forget about minimal UI? I find that makes a much bigger improvement in my eyes than even the removal of the bumping flags or green arrows could compete with. The default is just too big and in the way, and only serves to distract me now that I've grown used to the minimal version.
Thanks! Yeah i completely forgot about the minimal UI. I personally am so used to the usual interface that didn't even think about it. I guess it's like everywhere - very hard to change habits, even if the new ones are better/more effective/etc. I'll update my guide and include minimal UI once I have some more free time. Thanks for a reminder!
I think it's awesome you posted this :D But is it just me or does EB look incredibly dark already? I'd rather make it lighter... Also, I can't change the trilinear optimization (it's unselectable), am I missing out on something?
Just open up Catalyst Control Center, use advanced menu not basic, and set everything to the highest. Make sure to have the A/C on cause your comp and vid card may explode.
A guide to making your EB look better
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Re: A guide to making your EB look better
, but your city labels and event scenes change will made most who like to roleplay (especially the important label-where should we build or train), and the cutscenes is important because EB doesn't have the backsound... "The enemy general is flee like a frightened goat!!! Hunt him... goat makes good eating!!!" or "The roman leader is fallen! made sure his corpses won't poison the carrion birds!"... and sometimes, when your own is dead, you'll have annoying breakdown, especially when you turn the banner off...
x 15
Originally Posted by SwissBarbar
These are just to suit my taste.
Re: A guide to making your EB look better
by Pharnakles
From Brennus for wit.
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