How do you actually run Crysis in software mode?

[generalkidd]

How does one actually run Crysis without using the GPU? There's articles everywhere about LinusTechTips running it on an AMD Threadripper and they're all freaking out about it but none of the articles actually explain how to run Crysis in software mode. Is it a simple flag at startup or is there something else you have to do to get it to run in CPU mode?

 

[sneekypeet]

Best I found in a couple of minutes of searching mentions use of WARP way back in 2008. Windows Advanced Rasterization Platform

 

[generalkidd]

Best I found in a couple of minutes of searching mentions use of WARP way back in 2008. Windows Advanced Rasterization Platform

I did some further digging into WARP and it seems like it's as simple as just disabling my GPU driver and letting my PC use the Microsoft Basic Display driver instead. I think that should probably work for the tests I'd like to run but with the GPU driver disabled, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be able to monitor the actual GPU at the same time either. I'll keep looking into WARP though. Seems like that's exactly what I need though.

 

[Regeneration]

Getting software rendering to work is a bit tricky.

* On Windows 8/10, you can try to disable the display adapter.
* Use 3rd party software like 3D Analyze or SwiftShader (recommended).
* Copy D3d10warp.dll to the game's folder and name it as D3d10ref.dll.
* Install DirectX SDK and add your game to dxcpl.exe.

 

[spectatorx]

Use DDU to uninstall gpu driver and load into normal mode os. You will have microsoft basic display adapter driver installed and this more or less equals software mode.

Here you can see what you can get that way:

Spoiler: A video

 

[generalkidd]

Getting software rendering to work is a bit tricky.

* On Windows 8/10, you can try to disable the display adapter.
* Use 3rd party software like 3D Analyze or SwiftShader (recommended).
* Copy D3d10warp.dll to the game's folder and name it as D3d10ref.dll.
* Install DirectX SDK and add your game to dxcpl.exe.

I wanted to try SwiftShader but I can't find a legit download from a website that doesn't look sketchy. I tried to compile it myself but I kept getting multiple errors in visual studio and couldn't figure out how to fix it. I'll give the other options a try too.

 

[Regeneration]

SwiftShader comes in a single d3d9.dll file, just check it in VirusTotal.

http://www.vogonsdrivers.com/wrappers/files/Direct3D/Software/SwiftShader/SwiftShader 3.0 DX9/

 

[johnny-r]

but will it actually Launch with those GPU drivers disabled, I was under the impression they ran it without a Graphics Card and use internal APU graphics for example Intel HD 610/630 or Vega 8 on the AMD's

 

[candle_86]

It uses software mode

 

[biffzinker]

Choppy frame rate even at low quality, and 1024x768

 

[Regeneration]

SwiftShader binaries for DirectX 9 and OpenGL ES 2.0 with no watermark:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B8_BlOx5-97CcEhTdy1UNzhXSVE



26-33 fps in SWAT 4 default settings.

Choppy frame rate even at low quality, and 1024x768

Max Payne 2 supports software rendering out-of-the-box. In the launcher, set 'Acceleration' to 'D3D Software T&L'.

 

[biffzinker]

26-33 fps in SWAT 4 default settings.

Wonder if it's using the later x86 SIMD instruction sets after SSE? The version I downloaded earlier only mentioned requiring at least SSE.

 

[candle_86]

SwiftShader binaries for DirectX 9 and OpenGL ES 2.0 with no watermark:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B8_BlOx5-97CcEhTdy1UNzhXSVE

View attachment 147107 View attachment 147108

26-33 fps in SWAT 4 default settings.



Max Payne 2 supports software rendering out-of-the-box. In the launcher, set 'Acceleration' to 'D3D Software T&L'.

software TnL does not mean the game runs in software mode, during the days of TnL being something we talked about some cards didn't have a TnL unit or it was slower than your cpu and would bottleneck the game. For instance if I'm using a Voodoo 5 5500 I'd have to use software TnL because the voodoo does not have a TnL unit onboard, it's why its a directX 6 card and not a 7, it was TnL that made cards DX7 cards. The other instance would be lets say I'm using a Geforce 2 MX400 but i have an Athlon XP 2000, the AThlon XP can do TnL faster than the MX400 can, so you'd again use software TnL. The rest of the game still uses the hardware. DirectX 5 was the last version that supported Software rendering in the API, DX6 and above requires hardware, that's why Microsoft even released a software adapater for directX, because they have been requiring a 3d accelerator since DX6.