Texture rendering error

Fizzonance

Hello,

For about one week ago I noticed this issue, but I might have had it for a while without noticing it.

I run the game at 1920x1080 at Ultra-High settings (and nothing have been changed in regard to this or game settings) and as I approach a NPC it renders it in a Low, almost pre-view texture, then it takes about half a second-one second and it appears rendered in High quality. So far so good, the game has always been like that.

But! Nowadays if I stay close to the NPC it first flips from low to high, then after about 3-4 seconds, it flips back from high to low rendering again and stays like that. If i back up a few meters and close up on the NPC the process is repeated. Low > High > Low

When I am interacting with NPC's during quests or trading, they stay in High Quality.

Anyone else experiencing this?

P.S. "Low" is probably "Medium", but I have no experience of the game at Medium Settings.

SirAndy

Same here, the textures are popping in and out from low to high to low. And it's not just NPC, it also happens with some of the other assets in the game, like buildings etc.
It's really annoying.

Oh and while we're at it, i *really* would like to see some better anti-aliasing, the flickering textures are getting on my nerves too.
;-)

Fizzonance

I got an answer from support regarding this. Unfortunately none of the solutions worked for me, but they might work for someone else! So for that reason I've included the mail I received:

Thank you for contacting The Elder Scrolls Online and thank you for bringing this to our attention. Our game team is currently investigating a fix for this and hopes to have a resolution prepared in an upcoming patch. Please keep an eye on the forums for the latest updates. But for now, I have a few things you can try to lessen this issue for you.

Go into your Graphics settings while you're in the game to lower some of your graphics settings. You do this by pressing Escape, then navigating over to the Graphics menu. Open this up, and then please go through some of the following settings to see if this helps:

Reduce light effects, grass, water reflections, and distortion
Lower the viewing distance
Lower the in-game resolution
Lower the graphics to the lowest setting, and then see if bumping up the graphics one setting at a time affects anything

After this, please go into town and try talking to an NPC to see if this has helped at all. If not, the next thing we'll have you try is updating your UserSettings file to force the game to use DirectX 9 instead of DirectX 11. With our most recent patch, there have been some boosts to the textures on these NPCs and forcing the game to use an earlier version of DirectX will prevent the game from trying to load them.

To update your UserSettings file, please locate the file itself. By default, this file is located in the Live folder, found here:My Documents\Elder Scrolls Online\Live
Once you have located this file, please open it up and look for this line of code:

SET GraphicsDriver.7 "D3D11"

Once you locate this line, please change the "D3D11" to "D3D9." This is telling the game to run using DirectX 9 instead of 11, which should hopefully clear up the bugging textures for you.

Fizzonance

Got one more response from the support team.
Same as before - none of these solutions worked for me. But might to the trick for others who has the same or a similar issue.

The mail:
"Thank you for contacting The Elder Scrolls Online Team. Being a gamer myself I can relate to any and all frustration you may be feeling and would like to apologize for the inconvenience this issue may have caused. I will do everything I can to resolve this series of misfortunate events. I can promise that I will do everything in my power to get it taken care of and get you back into the game. I would like for you to try the steps below and please send me a response email and thank you.

Game Consultant is a specialized diagnostic tool designed to identify issues that may be affecting a player's The Elder Scrolls Online play experience. It captures information that can be vital to troubleshooting any hardware issue. Here is how to find and use it:

•Click on the golden cog icon in the top right corner of the game launcher.
•Under SETTINGS - LAUNCHER, select the ABOUT tab. This tab includes the current launcher version, minimum specifications, and information about Game Consultant.
•Click the "Game Consultant" button beneath the tool description.
•A new window will pop up. When it does, click "Run Tests." This may take a few minutes.
•When the test is complete, a new window will pop up saying "Success!" The report saves itself as a text file called Report.txt in the My Documents folder.
•To retrieve the file, click the "Open Report Location" button on the Game Consultant window, or click "Open Report" to simply view it.

You can repair the files for The Elder Scrolls Online on their computer by following the steps below:

If the "Play" button reads "Play" or "Update":
•Expand the Game Options menu (located under the News Section)
•Click repair, and wait for it to finish.

A soft-reset is a troubleshooting step that will clear out the cache and allow the game to reload if something does not load properly the first time. Here's how to perform a soft reset:

•Leave any groups a character has joined.
•Type /camp in the in-game chatbox. This logs the character out to the main menu.
•Exit out of the game completely.
•Close the game launcher.
•Wait 15 minutes before opening the launcher and logging back in

I hope that I made this as painless as possible and provided a swift solution to your inquiry. Please feel free to contact us back at anytime for anything that may arise during your adventures. Remember to always dodge the arrow they shoot at the knee, as it has been proven to take many adventurer's out of the game.

With the best regards intended,
Elder Scrolls online team"

Fizzonance

@sirandy
Found a temporary solution for the issue!

http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/discussion/125809/high-quality-armor-weapon-textures-won-t-show-on-other-players-and-npcs#latest

open UserSettings.txt and change
SET MIP_LOAD_SKIP_LEVELS "0"
to
SET MIP_LOAD_SKIP_LEVELS "-3"

and all should render nicely for the time being!

Big thanks for this suggestion!

SirAndy

mikaelvinrothb16_ESO wrote: »

@sirandy
Found a temporary solution for the issue!

http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/discussion/125809/high-quality-armor-weapon-textures-won-t-show-on-other-players-and-npcs#latest

open UserSettings.txt and change
SET MIP_LOAD_SKIP_LEVELS "0"
to
SET MIP_LOAD_SKIP_LEVELS "-3"

and all should render nicely for the time being!

Big thanks for this suggestion!

I'll give that a try tonight, thanks for posting the link!

Ethoir

I am having something similar to this issue. Only for me, certain characters (usually guards) start at the desired texture from a distance and actually bump down when I am practically in their faces.

For example, I could be set to High and see most things well enough (except for materials like the "burlap" of alliance banners which look a bit lower-res no matter what), but when I get up close and "rub my face in it", the textures drops down a peg or two (from high to medium or low). On guards, their shoulder pads remain in high texture details but the armor, helm and legs go to pot.

I've tried changing "set mip_load_skip_levels" to -1 and even -3, but this temporary fix doesn't stick between sessions. The game always resets it to 0 on my next log-in. Its exceptionally annoying. Best trick to keep it from resetting on its own is to flag the file as read-only.

Elf_Boy

I've been watching plants grow as I approach them lately. Same kind of thing -- low res distance texture swapping to higher res ones in a very noticeable way. Anywhere there are small plants in a clump with nothing around them.

Fizzonance

Been strolling around looking at plants + alchemy nodes now for about 10 minutes and my plants/flowers/brush/shrouds etc does not change depending on distance.
And as SirAndy pointed out in the beginning of the threads regarding building - that, as well, does not occur for me.
Only NPC's when I'm getting really up-close (if I enter conversation mode they're hi-res).

Elf_Boy

Very odd. I am about to play. I will go look at plants and things see what I see. What zone are you in - in case it is a specific artwork issue.

Fizzonance

Malabal Tor and Reaper's March. Think we might be in different time zones, but still - sorry for the delay!