FFXI Finally In High Quality Graphics

Now FFXI crashes immediately at start.

You only put the D3D8.DLL into the folder, remove the other two that you copied.

So I finally caved in last night and decided to give it a try. It's not as hard as some people are making out, but I can understand where some go wrong as some instructions are spread out across the thread. I set this up on two different accounts on seperate systems, and I'm going to monitor them over the coming weeks to see what's good/bad about it.

Step By Step Instructions

1) D3D Compilers - You should sort this out first, but most players will already have the correct .dll in the right place. If you don't, this step is 100% required.

>> D3D Compilers <<

Check your Operating System specs (If on Windows 10, open your Start Menu, click on "Settings", then "System", then "About") to see if you have 32 or 64-bit Windows.

32 Bit = Download Compiler_43 and put it in C:\Windows\System32
64 Bit = Download Compiler_47 and put it in C:\Windows\SysWOW64

As has been stressed before, if you already have the corresponding .dll in the right place, you do not need to replace it, you do not need to delete the old one, you simply leave this step alone and move on.

2) Downloading DGVoodoo2 / Moving d38d.dll.

The Work In Progress DGVoodoo was specifically created to help Final Fantasy XI, if you are using the wrong version you will experience issues.

EDIT: The latest version of dgvoodoo is acceptable. Download the latest from this link: dgvoodoo2

Find somewhere to unpack these files. For my own convenience, I extracted them in to a New Folder in my downloads folder, to make sure all the files were together in the same place.

Moving D38D.

Take notice of a folder called MS, because it has a very important .dll. Next you want to move the D38D.dll to the right place, but it depends on if you use Windower and whether it's 32 or 64-bit.

-If you use Windower and have 64-bit, move the file to: C:\Program Files (x86)\PlayOnline\SquareEnix\PlayOnlineViewer

-If you use Windower and have 32-bit, move it to: C:\Program Files\PlayOnline\SquareEnix\PlayOnlineViewer

-If you do not use Windower and have 64-bit, move to: C:\Program Files (x86)\PlayOnline\SquareEnix\FINAL FANTASY XI

-If you do not use Windower and have 32-bit, move to C:\Program Files\PlayOnline\SquareEnix\FINAL FANTASY XI

You do NOT need to move the other .dlls in the MS folder, leave them alone. You need to move D38D.dll to the correct folder, do not put multiples in different places or you may experience crashes.

3) Configuring DGVoodoo2

I made an error at this stage initially, as I didn't move the right files before configuring.

a) I do not know if this matters, but just to be sure, I moved dgVoodooCpl.exe and the 3dfx / MS folders to the same folder I moved D38D.dll too. The folders may not be necessary, but I found it doesn't hurt to move them anyways.

b) Some Windows 10 systems may have issues with some files as anti-virus programs may try to block them. I didn't have to do this, but if you run into problems, check the properties of these files and "Unblock" them. If you have issues you may have to look up how to unblock files with your anti-virus, or disable/uninstall the antivirus programs so you don't have to.

c) Travel to the folder you put dgvoodoocpl in, Right-Click the .exe and Run As Administrator. Failure to do this will make it impossible to save settings.

d) Start the dgvoodoo program. Under Config folder / Running Instance, "Add" the folder the .exe is in (the same folder you moved the files too). The following changes are for my system and what I want from this; I use a Desktop with Windows 10 64-bit, Nvidia GEFORCE 750 TI graphics.

Under General:

- Pick the graphics card under Adapters to use. <----- This makes laptops crash!!!

- Choose Windowed Appearance.

- Uncheck Capture Mouse.

Under Glide:

- Uncheck Force Vsync. (Saevel suggested it lately)

- Uncheck 3dfx watermark.

- I kept Antialiasing (MSAA) on App Driven, because when I turned it up I found serious dips in FPS in crowded areas and some battles.

Under DirectX:

- VRAM to 1024 MB (you may need to 512 if you multi-box)

- Uncheck DGVoodoo Watermark (keep it on the first time, so you know it works! You can uncheck it later)

- Check Fast Video Memory Access : Saevel suggested FFXI does not blow up and it gives a performance boost, yet it may interfere with taking screenshots.

- The right settings for (Texturing) Filtering and Antialiasing (MSAA) depends on your system and preferences. Enabling Supersampling in Windower should be considered. It's better to raise the filtering before AA. Saevel suggested x16 Filtering and x2 AA, but I found it was too much for me, so I'm sticking with App Driven on these for now. With a stronger system I could get away with higher settings in congested areas.

These options depend on your personal preference, and you can experiment til you find the right balance, but you'll have to restart the game several times to find the balance of quality and performance.

e) Click on "Apply" and the program should make a dgvoodoo.conf file in the same folder. If this doesn't happen, you've done something wrong. You do not need to do anything to this file, you just need to make sure it's created after you applied your settings.

4) Graphics Settings

I use Nvidia so I can't say what to do for AMD. Saevel suggested you make changes in your Nvidia Control Panel to force specific options for FFXI. You can find this in your Windows OS Control Panel. If you click Nvidia Control Panel and it does not start, you may need to install the latest drivers and restart the system.

When you get on the Nvidia Control Panel, click on "Manage 3D Settings", then "Program Settings", then go in to the drop down menu and select "All Play-On-Line Games (pol.exe)". Saevel suggested these settings:

- AA Mode on Application Controlled
- Power Management Mode on Adaptive
- Shader Cache to On
- FXAA Antialiasing to Off

Click Apply after this, and you're ready to sort out FFXIs options.

5) FFXI & Windower Settings

a) Some say this makes the font look funny. If this happens to you, go on the Start Menu, find Playonline, open FFXIconfig, and stick Fonts on "Compressed".

b) To sort out further graphics settings for FFXI with Windower, make sure you have the "Config" Plugin installed. Navigate to the Windower4/plugins/settings folder and open config.xml

You can do a lot here. If you want 60 fps instead of 30, put FrameRateDivisor on 1. I have Map and MobDrawDistance on 3, but can probably put higher if you want. AnimationFrameRate on 0. Clipping Plane is on 5, but it can go up to 10 if your system can handle it.

In the Windower 4 Launcher, it was suggested to turn Supersampling Off unless you know your system can handle it with Filtering and AA in dgvoodoo. I decided not to use Supersampling at this time, as I'm looking for stability at a higher frame rate than I'm used too.

In-game settings

High quality shadows drops FPS by a ridiculous amount, so make sure shadows are on Normal or turned off. Weather and other environmental effects should be ok to keep on.

Battle Animations is your choice, having them on makes battles look very pretty, but if you turn the graphics up too high you may notice big FPS drops. This is your personal preference; I don't like battle animations but my Dad does, so I'm going to get feedback off him later.

Side effects of having 60 fps is a camera which may turn too quickly (I'm slowly getting used to it as I played 30 FPS for 14 years). Your character may appear to float sometimes. On the upside, colours stand out more (like flowers) and all animations look clearer with more detail.

End For Now

I don't think I've missed anything, but if I have I've made this section to add more info. I hope having all of this in one place makes it easier for those installing it for the first time.

Since I've done this, I've been able to use Task Manager without it crashing FFXI, and I ain't seen any "checkerboard" crashes I randomly get with my card (and only with FFXI). Which is nice! The biggest thing to take away from this is how much clearer animations are. In towns you won't notice much difference, but in other areas you will notice things you never did before.

With my settings the FPS can sometimes drop to the 30-40 range (lots of PCs/NPCs/boat w/ shadows + weather in Mhaura), but I'm ok with that. I'm assuming if you want the smoothest gameplay, you could stick to 30, but otherwise go for 60 and accept that it might drop out sometimes. It doesn't make the game unplayable if configured right. I've yet to see any issues with bard songs or fire spells, but I can't say I've done anything with them yet. Will add more as I get it.

Thanks! Hope this is helpful to someone.

That's pretty dissapointing.. I guess I will keep tinkering seeing if i can get it to work

I was trying to record this happening in OBS studio and it magically worked. I was able to log on all 3 characters with dgvoodoo using nvidia graphics on the laptop, however if I close OBS studio or remove the display from the capture options then it becomes unstable and crashes one or all of the instances I have open. Just keeping OBS open seems to be kinda of a memory hog and I don't know what it's doing to allow me to open 3 POL instances on nvidia graphics that wasn't allowed before.

Thanks! Hope this is helpful to someone.

Go figure... This is why I hate this stuff... So basically I should download obs studio and just record all my sessions!! lol

/fps1

On a side note are people able to constantly keep fps at 60?

Im wondering if it is possible to use the mouse with the newest dgvoodoo release. played around with it for the first time tonight, but it removes my mouse. I tried with both "Capture Mouse" checked and unchecked.

I have always played with mouse and keyboard WSAD controls like a first person shooter game, so i cannot survive without it lol...