Baldur's Gate and AMD Fidelity

[TallManNY]

So I'm playing (and enjoying) Baldur's Gate 3 on my base model M2 Pro mini. I play it on High settings (2560 x 1440; the game chugs if I set it at my Studio display's 5120 x 2880) and recently discovered the AMD Fidelity (FSR 1.0) toggle in the video settings. I was getting about 30 FPS (which is fine in a game where combat is turn based), but when I turned AMD Fidelity on I got between 55 and 60 FPS. I've read a bit about AMD Fidelity, but I'm a bit confused as to how to tweak this (there are like four settings ranging from high quality to performance). As far as I could tell though just messing with it for a bit (I wanted to get playing, so I just spent a few minutes trying a few settings), using this was basically just "free" FPS without any degradation on any of the picture quality.

Note: I'm a console player and haven't used my Mac to play a modern triple A game in at least a decade, so I'm a noob as far as futzing around with video settings. I'm going to experiment a bit (like maybe putting the graphics at "Ultra" while using AMD Fidelity). Also I'm still on Ventura, though I might go to Sonoma this weekend (since Mac is mission critical for work, I tend to take my time before switching to new OS).

Anyone with some advice or thoughts on the pros/cons of running with AMD?

 

[diamond.g]

So I'm playing (and enjoying) Baldur's Gate 3 on my base model M2 Pro mini. I play it on High settings (2560 x 1440; the game chugs if I set it at my Studio display's 5120 x 2880) and recently discovered the AMD Fidelity (FSR 1.0) toggle in the video settings. I was getting about 30 FPS (which is fine in a game where combat is turn based), but when I turned AMD Fidelity on I got between 55 and 60 FPS. I've read a bit about AMD Fidelity, but I'm a bit confused as to how to tweak this (there are like four settings ranging from high quality to performance). As far as I could tell though just messing with it for a bit (I wanted to get playing, so I just spent a few minutes trying a few settings), using this was basically just "free" FPS without any degradation on any of the picture quality.

Note: I'm a console player and haven't used my Mac to play a modern triple A game in at least a decade, so I'm a noob as far as futzing around with video settings. I'm going to experiment a bit (like maybe putting the graphics at "Ultra" while using AMD Fidelity). Also I'm still on Ventura, though I might go to Sonoma this weekend (since Mac is mission critical for work, I tend to take my time before switching to new OS).

Anyone with some advice or thoughts on the pros/cons of running with AMD?

I am not a huge fan of upscaling (especially spatial upscaling) but if I have to use it to get acceptable performance I always use the quality or ultra quality setting. I also make sure I am setting the final resolution to native on PC, on macOS I think half resolution is fine because the UI gets really tiny otherwise since games typically don't understand how Apple's retina displays work.

At some point BG3 should get either MetalFX or FSR2 (or maybe both) which are better than FSR1. If we are going to get it it should drop around the first week of December, but since they have unhired the porting house that worked on the macOS version I am not sure if the 5 week lag time will still be a thing.

 

[TallManNY]

I am not a huge fan of upscaling (especially spatial upscaling) but if I have to use it to get acceptable performance I always use the quality or ultra quality setting. I also make sure I am setting the final resolution to native on PC, on macOS I think half resolution is fine because the UI gets really tiny otherwise since games typically don't understand how Apple's retina displays work.

At some point BG3 should get either MetalFX or FSR2 (or maybe both) which are better than FSR1. If we are going to get it it should drop around the first week of December, but since they have unhired the porting house that worked on the macOS version I am not sure if the 5 week lag time will still be a thing.

Thanks for the insight. The names of UQ, Q, Balanced, Performance are not particularly useful. The good news is that on BG3 I think just a touch of help is all I need here because it isn't really a game that needs a high FPS. And it looks pretty good already, but ultimately not really that interesting a game to me from a graphics standpoint. It is more story and strategy game (and one I'm really enjoying), but not graphics that are stunning or scenic.

By "setting the final resolution to native"/half-native. Does that mean you start with a setting and then multiply by FSR setting (I believe HQ is 1.3 upscaling) and that is what you are targeting? My display will ultimately be 5K (5120-by-2880 resolution) no matter what, so there is upscaling going on at the display level, right?

If we can get FSR3 or MetalFX, that would be amazing. I'm probably going to be playing this game for a few months, so if we get something in December. I've read that Act 3 has some scenes that are more demanding, so maybe we get an update before I end up progressing to that part of the story. I'm only level 4, so I think I've got a long way to go.

 

[diamond.g]

Thanks for the insight. The names of UQ, Q, Balanced, Performance are not particularly useful. The good news is that on BG3 I think just a touch of help is all I need here because it isn't really a game that needs a high FPS. And it looks pretty good already, but ultimately not really that interesting a game to me from a graphics standpoint. It is more story and strategy game (and one I'm really enjoying), but not graphics that are stunning or scenic.

By "setting the final resolution to native"/half-native. Does that mean you start with a setting and then multiply by FSR setting (I believe HQ is 1.3 upscaling) and that is what you are targeting? My display will ultimately be 5K (5120-by-2880 resolution) no matter what, so there is upscaling going on at the display level, right?

If we can get FSR3 or MetalFX, that would be amazing. I'm probably going to be playing this game for a few months, so if we get something in December. I've read that Act 3 has some scenes that are more demanding, so maybe we get an update before I end up progressing to that part of the story. I'm only level 4, so I think I've got a long way to go.

I believe the scale factor is inversed. As in the resolution you set in game is the final resolution that the upscaler upscales to.

 

[TallManNY]

I believe the scale factor is inversed. As in the resolution you set in game is the final resolution that the upscaler upscales to.

Ah, hah. That makes sense.