r/metalgearsolid

Fox Engine: Material ID Systems, Auto Exposure, and Tonemapping
▲ 818 r/metalgearsolid+3 crossposts

Fox Engine: Material ID Systems, Auto Exposure, and Tonemapping

There are 3 aspects about Fox Engine that I wanted to highlight as they are in important in explaining why MGSV still holds up in terms of visuals even today.

Fox Engine uses Material IDs to enhance the realism of many objects in the scene. During the lighting stage, Fox Engine skips the 24-bit Base Color Information part as an optimization. For specular lighting, the shader will identify the material ID and use the LUT to figure out what properties a given pixel would need (specular color, fresnel, hair, etc). No big G-buffer required. The albedo and diffuse lighting are later blended together in the resolve stage. This is an incredible optimization that the developers made and I simply wish that more games could take advantage of something like this.

The engine is able to maintain a very stable exposure by focusing only the lighting elements of a scene. Downsampling the diffuse only buffer (which excludes dark material attributes and emissives) is the mechanism that they use to get this effect.

MGSV’s tonemapping has very similar on screen results when compared to the Gran Turismo tonemapper. The tonemapping curve itself lacks a bit of contrast. Fox Engine counteracts this by using color grading via a LUT to raise highlights and add that missing contrast without completely blowing out the image. 

TLDR; In Fox Engine, Material IDs determine a pixel’s specular color without a big G-buffer, the auto exposure system purposefully excludes dark areas to remain consistent, and a color graded LUT enhances the game’s tonemapping.

Resources that were extremely helpful in trying to understand Fox Engine:

https://youtu.be/aB5qxp6SPPQ?si=Y0hEH7tY-9U6qIMv

https://youtu.be/WsmxBE9Gw6A?t=2793&si=DOoZbMuOlsyiElKX

https://youtu.be/SnNm7rSSvlg?t=4052&si=IOJPKnBgo8hkogdO

https://www.shadertoy.com/view/tcSyDy

https://www.adriancourreges.com/blog/2017/12/15/mgs-v-graphics-study/

u/Traditional-Shoe-660 — 9 hours ago
▲ 1 r/metalgearsolid+1 crossposts

The most canonically accurate playtrough?

As the tittle suggest, I'm trying to go for the most immersive, canonically accurate playthrough. What things would Snake do? For example, in my canon, Snake beats the Boss using CQC mainly and is dressed in USSR sneaking suit (because we see him like that during the PW flashbacks). What would other canonically accurate things be like? Is he spotted during the Virtuous Mission or not? Does he kill many soldiers, or is he mainly tranq them? Does he cqc Volgin during his Boss fight? Or does he uses heavy weapons? I don't imagine he would be spotted a lot, but we do know for the cutscenes that he does indeed get spotted a couple of times. Also, for immersive purpouses, I am not allowed to die. If I die, I have to start over. What other things can you think of to make the run as canonically accurate as possible?

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u/Beginning-Fix-4628 — 9 hours ago

My daughter is a huge MGS fan, particularly MGS3. A friend got a 3d printer so I had an idea to print a statue and try painting it for her. This is it finished

u/Psfanboy79 — 1 day ago

starting the series

completely new to the series, haven't played any of the titles but I played death stranding and liked it a lot. So now I wanna start this series too. But looking back the extremely old one like the one in 1998 looks way too much retro and I fear I might lose interest while playing that. I wanna start in a point where I would get fairly excited and eventually if I come to like it I think I will also play the earlier ones. That said, I have no clue of how much each series depends on the prequels of it. So I was looking for suggestion from where should I start .

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u/retrox_56 — 1 day ago

Who else had MGS4 as their introduction to the series

And had no fucking clue what was going on 😭😭😭 I remember I had vaguely heard about MGS, and decided to buy the disc cus I found it by accident in a game shop. 10/10 had no clue what the fuck was happening and had a blast, been a fan of the series ever since

reddit.com
u/Devanshkalia — 1 day ago

MGS figure collection

Just a few pics of my collection. Unfortunately I gave away my other Raiden white figure. Also have a pre order for the revoltech naked snake coming next year.

u/Airsoftmadman — 2 days ago

My Revolver Ocelot (Revolver Ocelot) collection

I got my new Ocelot kitten and wanted to share my collection of Revolver Ocelots.

Now I'm impatiently waiting for that Revoltech one… and with vol.2 coming out, if they could make me a proper Liquid Ocelot that would be great too.

I also got Snake and Eva <3

u/legmu — 1 day ago

What exactly is "Accelerated Aging" that Snake suffered in MGS4?

I had a debate with my friend about why Old Snake is still so fit for a 70-year-old man.

Whether it's because his genes were modified to make him die faster while he still retained some of the physical capabilities of his late 50s.
Or whether it's simply the Muscle Suit and the genes of "The Greatest Soldier of the 20th century" that are responsible for his performance.

reddit.com
u/NTHHexxer — 2 days ago

Mój stary to fanatyk Hideo Kojimy

Mój stary to fanatyk Hideo Kojimy. Pół mieszkania zajebane kartonami po lodówkach, najgorsze to wdepnąć w jakiegoś plastikowego Naked Snake'a ze skrzydełkami albo schodząc w nocy nabić się na celownik snajperski. Średnio raz w miesiącu ktoś w rodzinie dostaje zawał, bo stary siedzi w piwnicy i od trzech godzin przez modulator głosu szepcze przez domofon: "I'm no hero... Never was, never will be".

​Co weekend ojciec jest w swoim żywiole. Przebiera się w stary mundur polowy, nakłada opaskę na oko i pyta mnie albo matkę: "Snake, do you copy?". Jak powiesz, że nie, to patrzy na ciebie jak na debila i tłumaczy przez dwadzieścia minut, że fabuła z Metal Gear Solid 2 dotyczyła kontroli informacji i memów, a my jesteśmy tylko pionkami w grze Patriotrich.

​Przez lata całe w tym domu przewinęło się tyle teorii spiskowych, że głowa mała. Stary twierdził, że Solidus Snake miał rację, a cały system polityczny to jedna wielka gra zorganizowana przez sztuczną inteligencję GW.

​Głównym contentem starego na Facebooku są grupy typu Metal Gear Lore & Theories. Tam może godzinami pisać z sebiksami z Lublina, czy Skull Face faktycznie miał motywację, czy fabuła V została ucięta. Potrafi się tam popłakać, jak ktoś napisze, że MGS4 to interaktywny film i że wolał zwykłe skradanie w cieniu.

​Jak raz w 2020 roku pojechaliśmy z całą rodziną na kemping nad jeziorem, to stary zamiast iść na grzyby, rozstawił namiot w krzakach, ubrał się w karton po telewizorze i przez trzy dni czołgał się po błocie wokół pola kempingowego, żeby "zrobić stealth kill na sąsiedzie z domku obok, bo ten skurwysyn za głośno puszcza disco polo". Matka płakała, ja musiałem udawać, że go nie znam, a ludzie z sąsiednich namiotów dzwonili po policję, bo myśleli, że uciekł psychol z Tworek.

​W każdą niedzielę przy obiedzie stary musi puścić motyw muzyczny The Best is Yet to Come albo Snake Eater. Oczywiście przy Snake Eater drze się na całe gardło, udając, że wspina się po drabinie w Tselinoyarsk, i żre przy tym żywego węża (kupionego w zoologicznym, niby pyton królewski, ale matka mówiła, że to zwykły zaskroniec za czterdzieści złotych).

​Jak co roku ojciec urządza Wielkie Mistrzostwa w Speedrunowaniu Metal Gear Solid na PS1. Zwozi wtedy swojego brata (wujka Janusza, który gra zawsze jako Otacon i tylko beczy w cutscenach) oraz kumpli z osiedla. Najlepszy moment był dwa lata temu, gdy stary pobił swój rekord czasu na bossie z Psycho Mantisem i tak się cieszył, że zaczął wyciągać wtyczkę z portu kontrolera i przekładać ją do drugiego portu w telewizorze, krzycząc do wujka Janusza: "Widzisz, skurwysynu, teraz nie czyta moich ruchów!". Wszyscy pijani, wujek Janusz rzyga w karton po konsoli, stary drze się, że Kojima is a genius, a sąsiedzi walą w ścianę.

​A najgorsze było, jak rok temu wpadł do nas kominiarz. Stary otworzył mu drzwi w samej chustce na głowie, z plastikowym katanem w ręku i wysunął mu prosto w twarz: "You're pretty good...". Gość uciekł po schodach bez słowa i przez miesiąc nie chciał przyjść na przegląd przewodów kominowych.

Macie podobnie?

reddit.com
u/kamuisan — 1 day ago

Funny bug in the MC version of MGS2

when taking different pictures of the Tanker section, the game forgets to overwrite the picture of Gurlukovich, which can gets some funny juxtaposition with Otacon(the picture is supposed to be one of the pin-ups)

Taken with the Switch version, so I don’t know if this is in the PS5/Xbox versions

u/Megas751 — 2 days ago

What would be your wants for a Delta styled Metal Gear Solid 1 remake

For me. The cutscenes have to have a balance between the original and the twin snakes versions. The game can make do for a few fight scenes, but it can’t be over the top like the twin snakes or else it loses its tone quickly. Also don’t just port every new game mechanic from MGSV as it would just make the game too easy.

u/FuturetheGarchomp — 3 days ago

As a follow-up to the MGS4 Switch 1 &amp; 2 manual page in Master Collection Vol. 2, it looks like Konami quietly updated the image. A PlayStation 3 console can now be seen in the screenshot, just like the other platforms.

Previous post: https://www.reddit.com/r/metalgearsolid/comments/1vqwz5n/according_to_the_mgs4_manual_page_in_master/

I think they saw the discussion about this online and decided to update the image to clear the confusion?

https://metalgear.konami.net/manual/mc2/mgs4/switch/en/page05.html

Update: Nvm, it fucking got changed again, make up your mind Konami, this is like third time you changed the image. lol

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/HQFPxr8aUAAzWTd?format=jpg&name=large

u/KosChannel — 2 days ago

As a massive fan of Solid Snakes story. Is it better to end the series on mg4 or mgs5?

So far ive played 5 mgs games. Mg1/mg2 and mgs1/2/3. And i just fell in love with Solid Snakes story. To the point where i just want more of him. (whixh i can get through vol 2 when it drops)

But is it better to continue playing in release order or should i deviate for this final one and do PW/MGS5 and end it on mgs4? Im so stuck on this. Cause im also scared that mgs5 will take to damn long combined with PW.

u/Creative-Recording40 — 3 days ago

I'm playing through the series for the first time, and this might be the best opening cutscene I've ever seen in a game

I think it highlights Kojima's moviemaking skills at their finest. The interplay of sound and music, the clever use of camera and lighting. Just absolute good shit all around.

youtube.com
u/rattlenroll — 2 days ago

Foxhound and platinum

Finally got around to doing foxhound run and getting the platinum trophy. It was a stressful but exhilarating. I didn’t want to stop but had to do it over two days. The only part I got stuck at was at the Volgin boss fight. Honestly I still don’t know how I managed to beat him. His attacks on my run alway seemed random. I’ve seen people complain about the Pain but for me that wasn’t much of an issue especially with smokes.

This is now another MGS 3 game I’ve platinum. All I’m missing is the master collection version. I’ve done the ps3 and vita ones.

Man I love this game. 😮‍💨

u/Chewie_198 — 2 days ago