More on epilepsy in Cliffs of Dover

[luthier]

Hi everyone,

The team could never in a million years imagine that a post on a Russian-language forum would so quickly make the rounds and spread around the internet.

The information there is not accurate, especially the placing of the blame on Ubisoft.

I feel that I need to describe this in more detail.

Our game did cause wide-scale epilepsy failures when tested. Propellers, muzzle flashes, smoke puffs, explosions, falling bombs, flying or taxiing between buildings, sun shining through canopy framework, etc, they were all causing potentially seizure-inducing flashes.

We worked hard to address all these issues individually, but since a flight sim is all about fast-moving large objects, there were just too many instances of things causing high-contrast flashes.

So, as we were running out of time, WE decided to implement this epilepsy filter as a stop-gap measure.

The filter sits on top of the game's graphics wrapper. It saves a previous frame, and then compares it pixel-by-pixel to the new frame. When two pixels are found with a high degree of contrast between them, the new pixel is toned down to make the change less drastic.

This causes a visual effect somewhere between bloom and motion-blur that removes virtually all instances of high-contrast flashes.

However this pixel-by-pixel frame analysis and modification takes up additional resources, it in fact delays the showing of each new frame until each pixel of it checked, and therefore the filter is causing deteriorated performance that is especially notable on lower-end machines.

We are continuing to work to optimize the game and to increase its framerate. Ubisoft has been very patient and understanding with us throughout the entire process, and we are continuing to work with them very closely to find the best solution to epilepsy issues.

In summary, I want to stress that it is OUR code and OUR game engine that is causing performance issues. And it US who has to make it better, and that's exactly what we pledge to do.

[JG52Krupi]

Thanks for the clarification luthier.

Any idea when the problem will be solved?

[Bowtome]

Give us an option to turn it off?

Thanks for the update

[meshuggahs]

Thanks for the honest reply.

Hoping to see those improvements on the 31st!

[Triggaaar]

Thanks for the update. So is there the option to turn the filter off, allowing the game to run quicker, with less obvious motion blur etc?

Will this filter be switchable?

[JG52Uther]

Originally Posted by Bowtome

Give us an option to turn it off?

Thanks for the update

+1
Can you not put it in the conf.ini?

[swiss]

I'm willing to accept the risk and therefore want the original.

Where do I sign the waiver?

[T}{OR]

Thank you for this explanation. Fingers crossed that you succeed in solving this in near future. Especially for making it an optional feature.

[1.JaVA_Sharp]

thanks for the information, Luthier.