Grand Theft Auto IV TweakGuide

Grand Theft Auto IV TweakGuide
written by Ettans @ iv-scripting.pri.ee
Update: New information in Part 2 concerning FarClp @ 3500.00

Part 1: Patching the files

First thing you should do, is download the GTA IV Magic Patcher by aru, in order to edit the files. Now, once you've downloaded and extracted it, open it and you'll see this:


If you haven't already patched your files, click on Validate Files, once done, click on Apply Patch. Now you can edit your GTA IV files and you'll also have backups of every file, with .magic as their file extension. You can revert the files anytime, by clicking on Verify and then Recover. You can now close the program.


Part 2: Changing the view-distance

That was quite easy, wasn't it? Browse to your Grand Theft Auto IV\pc\data folder and open the file named timecyc.dat. I suggest you use Notepad++ for the editing, since it'll look very messy in the default Notepad. Once you have the file open, look for the fiel called "FarClp", this controls the distance from which buildings, trees etc. are drawn at. The smaller the value, the shorter the view-distance. The default value is 1500.00, which is very big and quite pointless. To change the view-distance, simply change the value to a smaller one, I use 500.00 personally. If you're either too lazy to change it or whatever your reason is, I've attached the edited file at the bottom of this thread.

Comparison screenshots:

FarClp: 3500.00

Note: This gave me about +5-8 FPS, I suggest you try it out. I'm not entirely sure, but I think this has got something to do with PreFetch.

FarClp: 1500.00 (Default value)


FarClp: 750.00


FarClp: 500.00


In-game settings used:

Note: All screenshots were taken at the same place, time and weather, on-top of the GetALife building.

Download timecyc.dat (FarClp 3500.00)
Download timecyc.dat (FarClp 750.00)
Download timecyc.dat (FarClp 500.00)
Note: Extract it using WinRar or any similar program and place the file in your Grand Theft Auto IV\pc\data folder.

Part 3: Disabling shadows

Disabling the shadows doesn't have any significant impact on the games performance, but it might be useful for you if you're really struggling with the FPS. In order to disable the shadows, you should first download Alice by Alexander Blade. Extract the file and place the Alice folder in your main Grand Theft Auto IV folder. To disable the shadows, you can either make the script yourself, or download the one I made, using Alexander Blade's example script(s). To re-enable the shadows, simply delete the disable_shadows.lua in your Grand Theft Auto IV\Alice folder.

Shadows: Enabled


Shadows: Disabled


Note: All screenshots were taken at the same place, time and weather.
Download disable_shadows.zip

Part 4: Lowering bloom intensity

Currently there's no way to completely disable the bloom in Grand Theft Auto IV, but you can lower it's intensity. To do this, browse to your Grand Theft Auto IV\common\data folder and open the file called visualSettings.dat. Open the file and find the following names:


misc.BloomIntensityClamp.HD
misc.BloomIntensityClamp.SD
misc.BloomIntensityClamp.SD.ps3


Simply change their values to 0.00. If you don't want to edit the values yourself, download the visualSettings.rar at the bottom of this part and extract it to your Grand Theft Auto IV\common\data folder.

Bloom intensity: Default


Bloom Intensity: 0.00/Disabled


Note: All screenshots were taken at the same place, time and weather.
Download visualsettings.zip

Part 5 (Optional): Lowering the amount of rain particles

A lot of people are having trouble playing Grand Theft Auto IV with it's rainy weather, this is caused by the amount of it's particles (mostly). I can't guarantee that this will give you any performance boost, but It did make my gameplay smoother. To change the amount of rain particles, browse to your Grand Theft Auto IV\common\data folder and open the file called visualsettings.dat. Find the following fields there:


rain.NumberParticles.ps3
rain.NumberParticles


Here are the values I use myself:


rain.NumberParticles.ps3 256
rain.NumberParticles 1024


So, that concludes my Grand Theft Auto IV TweakGuide. Thanks a lot for reading, hopefully this tweak will help some people. If you want to post this on your forums/website, please don't copy & paste, but put a link to this thread.

Credits:

aru (Making the GTA IV Magic Patcher)
Anders (Telling me about the rain particles & FarClp 3500.00)
Rockstar (For making such un-optimized game)