Better graphic menu please

I’ve seen that the graphics options for the game are all over the place, and it's confusing. Like how there’s a small settings button at the top with just MSAA, FPS limit, and VSync. Then, you have to search in Project Settings -> Physics for Physics graphic settings, and things like SSAO have their graphics settings inside their component, while SSR and sun don't have anything. It would be way easier for users if all the graphics choices were in one spot. I'm newer to s&box, and it's confusing trying to find anything. But graphics settings are the worst.

If we had one Graphics menu, we could easily find graphics settings like Anti-aliasing, shadow settings, SSR, SSAO, and more. Also, there aren't even that many graphics settings total. I hope the s&box devs do something about this because it's one of the main reasons I'm not using it.

There are two types of setting. You've got the actual render settings (resolution, msaa, vsync), then you've got post process settings.

The post process is defined by the game. The render settings are chosen by the client.

Will there be more render settings options for standalone exporting in the future?

i think the post process settings would be up to the developer exporting the game, the basics that garry mentioned are always editable in the escape menu, no?

I'm talking about that. The engine doesn't have many basic graphics settings, like Texture quality, shadow settings, particle quality settings, and lod bias.

but when this is a platform for many games to be made on, why would you want a master slider for everything?

If I'm playing DXRP, yeah, I'd want to crank it down a bit since it's rendering a lot more, but if I'm playing Clean Up, I'm going to have a lot less rendering to worry about, so my settings can be up higher. I think the way it works now best suits the individual game.

You still need a graphic menu for lower-end systems. If you're trying to export a standalone game, you would want a graphic menu so all types of systems could play your game. There are only benefits from adding more graphics settings, more people will be able to play s&box. 

then make that menu before you export, it's up to the game developer, this is an engine. you can override the escape menu and create your own settings page fairly easily and just store those values in a config file.

I'm pretty sure there's no way to change the shadow quality settings. I don't see any documentation to change it.  It's not an easy thing to do when you're just starting the engine, and there's no documentation.

What do you want to change the shadow quality settings to?

I think graphics settings should always be available. In the game’s main menu, my RTX 2070 gets really hot — over 70°C. I watch my temps closely, and that’s way too high. For comparison, in The Witcher 3 (Legacy) on high settings, my GPU stays around 45–50°C while playing. In CS2 with low settings, it’s about 35–45°C.
Many ppl don’t pay much attention to temps, but I think it’s important. The main menu probably has too many effects causing the high temps.

A lot of ppl want to make games in a retro style, and deep graphics settings would really help. This would let them turn off heavy effects and allow lower-end systems to run the game.

> A lot of ppl want to make games in a retro style, and deep graphics settings would really help. This would let them turn off heavy effects and allow lower-end systems to run the game.

this is already how it works, the game creators can already choose what rendering features are used

I don't know what you mean by that, Garry. However, basic shadow settings and effect quality settings would be nice