Guys,
I would like to share here my adventures too. Tried for looong hours to make it work on a Intel HD Graphics 4000. Its an i7 3520M from aroung 2012 or so...a notebook. Performancewise possible.
The devs wrote different render paths for different hardware.
Luckily there is a log written when FC.exe is executed..file is put in de Far Cry dir. In it besides other info the following is stated
...
System: VideoCard Detected: Intel (Unknown)
...
D3D Driver: projected textures with Env. bump mapping not allowed
Projective EMBM: Disabled
...
Use Hardware Shaders for ATI R420 GPU
Pixel shaders usage: PS1.1 only
Vertex shaders usage: VS1.1 only
...
RV420 architecture is the Radeon X800 series ...but unfortunately Intel HD 4000 is quite a different chip. And only early shaders? So no wonder everything looks good but the water indoors (right at the beging of the game) the environmental mappings is just left out in this case and to see is low quality water. see attached pic
I tried different permutations of drivers and patches ... but no remedy.
To let you know some of it :
v1.1 r_driver="direct3d" results in blue fog
v1.1 r_driver="opengl" results in
THIS Super interesting. This is a feature intel probably has not implemented since it is barely used in graphics so this chip will fc1 never render properly if it is not emulated through the driver in opengl.
I conclude with this though this article:
https://cookieplmonster.github.io/2018/07/07/farcry-d3d9-bug/
v1.1 r_driver="opengl" + silent patch results in black land masses
of course i tried other versions between 1.1 and 1.4
On an other machine with an quadro k2000 (basically a nvidia 640) everything runs perfectly, even r_ShadersPrecache = "1" is no problem. WIN7 x64 nvidia driver 296.86
log says:
...
System: VideoCard Detected: nVidia (Unknown)
Direct3D9 driver is creating...
Best-match display mode: 1280x1024x32 (Error=8)
Creating D3D device (Adapter format: D3DFMT_X8R8G8B8, BackBuffer format: D3DFMT_A8R8G8B8, Depth format: D3DFMT_D24S8)
D3D Adapter: Driver name: nvd3dum.dll
D3D Adapter: Driver description: NVIDIA Quadro K2000M
D3D Adapter: Driver version: 8.17.12.9686
D3D Adapter: Driver GUID: D7B71E3E-4CBB-11CF-5A5667371FC2C535
D3D Adapter: VendorId = 4318
D3D Adapter: DeviceId = 4091
D3D Adapter: SubSysId = 392892476
D3D Adapter: Revision = 161
D3D Detected: NVidia video card
D3D Driver: MaxTextureBlendStages = 8
D3D Driver: MaxSimultaneousTextures = 8
Using '8888' pixel texture format
Using 'Alpha8' pixel texture format
Using 'Alpha8Lum8' pixel texture format
Using 'V16U16' pixel texture format
Using 'Depth24' pixel texture format
Using 'BumpV8U8' pixel texture format
Using 'BumpQ8W8U8V8' pixel texture format
Using 'BumpX8L8U8V8' pixel texture format
Using '3Dc' pixel texture format
Using 'DXT1' pixel texture format
Using 'DXT3' pixel texture format
Using 'DXT5' pixel texture format
D3D Driver: Supports trilinear texture filtering
D3D Driver: Allowed projected textures with Env. bump mapping
D3D Driver: Supports alpha palettes
D3D Driver: Supports range-based fog
D3D Driver: Supports eye-relative fog
D3D Driver: Supports anisotropic filtering
D3D Driver: Supports LOD biasing
D3D Driver: Supports Z biasing
D3D Driver: Supports scissor test
D3D Driver: Supports stream offset
D3D Driver: Supports non-power-of-2 textures
D3D Driver: Supports D3DTOP_ADDSIGNED2X TextureOp
D3D Driver: Supports D3DTOP_BUMPENVMAP TextureOp
D3D Driver: Supports D3DTOP_BUMPENVMAPLUMINANCE TextureOp
D3D Driver: Supports D3DTOP_DOTPRODUCT3 TextureOp
D3D Driver: Supports D3DTOP_MODULATEALPHA_ADDCOLOR TextureOp
D3D Driver: Supports D3DTOP_MODULATECOLOR_ADDALPHA TextureOp
D3D Driver: Supports D3DTOP_ADD TextureOp
D3D Driver: Supports MaxAnisotropy level 16
D3D Driver: Supports Stencil shadows
D3D Driver: Supports Two-Sided stencil
D3D Driver: Textures (0x0)-(8192x8192), Max aspect 8192
Apply anisotropic texture filtering (level: 8)
Warning: Disabled 3DC for NVidia card
****** D3D9 CryRender Stats ******
Driver description: NVIDIA Quadro K2000M
Full stats: HAL (pure hw vp): NVIDIA Quadro K2000M
Hardware acceleration: Yes
Full scene AA: Enabled: 4x Samples (0 Quality)
Projective EMBM: Enabled Detail textures: Enabled
Z Buffer Locking: Enabled
Multitexturing: Supported (8 textures)
Use bumpmapping : Enabled (DOT3)
Use paletted textures : Disabled
Current Resolution: 1280x1024x32 Full Screen
Maximum Resolution: 1920x1080
Maximum Texture size: 8192x8192 (Max Aspect: 8192)
Texture filtering type: TRILINEAR
HDR Rendering: FP16
MRT Rendering: Enabled
Occlusion queries: Supported
Geometry instancing: Supported
NormalMaps compression: V8U8
Gamma control: Hardware
Vertex Shaders version 3.0
Pixel Shaders version 3.0
Use Hardware Shaders for NV4x GPU Pixel shaders usage: PS.3.0, PS.2.0 and PS.1.1
Vertex shaders usage: VS.3.0, VS.2.0 and VS.1.1
Shadow maps type: Depth maps
Stencil shadows type: Two sided
Lighting quality: Highest
...
Construct Shader '<Default>'...ok
Construct Shader 'ZBuffPass'...ok
Construct Shader 'ShadowMap'...ok
Compile System Shader 'StateNoCull'...ok
Compile System Shader 'HDRProcess'...ok
Compile System Shader 'SunFlares'...ok
2 Sun flares was parsed
Compile System Shader 'LightStyles'...ok
34 Light styles was parsed
Compile Glare Shader ...
Compile System HW Shader 'CGVProgramms'...ok
Compile System HW Shader 'CGPShaders'...ok
Compile System Shader 'TemplFog'...ok
Compile System Shader 'TemplVFog'...Fail.
Compile System Shader 'TemplFog_FP'...ok
Compile System Shader 'TemplFogCaustics'...ok
Compile System Shader 'TemplVFogCaustics'...Fail.
Compile System Shader 'TemplFogCaustics_FP'...ok
hope it will help one or the other