🎮 COGBox 0.6.2: DualSense triggers, pick your graphics card, ultrawide, better HDR and many fixes

Join the COGBox Discord to find people to play with, organise matches and get help.

Quick start: download COGBox-0.6.2.7z, right-click it > Extract All... (Windows 11; on Windows 10 use 7-Zip) to a folder of its own (for example
C:\Games\COGBox), start CogBox.exe, and add your game copy and its title update.

COGBox is on RecompLauncher, the free home for recompiled PC games. Get it straight from its developer:
https://recomplauncher.com/game/cogbox

New and experimental (all off by default)

• DualSense adaptive triggers (Controls tab, now all four games, experimental): with a PS5 DualSense
  controller (USB or Bluetooth), the triggers push back, click or buzz to match the weapon in your hands, and shake
  while the chainsaw revs. Other controllers are not touched. If Steam Input is on for the controller, Steam keeps the
  triggers. We haven't tried it on a real DualSense yet - if you have one, please turn it on and tell us on GitHub
  #245 what you feel (and send the game's log if something is off). Suggested by HubertFer, GitHub #245.

Launcher

• Dead bodies (Gameplay tab, new, Game's own by default): More or Many keeps more fallen enemies on the
  ground (with Many, up to 20 in Gears 2 and 32 in the other games), and in Gears 1, Gears 3 and Judgment for longer.
  Cutscenes still clear them. It costs some performance and memory. All four games. GitHub #306.
• Duplicate DLC is marked (a game's About tab, Downloadable content): a DLC package whose files are all in another
  package you have installed, with the same contents, is marked "duplicate of ... - can be removed", and a Remove
  duplicates button removes them all after asking. Duplicates give the game the same items twice (for example the
  same skin twice in Gears 3). Only COGBox's unpacked copy is removed - your own package files are not touched, and the
  package that covers it is always kept. Thanks to Lerrycapetime for the tip, GitHub #283.
• Cheats for Gears 1, Gears 2 and Judgment (Gameplay tab, off by default): the developers' cheat keys F5-F11 (god
  mode, slow motion, free camera, hide the HUD, all weapons), as Gears 3 already had. Gears 2: only in games on your
  own PC, never in System Link or online games. Judgment: also in a System Link or online game you host, where slow
  motion and the rest affect every player - please keep them to your own games. Gears 1 has no free camera, so its
  F9 flies you through walls instead; Gears 1 in System Link is not checked yet. GitHub #264.
• Controls tab: a clear note when Keyboard and mouse is off. The key list could be changed while the keyboard was
  switched off and then did nothing in the game; an amber note above the list now says so. GitHub #281.
• More of the launcher is translated: the Social tab, the Linux System Link note, region names, friends' status
  and the new 0.6.2 text, in all 11 languages. These translations are machine-made - if something reads wrong in
  your language, please tell us on GitHub or Discord.

Gears 1

• DualSense adaptive triggers, Cheats and Dead bodies (see above).

Gears 2

• The green lightning on the way to Nexus (GitHub #287): in that cutscene the lightning effect could go black for a
  few frames the first time it played, while the graphics driver was still preparing it. On DirectX 12 the game now
  waits a moment longer for such a full-screen effect instead of leaving it out - at worst a short hitch the first
  time, never more than a few a second. (--gow2_renderer_fullscreen_pipeline_wait_ms=0 in extra-args.txt goes back
  to 0.6.1's behaviour.)
• Import saves also takes saves from the Japanese Gears 2 disc and puts them where your copy looks for them.
• DualSense adaptive triggers and Cheats (see above).

Gears 3

• DLC at the main menu (GitHub #283): with many DLC packages, Gears 3 often opened only the first one at start-up.
  We found why - the game closed something it had finished with a moment late, and COGBox had already reused its number
  for the DLC search, which ended it - and changed it. It should now open all of them, but we haven't had it confirmed
  on a big DLC folder yet: if DLC is still missing for you, please tell us on #283. The old workaround (Options >
  Storage Location at the main menu) still works, and the launcher now marks duplicate packages (see Launcher).
• RAAM's Shadow: dying no longer restarts the whole checkpoint (GitHub #273, #226): the wait for the level to finish
  streaming in, made for this in 0.4.8, had been left out of every build by mistake. It is in now.
• "Reload last checkpoint" missing after a death (GitHub #309, not fixed yet): the game's log now notes the squad
  slots the game checks before it offers Reload. If it happens to you, please press Report a problem on Gears 3's
  page right after and attach the zip to #309.
• Two-player split side by side (Gameplay > Two-player split): the game put the split back to top and bottom
  whenever a level started; COGBox now sets it again. GitHub #269.
  It no longer gives up for the rest of a level when the game puts the split back right after COGBox set it: it tries
  again, waiting longer each time (up to 30 seconds). GitHub #313.
• Frame limit in split screen (GitHub #313, not reproduced yet): Gears 3's log now says how many game ticks did
  not reach COGBox's frame limiter and how many players are in, so a report from split screen shows why the limit did
  not hold.
• No more short hitch every 5 seconds in the menus and multiplayer, caused by COGBox's check for the path-choice
  mouse fix (GitHub #277).
• Your options and brightness are kept after a crash: a game setting saved at the moment of a crash or with a full
  disk could be cut short, and Gears 3 then reset all its options and showed the brightness screen again. Settings are
  now saved in one piece.
• DualSense adaptive triggers (see above).

Judgment

• Soft shadows (PCSS) in Judgment too (by gmihaic): Judgment draws its shadows the same way as Gears 3, so the
  Graphics tab's Soft shadows option now works there as well.
• Cheats (see Launcher). Checked on our PC: god mode, all weapons, slow motion and the free camera all work.
• DualSense adaptive triggers (see above).

Graphics

• Indirect lighting (SSIL, experimental, by gmihaic) (Graphics tab, below Ambient occlusion; Game's own by
  default): light bounced from nearby lit surfaces - walls, floors and lamps brighten what is next to them, with some
  colour bleeding. Most visible in lit interiors and city streets, subtle in open or dark areas. It needs Ambient
  occlusion: XeGTAO (high or ultra); with any other Ambient occlusion choice it is greyed out and does nothing. It
  is smoother with DLSS, FSR, XeSS or SMAA T2x. Gears 3's picture has a lower brightness range, so the bounce is
  gentler there. Where the graphics card can't run it on a game's picture (for example some setups under Proton), it
  switches itself off instead of failing. Cost on an RTX 3080 Ti at 2x (1440p): about +1.6 ms a frame in Gears 2
  and +2.1 ms in Gears 3.

• Soft shadows (PCSS) fixes (by gmihaic): lit spots just inside a shadow's edge are no longer too dark, and no
  longer jump when you move. Cost on an RTX 3080 Ti at 2x (1440p):

  Game	PCSS High	PCSS Ultra
  Gears 3	+0.1 ms	+0.6 ms
  Judgment	+0.2 ms	+0.25 ms

• Better HDR in Gears 2 and Gears 3 (by legoliamneeson, PR #295): the native HDR now uses the PsychoV35 tone mapping
  (by ShortFuse, with mqhaji's edition) and grading from RenoDX. Explosions, muzzle flashes and lights reach your
  screen's peak brightness more faithfully, while the game's own colours and shadows are kept.

• HDR highlights (Display tab, Gears 2 and Gears 3 with HDR on): Off / Subtle / Default / Strong - how much
  brighter than normal white explosions, flashes and lights get. Default is legoliamneeson's tuned look.

• Ultrawide up to 48:9 - three 16:9 screens side by side - in Gears 2, Gears 3 and Judgment. Before, the picture
  stopped at 32:9 (Gears 2) or 4:1 (Gears 3, Judgment) with black bars beyond. Requested by ciegefaye21, GitHub #293.

• The right graphics card on PCs with two or more (GitHub #304, reported by praudmur): DirectX 12 and Vulkan now
  always use the same card - the one with the most video memory of its own, and between cards with about as much, the
  one your monitor is plugged into. A PC with an RTX 4090 and an RTX 3090 could run Judgment on the wrong one, and
  DirectX 12 and Vulkan could pick different cards. Checked on our two-card PC in all four games, on both. To choose a
  card yourself, use the new Graphics card list on a game's Graphics tab: Automatic (the default) or one of
  your PC's graphics cards, shown with its name and video memory. The choice is kept by the card's name for all four
  games; if that card is not in the PC any more, the list shows it as not found and Automatic is used. (Still possible
  by hand: --gow2_graphics_card= and part of the card's name in extra-args.txt; the game's log lists every card it
  found.)

Online play

• Your Social tab account keeps its #number (GitHub #302): the launcher could make a new online account at every
  start, so your #number changed and friends were lost. It now always keeps the one it saved, and if it can't save one
  (for example a folder it can't write to), the Social tab says why.
  OneDrive or a virus scanner holding the file for a moment no longer counts as "no account": the file is saved as a whole
  new file moved into place with a few short retries, read with retries too, and when it is busy the launcher waits and
  tries again instead of making a new account.
• Show ping fixes (by Flippage): the bar shows nothing when you are not in an online match or party (0.6.1 showed
  "Ping --"); a host that stops answering drops out after a few seconds; when you host, the players in your match
  count before an old join target.
• Private matches in Gears 2 keep their 0.6.1 behaviour until COGBox's private-match changes are tested there (by
  Flippage).

Linux, Steam Deck and Mac

• Mac (CrossOver) is now a supported way to play, alongside Proton (community-tested; we have no Mac): COGBox knows
  it is on a Mac, always runs the games on DirectX 12 there (Vulkan doesn't start under CrossOver), and no longer calls
  the Mac "Linux". The README has a Mac section, with L33tRonin's fix for a constant bass hum (GitHub #261).
• Launcher music no longer holds the sound output while it is silent (music off, or a game running). This may help
  with sound problems under CrossOver (GitHub #261) - tell us if it does.
• Hosting System Link from Linux / Steam Deck: Linux keeps the port the games host on for administrator programs,
  so a game hosted there couldn't be joined. The System Link option now says so, problem reports include the setting,
  and the README has a fix to try (not confirmed yet - please tell us on GitHub whether it works).
• Folders open in your own file manager (Mods, Saves, Logs, Licences) instead of Wine's, and COGBox also shows the
  Linux or Mac path - useful in the Steam Deck's Game Mode, which has no file manager.
• Desktop shortcuts under Wine are replaced by how to start one game directly: Steam's Launch Options
  --play <game>, or CrossOver's Run Command saved as a launcher.
• Under Proton the Graphics API shows "DirectX 12 (Proton runs Vulkan)" when Automatic runs Vulkan; the first-start
  settings dialog shows the real frame-rate cap (the Steam Deck was told 60 while getting 45); a CPU's AVX2 is now
  found on older Wine and CrossOver too; "Look for my games" on a Mac searches your drives under /Volumes.
• Problem reports made under Proton or CrossOver remove your Linux or Mac account name, as they already did your
  Windows user name.

Fixes

• White or flickering surfaces on DirectX 12 (GitHub #311, #282, #255, #297, Judgment #315 / #243 - not confirmed yet):
  a texture whose loading was cut short on DirectX 12 could be shown with whatever an earlier texture had left in that
  memory - white floors, bright blue blocks. It is now loaded again, and new textures start out clean, as on Vulkan.
  We couldn't reproduce these here (they were reported on AMD cards), so please tell us whether they are gone. All four
  games. (--gow2_renderer_zero_new_textures=false in extra-args.txt turns the clean start off.)
• No more crash at the start on a PC without speakers or headphones (GitHub #312): with no sound output device, the
  sound start-up failed and the game crashed a few seconds after the Epic logo. The game now runs silently instead, and
  picks up sound by itself when a device is plugged in. All four games.
• Short key and mouse taps reach the game (GitHub #305): a tap quicker than the game's own reading of the keys
  could be lost - for example the fast presses in a chainsaw duel. COGBox now holds each press until the game has
  read it. All four games.
• PCs with fewer than 6 processor threads (GitHub #288): the game's busy background threads could keep the game
  itself off the few cores and freeze it; they no longer get extra priority there. The log is also no longer filled
  with "Too few processor cores" lines (it was written about 1000 times a second). PCs with 6 or more threads are
  unchanged.
• The update check falls back to the default proxy setting, as the download already did.

Known issues

• Gears 3: GPU at 100% in some menus and the Horde character select on mid-range cards at 2x (GitHub #296). 1x
  render resolution helps; being worked on.
• Gears 3: "Reload last checkpoint" sometimes missing in RAAM's Shadow (GitHub #309): see Gears 3 above - a report
  zip from 0.6.2 helps.
• DualSense adaptive triggers are experimental and off by default (see above).