Graphics

Graphics

Everything here is in the Graphics tab of the settings window (F10) and saved to Config.toml (under [video]) as soon as you change it.

Resolution

F10 > Graphics > Resolution sets the internal resolution: Auto (the window's own pixels), Native (1x) (what a Wii renders), or 1.5x to 8x. Higher is sharper and heavier: 8x is too much for many machines.

Graphics menu

• Force 16:9: keeps a 16:9 picture with black bars when the window has another shape. Off, the 3D view fills any window: it gets wider (Hor+) in windows wider than 16:9 and taller (Vert+) in narrower ones, while menus and the HUD stay on the game's 16:9 canvas. With widescreen = false in Config.toml the game runs in 4:3 instead.
• Frame rate: 30, 60, 120, 144, 160 or 165 FPS, or Match the display (its refresh rate). It isn't interpolation: matches are simulated on a fixed clock and drawn between its steps, so every frame is really rendered at normal game speed. Above 60 needs a display that refreshes that fast (a ProMotion MacBook, a 120 Hz+ monitor) and uses more power; 30 halves the work on slow machines. Exclusive fullscreen picks the display mode closest to the frame rate.
• Scaled EFB copies (on), as Dolphin's Scaled EFB Copy: the game builds several effects from copies of the screen (bloom, depth of field in replays and cutscenes, heat haze, blur). On, those copies are made at your internal resolution: sharper, but the blurs get weaker the higher you go. Off, they stay at the Wii's native size, so those effects look as on a Wii at any resolution. Heat haze (Lava Pit, Sand Tomb) and impact ripples (Hammer Bro's hammers, Shy Guy's rocket) redraw the whole 3D view from such a copy, so while one plays, the scene shows at native size too.
• Disable copy filter (on): skips the Wii's vertical smoothing filter, on the final image and on the screen copies effects are built from, for a sharper picture.
• Skip draws while shaders compile (on): a new effect's first frames are skipped while its shader compiles, instead of the game stalling.
• Show FPS: the frame counter in the corner.
• Display mode: windowed, borderless fullscreen or exclusive fullscreen.

Custom textures

Texture packs made for Dolphin work as they are. Turn on F10 > Graphics > Custom textures, click Open the custom textures folder and copy the pack's files into it (a Dolphin pack lives in Dolphin's Load/Textures/R4QE01/; copying that whole folder in is fine). Packs must be for the USA disc, R4QE01. The folder is read when the game starts, so restart it after adding files; F10 then shows how many custom textures it found.

To make your own, also turn on Dump textures: every texture the game shows that has no replacement yet is saved to the dumps folder (Open the dumps folder), named as its replacement must be (tex1_<width>x<height>_<hash>_<format>). Edit one, save it as .png or .dds under the same name in the custom textures folder, and restart. Replacements can be larger than the original.

Config.toml only

• graphics_api: auto (the default) picks the backend for you. macOS only has metal and Linux only vulkan; on Windows you can force d3d12 or vulkan.