How to Remaster Star Wars™: KOTOR II with ReShade

To remaster Star Wars™: KOTOR II on PC using ReShade, you must inject post-processing shaders directly into the game executable using the OpenGL rendering API. This setup allows you to add ambient occlusion, adjust contrast, and sharpen textures without modifying core game files or conflicting with mods like TSLRCM.

Installing ReShade with the OpenGL API

Star Wars™: KOTOR II runs on the Odyssey Engine, which natively uses OpenGL to render 3D scenes and menus. Selecting DirectX or Vulkan during installation will cause the ReShade hook to fail on startup.

1. Download the latest stable ReShade installer from the official website.
2. Run the installer and browse to your Star Wars™: KOTOR II directory. Select swkotor2.exe, typically found in your Steam (steamapps/common/Knights of the Old Republic II) or GOG library folder.
3. Choose OpenGL when prompted for the rendering API.
4. Select your shader packages. Check SweetFX by CeeJay.dk, qUINT by Marty McFly, and AstrayFX to ensure you have the required shaders for color correction, sharpening, and ambient occlusion.
5. Finish the setup and launch the game. A ReShade status banner at the top of the screen confirms a successful injection.

Calibrating the Depth Buffer

Screen-space ambient occlusion and depth-based effects require access to the game's depth buffer. Because older OpenGL engines handle depth buffers differently from modern games, you must configure the buffer manually.

1. Press Home while in-game to open the ReShade overlay and finish the initial tutorial.
2. Go to the Add-ons tab and locate the Generic Depth Add-on.
3. Check the list of active depth buffers. Select the buffer that matches your current display resolution (such as 1920x1080 or 2560x1440) with the highest draw call count.
4. Open the Settings or Edit Global Preprocessor Definitions menu to configure your orientation flags:

• Set RESHADE_DEPTH_INPUT_IS_UPSIDE_DOWN to 0 (change to 1 if the depth map appears vertically flipped).
• Set RESHADE_DEPTH_INPUT_IS_REVERSED to 0 or 1 depending on whether near and far planes appear inverted.

1. Enable DisplayDepth.fx from your shader list to verify the output. If the calibration is correct, character models and background geometry will appear as a crisp greyscale gradient. Uncheck DisplayDepth.fx after confirming.

Recommended Shader Configuration

Once your depth buffer functions properly, enable shaders that restore contrast and depth to flat, low-contrast environments like Peragus and Telos.

When configuring qUINT_mxao, avoid raising the radius beyond 3.0. Overly high radius values create dark halos around companion models during close-up dialogue scenes.

Sharpening and Bloom Settings

Low-resolution textures can look soft on modern monitors. An adaptive sharpening filter restores surface fidelity to consoles, armor, and environments without introducing heavy image grain.

• Adaptive Sharpening: Enable AMD FidelityFX Contrast Adaptive Sharpening (CAS) or qUINT_sharp. Keep CAS strength between 0.4 and 0.6. Setting the slider near 1.0 introduces harsh edge shimmering on thin geometry like catwalks and wire grates.
• Bloom Control: If using MagicBloom.fx or qUINT_bloom, keep exposure values low. Overly strong bloom makes terminals, force fields, and lightsaber blades bleed across the screen, obscuring combat menus and tactical targets.

Mitigating UI Artifacts and Performance Drops

ReShade processes the complete final image sent to your display, which means post-processing shaders apply to user interface elements as well as the 3D world.

• Preventing Drop Shadows on Menus: Because Star Wars™: KOTOR II cannot isolate its 2D HUD from the OpenGL 3D buffer, ambient occlusion can draw faint shadows behind dialogue boxes and inventory icons. If this is distracting, lower your MXAO opacity or bind an effect toggle key (such as Scroll Lock) in the ReShade Settings tab to quickly disable effects during inventory management.
• Activating Performance Mode: Once your shaders and parameters are finalized, check Performance Mode in the lower-right corner of the ReShade Home tab. This compiles the active shaders and disables real-time variable editing, lowering input latency and GPU overhead.
• Resolving Combat Stutter: If frame rates drop or stutter occurs when entering combat, open your graphics card control panel and verify that driver-enforced multi-sample anti-aliasing (MSAA) is disabled. Set anti-aliasing to application-controlled so ReShade does not continuously reconstruct the depth surface during scene transitions.