Game is Too Dark at Night and Unplayable

[Ned]

Temporary Fix:

Set Shaders to "No"

 

 

I think this is happening online most of the time.

I don't know if everyone is seeing the same thing and that it's supposed to be like this, but I find when exploring buildings during nights the game is unplayable. It is simply too dark to see a single thing. Everything outside is also a very dark blue color, but it's not as bad as inside.

The darkness of the game is very abnormal since it's only supposed to be dark with a hue of blue, yet it's not and the game just has little to no visibility at night.

 

Is there any fix for this, and does anyone know what's wrong with my monitor that it's causing the game to display like this?

Also, lightswitches rarely work, if ever.

 

 

 

 

It starts to become fine again once morning light starts to come.

 

 

Adding Tags to this post so people looking for the same fix can find it easier on Google. I searched for hours with no luck until finally making a thread here

 

Tags:

Project Zomboid too dark fix Project Zomboid too dark fix Project Zomboid too dark fix Project Zomboid too dark fix Project Zomboid too dark fix Project Zomboid too dark fix

Project Zomboid no lights fix Project Zomboid no lights fix Project Zomboid no lights fix Project Zomboid no lights fix Project Zomboid no lights fix Project Zomboid no lights fix Project Zomboid no lights fix Project Zomboid no lights fix Project Zomboid no lights fix 

Project Zomboid can't see Project Zomboid pitch black

Project Zomboid dark bug

Project Zomboid too dark in houses Project Zomboid too dark in houses Project Zomboid too dark in houses Project Zomboid too dark in houses 

[harakka]

Temporary fix is actually to disable shaders, it's the color correction shader that makes nights pitch black.

[Rathlord]

Try setting shaders to "on" in the options and see if that helps.

 

Edit: This will only show up in the game options if you're using build 25, the IWBMS branch; otherwise you should be able to set it at the main menu.

[Ned]

Try setting shaders to "on" in the options and see if that helps.

 

Edit: This will only show up in the game options if you're using build 25, the IWBMS branch; otherwise you should be able to set it at the main menu.

 

Shaders is already set to "Yes"

 

[unsaved_progress]

The game looks this dark to me. Isn't it this dark in your house at night IRL anyway? That's what they are going for, IMHO.

 

Once you know your safehouse you can confidently stumble around in the dark knowing where your fridge, book case is etc the same way you can blindly navigate to the bathroom at night in your own house.

 

Well this is how I look at the darkness in PZ anyway. Plus, what are you doing in the dark anyway, get some rest survivor! Read a skill book! Pat Spiffo!

 

Don't explore in the dark....

[EnigmaGrey]

Lookin' normal to me. At a certain point, it's supposed to be too dark to see.

Grab a lighter, a candle and match (to craft a lit candle), or a flashlight if you want to roam around late at night.

Or manually increase your brightness/gamma in something like nVidia Control Panel/or with your monitor's buttons.

[ApolloDiaspora]

Trying using a flashlight, or a lighter in a pinch, to light up the surrounding area.

 

Having to be active at night in multiplayer is what started me carrying a lighter on my person at all times, and sparked off my desire to loot every freakin' battery I could get my hands on

[Ned]

The game looks this dark to me. Isn't it this dark in your house at night IRL anyway? That's what they are going for, IMHO.

 

Actually no, because I have two friends who play this as well and their screens never get this dark. There are even occasions where I can turn on light while they can't and vice versa.

While we we're traveling together during nights, they even see street lights, while on my screen there isn't any street lights at all and everything outside is painfully dark.

It becomes so dark (nearly pitch black) at times that it takes me more time than necessary to leave a building since I can't see my own character.

I'm pretty sure it's not normal. And this isn't IRL.

 

Notice in the second screenshot that I can barely see where my character is anymore; it actually gets worse than that at times.

 

Or manually increase your brightness/gamma in something like nVidia Control Panel/or with your monitor's buttons.

 

Already tried that, unfortunately.

 

 

 

It seems some people have PZ showing up the way it's supposed to be shown, and there are others who have the same issue I have.

And up to this point the people with the same graphical bug I have, have been believing that PZ is supposed to be this dark at night. It's not.

[Ned]

 

I'm assuming this is how PZ is supposed to look. This is from my screen but taken in single player. Correct me if I'm wrong.

 

Like I mentioned, the unbearable darkness mostly happens in online multiplayer and light is just nonexistent.

 

 

Temporary fix is actually to disable shaders, it's the color correction shader that makes nights pitch black.

 

I'll try and see if that works, thanks.

 

 

 

Edit:

Holy cow, disabling the Shader worked.

Thank you very much Harakka, for saving me from having to tinker with it.

 

 

It looks normal now.

How come my friends have Shader enabled and their screens look fine? What exactly is shader doing that was causing the annoying pitch-blackness look?

 

 

So I was wrong earlier, THIS is how PZ is supposed to look:

[harakka]

The shader just does color correction, which makes it darker at night than it is without color correction. The reason you're not seeing streetlights or indoor lights and your friends do it probably because the electricity cutoff isn't synchronized properly in MP, so from your point of view lights have gone out, but from your buddies' point of view they haven't.

[EnigmaGrey]

Yep, clearly visible on the screenshots now, with the light source in view.

Odd, with or without shaders, it's quite bright for me. Traits  might affect it a bit.

[songbird2384]

I found this topic and wanted to comment to those suggesting using a lightsource. Now I don't have a screenshot (mostly b/c I didn't really think about it before seeing this topic) but yesterday when I was playing I had the same problem, turned on my flashlight and it did sweet F-A.  Didn't make one bit of difference. So I'm turning off my shader to see if that helps (glad I saw this and that suggestion!)