Cinematic Outward (Customizable Post Processing & Camera Modes)

Using the F5 settings menu you can enable effects like depth of field, ambient occlusion, screen space reflections, etc. - as well as change exposure, contrast, and so much more. Full control over all post processing! This started as a simple free-cam mod, and accidentally turned into a complete visual overhaul for Outward. Basically it just exposes the post-processing effects already built into the game's Unity engine.

On top of that (and the initial reason I built it in the first place) it adds some wicked cool new camera features:

• Multiplayer Spectating: Instead of staring at your own corpse, you can spectate your friends! Works anytime; most handy after death.
• Fully automated, broadcast-style "Director Mode" that is sort of like a "cinematic" camera in a racing game. The camera will automatically jump to new locations, alternate between four different cinematic shots (tripod, slider, static, chase), and when you lock onto an enemy it enters a "combat mode" too.
• Flying free-camera with smoothed motion, collision, speed controls, etc. for taking great looking screenshots or B roll or whatever.

I designed this for streaming and content creation, but it's honestly really fun to just play in director mode. For example, I like to turn off all of the shots except "static" and then it becomes sort of like playing a resident evil game lol.

CUSTOM CAMERA MODES ARE NOT DESIGNED FOR SPLITSCREEN. HAVEN'T TRIED IT; VISUAL DISASTER LIKELY.

If you have any issues or suggestions, you can reach me via email: gamestuff (at symbol) poweredbypodcube.com

Special thanks to Grandma Death, Valaenara, and Auntie Carnage.

Core Features

1. The Post-Processing Suite

Customize the look of Outward entirely through the BepInEx Configuration Manager (F5). You can save and load presets too, but you have to restart the game to see them in the list. I might update this mod with some presets to play with, but for now you just have to make your own.

Everything is disabled by default, allowing you to turn on only what you want:

• Ambient Occlusion (AO): Outward has some by default. Enabling this overrides it and lets you adjust.
• Screen Space Reflections (SSR): I'm pretty sure it works but this game doesn't benefit that much from it.
• Anti-Aliasing (AA): Different flavored acronyms of delicious anti-aliasing. Adjust to taste. Set to "None" for default game AA.
• Depth of Field (DoF): Configurable separately for Normal Play and Director/Free-cam Mode. Unity's DoF is a little janky but I like it.
• Color Grading: Temperature, Tint, Exposure, Saturation, and Contrast. Play in black and white if you want, hell yeah.
• Film Effects: Bloom, Vignette, Chromatic Aberration, and Film Grain. I especially like how Film Grain looks in this game.

2. Director Mode

Press a hotkey (Alt + X by default) and the game turns into a movie. The Director detaches the camera and films your character using a weighted randomizer of different shot types, automatically cutting to a new angle based on time, distance, or if your character walks behind something for too long.

• Shot Types: Locked Static, Tripod Pan, Chase Cam, and Slider Track shots, and you can adjust the probability of each.
• Combat Action Cam: The moment you lock onto an enemy, the camera snaps to a playable, over-the-shoulder action camera so you can fight without turning the mod off. It tries to give you a stable over-the-shoulder view of your target!
• Smart Movement Sync: It's kinda hard to orient your movement in a cinematic camera mode. There's an adjustable indicator at your feet that shows you which way your character thinks is "forwards". When you stop moving in Director Mode, that movement axis aligns with the cinematic camera angle.
  • If you have a hard time going the right way in director mode, just hold still for a moment and then your controls will align with your view. While moving, your character orientation won't change as the camera angles switch. (Let me know if you have a better idea on how to handle this, I want to make it more intuitive to control. You can also turn this off.)
• Cinematic Extras: Optional Letterboxing and procedural camera shake for a more handheld feel.

In the settings menu you can customize thresholds and behaviors for all of this. I tried to label it all in ways that make sense, so just play around! This camera mode isn't perfect by any stretch, and sometimes you get some really bad/confusing shots - but I've found it surprisingly playable for what it is. I'm very open to improvement suggestions.

3. Multiplayer Spectator Mode

Hit Alt + ] or Alt + [ to jump to the next or previous player. It works whether you're alive or dead!

Spectating is basically Director Mode pointed at someone else. The camera cuts around whoever you're watching using all the same shot types, and if they lock onto an enemy you get the combat action cam on them too. Keep pressing the key to cycle through everyone (it loops around).

If you're alive while spectating you still control your own character the whole time, which is kind of funny. If you're playing solo, nothing happens.

It switches back to you automatically if you get revived or if the person you're watching leaves. To stop spectating on your own, just cycle back to yourself, or turn the camera off (Alt + X, Alt + ~, or Esc ).

4. Photography Freecam

A drone camera for taking perfect screenshots or B roll, complete with adjustable movement speed (Scroll), FOV zooming (Alt + Scroll), and a rule-of-thirds autofocus that works pretty okay, but I'll proba. The flying cam has some weight to it and moves around kinda drone-like.

Default Hotkeys

You can remap all of these keys in the F5 menu, not in the game's normal keybinding section.

Installation & Configuration

Just use R2ModMan, and click "download with dependencies".

Or, install it manually:

1. Install BepInEx and the Configuration Manager plugin for Outward.

2. Drop OutwardCinecam.dll into your BepInEx/plugins folder.

3. Launch the game and press F5 to open the Configuration Manager.

4. Expand the Cinematic Outward section. Configure your post processing in the top part, then configure your Director rules at the bottom. I tried to keep it somewhat organized but it's uhh... a lot.

Known Issues

• Director Mode is a bit janky to control and stuff, but that might just be the nature of it.

• When first loading into a zone, the post-processing takes a split second to pop in. You can see it pretty clearly. Not too terribly annoying but something I hope to fix. It's because the volume gets lazy-loaded once you're actually in a new zone (to avoid weird loading screen issues).

• Native controller input isn't supported but using Steam input you can map keyboard inputs and it all pretty much works enough

• Preset saving/loading is quite hacky. You have to reload the game to see your list of presets populated. It should work, but it's just not pretty.

• Probably something glaring that I've missed despite testing this extensively. (Email me if you find something: gamestuff at poweredbypodcube.com)

How It Works

Outward was made in Unity, which includes a post-processing stack built right in. However, the developers only utilized a few of its capabilities for the base game. While I think the game looks perfectly good by default, this lets you have full control to do whatever you want!

This mod doesn't inject external shaders like ReShade; it hooks directly into the engine's native rendering pipeline. When initialized, the mod grabs Global.MainCamera, forces the DepthTextureMode.Depth flag to active (telling the GPU to generate a depth buffer), and injects a custom PostProcessVolume on the fly set to global priority 9999. This lets us add Bloom, ColorGrading, AmbientOcclusion, ScreenSpaceReflections, and DepthOfField settings directly to that volume. It's pretty performant, too!

AI DISCLOSURE: AI WAS HEAVILY USED TO ASSIST IN CREATING THE CODE FOR THIS MOD. HOWEVER, I AM ALSO A PROGRAMMER AND HAVE WORKED IN UNITY, SO I KNOW WHAT I'M DOING. I BUILT THE ORIGINAL CAMERA MOD BY HAND, AND THEN USED FREE TIER CHATBOTS TO ITERATE AND EXPAND ON IT FASTER THAN I COULD BY HAND. I DO NOT PAY MONEY FOR ANY AI USAGE, AND I AM AGAINST THE RECKLESS DEPLOYMENT AND EXPANSION OF COMMERCIAL GENERATIVE AI AND ITS EFFECTS ON THE ENVIRONMENT, LOCAL COMMUNITIES, AND ARTISTS.