As PC gamers we are (usually) blessed with a number of options in the games we play, for tweaking performance and visual quality. Textures, lighting and shadows, tessellation and more can all be under our control, and each has its impact on our experience. One setting present in many if not all modern PC games that can dramatically impact performance and quality is anti-aliasing and, to be honest, I never really understood how it works. Sure we have the general idea that super-sampling is in effect running at a higher resolution and then downscaling, but then what is multi-sampling? How do post-processing methods work, like the very common FXAA and often favored SMAA?