I don't think it should be necessary to rely on external tools just to make the game display proper contrast. Adjusting brightness does not work for me. If I raise the brightness, I may see better in the dark, but as a result the normal lighting becomes blown out.
Don't get me wrong, it's not like I can't physically see people, but having too much grey-on-black or grey-on-grey contrast is just very taxing to the eyes. It's like you easily overlook things unless you really focus on trying to see small details. Similar issues occur when you have shadows in exterior spaces.
It's a bit hard to describe, but it's like the dark areas in the game lack a proper refraction of the light. This in turn causes the dark areas to look extremely flat. It's this flatness of the light that makes it harder to contrast objects from the background, especially when they are stationary.
If you've ever used raytracing, you know how things subtly seems more real compared to rasterized lighting? It's because the light more accurately reflects on surfaces and that helps with creating the contrast necessary for depth perception. That isn't to say that rasterized lighting is bad. My point is that proper lighting can help with depth perception.
The lighting in general is not great either, but in addition to the exposure blow-outs.
Indoor lighting is especially lacking.
