Author Topic: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures  (Read 37830 times)

Fraggoso

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It's getting hot in here, so take out all your cloth... well...
I filtered all the NPC's-, weapon- and battle background textures.

Let's make this Game more awesome! :D

Here are comparison shots:
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/210535/picture:5

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B9iOUmoUbwc4N181dTRDckVRZlU

Just unpack the 7z into your streaming assets.

If you've downloaded the old version, here's a temporary fix so the overworld stuff is vissible again.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B9iOUmoUbwc4ZVc1Y1N6QmtqQ0k

Known Issue:
Worldmap model texture seem to be broken like Zidane and the vehicles (download the temp fix from above).
Characters don't blink. I'm investigating this and will release a patch ASAP. Sorry for all the inconveniences!
« Last Edit: 2017-05-28 13:06:04 by Fraggoso »

Covarr

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Something's gone wrong with your comparison shot link

Fraggoso

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Something's gone wrong with your comparison shot link

Thanks for pointing that out.
Copy and Paste from steam doesn't always work as intended.

KaidenJames

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This is awesome. Thanks for the hard work Frag. Now if we can find someone to clean up the battle ui. Way too big imo. I've been holding off on a playthrough waiting for mods to come. Looks like the time is near! Thanks again!

Edit: Your comparison shots are working now. Had to comment again and say wow. The details on the NPC characters look fantastic. Makes me wonder why Silicon didn't do this, as well as other things (like shoddy sound port). Again, great stuff Frag!
« Last Edit: 2017-05-22 17:48:29 by KyubiNemesis »

Mcindus

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This is awesome. Thanks for the hard work Frag. Now if we can find someone to clean up the battle ui. Way too big imo. I've been holding off on a playthrough waiting for mods to come. Looks like the time is near! Thanks again!

Edit: Your comparison shots are working now. Had to comment again and say wow. The details on the NPC characters look fantastic. Makes me wonder why Silicon didn't do this, as well as other things (like shoddy sound port). Again, great stuff Frag!

If you guys want to send me the original png files for the text/UI/menu items in the game, I can chisel away at making an upscale/replacement the likes of 'SeeDReborn'
I'm quite busy, but if I can merge it with the work from SeeDReborn in some way, then we can really get this project underway.

Great work, Frag!

Fraggoso

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As far as I understand the engine scales the Files no matter what Size the files have.
Maybe talking with albeoris might do the trick as he can do pretty much anything with memoria.

dclem

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If you guys want to send me the original png files for the text/UI/menu items in the game, I can chisel away at making an upscale/replacement the likes of 'SeeDReborn'
I'm quite busy, but if I can merge it with the work from SeeDReborn in some way, then we can really get this project underway.

Not possible, nor that easy.
The UI isn't easy to edit in this case. And this coming from the only one who's managed to change all UI's.
If I find a way I'll do it. But currently, have not. Too busy with the sound mod nobody cares about

EDIT:
Another bug?



All this ties in great together, I hope it doesn't bug with the model importer though...

EDIT-EDIT2:
And it seems to have messed up the texture animation on all characters.
Ex:
When Zidane or any other died in battle, they're eyes were still open!
NPC characters also don't "blink" their eyes.
See... not everything goes as planned!  :-\

And look:



Dagger's hair tie is blending!

And in the battle scenes, there are lots of unwanted polka dots and artifacts that weren't there before!


But at least I fixed the Silicon borders for everyone. May not be a widescreen patchy-thing, but it's a lot better!

EDIT#3:
And yet another.
The moogle's broken.



A big file for this?
Was the WHOLE game beta-tested beforehand?

And another one:
(I'm only on "Disc 1")



What more awaits?
And no, it's not just (my problem), someone else had the same Zidane "half-blue" glitch as well.

This is the polka dots I mean:



Even the tents:



I think you went too hasty with this one.
That social gratification...

Like really though...



:-\



If it was fully beta-tested, it should've been taken care of.

Yep, Dagger is sleeping
...with her eyes open



An orange Garnet...



Airships:

« Last Edit: 2017-05-23 08:02:49 by dclem »

Kaldarasha

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Quote
I think you went too hasty with this one.

No, this is how things should work in a moding community. You give us something and we will test it for bugs. The whole project is too big to do it differently, if you are working on it alone. I probably would do it in the same way even with a team, since finding minor bugs is a real time waster and sometimes you are to blind to see them.

Fraggoso

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The "Problem" is that I have a wife and a 16 weeks old son so time (and time management) becomes more essential then everything else.
Like Kal said, I use the community to test this as I could do only a handful of testing and my worldmap worked before I did something wrong... I'll work on a patch.

Maybe the UV Maps on the worldmap meshes are bunked and it doesn't scale the upsized textures that well.
The "polka" is a sideffect of my filtering. I said it in another Tread: I wanted to release the sharper Textures now and will work, if time allows, on a more refined version where the seams in the textures are also working.

Thanks for pointing that out, Dclem.

Edit: I think I found the problem. I don't know if it's fixable as it seems not related to the upsized textures.

@Dclem I never said I beta tested anything. I went trough all the textures after importing it back in the game and they looked good.
The Fields you mentioned are already fixed (and a few more). If you should encounter more of them, please let me know so I can repair them as well.
« Last Edit: 2017-05-23 13:40:37 by Fraggoso »

dclem

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So will the polka dots and texture animations be fixed?
And, this (huge) file won't affect the model importer now, will it?

Tsuna

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Re: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures
« Reply #10 on: 2017-05-23 20:14:18 »
If you guys find a way to do actual character importing i'll help you do the game with new models

Fraggoso

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Re: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures
« Reply #11 on: 2017-05-23 20:15:07 »
About the animation I don't know. I've to look why the engine behave that way.
For the polka, yes this will be fixed.

I don't know if it interrupts the model importer. The textures for sure but the Modell itself is kept as it was.

dclem

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Re: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures
« Reply #12 on: 2017-05-24 01:24:09 »
If there's a fixed link to all this, backgrounds, etc., post it.

If you guys find a way to do actual character importing i'll help you do the game with new models

Hades workshop will do this. You have some higher poly FF9 models you want to import?

I just need that for my custom models for my mod that comes with the sound mod.
Hopefully it'll come with bone structuring of some sort support since there are animations included with them.
You can replace animations currently. Worked well for me. I replace all standard animations of standard characters today; got no bugs nothing.

nfitc1

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Re: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures
« Reply #13 on: 2017-05-24 04:05:16 »
Suddenly the battles look like they're in Wind Waker. :)

The NPCs on the field are incredibly better. I noticed that your screen-res is pretty high, will lower res (1080) notice this difference?

Slightly on tangent: I get annoyed by "remasters" that only up the detail on the main characters and ignore all the other NPCs/models the game has. Square is guilty of this for sure (X HD was noticeable that only the main characters really looked any better).

Tsuna

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Re: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures
« Reply #14 on: 2017-05-24 05:50:34 »
I'll help in any way. Ya can use higher res ones from other sources but this forum will not allow that. Didn't really think of that till just now

Fraggoso

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Re: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures
« Reply #15 on: 2017-05-24 08:42:20 »
If you mean the HD Art, no I'll include them in a future package.
I already talked with Rowell, who has the majority (if not all) of his work as higher resolution Masters. But the copyright is not with him and i really don't want to slip on SE toes.

@Dclem Right now there's no upload for them.

@NFITC1 You'll see the benefits on every Monitor as the texture are bumped up in resolution, so yes, a 1080 Monitor will let you see the difference. :)

Fraggoso

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Re: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures
« Reply #16 on: 2017-05-24 10:09:46 »
Not possible, nor that easy.
The UI isn't easy to edit in this case. And this coming from the only one who's managed to change all UI's.
If I find a way I'll do it. But currently, have not. Too busy with the sound mod nobody cares about

There's a UI scale mod, released yesterday over Steam.
It's not working 100% but it's a great start I think:

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/ff-modding/discussions/13/1290690926876650747/

Tsuna

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Re: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures
« Reply #17 on: 2017-05-24 15:22:55 »
I meant things ripped from other games. Like Dissidia for Zidane and enemies from literally anywhere and such

Fraggoso

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Re: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures
« Reply #18 on: 2017-05-24 15:36:19 »
Oh I understand.
That would really be great but as you said, that's forbidden.

Mcindus

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Re: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures
« Reply #19 on: 2017-05-24 21:32:56 »
Not possible, nor that easy.
The UI isn't easy to edit in this case. And this coming from the only one who's managed to change all UI's.
If I find a way I'll do it. But currently, have not. Too busy with the sound mod nobody cares about
What more awaits?

I think you went too hasty with this one.
That social gratification...

Like really though...

If it was fully beta-tested, it should've been taken care of.
*EDIT* oops, forgot to mention the first part.  I think you'll find that many people care about your sound mod.  Also - if you ever get access to the UI elements as .png's, I can definitely help you with the look of the game.  I've come far since my first days creating SeeDReborn.

Frag, from one modder to another - great job!  As a community, it's up to us to find the bugs - and in your own time fix them :)

Thanks again for your time, hard work, and this awesome mod!  Modders don't always get the applause they deserve for being as philanthropic as we are.

dclem: Thank you for your bug input - but unless you're paying for a mod, it's really not your place to put down the efforts of a mod creator.  (Especially if that mod is an excellent one such as this.)  None of our mods are 'perfect' - and with more input and less criticism (of motive no less) we will go far with these mods.
« Last Edit: 2017-05-24 21:34:55 by Mcindus »

Fraggoso

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Re: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures
« Reply #20 on: 2017-05-25 08:14:17 »
Mcindus thank you very much. Also for your time to help me with some questions I had.
I'll still work on the worldmap mod and with your awesome help i think it'll look better than ever. :)

dclem

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Re: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures
« Reply #21 on: 2017-05-27 20:40:49 »
it's really not your place to put down the efforts of a mod creator.

Who said I was putting down efforts?  :roll:
Boy, bye.

I think you'll find that many people care about your sound mod.



don't make me laugh.
I have yet to see a Ratio where the sound mod matches up to this mod, or any other relative. I maybe see a 50:6
if you ever get access to the UI elements as .png's, I can definitely help you with the look of the game.
Already had access.
Sorry, I'm designing that part for what I do - going along with the sound mod. And I'm not looking to change that. Any of the UI's designs. Shrinking the battle command UI and getting it behave like psx; haven't yet to see that happen.
« Last Edit: 2017-05-27 21:40:26 by dclem »

Mcindus

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Re: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures
« Reply #22 on: 2017-05-28 02:06:43 »
Who said I was putting down efforts?  :roll:
Boy, bye.

I have yet to see a Ratio where the sound mod matches up to this mod, or any other relative. I maybe see a 50:6

Already had access.
Sorry, I'm designing that part for what I do - going along with the sound mod. And I'm not looking to change that. Any of the UI's designs. Shrinking the battle command UI and getting it behave like psx; haven't yet to see that happen.

Sorry if I misinterpreted your post - it seemed like you were putting Frag down for not 'beta-testing' his mod enough.  If that's not the case, please accept my apologies :)

As far as the interest - sound mods always have less 'visible' interest than graphical mods.  The only way to really know how 'essential' your mod is, would be to see the overall downloads after a period of time - and from personal experience, you may end up being surprised.  I know I'm interested in all of these mods as an essential 'package' for FF9 and am looking forward to using all of them :)

Oh, so you're doing all of the UI elements yourself??  Sounds like a beast of a project, but I hope you the best!  I will add it to the 'essential' mods list.  What is your progress like on that mod?

What is the difference in behavior of the battle UI in the Pc vs the psx version?

Lein

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Re: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures
« Reply #23 on: 2017-05-28 02:24:09 »
You actually lose detail when you apply such filters on them, it starts to look cartoony instead of pretty. The reason the backgrounds seem so pixelated in the PC version of the game is because you're running the game at a high resolution, the backgrounds stay the same quality but the models become super crisp. There's an easy fix, lower the resolution to 640x480.

Then the character models will seem to blend in much better just like in the ps1 game. In the ps1 version the resolution was even lower though. It would be nice if there was a mod that made the game run in 320x240 resolution, the original ps1 resolution. Then the updated character models and backgrounds will perfectly fit each other.

There is already a mod that fixes the sound in the game, there's only three things that need to be modified for the port to be perfect.
•Scale down UI elements in battle.
•Remove the talk/card icons when you walk next to NPCs.
•Remove the options to cheat.

I don't know how to code or mod games, but if you're a modder get to work on the above stuff. :wink:

dclem

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Re: [FF9 PC/Steam] Improved NPC and battle background textures
« Reply #24 on: 2017-05-28 03:39:05 »
You actually lose detail when you apply such filters on them, it starts to look cartoony instead of pretty.

I say the filter is lovely! Okay, they don't lose any detail, in fact, they show more detail (in my eyes at the least) especially at a high resolution.
But its whateva.

There is already a mod that fixes the sound in the game.


That Sdlib.dll only changes the sampling rate the game engine uses. But don't worry, I still use it anyways. But know Alboris got a launcher (it comes with the sound mod I do) that allows to change the sampling rate with various rates.

The sounds are botched eternally. I've went through 90% of all of them (still working on the rest, clearly)
All Silicon Studio's botched sfxs. Just EWW, like, no. Like, yeah, graphics are great, but, I tried playing through the whole game with no sounds or sound effects on, and, it felt... quiet.

there's only three things that need to be modified for the port to be perfect.
Scale down UI elements in battle.
Remove the talk/card icons when you walk next to NPCs.
Remove the options to cheat.

Removing cheating is done with Hades Workshop
And is included with the sounds mod.

If anyone else wants the Card Icons removed when talking to NPCs tell me now, and I'll remove it.


I don't know how to code or mod games, but if you're a modder get to work on the above stuff. :wink:

And you automatically assumed that a Sdlib.dll fixed all those sounds (even missing sounds)?
No. And yes, the enemy death sfxs are back, fixed included with the sound mod.
And instead of saying: "get to work" say: "hopefully someone can fix". None of us gets forced. Not me, you, Fraggoso, Tirlititi, Mcindus, anyone.
I've already done everything you mentioned except, the scaling down of the battle UI's. If anyone knows how to do that. Talk to me in this thread:

http://forums.qhimm.com/index.php?topic=17616.0



Sorry if I misinterpreted your post - it seemed like you were putting Frag down for not 'beta-testing' his mod enough.  If that's not the case, please accept my apologies :)
Accepted. :)

As far as the interest - sound mods always have less 'visible' interest than graphical mods.  The only way to really know how 'essential' your mod is, would be to see the overall downloads after a period of time - and from personal experience, you may end up being surprised.  I know I'm interested in all of these mods as an essential 'package' for FF9 and am looking forward to using all of them :)
Yeah, when showing visuals over audio, eyes always win over ears don't they?

Oh, so you're doing all of the UI elements yourself??  Sounds like a beast of a project, but I hope you the best!  I will add it to the 'essential' mods list.

Yeah see:




Similar what I have for my game, but i just started from scratch with all FF9's UIs.

What is your progress like on that mod?

http://forums.qhimm.com/index.php?topic=17616.0
See the percentage? I update that every day. That's how close!

What is the difference in behavior of the battle UI in the Pc vs the psx version?

In the PC version, it's one big fat UI with all commands listed.
In the PSX version, the UI is small and the secondary commands are accessed by pressing left and right.
Until someone helps me with this, I have this currently:



Just getting ready for what's possible; 'cause you already know its possible.

Little OFF TOPIC:
Silicon Studios botched FF9 just how HiJinx Studios botched Silent Hill HD Collection.
(SIlcinon preopbaly used a beta version like they did too!)
Leaving all these bugs in here.

Back on topic now.
« Last Edit: 2017-05-28 03:48:27 by dclem »