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Final Fantasy 9 => Graphics => FF9 Graphical Releases => Topic started by: Fraggoso on 2017-02-28 08:42:13
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Hi everyone.
I've started on a Backgrounds replacement mod for FFIX for quite some time now and I'm finished around 50% right now.
Here's a quick video of an early WIP.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kn1WGOKpt00
And yes, I've started a discussion on the steam forum as well:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/377840/discussions/0/142261352660457538
The mod will be compatible with Hades Workshop and I'll try my best to implement it in Memoria as well.
Everything is going smoothly, still I can't give out an ETA.
Edit:
Mod released! :D
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B9iOUmoUbwc4eHJSb3EwOWZNMEE (Version 1.1)
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B9iOUmoUbwc4Si1DNk4wNl9Rb1E (csharp.dll file)
Installguide:
- Backup in your FFIX install directoy under "StreamingAssets" the bin files p0data11 till p0data19.
- Backup in x64\FF9_Data\Managed the Assembly-CSharp.dll file.
- Download the 7z and unpack it directly into you Final Fantasy IX install directory where "StreamingAssets" and "x64" sit.
Play! :D
If you don't want to use it anymore just copy over the old bin files as well as well as the Assembly-CSharp.dll.
I know Meru is working on the Backgrounds, too. As he's using a complete different tool set that I'm and we also have other ways of implement the mod, we're not collaborating in any way so please don't ask.
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A little video wip of course.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=loRrEf8AAwA&feature=youtu.be
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Are you doing all the masks right away? I started to work on BGs when you was at Ice Cavern, I think. So you have to be past disc2 by now. I am mid-disc2 and only did the most ugly masks so far :D
Cleyra is probably gonna be a real pain in the ass in terms of these masks that would need to be created even though I don't want it for now. I was gonna do some part of Cleyra but couldn't bring myself to open the folder with textures... Maybe tomorrow :mrgreen:
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What files does the background mods replace?
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I've finished almost all on disc 3, should be around 70% completed and I learned a lot on mask on the way.
I'm not saying it, but I would start over and clean up everything prior to disc 3 but I don't know if I can motivate myself to do so... <.<°
@dclem What do you mean? It replaces the ugly steam backgrounds with (my taste) better ones. ^^
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Fraggoso
I also neglected some things on disc1 and will probably come back there to fix them... But that is not related to masks, I only do masks for like 1 background per zone, and sometimes not even full background. I tried various things for masks but they still don't match the hand-made ones.
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I'll make some more tests today regarding that and hopefully I get a perfect mask.
I'll let you know if it's feasible to do.
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Perfect one is not possible (only if hand-drawn) because upscaled image is too big and too distorted. Even original PSX masks are far from perfect. But they work there cause of overally low resolution.
Personally I will still be doing most of them after all the backgrounds are in.
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I'm trying another solution which needs an in between step but initial test are promising atm.
How do you use the PSX masks as a background btw.? When I import them via HQ I have gray seams everywhere (atm).
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I think you misunderstood. I do not use them I said they are bad.
They can not be processed with waifu. They need a totally different approach. But they will still suck. Very rarely they can be made into something useful. Like here
(https://i.imgur.com/EFFCrDc.png)
Most of the time I keep PC masks. The plan was to do the masks as a 2nd pass.
Edit: but PC masks are beyond help. I wouldn't want to even touch them. The only place for them is a trash bin.
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What do you think, Meru?
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/202947
It's not perfect, yeah but still better then PSX as well as Steam seams (at least for my taste).
I've to test them in game but at least from the picture the masks seems very fitting.
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I meant the steamfiles. Like p0data5.bin or something.
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What do you think, Meru?
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/202947
It's not perfect, yeah but still better then PSX as well as Steam seams (at least for my taste).
I've to test them in game but at least from the picture the masks seems very fitting.
I think this looks something like 4x nearest neighbor + Smooth 3px + Expand 2px applied to the PSX mask or something close to that.
It may work in some cases, but will not work for other cases. Most likely it will have to be tweaked for every other image. For some images it won't work at all. Like the ones with some trees/leaves or other high-detail stuff. So this may result in too much tinkering to produce sub-optimal results. I better just draw it by hand...
I can say that photoshop itself, unfortunately, does not have anything that is capable to produce mask that will satisfy me. There is other software that _sometimes_ can, but only sometimes.
I meant the steamfiles. Like p0data5.bin or something.
p0data11-19
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The thing is that I don't want to draw the mask and automate as much as I can or else this Mod will never be released.
Like we say here in Germany: One death you have to die. Or "You will have to opt for the lesser evil."
The PC seams are ugly, let's trashcan them ASAP.
PSX is too blocky but at least way better then the PC ones.
I'll give it some further testing with leaves and fine detail and see how it goes.
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The thing is that I don't want to draw the mask and automate as much as I can or else this Mod will never be released.
Like we say here in Germany: One death you have to die. Or "You will have to opt for the lesser evil."
The PC seams are ugly, let's trashcan them ASAP.
PSX is too blocky but at least way better then the PC ones.
I'll give it some further testing with leaves and fine detail and see how it goes.
Yea I agree with that. This is exactly why I decided to do these masks, transparent objects and text as a 2nd pass, how good they will be done will depend on how much motivation I have left. It could be that I'll end up using some more automated thing too. I can't say for sure. But at least like 5% will be hand-drawn anyway.
Edit: Try Mountain/Summit background for testing mask stuff
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I'll try that out tomorrow.
Today I tried the field with the weeping blossoms (I'm in bed and forgot the name of it) and it looked ones really good. At least better as with psx and pc seams. It still needs some tweaking but I'll give it a try and test it ingame. :)
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Here is one case from Cleyra. Thing where arrow points is way to off. It may be possible to make it look better by tweaking the settings, but then other parts will be bad. (This is based on PSX mask too.)
(https://i.imgur.com/7GYZ6Ky.png)
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I didn't test summit,will do that today.
But I tested other fields and the result is a little bit better then using the psx mask 1:1 but on the other hand other things gets worse.
Still I'll go with that approach now as it doesn't need a lot more time. Maybe I can write a phyton Script do to the daunting tasks.
Edit 1:
I made some adjustments to my workflow and now I can present you the results:
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/203111/
This time it preserves more of the details and I like it more then the old one.
I have to redo the first 200 Backgrounds (from 800) but that will come after I finished the whole project. ^^
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Looks cool. Good luck!
What a coincidence haha. In my case things that I do not want to verify with eyes are also done with python or javascript.
I have to redo some older images too. Not sure how much. Sometimes I just skipped something, sometimes it was pretty hard to figure out what part comes from where (because image was exported "by depth") and I probably made some mistakes there. Some gears in Lindblum is a one example of that.
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I know what you mean regarding the depth.
I also looked over a let's play to see how things work so I know what to push to the foreground for filtering. ;)
I also tried to fix several area like the both engine rooms from prima Vista. The psx / steam version got some layers wrong and animation is playing behind another where it shouldn't.
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I testes now with Dali Fields (the first with the Scarecrow and it looks good to me. Better as with the PSX seam but yeah, handmade would be awesome³).
(http://www.fotos-hochladen.net/uploads/dalifield08qcvkuf1d.jpg)
I also tried summit:
(http://www.fotos-hochladen.net/uploads/summitlonh4gmcj3.jpg)
And here's a comparison on Cleyra. That one is really "messed" up but at least it's not that choppy anymore. *lol*
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/203161
Right click and open in a new tab or window to get it maxed out.
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Do you like the results in case of Summit? Many of these white spots should be transparent. :|
I just had a similar case in Cleyra. Ended up drawing it all
(https://i.imgur.com/XeNKt1e.png)
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If you think the average player stays 10 seconds there, yes I find it okay.
Hand drawn is better but that's not what I opt for now. At least it's better as with the standard seams.
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If you think the average player stays 10 seconds there, yes I find it okay.
Hand drawn is better but that's not what I opt for now. At least it's better as with the standard seams.
Haha, you right. Now I remember saying something similar about zone titles :-X
In my case there is a one problem though. I aim to please a one special person (me), and he is no average player :mrgreen:
So it's kinda hard to prioritize these things sometimes.
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Yeah it's basically the same on my end as I'm doing it primarily for me.
I think I'll do a second pass whatsoever and fix the seams as good as I can.
We've much in common. ;)
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Cool !
Sent from my SM-G925F using Tapatalk
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It's been a week, I guess there's been no progress.
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I'm working as much as I have time.
76 Backgrounds are remaining right now.
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(https://s15.postimg.org/rbmnsgyez/avatar.gif)
i can't
(https://s8.postimg.org/d8rfb96xx/1sy_Nixb.gif)
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Another update (?) sidenote:
I'm also upscaling the "ugly" Battle textures... well at least they look ugly to me.
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/203702
This is early WIP but the upscaling shouldn't take as long as the backgrounds, so maybe 1 week if I've decided on my filter pipeline.
I'm also touching on those ugly low res character textures and weapon texture as well.
Let's see if I can even do something with the worldmap textures.
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Another update (?) sidenote:
I'm also upscaling the "ugly" Battle textures... well at least they look ugly to me.
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/203702
This is early WIP but the upscaling shouldn't take as long as the backgrounds, so maybe 1 week if I've decided on my filter pipeline.
I'm also touching on those ugly low res character textures and weapon texture as well.
Let's see if I can even do something with the worldmap textures.
If you find yourself running into lines between textures after you upscale, you might need to make them seamless. I did this with masking seamless textures over the existing ones and/or clonestamp tool to each tile by hand (old school way) for my FF8 maps. Unfortunately, the FF8 UV's are bunked on the PC version. Hope FF9 fares better.
Turn off any filtering first just to make sure, before you go re-seaming everything though... linear filtering, etc. can cause extra edges between seamless textures on atlases.
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If you find yourself running into lines between textures after you upscale, you might need to make them seamless. I did this with masking seamless textures over the existing ones and/or clonestamp tool to each tile by hand (old school way) for my FF8 maps. Unfortunately, the FF8 UV's are bunked on the PC version. Hope FF9 fares better.
Turn off any filtering first just to make sure, before you go re-seaming everything though... linear filtering, etc. can cause extra edges between seamless textures on atlases.
Thanks for the info. Still I'm not good at PSP or Gimp.
I just know how to run my filter pipeline that I refined from my first Final Fantasy X upscale.
I'll see how that ends but I think someone else has to do this. :)
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Okay I've done it!
Finally! :D
Every Background is finished. Now I need only to double check it so hopefully I can release a beta end of the week / starting next week.
To celebrate the release, tirlititi was so nice to make a spoof Video with the FFIX Engine:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/l7a7y620mws1h1t/HDMod.mp4
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To celebrate the release, tirlititi was so nice to make a spoof Video with the FFIX Engine
Haha, I love it ;D
Every Background is finished. Now I need only to double check it so hopefully I can release a beta end of the week / starting next week.
Well done Fraggoso, quite excited for the beta release!
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Deleted as the video isn't meant to be released as of now.
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Yep private, so we can't watch it :/
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I'll repost as soon as tirlititi put it on public. :)
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I'm uploading the Mod now! :D :D
Just need a final approval from tirlititi if everthing seems good then I'l hit the button!
Chooo Choo Hypetrain! :D
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Finally, it's coming (with a delay).
Voll das DB-Feeling hier! ;D ;D ;D
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Hey Kal, if the mod is released, do I need to open a new Thread under released or is it possible to move that either by you or me?
Yeah, feels like DB for sure. xD
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Send a PM to an admin or use Report to moderator and request to move it to the release section.
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Uploading the mod now to Mega! I've reworked 9 broken backgrounds and looked trough all of the remaining. Couldn't spot anything off so -> Chooo Chooo! :D
If someone could provide me mirrors that I can link, that really would be great.
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Mod released! :D
https://1drv.ms/u/s!AuiCrYsY4i_FhBJ6bWIImohYov5P
https://mega.nz/#!UNIVyI6L!vZuUrit2MQa5KvhwmH6L9gXc8wMQBJT7CoP-ZI8rkCI
Installguide:
- Backup in your FFIX install directoy under "StreamingAssets" the bin files p0data11 till p0data19.
- Backup in x64\FF9_Data\Managed the Assembly-CSharp.dll file.
- Download the 7z and unpack it directly into you Final Fantasy IX install directory where "StreamingAssets" and "x64" sit.
Play! :D
If you don't want to use it anymore just copy over the old bin files as well as well as the Assembly-CSharp.dll.
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Wow you are the best! Du bist der BESTE!
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I come to the Memoria/Time Warp
and see this:
(https://s30.postimg.org/hri8kgwxt/already_an_ERROR_with_new_backgrounds.png)
And just what is this?
Zidane isn't positioned right in the corner...
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Wow! You're the best! Although I already played the Android version, now I gotta buy the PC version again, because of YOU!! :lol:
Adding filters to improve backgrounds already sounded good enough, but hearing that you also dealt with those masks, I can't but get the PC version to play with this mod. Those dirty masks always bothered me throughout the gameplay... Thank you for making this game look much, much better!
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I come to the Memoria/Time Warp
and see this:
(https://s30.postimg.org/hri8kgwxt/already_an_ERROR_with_new_backgrounds.png)
And just what is this?
Zidane isn't positioned right in the corner...
Thanks for pointing me to that field.
The Field is fixed, as well as others which also had some bugs.
A patch is in the making. :)
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Just wanted to say thank you for this! The better graphics is going to make my second playthrough more amazing :)
Looking forward to your NPC/Battle background mod to get the kinks worked out, but it looks good as well.
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I tested everything till end of Disc 2.
Encountered some "broken" textures (black tiles) and some, which are just somewhat ugly but can only be repaired if I dive deeper in doing the masks manually, which I'll not do at this time.
Besides that everything is really looking great (at least for me). :)
I maybe will upload a whole package, like version 1.1 as I'm done with testing which shouldn't take that long with fast forward.
A patch can only be done with the next version of Hades Workshop and that depends completely on tirlititi and the time he has. :)
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If anyone could test the Chocobo Locations (Chocobo Dreams e.g.) that would really help me a lot.
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Tested. Nothing wrong with any Chocobo (Forest/Lagoon/Air Garden/Dream World) fields.
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Thanks a bunch, Dclem.
I'll release the update later this day.
Sadly it's a whole package, but I guess in today's time of internet this shouldn't be any real problem.
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would be nice if you add the "Version" in your description, like version 1.1 etc. Otherwhise I'm not sure if there's any update available :D great work btw!
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Sorry couldn't upload yesterday.
Today definitely.
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On here or steam?
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I'll try to upload the update and also the notifications everywhere, that includes here and Steam as well.
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Steam is way out of the box rn.
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Released version 1.1.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B9iOUmoUbwc4eHJSb3EwOWZNMEE
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Hey Fraggoso how did you extract the backgrounds and then put them into the game again?
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I extracted everything with hades workshop and imported it back with it as well.
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Is it under batch "export field background"? Seems self explanatory but after you select a path for the exported images the ok button seems to be hidden, very odd.
(http://i.imgur.com/sizjFVT.png)
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Yeah the button is sadly hidden. You've to tab and hit enter.
Or you can do it, like I did it, one by one if you go to fields background and go to background editor.
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The first tiff file is 44MB, I guess there is more than one image inside of it, but when you open it in photoshop you're just seeing one part of the image. Do you have to extract the images from the tiff file somehow? I want to try to recreate the first prima vista room with the candle...
EDIT: I figured it out, thanks for the tab help.
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You also want to untick merge tileset or you don't get the individual tile layers split up instead of one image.
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I forgot to upload the csharp.dll file with the latest update.
here you can download it: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B9iOUmoUbwc4Si1DNk4wNl9Rb1E
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hey there your mod looks so nice. great job on your hard work. i tried your mod on my FFIX steam and it works completely fine. can i ask about your the other worldmap mod? hows the progress of it? i cant see the comparison since there nothing there.
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Im not working on that right now. I've got so less time nowadays and you need to touch the textures 1:1 manually or else it'll look like shit. :/
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oh okay. you are very busy with daily lifes i see. that's makes time not enough :(
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hey fraggoso, want to ask you a bit about your hd battle background mod. how do you merge it with alternate fantasy mod? or the battle background v1.1 mod is already bugless when install with alternate fantasy mod?
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I don't know if AF alters the texture files?
Doesn't it work from the getgo without doing anything? If not you better ask tirlititi about it.
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yup i already asked him today and he says "You can't merge AF and the battle background mod as far as I know ; I guess Fraggoso will provide the modded files (and not the whole modded archive) once they are bugless."
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Hello, i had a problem with your mod. When start the game the blackgrounds dont look good. It is brocken but the game it is runing. I dont know whats happen and how i can repair. Can you help me please? file:///C:/Users/Usuario/Desktop/ff9.png
Thanks you very much