BEAR on 25/4/2020 at 19:57
Thanks so much for your work, I look forward to trying it out. How well do these textures play with FM's do you think? I beat T1 and T2 recently for the first time in years with some of the other HD mods installed and I want to dig into FM's more. I might replay T2X as well though so I look forward to trying that out.
Akven on 25/4/2020 at 20:53
They will work with any FM I think. But if author of the FM uses any own custom textures - they will be with the quality he provided.
Yandros on 25/4/2020 at 21:37
As these are literally upgraded versions of the original textures, they are probably the safest upgrades to use with FMs. Any others are quite likely to have issues with FMs in terms of visual conflict, or worse. In general, though, most people here advocate the use of no resource enhancement or upgrade packs when playing FMs so that you experience them the way the author intended. Exceptions to that would be FMs which use stock/vanilla resources only.
Soul Tear on 28/4/2020 at 08:20
Quote Posted by Yandros
In general, though, most people here advocate the use of no resource enhancement or upgrade packs when playing FMs so that you experience them the way the author intended.
I always played FMs with maximum improvements. Improvements are designed to improve. In other words, if the author in the readme recommends not using improvements to get a unique experience, I will say, "thank you, brother, but I will use the improvements."
People spent tons of tons of personal time to make improvements, and then authors decides for others not to use these things. The author does not have to decide for the players how to play. Some people make missions, others draw textures, etc. Everyone should be able to bring their project to the final user.
If I get tired of HD textures , I disable it. If I get tired of the original textures, I enable HD. I can change the visual concept several times while playing FM.
An exception is resource conflicts. I recommended not using EP in my FM, because I used the same, but edited textures, otherwise players could see a white spot where there should be black.
Regarding this project. Both mods for T1 and T2 are great, but unfortunately they completely negate the work on EP2 textures.
Yes, there are a lot of beautiful and quality textures in EP, but absolute visual disharmony reigns there: photorealistic things lie next to painted stylizations. Many things within one family do not fit in any way, and no one will redo it. Brightness and clarity are also very different from texture to texture.
To summarize, I would recommend everyone to use these mods, because they are absolutely authentic, visually balanced and fully completed. At least 90% of the textures did not cause me any quastions. I use this both in OM and contstes T1 and T2 missions, and yes, I get a great experience.
bassoferrol on 28/4/2020 at 18:45
Well I have my own fam and obj crfs in RES folder. A mix of textures made by different people and also by me.
And with every mission I play I change many of the texture to suit my likings in that mission.
Feast of Pilgrims for example:
(
https://ibb.co/87JJvVG)
Inline Image:
https://i.ibb.co/z4119wC/dump001.png
Akven on 7/5/2020 at 12:03
Screenshots for EP1 addon Fix with ripple texture
Vanilla Thief Gold vs Thief Gold with EP1 installed
(
https://imgsli.com/MTU4NjQ)
Thief Gold with EP1 installed vs Thief Gold with EP1 and ESRGAN Pack for EP1
(
https://imgsli.com/MTU4NjQ/1/2)
Thief Gold with EP1 installed vs Thief Gold with EP1 and ESRGAN Pack for EP1 with latest fix
(
https://imgsli.com/MTU4NjQ/1/3)
I redraw this texture instead of upscaling EP1 version. It's animated and looks good ingame. I can fix transparency in the upscaled EP1 version, but don't know if this is necessary.
Akven on 31/5/2020 at 21:43
Well, I completed game (last mission left).
Found two last bugs but I don't know if they are engine related:
-illumination map for the animated textures applied only to the first frame. Documentation said that the first frame settings should apply to all the others. But it seems not. I'll try to add additional mtl files and see if it can be fixed.
-animated textures do not work for objects (like drills and some gauges) not matter how I try. They don't work in game without any ESRGAN textures either (vanilla with T2Fix). It seems to me there is a bug in NewDark engine.
I don't know if this two bugs appears in Thief Gold too. But I think they are (I already wrote about not animated textures on objects).
Now I will start T2X and fix its texture issues (like webs).
Akven on 1/6/2020 at 19:28
I found the source of the first bug))
For some reason I forgot to delete animation mtl files _1, _2, _3, _4, _5
In Thief Gold everything is ok cause I deleted them.
MTL files apply to the first animation frame if there are only one mtl file for root animation
Or they apply to each frame if each frame have its own MTL file.
I'll fix that and will play with ani_mode PINGPONG and ani_mode REVERSE setting. Also I can set slightly difference brightness of illumination map for each frame
I think I'll port part of this things to Thief Gold too.
Akven on 4/6/2020 at 12:04
I created MODDB page with all downloads. Will delete cloud links (mega and so on) soon
(
https://www.moddb.com/mods/thief-ii-esrgan-pack)
And updated to 1.14 version
1.14 Fix (uploaded on ModDB only)
-tweaked animation sequences for animated textures, made illumination maps slightly glow on animated gauges
Akven on 19/6/2020 at 18:20
Last updates to ESRGAN mod. Available on ModDB. I nearly completed Thief 2X, so I hope this is last update for Thief II, no more improvements I can implement. Will upload fixed Thief 2X ESRGAN pack to ModDB soon (I'm waiting for Corsair to improve carry images like he did for Thief 1/2.
1.15 changes:
fixed broken animated textures sizes in 1.14
fixed textures for WATPUMP object, now it's animated correctly (it was broken even in the original Thief)
fixed ELTRANSF object by Jax64 (it was broken even in the original Thief), animations set properly now
1.16 changes:
obj/txt/ORE2 object texture was interpolated using DAINapp to contain 20 animation frames instead of only 5
fam/mech/PWALL01 and PWALL01s were animated. Previously they were static gauges.