Authentic Model Improvement

[osjclatchford]

yup. found his twitter post in my 'research' a few days ago.
AFAIK, he was the lead modeller and worked with a girl called evie who did the anims.
looking at how the skins are made. I got the impression that they used (or capnbubs donated) his grunt, player, dog and ogre and then they got eldrone to make the others in a style thats close enough to capnbubs stuff. like capnbubs was the gold standard of the project. hey, just like he was for our project. him starting it and all... LOL

Its really evident when you compare some of the skin textures. the enforcer might have been capnbubs as its skinned similarly to the grunt., all the others share similar construction methods. (the big halo around the skin parts to ensure edge integrity and the grey backgrounds) now compare them to the ogre, dog and soldier. seems to me the ogre has more in common with the dog and soldier than the others but it does have some of the new models's skin attributes. leading me to believe that eldrone perhaps 'fixed' the ogre, perhaps polishing it off and finished it from its unfinished state?
it seems to me that many (fish, scrag, zombie, demon, tarbaby, shambler, shalrath) are clearly all done by one desinger but perhaps more from a standpoint of emulation of a style rather than all the models as a whole coming from the hands of the same designer....

or I'm talking utter spunk and eldrone IS capnbubs and his style/methods have changed over the years... meh. we'll never know for sure but I'll stick to my theory...

all a fun bit of conjecture nonetheless...

[NightFright]

Well, gotta give this guy the credit he deserves. If he imitated capnbubs, he did a damn good job. However, the real star of this new port seems to be that new episode, really. I have just started playing it and it seems they made it to showcase the capabilities of the new engine. It's like Half-Life is doing it with Quake. Huge maps with a dirty, industrial look, and there are some really nice shadow effects in it which you don't see anywhere else, at least right now.

[osjclatchford]

can't help but wonder, would any of that ever had existed if Arcane Dimensions had never been made... it did set the bar high afterall...

[NightFright]

They could have published this as an AD expansion and it would have fit right in. It's the same quality level, easily.

*EDIT*
Looks like mh was already able to add MD5 support to vanilla FitzQuake. It doesn't mean we'll be seeing support for re-release models in custom ports any time soon, though. This was rather done for demo purposes and will require a lot more work before it's usable for gaming purposes. Our MDL conversions will remain relevant, one way or the other.

[osjclatchford]

Been reading that too... Seems a bit early on as yet but it's an interesting development nonetheless...

[NightFright]

Everybody is on the edge right now to get that new episode working outside of Kex. As good as it is, it's a giant showcase for the new effects and therefore contains a lot of Kex-specific code. Getting the missing loca strings in wouldn't be a big issue, but the advanced shadows and mirror effects are. Without that, the whole thing loses a lot of its wow moments.

Converting the models was really the easier part.

[osjclatchford]

huh! funny. im not all that bothered by it, tbh.
I still havent finished everything in the latest arcane dimensions as I got a bit fed up of wandering around in identical rooms not telling if I'd been there or not...
but i did play through it obbsessively looking for all four runes to unlock the 'credits' end-level (man that was well designed...)

guess I've just had my fill of overly large quake maps for a while.

from what I've seen a lot of the texture work seems real out of place among the quake resources. like its taken from a q3 engine game or something. I know it isnt but its like what you've said. it would not look out of place in half-life and the like.
doesn't hit that quake button (pun intended) enough for me...
where this is true for many of the new maps in ad (realm of enceladus for example), the stuff is so beyond quake graphically and stylistically that it feels kinda strange at times.
most of them in AD are fimly grounded in quake's universe and texture style, I'm talking, critical error, obd, foggy bogbottom and firetop mountain to name but a few...
also i felt that 'dimension of the past' was a very nostalgic and well created episode. added many new things but still remained quake at-heart...

still new content is always good. but I just feel that some of the new feature stuff just seems to be more a loveletter to the kex engine rather than to quake's legacy itself...

thats obviously the 'hidden' intent there. "look what you can do with kex" kinda deal...
thats to be expected... its what I'd do...

[NightFright]

DOTM was nice to play, but after you are done with it, you are also kinda glad it's over. I tend to lose my bearings in huge maps, especially when there is no automap feature (which they could have made - THAT would have been a novelty!).
Projects like the upcoming "Tremor" are much more up my alley. Vanilla-style maps, basically "Quake the Way id Did".

Anyway, should Nightdive listen and provide SoA/DoE model remasters after all, I *MIGHT* consider replacing the Grenade Launcher as well. I doubt that's going to happen any time soon, though - if it does at all. I'll probably prepare the AMQ release for the second September week or so, just to make sure there's enough time to react in case a last-minute problem is found and needs to be addressed. The more changes are applied, the more waiting time I add.

[Tea Monster]

Getting the missing loca strings in wouldn't be a big issue, but the advanced shadows and mirror effects are. Without that, the whole thing loses a lot of its wow moments.

I was quite impressed by the geometry and advanced level design. As I said in another thread. It's like someone saw Arcane Dimensions and was all like "Hold my beer!". I also said that it's very much like a 'lost' sequel to Quake I that was built on the Q2/Half Life engine around 2004, never released and kept in a cupboard for the last few decades. I'm still playing it and I'm constantly being pleasantly surprised by the last episode. I've yet to play any MP with it or play any of the original levels on the port.

I've got a few days before another commission. What were these heads you needed doing?

[NightFright]

Well, osj did them in the meantime, but at least some of them still have some seams where he "glued" the new model on top of the old one (if I got that part right), so if you wanna try whether you can do it without any visible transitions, feel free to give it a shot. Affected should/might still be: Death Knight, Enforcer, Ogre, Vore, Zombie (h_hellkn, h_mega, h_ogre, h_shal, h_zombie). The most obvious case would be the Ogre head (even though you'd still have to look at the model from really weird and close angles to spot it). The converted MDLs are on Github, but only in the dev build (which you can get via green "Code" button --> "Download Zip").

Other things on the "nice to have" list (if you wanna try):
- DoE Mummy skin for new Zombie
- Additional DoE cruc_ animation frames (#198-207) for new Zombie
- DoE Lavaman skin for new Chthon

Looks like someone made the Prox Mine Launcher, btw! Just dunno if the guy will release this as MD5 or MDL, but anyway, if this Proxer passes our quality control, osj can do his thing once more. We need three variants: ID1, SoA and DoE.

[osjclatchford]

I can tell you now that the zombie and vore hedgibs are fine. no gaps AFAIK...
the only slight (and I emphasize slight) vertex gaps are on the h_mega, h_ogre and h_hellkn models. where the heads meet the necks...
if something can be done, great i suppose but it kinda feels like splitting hairs now...

as for the prox. if that preview pic is an honest depiction ofht efinished model it looks kinda bad tbh.
Its a bit of a fudgeup as you can still see where the 'segments' of the orginal gl 'barrel-shroud' are, albeit sunken into the barrel (or is that the barrel bought up to the shroud?) I'd need to see the model to be sure.
anyway, even with this, its unfortunate that after conversion from md5 to mdl the 'enhanced' grenade launcher seems to be a bit of a downgrade from the plague one with my skin on it we currently use.
like the ssg, it seems to loose it's 'edge' somewhat.
Still, its true that it is technically more authentic to the original id1 mdl but I fear at the cost of quality. Your call at the end of the day.
doesnt hurt to have alternatives out there anyway...

oh, just fyi, I've already converted the v_multi and v_multi2 models/skins from trickle from md5 to mdl (alongside the v_lava and v_lava2)and are now available here:
https://quakeone.com/forum/quake-mod...rsions-pack-v1
Despite quality or lack of it, I'll most likely add that prox to that collection once its available too as its an ideal candidate for the 'enhanced' in mdl format pack, being derived from that gl model and all...

[NightFright]

I doubt that guy has the skill it takes to remodel the GL. Just slapping a skin on the existing model isn't that hard, at least in this case, but it's so close to your view that you will see if it's not done properly.

I tend to forget stuff that looks nice as MD5 doesn't necessarily keep its quality after conversion. It's not one of the replacements we NEED to have at all costs, anyway, so we can just as well ignore it if we don't like the way it's done.

The converted GL doesn't have the same muzzleflash issue as the RL did, right? In general, I am not against adding it, but the Proxer needs to fit.

Btw seems Zenimax won't release the source code. Didn't expect them to, but it won't make it easier for other ports to make the necessary adjustments.

[osjclatchford]

So, I replicated the look of that guy's prox preview:

seems it is just the prox skin, pasted and stretched onto the new gl model.
thats what I've done hore and it looks just like his.
not good at all is it...

funny, this converted gl model looks fine untill you fire it, then the rear of the gun goes all square and the muzzleflash is odd. (yes, tis different to the rl one) the flash kinda looks like it has a big seam down the middle...

anyway, its in need of a remodel methinks. I'd give it a shot by shifting verticies but id have to do it for each frame too... you can forget that...

[NightFright]

We have good replacements already. It would be a nice bonus, not more. But true, just slapping the skin onto the unaltered GL model is cheap and looks bad.

Maybe the Proxer is something Tea Monster can take a look at. But no pressure.

[NightFright]

We might have to review the new Enforcer. The muzzleflash of his gun looks wrong when he fires. Seems to originate from the wrong spot. It has to do with model interpolation since if you turn it off, it looks ok.

Mankrip also complains that instead of fixing interpolation, we are just turning it off, which is a "dirty hack" in his opinion. I see that these hidden muzzleflashes are there for a reason, for if they shouldn't be visible behind the gun at some point, they simply wouldn't be there. Maybe it's rather about moving those off-screen flashes back or forth until they appear where they should at the right time, avoiding that clipping effect. Might involve some trial and error, but it would only concern the RL and Enforcer in the AMQ.