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restored chapter screen art

Sam_Sam_ Member Posts: 172
in UI Modding
Several times over the years I have been asked about the feasibility of restoring the chapter screen art from the original game to BGEE. With the advancements of the V2 engine and improvements to NearInfinity, this should now be a reasonably straightforward project, and I'm considering looking into it again. I did a proof of concept back in 2015:home
My question is, has this already been done? I'm not interested in putting forth that effort just to reinvent the wheel...

Comments

  • KilivitzKilivitz Member Posts: 1,459
    I've been working on restoring those screens as part of my BG1 GUI project. The tricky part is to restore the images without the text box overlays. My solution was to use stills from the videos but the results are a mixed bag.

    Could you tell me how you got the prologue image to look this good? We might be able to exchange some stuff.
  • Sam_Sam_ Member Posts: 172
    @Kilivitz, I also pulled an image from the original MVE, but I used a special program that uses a custom algorithm to do the resizing. It produces better results in situations like this than anything else I have seen, including ImageMagick and PhotoShop. I don't remember which one it was offhand (it has been a couple of years), but I'll dust off my external HD and see what notes I made at the time.
  • KilivitzKilivitz Member Posts: 1,459
    I've been using Reshade myself. As you've said, it's certainly better than relying on Photoshop's scaling.
  • Sam_Sam_ Member Posts: 172
    @Kilivitz
    Do you happen to know where I can find the code that determines which MOS is used for each chapter/dream? I assume it would be in a LUA or MENU file, but I didn't see it...
  • KilivitzKilivitz Member Posts: 1,459
    I'm 99% sure that the code which determines which MOS is used for the Chapter Screens is hardcoded.

    However, if you substitute any of the following MOSes using the Override folder, they will show up in-game:

    Prologue: GUICHP0B.MOS
    Chapter 1: GUICHP1B.MOS
    Chapter 2: GUICHP2B.MOS
    Chapter 3: GUICHP3B.MOS
    Chapter 4: GUICHP4B.MOS
    Chapter 5: GUICHP5B.MOS
    Chapter 6: GUICHP6B.MOS
    Chapter 7: GUICHP7B.MOS
    Dream (Chapter 2): GUIDRM2.MOS
    Dream (Chapter 3): GUIDRM3.MOS
    Dream (Chapter 4): GUIDRM4.MOS
    Dream (Chapter 5): GUIDRM5.MOS
    Dream (Chapter 6): GUIDRM6.MOS
    Dream (Chapter 7): GUIDRM7.MOS
    Leaving for Werewolf Island: LEAVE.MOS
    Arriving from Werewolf Island: ARRIVE.MOS
    End of Black Pits: BPEND.MOS

    As an example, here's a screenshot of my BG1 GUI Mod (running on the 2.5 BGEE Beta):


    I don't currently have SoD installed but it shouldn't be too hard to find the MOSes that correspond the SoD chapters. If you'd like to take a look at the code that determines where the text on the chapter screens are, take a look at the 'CHAPTER' menu in UI.MENU. And to look at how to restore the fancy initials, there's some very interesting code in the UI.MENU of Lefreut's Enhanced UI.

    I'm still having a bit of trouble with the variable dimensions of the text boxes for the different chapters. It seems that in certain sizes, the text lines don't break like they're supposed to.

    (tagging @AndreaColombo so he can see I'm actually making progress with the mod)
  • lefreutlefreut Member Posts: 1,462
    Sam_ said:

    @Kilivitz
    Do you happen to know where I can find the code that determines which MOS is used for each chapter/dream? I assume it would be in a LUA or MENU file, but I didn't see it...

    It's controlled by the chapterBackgrounds table in BGEE.lua. For SoD, the BG chapters are GUICHPXA and SoD chapters are GUICHPXB. In my mod, I use this naming even for BGEE without SoD so I don't have to use different names depending on the game.

  • Sam_Sam_ Member Posts: 172
    My mod BG:EE Classic Movies has a new component that Restores BG1 Chapter and Dream Screens. It supports BGEE and SoD themes. If anyone is interested, I can upload my processed sources at various stages of completion.
  • Sam_Sam_ Member Posts: 172
    John_Doe said:

    Sam_ said:

    My mod BG:EE Classic Movies has a new component that Restores BG1 Chapter and Dream Screens. It supports BGEE and SoD themes. If anyone is interested, I can upload my processed sources at various stages of completion.

    Great work. I would like to request the original images (minus the UI themes) you started with to include them in LeUI (BG2EE/EET) screens. I tried editing the .PNGs but they really don't fit well. If I had the original size images I think it would be a lot better. Thank you.
    Upon request, here are the original and resized images I used for the chapter screens:

    ChapterScreens.rar
  • kungfuhobbitkungfuhobbit Member Posts: 169
    edited November 2018
    @Sam_
    Thankyou looks great
    [edit - @smady3 thanks, initial error opening archive updated with latest 7zip]
    Post edited by kungfuhobbit on
  • smady3smady3 Member Posts: 48
    kungfuhobbit said:

    @Sam_
    Super excited to get these art originals but the rar is corrupt! :'( Please could you reupload?
    Eager to see Alaundo in his highest res
    Thankyou

    Just tested myself using Winrar, archive extrtacts fine.
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