[FF8PC-Steam] Rebirth Flame v1.3 - Character Texture Replacement

[FatedCourage]

This is awesome! Thanks, as always.

You're welcome.

Super update, fellas. It's like you touched upon all the stuff I've always talked about needing fixed, but never could since Mago ghosted the forums. And the Devina eyes look so nice.

Thanks for sending the textures for me to incorporate them. Oh, definitely. With all the codes now in place, any artist can now paint any of the main characters they want and they'll work right away. Though, all that remains to be seen. From here on out, there isn't much more updating I can do on my own.

 

[Nedus]

First of all i want to thank all the modders/artists who made this mod.

But i don't see any eyes blinking when they should (ie Quistis and Squall during theyr animations after a victory, or when summoning a GF, etc). Did i mess up something while installing? (Although the models seems to work perfectly apart for the blinking).
Or is this meant to be like this? Are there any chances to see a "fix" on this in the future?

 

[FatedCourage]

First of all i want to thank all the modders/artists who made this mod.

But i don't see any eyes blinking when they should (ie Quistis and Squall during theyr animations after a victory, or when summoning a GF, etc). Did i mess up something while installing? (Although the models seems to work perfectly apart for the blinking).
Or is this meant to be like this? Are there any chances to see a "fix" on this in the future?

They don't blink at the moment. That requires two things for it to work. One is for Tonberry to give more accurate hashes because at the moment it can't tell the difference between open and shut eyes. Two would be for the artist of the textures to create the textures with their eyes shut. At the moment some are and some aren't.

 

[Nedus]

I see, thank you for the fast and clear reply.

I just hope this will be possible one day or another. I think the blinking (in all sorts of FF8 animations/situations) really gives an extra % of realism to the whole experience.

Anyway, keep rocking guys.

 

[FatedCourage]

Small update: Fixed up Irvine's legs so they are more consistent. Added a few more hashcodes to the fray. One thing I forgot from the last update was that I changed Zell's face to the more serious look across all models for more consistency. I might reupscale a few textures later down the line, but I'll see.

On an unrelated note to this project... Some people are curious how the FF8 backgrounds would look with waifu. It is something I'm working on as well. Just a long and very, /very/ tedious project. So if you want to see, here is a video with some. I'll upload more as I continue with this and getting battle effects/magic upscaled and looking all pretty.

 

[neguer28]

Hello ! how are you? im new here so i will try to explain my problem the best i can(excuse my bad english) i just installed RF v1.2 and i tought everything works perfect but is not... in some parts of the game the squall body and face looks bad, and in other parts it looks fine. i have been testing and changed some names in the ch folder and it seems that the problem is in the "char_sql"and "char_sqlt" folders, because i changed the name of the pictures in that folders, and the result was that in battles and in some parts of the game squall looks greats but the most of the time it looks like a squall without mods, how can i make it work all the game? thanks!

 

[olearyf2525]

Small update: Fixed up Irvine's legs so they are more consistent. Added a few more hashcodes to the fray. One thing I forgot from the last update was that I changed Zell's face to the more serious look across all models for more consistency. I might reupscale a few textures later down the line, but I'll see.

On an unrelated note to this project... Some people are curious how the FF8 backgrounds would look with waifu. It is something I'm working on as well. Just a long and very, /very/ tedious project. So if you want to see, here is a video with some. I'll upload more as I continue with this and getting battle effects/magic upscaled and looking all pretty.

Thank you FatedCourage, it does look better with the Waifu upscale.

 

[FatedCourage]

Hello ! how are you? im new here so i will try to explain my problem the best i can(excuse my bad english) i just installed RF v1.2 and i tought everything works perfect but is not... in some parts of the game the squall body and face looks bad, and in other parts it looks fine. i have been testing and changed some names in the ch folder and it seems that the problem is in the "char_sql"and "char_sqlt" folders, because i changed the name of the pictures in that folders, and the result was that in battles and in some parts of the game squall looks greats but the most of the time it looks like a squall without mods, how can i make it work all the game? thanks!

Sorry for not responding faster... By bad, do you mean back to the original textures or is there overlap? Or do you mean his model changes detail? Because the second one is normal since the game does that. A screenshot would be helpful.

Thank you FatedCourage, it does look better with the Waifu upscale.

No problem. I just wanted to see what the game would look like, too. The only drawback is I won't be able to get smooth edges like Omzy's with my method. But I'll get a lot less glitched areas.

 

[EQ2Alyza]

No problem. I just wanted to see what the game would look like, too. The only drawback is I won't be able to get smooth edges like Omzy's with my method. But I'll get a lot less glitched areas.

A minor drawback, imo. I prefer having no glitches, while still getting a quality improvement

 

[iDerek759]

A minor drawback, imo. I prefer having no glitches, while still getting a quality improvement

I 2nd that! Rebirth Flame is seriously my favorite mod thus far. I always hated how low poly
the characters looked, but with this, it's like a breath of fresh air.

 

[neguer28]

Sorry for not responding faster... By bad, do you mean back to the original textures or is there overlap? Or do you mean his model changes detail? Because the second one is normal since the game does that. A screenshot would be helpful.

Thanks for your answer, so here is my problem, the first image is when squall looks low quality (you can see the low detail in his face and in his jacket) , the second one is the one i want to see all the game , both pictures where taken on the Lagunamov , but the good quality image is just in that room of the Lagunamov. is it normal ? thanks again!

 

[FatedCourage]

A minor drawback, imo. I prefer having no glitches, while still getting a quality improvement

That's reassuring. I'll be sure to continue.

I 2nd that! Rebirth Flame is seriously my favorite mod thus far. I always hated how low poly
the characters looked, but with this, it's like a breath of fresh air.

Thanks. Everyone involved worked hard on this mod. Definitely will continue with the fields as well.

Thanks for your answer, so here is my problem, the first image is when squall looks low quality (you can see the low detail in his face and in his jacket) , the second one is the one i want to see all the game , both pictures where taken on the Lagunamov , but the good quality image is just in that room of the Lagunamov. is it normal ? thanks again!

Yup! That's all normal. That's just how the game is. The quality of textures/models change depending on the field. The other characters are affected as well. So all is good.

 

[Mcindus]

The reason this happens is because the UVs in the game are off.  It seems that everything is scaled too much and cuts off a pixel at the texture seams. this causes strange issues, and in the lower poly models, the issue is much more obvious.

There is a way to sloppy-fix this, but it would be much better for an overall UV patch for FF8 Steam

 

[neguer28]

That's reassuring. I'll be sure to continue.

Thanks. Everyone involved worked hard on this mod. Definitely will continue with the fields as well.

Yup! That's all normal. That's just how the game is. The quality of textures/models change depending on the field. The other characters are affected as well. So all is good.

Ok i understand! Thank you so much for your fast answer!

 

[neguer28]

The reason this happens is because the UVs in the game are off.  It seems that everything is scaled too much and cuts off a pixel at the texture seams. this causes strange issues, and in the lower poly models, the issue is much more obvious.

There is a way to sloppy-fix this, but it would be much better for an overall UV patch for FF8 Steam

Oh! I get it :/ ! Thank for your answer!  where can I find this patch?

 

[Kaldarasha]

Can't the model be changed trough Deling? I mean there must be model loader as for ff7 for every field.

 

[Nedus]

Small update: Fixed up Irvine's legs so they are more consistent. Added a few more hashcodes to the fray. One thing I forgot from the last update was that I changed Zell's face to the more serious look across all models for more consistency. I might reupscale a few textures later down the line, but I'll see.

On an unrelated note to this project... Some people are curious how the FF8 backgrounds would look with waifu. It is something I'm working on as well. Just a long and very, /very/ tedious project. So if you want to see, here is a video with some. I'll upload more as I continue with this and getting battle effects/magic upscaled and looking all pretty.

Raw screenshot from FatedCourage's video: (colors look a bit "washed out/filled with light", see the bottom black bars, because nowadays YouTube tends to do that)

Screenshot from my game:

I have the Project Eden mod installed and it does a fine job in refining most backgrounds i've seen (i've seen just the initial part of the game tho, and even found a couple of glitches; no big deal, i'm not complaining ofc, it looks amazing).
But i wonder: is there something wrong with my Project Eden installation, or, are the differences in the 2 screenshots normal? Is all thanks to waifu? If that's the case, wow, so looking forward to that.
Really nice improvement. Great job!

 

[EQ2Alyza]

Your installation is fine. That's the noticeable difference using waifu. It's a really good filter.

 

[Mirrorman95]

Yes, waifu is generally better-looking than Project Eden, but upon closer inspection, many of the areas of Nedus's game are still pixelated, like the up arrow sign. A fully functional installation of Eden would at least make it look better than the original game, so something else is wrong here, whether it's the texture folders or the hashmaps or some other third thing.

 

[Nedus]

Yes, waifu is generally better-looking than Project Eden, but upon closer inspection, many of the areas of Nedus's game are still pixelated, like the up arrow sign. A fully functional installation of Eden would at least make it look better than the original game, so something else is wrong here, whether it's the texture folders or the hashmaps or some other third thing.

Here's my game with and without Project Eden:

Spoiler

So, it is definitely doing its job. But yeah, i got some pixelations here and there but i thought that was normal. Now you're making me doubt.
EDIT: I just realized this is mostly Project Eden-related. I'll go post in the appropriate thread. Sorry for the unintentional off topic, but the news about this waifu stuff were very interesting.