Off Topic Productions

By the way...

That Deus Ex Extractor and Decompiler is a fucking menace. Just now I wanted to extract some textures and I chose the target folder as the root of my Deus Ex installation, without realising that it erases the folder you extract into first. Not only would I have lost the replaceable Deus Ex files themselves, but all my textures, meshes, sounds and classes i.e. several weeks of work (and if I hadn't only started modding DX recently, potentially months' or years' worth). I would have put my fist through the monitor if 'twere not for the judicious use of a file recovery application, which seems to have brought the most important stuff back from the brink.

Whilst this has impressed upon me the importance of backing up; what is the point of it, and why doesn't it warn you first?!

I don't think I can stomach any more modding tonight, I'm going to go to bed and relax my shattered nerves...

I use the WOTGreal program. Don't know why anything other than it would be used for extracting items from packages. I'm not sure, but I think "deed" is one of the programs which converts unreal models to deusex, and that is why it is included in the editing pack.

Because WOTgreal couldn't find what I was looking for. I was trying to find 'Effects.Fire.Proj_PRifle' as referenced in DeusEx.PlasmaBolt, but WOTgreal couldn't see it in Effects.utx and I was wondering whether it was hidden in some fashion.

At least this is as far as I can remember from last night, I think the shock of seeing all my work instantly deleted wiped what I was trying to do from my memory.

Most of the effects textures are procedural (certainly all the fire effects are), and thus cannot be exported (there's no actual texture to export). Which'd be why wotgreal wasn't finding them.

That certainly would be why. Where would I find the code, then?

Um..what are you trying to do, exactly?

Procedural (animated) textures are something you either take from the package as is (i.e. reference them within the code, the game finds them at runtime), or something you make yourself, and then take from the package as you made them (referenced within the code as above).

So for instance, the plasma rifle's import code assigns the plasma rifle procedural texture to the plasma plumes and stuff, so that when viewed in the editor or in-game, the weapon has that procedural texture. You can't export that texture and view it in another program, however, as the texture itself is generated by the game engine, dynamically, every time.

I don't understand your first paragraph.

"What are you trying to do, exactly"?

It'd help if I knew what you were trying to achieve, so I could suggest the best way of doing it. Chances are a lot of the stuff you're doing (and the problems you're encountering) have been done (and encountered) before, so I was hoping I'd save you some time, but since I don't know why you'd want to extract the Proj_PRifle texture, I'm a bit at a loss.

AdamM wrote:That certainly would be why. Where would I find the code, then?

If your asking what I think then, effect textures in effects.utx are all created in the editor when you create a new texture you can just have effects (like the fire textures or electricity effects) or put effects on a already imported texture (as in nanosword blade wavy texture) add effects to it like you see there and therefore the textures have no code as such (just generated code in the utx file when the effect texture is created and saved). All you can do is if you want to use one is use it like you would any other texture, you cannot export them, just make new effect textures yourself if you wish.

AdamM wrote:I was trying to find 'Effects.Fire.Proj_PRifle' as referenced in DeusEx.PlasmaBolt, but WOTgreal couldn't see it in Effects.utx

I guess that's what he's trying to do.
Recompiling Plasmabolt (or creating a similar projectile class)

Well, all you need to do is add this on top of your file:

HOPE THAT'S IT :$

Yes, I realise that's what he was trying to do in the simplest definition of the question, but as I explained: that particular task is impossible because the texture does not exist in exportable form. I was more interested in WHY he'd want to find/export that texture.

After all, if you're recompiling plasmabolt you should have no problems, since it just uses a mesh that's already imported and textured.

If you're reimporting the mesh, then you should have no problems, since the code for loading the textures is already in the mesh import code, and unless you've C&P'd badly it should be fine.

It's just impossible to effectively offer constructive help without more information. I mean, we could blurt out random, possibly-related factoids (and god knows we appear to be trying), but it'd be hit 'n miss as to whether this would actually solve the problem (whatever it may be).

Still very confused. Both DLL's and Morpheus' explanations are quite unclear.

Morpheus wrote:effect textures in effects.utx are all created in the editor

Oh. So you can only use UnrealEd to make procedural textures?

therefore the textures have no code as such (just generated code in the utx file when the effect texture is created and saved). All you can do is if you want to use one is use it like you would any other texture, you cannot export them, just make new effect textures yourself if you wish.

So... so the already existing procedural textures cannot be exported or edited in any form... so that Effects.utx is undecompilable? I, you, and everyone else have no way of knowing how Ion Storm made Effects.Fire.Proj_PRifle?

DDL wrote:I was more interested in WHY he'd want to find/export that texture.

If someone is trying to export an asset it's generally because they want to use it for themselves. Of course if it can't be exported or edited I'm out of luck, aren't I? If you just explain the concepts to me then I can figure out how to solve the problem (and prevent any future problems) myself. As I currently understand it, the textures are generated on-the-fly but the code that generates them is 'locked' in Effects.utx. Is this not the case?

Right.

As morpheus says, the procedural textures in unreal come in two flavours, those that are generated entirely in the game (fire, plasma etc) and those that are generated by applying a distortion to an underlying base texture (most of the water effects).

You'll note that effects.utx contains two ostensibly identical water textures: one is the base, the other is the actual procedural texture that uses the former as its base.

The base textures CAN be exported, because they are textures. The procedural textures cannot, because they're technically not textures at all, they're a series of instructions to the game engine as to how to apply distortions/generate patters at runtime.

You CAN however make and modify procedural textures, but only within the editor.
Backup your effects.utx, and have a play.

Open up the editor, select one of the effects textures, rightclick, edit.

The texture is in a box, and the instructions are in the big properties window. For, say, ambrosia_SFX, under firepaint, there are a lot of variables, which control how the effects move on the final generated texture. You can change these: some will alter the texture immediately, some won't. Note that there is a button labelled 'clear' next to the actual texture: hitting this will wipe the texture. Now clicking/drawing on the texture box itself will draw new texture effects, based on the texture properties chosen under firepaint.

You can change the colour by selecting a palette under texture>>palette (there's a nice selection of palettes in palettes.utx).

Mess around, see what you can do.

Now note that all of this is generating properties and behaviour that only apply to this texture, within this game engine. The texture itself is inherently dependent on the game engine, so no, you can't 'decompile' effects.utx (and indeed why would you want to?). But then it's a .utx, not a .u, so technically you can't decompile it anyway: you'd just export all the assets instead.


Long story short, knowing how Ion Storm made Effects.Fire.Proj_PRifle is a matter of looking which property values they chose (freely viewable in the texture properties window, see above) and then having a play at clicking/drawing in the texture box and trying to work out how they did it. In this case, "clicking in the centre of the box a few times" would seem sufficient.

Also, for future reference:

If someone is trying to export an asset it's generally because they want to use it for themselves. Of course if it can't be exported or edited I'm out of luck, aren't I? If you just explain the concepts to me then I can figure out how to solve the problem (and prevent any future problems) myself.

This still isn't terribly helpful: use it for themselves..how? Use it for themselves in a DX mod? That's a piece of piss. Use it for themselves in a HalfLife mod? That's impossible. Use it for themselves in a render in 3dsmax? Also impossible.

I don't know whether you want to use the texture for another model in DX (in which case there are MUCH better ways to do this), or to make an animated gif for a forum avatar, or to wallpaper your desktop, and not knowing these things, I am reluctant to spend two hours explaining the intricacies of procedural texturing w.r.t. the unreal engine, especially if it's entirely unnecessary.

Thank you, that's much clearer.

Hey, if you don't want to explain it to me you don't have to. It's your prerogative how you choose to help. But I couldn't find any relevant information about how they work on these forums or elsewhere, so if your knowledge can be shared, what's the problem?