Arx Fatalis Final Patch and Source Code Released!

[Fintilgin]

Wow, I haven't posted at TTLG in ages.

With the news of the new patch though, I thought I might replay this.

Is there a way to make the UI scale up? I think it used to do this. I'm playing at 1680x1050 and it's really small. I have to imagine at higher resolutions the inventory would be nearly unplayably microscopic.

I looked in the .ini but didn't see an option. Is there a console command or other method of making the UI scale larger?

[Aisis]

Will it be possible to create texture replacers for Arx with the source codes? I really love it, but the graphics do show the age of the game and a good texture replacer can create true miracles (you just have to look at Morrowind, Oblivion or Thief DS to see that). I also wonder, if there are any limitations to the texture resolution and quality...

[addink]

If there are any size limitations (I don't think there are), they should be configurable using the released source code.

But just increasing the texture sizes won't change the way world is shaded and textured. Modern engines allow for a number of textures blended together for various levels of detail and various lighting/reflection/displacement effects. IIRC Arx features only single textures combined with an optional bump map. Extending the renderer to allow for more texture layers and effects won't do much unless the new features are defined/embedded within the world itself. Adding those is a huge task (and even harder since there's -as yet- no editor available).

What might be feasible without requiring a serious overhaul of the world, is converting the engine to use HDR and add a number of post effects.

[Ziusudra]

Using just ArxPak I was able to replace Kultar's textures with ones with 4x the dimensions without issues. So it was already possible.

[Shadowcat]

In short, anything is possible with the source code available, but not everything is practical (assuming that anyone playing with the code will be doing so on a strictly part-time basis, and without the benefit of a QA department).

[Aisis]

Thanks for the answers.

Using just ArxPak I was able to replace Kultar's textures with ones with 4x the dimensions without issues. So it was already possible.

How did you do that?

Base textures with higher resolution would be plenty for me. Good bump maps could do too, depending on whether they are used on all (or at least all enviroment/static) models. I somehow managed to dig out the ArxPak, but didn't have a chance to test it yet. I'll have to instal the game once again before that. Do I need anything more? Some advices maybe?

[Ziusudra]

Once you have the game installed start ArxPak, it will find the game folder on it's own.

You can either extract everything to where ever you want by right clicking anywhere on the tree view. Or you can extract a single file by double clicking it, which will put it in the appropriate place in the game folder and open it in the default app.

Textures are in graph\obj3d\textures; be sure to keep their dimensions as powers of 2.

Files in the appropriate place in the game folder will be used by the game instead of the original ones in the pak files. ArxPak doesn't appear to allow saving textures into the pak files. (Though it appears to for scripts, I haven't tested it.)

[Aisis]

Thank you, I did as adviced and alredy made some quick retextures to see how it works.

And I also already encoutered a problem - for some unknown reason my hero character textures won't work. They are bmp files and some others I made for the game, also in bpm format work just fine. With one setting the game instantly crashes, although the size and resolution of the bmp are the same as the original. The other settings I tried doesn't crash the game, but the texture is invisible and that thing kind of beats the purpose. No idea what I am doing wrong.

Just somethig random I have made. It's only a shame, that the HUD can't use bigger textures right away. (By the way, there is a new water texture too, but it's hard to see.)

HUD - old bubbles
HUD - new bubbles

EDIT: A tiny addition, comparison shot.

Comparison - water and HUD

BTW, does anyone know, what kind of format the objects and NPCs are? I could only find FTL format files with the Arx Pak utility. I tried to google for FTP, but nothing sensible came out of it. Anyway, it doesn't seem like something Blender could export as.

[Stingm]

Well I got a chance to play 1.21 a bit. I have gotten as far as the search for the rings used to destroy the rock/meteror. The level ups are less frequent now making a few fights harder. But the biggest difference I can see so far is in the temple accessed through the tavern. The mummy/lich there is near invulnerable now. I used to beat it with a bit of trouble. Now it makes 1 hit kills and totaly annilates you. Anyone else notice this?

I plan to come back and try again after a few more level ups as the previous patch had me at a higher level by this time. The only other thing I noticed is little bursts of speed at different times. They are few and far between and don't hurt anything yet..lol All in all the patch is pretty good.

[Acleacius]

Can someone link a version of ArxPak or similar proggy which works with 121 version, please?

I'm currently using version 5.06 and getting an error every time I try open a game/graph/levels/fast.fts.
Access Violation at address 004B8092 in module 'ArxPak.exe'. Read of address 00000008.

Thanks for any tips, links or help.

[Ziusudra]

508 Virus Total says it's clean. This is the version I use on XP SP3.

Edit: FYI, I just tried and get the same error with 0.5.0.6 and 0.5.0.5.

[Bones]

Thank you, I did as adviced and alredy made some quick retextures to see how it works.

And I also already encoutered a problem - for some unknown reason my hero character textures won't work. They are bmp files and some others I made for the game, also in bpm format work just fine. With one setting the game instantly crashes, although the size and resolution of the bmp are the same as the original. The other settings I tried doesn't crash the game, but the texture is invisible and that thing kind of beats the purpose. No idea what I am doing wrong.

Just somethig random I have made. It's only a shame, that the HUD can't use bigger textures right away. (By the way, there is a new water texture too, but it's hard to see.)

HUD - old bubbles
HUD - new bubbles

EDIT: A tiny addition, comparison shot.

Comparison - water and HUD

BTW, does anyone know, what kind of format the objects and NPCs are? I could only find FTL format files with the Arx Pak utility. I tried to google for FTP, but nothing sensible came out of it. Anyway, it doesn't seem like something Blender could export as.

Could you make a download link to the bubbles, kind sir?

[KoHaN69]

This is great news, I can (hopefully) finally continue on in the game and beatdown some of the errors I was getting.

One question - why now? A prelude to an Arx 2 announcement? Is it a coincidence that Digi just got a job working on a new title for Arkane? Hmmm...

(sorry, that's actually 3 questions).

Because they were acquired by Zenimax (Bethesda) and had the legal ok to do it.

Most devs would love to release their source code. They are honored that there are still active fans of their earlier work, the problem is that in the traditional game industry model, the publisher hold the legal right to nearly fucking everything.