High res graphics

[snydley]

Are there any high-resolution graphic patches like there are for SS and SS2 for Terra Nova?
I finished those 2 games, and found a copy of Terra Nova on Amazon for $2.50,
but after playing those 2 games with the patches I find the stock TN graphics
terrible. Are there any for it?
Thanks

[Shadowcat]

Sadly no. Make sure you're running in 320x400 rather than 320x200, though. And take note that your settings are only remembered in saved games, so if you're not loading a saved game when you start up, you need to go back to the options screen ('o' at any time). Also note that you must manually select the best terrain setting (it doesn't make a lot of difference, but there's no reason not to use it).

You'll get used to the graphics. I've just been playing the game again myself the past few days, and I still think the scenery can look amazing. You just need to apply a bit of a mental filter...

[snydley]

Sadly no. Make sure you're running in 320x400 rather than 320x200, though. And take note that your settings are only remembered in saved games, so if you're not loading a saved game when you start up, you need to go back to the options screen ('o' at any time). Also note that you must manually select the best terrain setting (it doesn't make a lot of difference, but there's no reason not to use it).

You'll get used to the graphics. I've just been playing the game again myself the past few days, and I still think the scenery can look amazing. You just need to apply a bit of a mental filter...

'Fraid my filter's old and dirty and doesn't work that well. After playing SS and SS2 Terra Nova graphics don't cut it with me. I really liked those 2 games. Is there anything else out there like those 2, anything you can recommend?

[snydley]

Sadly no. Make sure you're running in 320x400 rather than 320x200, though. And take note that your settings are only remembered in saved games, so if you're not loading a saved game when you start up, you need to go back to the options screen ('o' at any time). Also note that you must manually select the best terrain setting (it doesn't make a lot of difference, but there's no reason not to use it).

You'll get used to the graphics. I've just been playing the game again myself the past few days, and I still think the scenery can look amazing. You just need to apply a bit of a mental filter...

What program was used to remake the graphics in SS2, any idea? Is it freely available? I wonder if it could be used to remake Terra Nova. Heck, I've got alot of time on my hands,(famous last words), I'd take a stab at redoing them if the tools were available free.

[jtr7]

Ever heard of ShockEd or DromEd? SS2 and the earlier Thief games used the Dark Engine. ShockEd and DromEd are the editors and there's a decade's worth of wisdom to tap.

http://www.ttlg.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=103

Read the FAQ there, and take all that free time to brush up!

[Renault]

Ever heard of ShockEd or DromEd? SS2 and the earlier Thief games used the Dark Engine. ShockEd and DromEd are the editors and there's a decade's worth of wisdom to tap.

Yes, but he's talking about graphical upgrades. Dromed/Shocked are level editors, not graphics editors.

[Shadowcat]

There are indeed tools to manipulate the Terra Nova data formats, but I am quite unsure of your expectations.

You cannot possibly change the screen resolution that the game runs at this way, which seemed to be your main issue. Nor do I think you could increase any of the texture resolutions.

You could likely replace textures with other textures, provided they were of the same resolution and used the same colour palette, but I am very doubtful that you would consider the results of such an effort to constitute any sort of improvement over the current graphical quality of the game.

The best efforts made in the realms of Terra Nova editing (primarily the work of Jörg Fischer and Gigaquad, and most excellent work it is too) can nowadays be found collected here:
http://terranova.110mb.com/files.html
(Note to self: We really need to get this stuff mirrored here at TTLG)

It won't exactly be trivial to use, but check it out, and if it doesn't scare you away then I encourage you (and anyone) to dive in and see what you can make with it :)

[d'Spair]

Wow, oh yes. Thanks for the link Shadowcat!

[Gigaquad]

Terra Nova's landscapes are still very nice, but the low resolution and small textures (there's a reson for this), although great in 1996, just haven't aged as well as SS1. However, inspired by this thread and ToxicFrog's high-resolution patch for SS1, I opened the exe file in a hex editor. At offset 0x1BB298, there are resolution tables like this one:

(1)	(2)	(3)			 	 (1)   (2)	(3)
40 01	C8 00	08	01 00 00 0D 00 00 00 	 320 x 200	Bits/pixel
40 01	F0 00	08	01 00 00 0E 00 00 00 	 320 x 240		
40 01	90 01	08	01 00 00 0F 00 00 00 	 320 x 400
68 01	C8 00	08	01 00 00 10 00 00 00 	 360 x 200
68 01	F0 00	08	01 00 00 11 00 00 00 	 360 x 240
68 01	90 01	08	01 00 00 12 00 00 00 	 360 x 400
80 02	5E 01	08	01 00 00 13 00 00 00 	 640 x 350
80 02	90 01	08	01 00 00 14 00 00 00 	 640 x 400
80 02	E0 01	08	01 00 00 15 00 00 00 	 640 x 480
20 03	58 02	08	01 00 00 16 00 00 00 	 800 x 600
00 04	00 03	08	01 00 00 17 00 00 00 	1024 x 768
00 05	00 04	08	01 00 00 18 00 00 00 	1280 x 1024
40 06	B0 04	08	01 00 00 19 00 00 00 	1600 x 1200

Changing the normal 320 x 400 to higher values produces mostly garbage, but "640 x 400" looks just like 320 x 400, even with every other line missing. I got the HUD to scale properly by copying the low-res HUD files over the high-res ones. The code to actually change video mode is somewhere else, but that's probably beyond my skills.

EDIT:
0xB842F, 0xB8440:
Screen width, height? (affects ctrl-x dialog position, mouse wrapping).

[Shadowcat]

Very cool :)

[ZylonBane]

What program was used to remake the graphics in SS2, any idea? Is it freely available?

There is no program with a magic "Remake Graphics" button. SS2 takes standard GIF, PCX, and TGA image files for its texture maps. You can use any paint program to make these.

[Dash]

Gigaquad what hex editor did you use to open the Terra Nova exe? I don't have much experience with these programs, so have little idea what works best. Thanks!

[Gigaquad]

xvi32

[Dash]

Thanks again. I managed to locate your stated offset [I presume $1BB298 is the same thing]. However how did you access the resolution tables from then on? All I see are duplicated alphabetic letters in the corresponding text mode box. I'm clearly looking in the wrong place, can you point me in the right direction?

[Gigaquad]

You are at the right offset. Resize the window (width) until the data aligns or copy to a text editor to edit. I use the Terminal font, that way zeroes are invisible and patterns are easy to see.

40 01 = 0140 hex = 320
C8 00 = 00C8 hex = 200

[justalookingglfn]

Is there any way to modify the original engine so it can allow larger memory sizes for textures and even maybe hardware accelaration ?

I know its one thing asking and another doing it but many old engines were modified like the doomed engine with full d3d support or the build engine with the new jonof engine so it is possible

[Shadowcat]

I recommend reading up about "source ports".

New engines for those games were made possible because the actual source code that the original games were generated from was released to the public.

No source code is available for Terra Nova, or any of Looking Glass' games.

That doesn't mean it's "impossible", but without source code the amount of time and effort involved would surely be absolutely prohibitive.

[justalookingglfn]

Is there any possibility to ask for a source code from the original developers of the game ? Yeah i know its pretty hard as the company was closed ages ago but...from time to time i remember some actual developers were visiting these forums and posting helping posts to make many old games playable....
I don't know if there are actually left any source codes but i don't think it would hurt asking.

Also in any case you probably all know about moddb and that there are some amazing mods/total conversions/remakes covered in that page.Maybe making a terranova page there and posting about making a engine mod/remake and a graphics update would attract the help of many many talented people !! If you still care about this game and i am know you do lets give it a shot...