Been a long time!

It's been so long since there was anything to update. So long that
there's a certain NIF to it!

Hey who moved this barrier!!!

Progress update

So just a little progress update.

Things have stalled a little as I've changed jobs and currently don't have much free time to work on none work projects. But I will still get there!

Vertex data extraction

Still making progress on automated model extraction.

So far automated vertex extraction is pretty much finished.

Here's some vertex data pulled from the Character section of the game files.

And here's some vertex data extracted from the level files as the format is luckily the same.

You can clearly see there is a model lurking in there :)

The next challenge is getting the face data that goes along with these so that you can see the actual models properly. This is about 50% done.

After that is working then it's onto automated rebuilding of the game files from extracted data and then we can start trying to modify the models!

More modding progress

So a few things have moved on:

Shaders fix for A Dangerous Voyage

I've published the shaders fix for A Dangerous Voyage as a Vortex mod here to make it easier for everyone to apply.

Windowed mode

I've also got DCoTEHook now reading the <WinWindowed>0</WinWindowed> xml setting and hooking Direct3D so that the game now runs windowed if that is set to 1. This makes testing things in the game much easier!

You can either change the xml yourself or there will be a Vortex mod to do it for you.

This will be published soon in the next version of the DCoTEHook mod once I've wrapped some other things up.

Model extraction

I needed some help getting started with extracting the character models. I'd managed to work out roughly where they were in the games files so went to the experts over on XeNTaX Game Research Forum. User shakotay2 managed to show me a tool and an example model extract to get me heading in the right direction so hopefully I can make some progress now.

Injecting XML into the Steam version

So using DCoTEHook I've managed to get the Steam version of the game loading in modified xml settings.

This means access to the debug menu, reach arm, picking start level etc for people who bought the game on Steam.

Hopefully this will also allow introducing the GOG fixes to fps that will fix the scripting issues.

At the moment I had to modify C:\Steam\steamapps\common\Call of Cthulhu\install.vdf to point to the Hook instead of the main executable which whilst not ideal from a Vortex modding point of view will do for now.

EDIT: Thanks to advice from the Nexus Mods forum I've now worked out that you just need to set an env var of SteamAppId=22340 when launching the Steam exe to not have to change install.vdf. The updated 0.4 hook has now been uploaded and awaiting approval.

So next task is getting DCoTEHook to load patch files to patch the exe on startup.