214 replies to this topic

[Povuholo]

-Objects with alpha sometimes show up as pure white if they are fogged, possibly they are being fogged by MW's vanilla fogging system?

Does this disappear if you turn Morrowind's character shadows off?

-Water shader seems to 'play faster' when the player is strafing, this is easiest to see at the edges. Might just be an optical illusion.

I noticed the same, the water appears to acts a little strange when you're moving.

[Knots]

@Puvuholo
That seems to have fixed it. Unfortunate to have to give up npc shadows altogether, though.

Certain objects with Alpha still have a blue 'frame' around the borders (the anomalies I mentioned). I think this is another fogging issue, as the color is similar to the blue you usually see in bright weather conditions.

@Hrnchamd
Your eye adaption shader seems to work (besides that there is that weird transparent grey bar thing I suspect has something to do with virtual eye dilation)

Honestly, the bloom/hdr in XE has never quite surpassed Phal's bloom/hdr shader for rev178. The eye dilation effect seemed perfect.

Edited by Knots, 25 November 2011 - 07:05 AM.

[JoelRader]

Im guessing this is one of those questions that gets asked a million times but what is the trick (if any) to getting fog back when using the fps optomizer? I mean that fog you get when using the view distance slider. It just looks a little odd when using MGE.

[Povuholo]

@Puvuholo
That seems to have fixed it. Unfortunate to have to give up npc shadows altogether, though.

I'd just go with a SSAO shader to fake some amount of shadows. Morrowind's shadows tend to have a noticeable impact on performance (more than SSAO on my PC it seems, when many NPCs are around) and they look terrible.

Edited by povuholo, 25 November 2011 - 10:27 AM.

[Vikart]

I can't use interior light sources because there are so many visible and invisible light sources in cells, it would be way too slow.

But you could use only some of them (static and most bright), like in Skyrim.

Edited by Vikart, 25 November 2011 - 10:39 AM.

[Povuholo]

But you could use only some of them, like in Skyrim.

But like in Skyrim that would probably require defining individual light sources in each cell that will cast shadows. At least I assume that's how it works, because which lights do and don't cast shadows is very inconsistent in Skyrim.

[Vikart]

But like in Skyrim that would probably require defining individual light sources in each cell that will cast shadows.

Maybe, through brightness and the radius of light: above the certain limit - casts a shadow

Edited by Vikart, 25 November 2011 - 10:46 AM.

[Turkeys]

I was wondering is that white bar supposed to pop up on the bottom left? Also, shadows look amazing

[Povuholo]

I was wondering is that white bar supposed to pop up on the bottom left?

Just noticed that as well. Seems to be an issue with the HDR shader.

[abot]

Just noticed that as well. Seems to be an issue with the HDR shader.

Thanks for the tip . For anybody interested, changing the line

if(tex.x < HDR.x && tex.y > 0.9) g = lerp(g, 1, 0.4);

in Eye Adaptation (HDR).fx to

//if(tex.x < HDR.x && tex.y > 0.9) g = lerp(g, 1, 0.4);

should do

[Hicks233]

0.9.1 is running great, took some fiddling with the distant land settings to get it just right but it's there now. Thank you for all your work on this.

Quick question. Is it possible to make use of the texture/mapping on the water that was present in MGE as in this screen and use it in 0.9.1?

http://postimage.org/image/chqn241sn/

[r.a.h]

Thanks for the tip . For anybody interested, changing the line

if(tex.x < HDR.x && tex.y > 0.9) g = lerp(g, 1, 0.4);

in Eye Adaptation (HDR).fx to

//if(tex.x < HDR.x && tex.y > 0.9) g = lerp(g, 1, 0.4);

should do

Thanks abot that fixed it! I think I could've figured that out myself even... I didn't realise the shader scripts were actually fairly comprehensible.

[papill6n]

Hrnchamd => please can you add the suport of the Hook textures in your MGE XE?
Because if this mod mod for example, which is amazing => Animated Morrowind Menu (16:10 Sepia)

[vurt]

Oh, a new version, cool

I find it funny that MGE XE is often more bug-free than the so called "stable" version of MGE, at least for my trees and groundcover mod.. I get emails from people every now and then saying that the trees doesnt render properly or that there's some strange phenomena with the groundcover mod. My standard reply has become "use MGE XE instead", seems to work every time and people are happy it looks even better than before.

Edit: this just in "Thank you! MGE XE fixed that weird grass bug"

Edited by vurt, 26 November 2011 - 08:41 AM.

[Turkeys]

Thanks for the tip . For anybody interested, changing the line

if(tex.x < HDR.x && tex.y > 0.9) g = lerp(g, 1, 0.4);

in Eye Adaptation (HDR).fx to

//if(tex.x < HDR.x && tex.y > 0.9) g = lerp(g, 1, 0.4);

should do

Thank you for the fix!

[samtam99]

Alternative combat controls still don't work correctly for me - whenever I try to execute a slash/chop attack (while standing still) I get the bash animation... the same happened with all the older version - I'm really puzzled as to why it has never worked properly in my game. Same with regular MGE, could never get those alt controls to work either.

Edited by samtam99, 26 November 2011 - 09:23 AM.

[JH2011]

I installed MGE XE 0.9 in two different games.

In my first game, heavily modded (lots of pluginless mods ~60 and plugin mods ~110), the FPS was atrocious (usually less than 8 in Seyda Neen) and quit.

My 2nd game is presenting more challenges. My intention was to install MGE XE in a relatively unmodded game (MCP, MPP) and add more mods later to see their effects on FPS.

So I installed MGE XE but did not select any shaders nor select the check box "use Distant Lands". I had successfully used MGE (stable version) this way in past games. When I started a new game, I got an MGE XE error message (below) and a gray screen. The game continued without interruption, just that I couldn't see anything other than input boxes and text printed by the game.

Any idea what's going on? I used MGE (the stable version) this way (no shaders, no distant land) without incident and am hoping to use MGE XE similarly. I know, that sort of defeats the reason for MGE or MGE XE, but I wanted the reported stability benefits - less frequent CTDs. Improved graphic quality is nice, but I'm still not sure how capable my pc is up to it. The games were test runs before starting a long game.

Thanks,

John

Spoiler

mobo - ASUS M4A89GTD-PRO/USB3
CPU - AMD Athlon II X3 440
graphics - ATI Radeon HD 4290 (on-board IC)
driver - 6.14.10.7050
O/S - WinXP, SP3

MGE XE 0.9.1
MWSE dll injected
>> CreateD3DWrapper
-- CreateD3DWrapper calling Direct3DCreate9
<< CreateD3DWrapper
>> D3D Proxy CreateDevice
-- D3D Proxy Factory OK
<< D3D Proxy CreateDevice
>> CreateInputWrapper
<< CreateInputWrapper
-- Proxy Keyboard OK
-- Proxy Mouse OK
>> HUD init
<< HUD init
>> Distant Land init
>> Distant Land init BSAs
>> Distant Land init shader
-- Shader compiled OK
-- Shadow map shader compiled OK
-- Depth shader compiled OK
>> Distant Land init post shaders
>> Post Process shader init
-- Shader chain indicates HDR Off
<< Post Process shader init
>> Distant Land init depth
>> Distant Land init shadow
>> Distant Land init water
>> Distant Land init world
>> Landscape Load
!! Could not load world texture for distant land
-- HUD release

[enderandrew]

I was under the impression that you couldn't use distant land generated by MGE with MGE XE. Have you re-generated distant land since switching?

[JH2011]

I was under the impression that you couldn't use distant land generated by MGE with MGE XE. Have you re-generated distant land since switching?

Perhaps confusing, but not relevant. I'm not. I'm using a newly cloned folder copied from a vanilla MW game installation that did not have mods; I keep the vanilla MW copy just for this purpose - to make copies.

in my earlier post, I forgot to specify that I'm using MGE XE 0.9.1.

John

Edit: Look, it's probably just that I am using the mod in a way that was not intended or expected.

I mention MGE because I could use MGE in the way I described without problems, because I did use MGE in countless games before now and because I have made the assumption that that could be done in MGE XE.

I see the toggles for "Enable Shaders" and for "Use Distant Land" (I have not selected either). I thought that if I don't select them, then MGE XE will not apply shaders and not generate distant lands graphics. FWIW, I did not toggle the generate Distant Lands button either because AFAICT, why? - if I'm not going to use them in the game and have set nothing up to generate statics, why does that impact the game. When I read the log message, it says cannot load World Texture for Distant Lands. That confuses me because I have not toggled the button "Use Distant Lands" but the log message would suggest that it's trying to build images based on Distant Lands.

Edited by JH2011, 26 November 2011 - 08:44 PM.

[JH2011]

Well, I tried some other things and got the game to load without the grey screen - essentially, I had to generate Distant Lands. Still don't understand why.

Even though I only have MCP 2.0 and MPP installed, with MGE XE running (shaders not enabled and Distant Land not in use), my FPS in Seyda Neen was consistently less than 10. When I experimented turning off MGE XE by way of the mgeui.exe, FPS in Seyda Neen jumped to between 40 to 60 FPS.

Is the ATI Radeon HD 4290 chip (onboard the mobo) truly that awful, or are there settings I can change to improve performance? I've looked at the SF MGE info but it hasn't sunk in much. Changing which settings give the best graphics enhancement with the least impact on FPS?

John

[Hrnchamd]

Spotted something interesting in my log after generating distant land.

I haven't really done much in the way of looking around so far, so I have no idea if it's affected anything.

I think it's to do with Darknut's GDR, his models have non-standard texture paths.

The only problem I have with MGE XE it the rendering of alpha (apparently). MGE XE cannot render properly texture/meshes using alpha: for example, trees or lava made by Vurt.

Do you need specific tests at the moment?

Please could you post some screenshots of the problem and your distant land settings.

Bug report, MGE XE 0.9.1
-Objects with alpha sometimes show up as pure white if they are fogged, possibly they are being fogged by MW's vanilla fogging system?
-Seems to be within the vanilla MW 'max draw' range, as they look fine at a distance so long as you are not too close, and don't look bad once you get 'close enough
-Reflections are sometimes subject to the same strange 'whiteness' but only at certain distances
-As with other versions of MGE XE, it is sometimes possible to see underneath landscape and objects from the water reflections; this has been made quite a bit more obvious by the introduction of waves
-Strange blue anomalies on some trees in distant land, but only from certain angles. Might not be blue, I apologize. I'm color blind. Looks blue to me.
-Water shader seems to 'play faster' when the player is strafing, this is easiest to see at the edges. Might just be an optical illusion.

Thanks for the report. I know there's a fog problem there still, but the easy fix seems to break interior fog colours. Still working out what's wrong. I'll also try to fix the reflection clipping.

Oh, a new version, cool

I find it funny that MGE XE is often more bug-free than the so called "stable" version of MGE, at least for my trees and groundcover mod.. I get emails from people every now and then saying that the trees doesnt render properly or that there's some strange phenomena with the groundcover mod. My standard reply has become "use MGE XE instead", seems to work every time and people are happy it looks even better than before.

Hey vurt!

Alternative combat controls still don't work correctly for me - whenever I try to execute a slash/chop attack (while standing still) I get the bash animation... the same happened with all the older version - I'm really puzzled as to why it has never worked properly in my game. Same with regular MGE, could never get those alt controls to work either.

Do you have "use best attack" turned on in Morrowind options? That will override which attack is input by MGE.

Edit: Look, it's probably just that I am using the mod in a way that was not intended or expected.

I mention MGE because I could use MGE in the way I described without problems, because I did use MGE in countless games before now and because I have made the assumption that that could be done in MGE XE.

I see the toggles for "Enable Shaders" and for "Use Distant Land" (I have not selected either). I thought that if I don't select them, then MGE XE will not apply shaders and not generate distant lands graphics. FWIW, I did not toggle the generate Distant Lands button either because AFAICT, why? - if I'm not going to use them in the game and have set nothing up to generate statics, why does that impact the game. When I read the log message, it says cannot load World Texture for Distant Lands. That confuses me because I have not toggled the button "Use Distant Lands" but the log message would suggest that it's trying to build images based on Distant Lands.

There are too many distinctions as to what things really mean to invent a new word for every new concept. The shaders in the log file are the technical (HLSL) ones used to render the land surface and distant statics, while the bloom, hdr, etc are post-process shaders, which are what people casually refer to. You can see there are no shader loaded entries in the post-process setup block. The distant land section isn't being rendered when you turn it off, but it would make the toggle distant land button unusable in game if the file didn't exist, so it errors early by default. Shadow casting and water reflections are also dependent on distant land, so it's non-trivial to have everything turn off smoothly.

At least distant land doesn't act as you would expect, though. I'll have to do something about that.

Your HD 4290 is somewhat underpowered. I'd advise draw distance 2.0, and turning off dynamic ripples, high quality fog, blur reflections, and set caustics to 0.

Edited by Hrnchamd, 27 November 2011 - 12:46 AM.

[RaveBlack]

I think it's to do with Darknut's GDR, his models have non-standard texture paths.

I don't use GDR, though. The textures are present in my textures file, but they're in .dds format. It's kind of odd that it tripped up on those three when everything else seemed to load perfectly for it.

[JH2011]

There are too many distinctions as to what things really mean to invent a new word for every new concept. The shaders in the log file are the technical (HLSL) ones used to render the land surface and distant statics, while the bloom, hdr, etc are post-process shaders, which are what people casually refer to. You can see there are no shader loaded entries in the post-process setup block. The distant land section isn't being rendered when you turn it off, but it would make the toggle distant land button unusable in game if the file didn't exist, so it errors early by default. Shadow casting and water reflections are also dependent on distant land, so it's non-trivial to have everything turn off smoothly.

At least distant land doesn't act as you would expect, though. I'll have to do something about that.

Your HD 4290 is somewhat underpowered. I'd advise draw distance 2.0, and turning off dynamic ripples, high quality fog, blur reflections, and set caustics to 0.

Thanks for the explanation, Hrnchamd. In spite of what my posts may suggest, I find your release much more friendly with the tool tips and instruction tab and that the package contains what's needed instead of requiring two different downloads. I also appreciate that you included the shaders that work with your version as part of the package. For someone such as myself, it makes it easier to use out of the box.

After installing and using MGE XE in the game, I was afraid that the GPU was underpowered. Well, can't do anything about that - tight budget. I'll give your suggestions a try and see how they turn out. I was floored by how signifcant a hit the FPS took. And that is before I even add mods to the game, some of which ISTR make a further hit on FPS.

John

Edit: P.S. - Welcome back

Edited by JH2011, 27 November 2011 - 02:40 AM.

[Silvist]

Heyo everyone,

I first off wanted to say I've always been a huge fan of MGE, and XE even more so. So thanks again for all the hard work Hrnchamd, and to everyone else to helped improve the quality of Morrowind (I see Vurt ;p). I just got tired of playing Skyrim, and switched back to Morriwind again. Was happy to see another update out, and seemed to work like a charm. Either case I got a really wierd glitch, its not game breaking, and I could just ignore it and play even with it. Its this little grey translucent bar that starts on the leftside of the screen, and slowly backs to the side till its as small as 1 inch. Here's a screen shot:

[img]http://i1106.photobucket.com/albums/h379/Silvist/Morrowind2011-11-2704-49-15-77.png[/img]

Any ideas? I really have no idea if this is related to MGE XE, but I didn't have it before. Thanks again!

*Edit* Wierd Turkey's method worked perfectly to fix this in notepad ++

//if(tex.x < HDR.x && tex.y > 0.9) g = lerp(g, 1, 0.4);

Seemed to fix it for me. Going to keep testing to make sure its not a random variable lol.

Edited by Silvist, 27 November 2011 - 08:28 AM.

[PAO_KILO]

MGE XE seems to be working fine here with one small issue..

i keep getting these errors every time that i start the game..

Failed to create shader Shaders\TexCoord_4_Offset_A.vso
Failed to create shader Shaders\TexCoord_4_Offset_A.vso
Failed to create shader Shaders\WC_TexCoordGen.vso
Failed to create shader Shaders\Faux_EMBM_Displace_2.pso
Unable to load pixelshader file : Shaders\Faux_EMBM_Displace_2.pso
Failed to create shader Shaders\FauxEMBM_Displace.vso
Unable to load vertexshader file: FauxEMBM_Displace.vso

i press cancel (yes to all)..

Morrowind is in a folder outside of Program Files, i'm using Windows 7 on a i5 2500k - HD6950 build.. (updated Directx too)

Morrowind GOTY with only Code Patch 2.0 installed..

Edited by P�O_KILO, 27 November 2011 - 07:33 PM.

[Dragon32]

MGE XE seems to be working fine here with one small issue..

i keep getting these errors every time that i start the game..

Failed to create shader Shaders\TexCoord_4_Offset_A.vso
Failed to create shader Shaders\TexCoord_4_Offset_A.vso
Failed to create shader Shaders\WC_TexCoordGen.vso
Failed to create shader Shaders\Faux_EMBM_Displace_2.pso
Unable to load pixelshader file : Shaders\Faux_EMBM_Displace_2.pso
Failed to create shader Shaders\FauxEMBM_Displace.vso
Unable to load vertexshader file: FauxEMBM_Displace.vso

i press cancel (yes to all)..

Morrowind is in a folder outside of Program Files, i'm using Windows 7 on a i5 2500k - HD6950 build.. (updated Directx too)

Morrowind GOTY with only Code Patch 2.0 installed..

Try this, from the Hardware & Software forum.

[PAO_KILO]

Try this, from the Hardware & Software forum.

tanks friend, it was a problem with permissions, even Morrowind being out of the Progam Files folder wasn't enough..

after i ticked run as adm the problems are now gone..

[da mage]

I figure this is the best place to ask.

Is it possible to get grass to appear in the distance on top of the distant land? It's getting really annoying watching the grass 'appear' as I walk along.


cheers,

[Apel]

Hey Hrnchamd.
Is it possible to create fog kind like this in MGE XE?

Edited by Apel, 28 November 2011 - 01:47 PM.

[JH2011]

Hrnchamd, just reporting some results. My GPU is just not up to even the suggested settings you gave. FPS improved marginally to around 10 FPS and the game looks great but still too much of a FPS hit to enjoy.

With MGE XE enabled but Distant Lands not in use, the game hanged when I made my first save game and then exited. I did not see anything in the log file indicating any abort nor did looking at the WinXP event log show any warning or error messages. I resumed the game from the saved game, exited without saving the game and had the same thing happen. However, when I started the saved game and wandered a few seconds more in Seyda Neen and did a new save game, the game exited without problem. Weird.


FYI - I am experiencing some quirkiness regarding screenshots. The in-game graphics look as one would expect; it's only the screenshot with MGE XE that looks strange.

With MGE XE in use but not Distant Lands, the game looks great but the screenshots are strange. Seyda Neen landscape with MGE XE Looks like Winter Wonderland

The screenshot elsewhere in Seyda Neen without MGE XE and Distant Lands running Seyda Neen without MGE XE

John

Edited by JH2011, 28 November 2011 - 02:28 PM.