Texture Format + Usage

[Pooka]

Can anyone tell me what texture format you use for hands.dds, the player model hands? I saved it as a DX1 with no alpha and it seems to work fine, but I don't know if that's completely correct.

While I'm on the subject, how do I distribute the changed hands to be used in my custom story?

[Bek]

If you don't need alpha wouldn't dx1 be fine? if not dtx5 I think if alpha is used for specular or something.

[Pooka]

Oh man, I haven't done this in a long time. I forgot you can just open the file in notepad and look for the format. Looks like DXT1, I still dunno if it's supposed to have alpha or not.

Still need help on how to direct the custom story to use new textures though.

[Tottel]

You need alpha if you have transparancy in your image. Which I don't think you have for the hands, so no.

[Pooka]

Sorry to add on to that, but in addition to my question on how you distribute a custom story with new textures, can someone tell me how to distribute a custom main menu level screen in a custom story?

I've read the tutorial on how to make them but it only shows that you must edit main files to get it to show. Hopefully there is a mod friendly way to do this instead?

[Frontcannon]

I don't think that a custom story (at least how they are worked into the game structure now) can and should be able to alter the menu screen map.
What if the player wants the old map back? He shouldn't have to delete your custom story for that.

[Pooka]

I don't think that a custom story (at least how they are worked into the game structure now) can and should be able to alter the menu screen map.
What if the player wants the old map back? He shouldn't have to delete your custom story for that.

They would simply need to hit refresh cache in the steam browser. It really doesn't matter, that wasn't my important question. I only need an answer on the hands.dds.

[Pooka]

Right, so. It looks like this game is much like the last one I modded for: Figure this damn stuff out yourself.

Important information below:

I couldn't find any way to take a custom story and get it to overwrite current textures and models. There may be a way, but this place isn't talking. I had to turn to the dreaded "Full Conversion" that is scarcely documented and even broken for Steam users.

Basically, you follow the Full Conversion method barely outlined here: http://wiki.frictionalgames.com/hpl2/amnesia/full_conv

Then, you have to build off that. Once you get the game to launch off of YOUR main_init.cfg, stuff becomes a lot easier. You can have the game launch with any name you want, have a new title screen (Which a poster above, correctly said, a custom story alone is incapable of), and all sorts of fun stuff.

I was especially eager to redirect my main_init to a new resources.cfg file so that I could specify my own hand textures.

<ConfigFiles
Resources = "my_mod/resources.cfg"
Materials = "materials.cfg"

Then, in YOUR new resources.cfg, you reroute the game's search patterns to YOUR mod directory:

<Resources>
<Directory Path="/_temp" AddSubDirs="true" />
<Directory Path="/fonts" AddSubDirs="false" />
<Directory Path="/maps" AddSubDirs="true" />
<Directory Path="/textures" AddSubDirs="true" />
<Directory Path="/my_mod/models" AddSubDirs="true" />

You then create that directory in your mod folder with your modified textures and voila, you have your own textures without modifying the core game.

PROBLEMS: The game doesn't seem to want to recognize my maps for the purpose of being the main story. If you try to press "Start new Game" with a custom map, the game will crash, stating the map doesn't exist. This is even after I have triple checked that the directory search is just right. No Luck.

Right now the workaround is that my story still has to be a custom story, but it is built in a modded frame anyway.

[Bek]

You need alpha if you have transparancy in your image. Which I don't think you have for the hands, so no.

alpha has a lot more uses than just transparency

As for the dtx1 thing pretty sure it doesn't support alpha channel anyway.