TRViewer: How to proper replace TR3 Meshes

[GiovanniLucca]

Hi Folks that is much more experient than me in this Modding TR trend.

I'm wanting to do a simple thing. Just replace the Lara's meshes on TR3 for the TR3 remaster...

I read all the internet about this topic, and it seems so simple, that's why I'm wrinting on here. Because nothing works for me and for sure I'm doing something wrong... Here's the deal.

I modeled the upper body of Lara, I made some UVs respecting the filosophy of each polgon is a texture. I've optimize the texture for use less tiles as possible. Then I exported to .3ds file format from meta, and when I import on TRViewer ALWAYS give me this error, no matter what I do. I tried to export from blender, even from 3DS Max that I downloaded just for this, and nothing seems to work... The only thing I see is the vertex poins, but no polygons...



I also tried other apps like WadTool, from there I see the model imported from meta, but the scale is huge and the rotation is a bit off place... and when I tried to save, it doesnt save to the jungle.tr2 file to replace the mesh... The only option is Was2 but how can I import this mesh to .tr2?

Sorry If my questions is so noob, But I'm struggling with this for days, and it is so frustrating...

Can someone with a good soul and a spare time point me in the right direction? Please?

Some extra details:
My texture is 256x256 i .tga format, I also tried with .bmp file... don't work too... On WadTool, I tried import from other formats like, .mqo .blender .fbx .obj nothing works, always giving me this error:



I aldo tried on StrPix3 but in the movables mesh doesn't apper all the Lara's body parts, I just found the legs

I'm so willing to improve the character model, since the graphics of the TR3 remaster is getting so good and Lara is really out of place with the actual model...

If someone want to see my files (all formats .obj, .blend, .mqo) to see if there1s something wrong, you can download here

Hope you guys can help me with that!

[ReH_]

Hello, i believe the problem of this model of yours is the scale proportions.
I was able to open the .mqo file in StrPix3 (btw the legs you are seeing it's Lara, but only the animations. The skin is stored in another slot called "Lara_skin" you should select this if you want to change Lara's skin in TR4)
Here's what u can do:
re-scale this model (it's really BIG ) and try to import again in Trviewer.
If the problem remains, you can try editing a wad file in StrPix3 import the mqo mesh and build a .TR4 file. Then open this .TR4 in Trviewer, export the mesh and import again in a .TR2 file

Hope it helps.

EDIT:
Here's a re-scaled mqo to open in StrPix3:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1kY...gszDNAMqaipuzZ

[GiovanniLucca]

Thank you for your help!

Indeed the mesh was too large.
But unfortunatly I have the same issues with TRViewer / WasTool and StrPix3 the mesh doesn't import correctly no matter what I do.

Fortunatly I manage to proper import the mesh on PixStr using Dxf file format!

I can't believe that after so many days of frustration I manage to make it work!

Now I have a new question:

TRTexTur allows to add/edit the textures pages of the level. The problem is that this program only allow 64x64 pixels tiles. Is there any way where I can optimize the texture table of the new meshes using smaller tiles? 32x32 or 64x32 and so on?

I came across one app called Texture Editing Studio 1.8 that seems to do that, but it doesn't work on windows 10 (error: tabctl32.ocx not registred).

Edit: This program doesn't allow creat texture tiles smaller than 64pixels too. :/

So the question is?

How do I create custom texture pages using tiles smaller than 64x64 allowed by the app TRtextur?

Thank you in advance!

Also moderators? How can I change the thread title to: HELP THREAD: How to customize Classic TR game's meshes?
I think it'll be a better title for help others with this tasks!

[mizuno_suisei]

Sorry to reply with no advice but, I'm very intrigued and would like to follow.

Also - TRF thread titles are not changable best bet is to edit the top of your original post if you want to deviate subject

[GiovanniLucca]

Originally Posted by GiovanniLucca

So the question is?

How do I create custom texture pages using tiles smaller than 64x64 allowed by the app TRtextur?

I just discovered a silly thing... on both programs PixStr and TRtextur you can define the size of the tile by holding shift and drag, and then on the main menu: Texture / Define Mouse Selected.

[TRJTA]

Originally Posted by GiovanniLucca

I just discovered a silly thing... on both programs PixStr and TRtextur you can define the size of the tile by holding shift and drag, and then on the main menu: Texture / Define Mouse Selected.

Yes that's one of 2 ways to do it. But I'm not sure you can be very precise this way. The tool Jack! Allows you to mathematically define the exact points of the texture tiles.

[Mokono]

Originally Posted by GiovanniLucca

If someone want to see my files (all formats .obj, .blend, .mqo) to see if there1s something wrong

Even though you already fixed your problem, i wanted to take a look. When i first wanted to import it, i got Erreur 3DS:1, so i opened it in Max and, like ReH_ said, the scale was off (smaller than the corner of a moveable box!), so i adjusted the scale to match Lara's torso and then exported it. Finally i renamed the texture file to match whatever TRViewer was looking for and voilà!

Link

What i don't get is why, in my case, the mesh was too small. Maybe it's because we're using different 3D editing programs? In any case, i support the motion for a change in titles since TRViewer will be deprecated by WadTool eventually and hopefully PixStr will be too (i hate the bloody thing).

[GiovanniLucca]

Originally Posted by Mokono

Even though you already fixed your problem, i wanted to take a look. When i first wanted to import it, i got Erreur 3DS:1, so i opened it in Max and, like ReH_ said, the scale was off (smaller than the corner of a moveable box!), so i adjusted the scale to match Lara's torso and then exported it. Finally i renamed the texture file to match whatever TRViewer was looking for and voilà!

Link

What i don't get is why, in my case, the mesh was too small. Maybe it's because we're using different 3D editing programs? In any case, i support the motion for a change in titles since TRViewer will be deprecated by WadTool eventually and hopefully PixStr will be too (i hate the bloody thing).

Yes, I assume the problem was due the way different softwares handle the files? changing scale, cordinates and so on...

I'm using Blender (I'm a blender nerd). I found a solution to the problem.

I'll describe here in case someone want to mod TR meshes:

And for my workflow is:

1- Export the mesh from PixStr

2- import on blender and made a new mash with same proportions

3- scale the mesh by 0.1 and rotate on 90 on X axis.

4- Export as an .obj file (because blender 2.8 doesn't have a proper .dxf exporter)

5- Open the .obj file in Metasequoia and export as a .dxf

6- Import the mesh in PixStr

7- Deal with the pain that is retexture the mesh.

If anyone had a better workflow for this, please let me know!

WadTool doesn't worked for me, because it doesn't save a .tr2 file neither a .wad... And I had a lot of troubles to import all file formats there... Nothing work correctly.

I'll use the oportunity to ask one more question:

If I import meshes with a medium number of polygons (not much more than the original) it work fine without any glitches... But If I mod a bunch of meshes, like a plant, a trunk and some Lara's meshes, the game goes crazy sometimes and make some polygons flicker and disapear... on the level itself, and on the meshes...

This is a limitation of the engine?
There's a work around for it?
I'm whilling to deal with this even If I had to edit some hex numbers on the .exe... perhaps??

I really want to improve Lara's mesh on the remaster, She look's really out of place with all the improvements on the environment. But infortunatly, I'm just being abble to modify some of the static meshes (not all of them) due to this problem....

I'll be very pleased to read something positive about this in the post bellow!

[CelticGuard]

Originally Posted by GiovanniLucca

If anyone had a better workflow for this, please let me know!

You might find it a lot easier to just export/import *.3ds models using TRViewer. You still need to stay within the limits of the engine, and your textures can't be greater than 256×256, but it's a lot faster. ��

Originally Posted by GiovanniLucca

7- Deal with the pain that is retexture the mesh.

You also get to use fully UV-mapped objects if you use this method.

Blender should be able to import and export *.3ds files, but personally I've used a registered version of Metasequoia which imports/exports with ease. It's been a while since I last did this but I'm happy to help.

edit: I just noticed you did try using 3ds export. Not sure why it didn't work for you, but I'll take a stab at it myself

[GiovanniLucca]

Originally Posted by CelticGuard

Blender should be able to import and export *.3ds files

Unfortunatly Blender 2.8 doesn't have a native support for .3ds and the addon for it doesn't work correctly... Everytime I tried to import a .3ds from blender on TR mod tools it doesn't work

Originally Posted by CelticGuard

You also get to use fully UV-mapped objects if you use this method.

WHATT wait! Are you saying that I can use proper UV mapped meshes and then use a proper design texture for it without the need of the limitation of texture tiles?

Something like this would work?




Just asking... I don't think it is possible anyway... It would be too good to be true.

Anyway...

Another question:

I do UV unwrap the meshes using a grid of 32pixels (most of the time) per polygon. The question is, theres anyway that I can import the mesh to the game already textured following the uv map? I mean, everytime that I import something I have to manually assign (and sometimes rotate) the texture to each polygon.