Thief: DS 'Collective Texture Pack' released. - by John P.
ulbe001 on 24/5/2006 at 22:21
Quote Posted by John P.
My bandwidth limit for this month has been exceeded. I 'only' have 100GB a month. If you wait until June 1st., the site and link will be up again.
In other news, I'm going to make a 'patch' which will replace the wall textures that people aren't happy with, as mentioned in this thread. No ETA on that though, I'm afraid.
I have two or three mirrors avaliable to help you host the file; both FTP and HTTP. If you upped a torrent over at thepiratebay.org, mininova.org and gamestorrents.com or something, everyone could help out.
I'll PM you an FTP account, and post the links to the mirrors when I'm done.
ulbe001 on 25/5/2006 at 12:55
Aight; I'm seeding the installer over at piratebay on my private DSL-lines. No amazing speeds I'm afraid, but once we get the ball rolling it'll pick up quickly. So get over there and help me seed people!
(
http://thepiratebay.org/details.php?id=3489133)
If you haven't got a bittorrent client yet, go get Azureus over at (
http://azureus.sourceforge.net/) (it's free as in beer, and as in freedom).
John P. on 14/7/2006 at 13:16
Thought I'd mention for those of you actually using it, that (
http://www.john-p.com/textures/Thief-DS/index.shtml) there's a minor "patch" available for my Collective Texture Pack.
It overwrites a few of the textures from the pack with updated versions, addressing some of the issues pointed out in this thread. It only addresses textures found in the Texture Pack's
Environment option Group; more specifically the
Walls/floors/ceilings/furniture option, so it's assumed that you already have that option installed.
The updated comparison screenshots show most of the updated versions.
SubJeff on 15/7/2006 at 04:01
I've just looked at the comparisons and although I appreciate how much work you've put into them I have to be perfectly honest and say that:
1. I really like all of the redos of the textures that are meant to be "clean".
2. I really dislike all of the redos of textures that are supposed to be dirty or gritty, except the cave wall rocks (which are v.cool, but a little too obviously repetitive). The "dirty" quality of the originals just suits the atmosphere more imho.
John P. on 15/7/2006 at 11:50
Quote Posted by Subjective Effect
2. I really dislike all of the redos of textures that are supposed to be dirty or gritty, except the cave wall rocks (which are v.cool, but a little too obviously repetitive). The "dirty" quality of the originals just suits the atmosphere more imho.
The cave wall texture & normal map I have made tiles almost perfectly in all directions when repeated. However, it
is repeated, and it's easier to notice repetition in a texture with details compared to a garbled, pixelated mess (the original texture is quite nice, it's just that it's stretched so much because of its small size). If I knew how to make a highly detailed, photo-sourced texture + normal map from scratch that is completely un-repetitive when repeated over huge areas, I'd be a happy guy.
Much of the 'dirt and grit' in the originals are due to pixelation and discolouring because of compression and small size. When there is actual intended dirt and grit present, they of course had the 'luxury' of having 3D meshes to make normal maps from, which I don't. Making a gritty texture in itself isn't so hard - making a normal map to go along with it that has some real depth caused by old age (bumps and 'bruises' like for example the wooden church door) when you have nothing to create real depth from, is much harder. I was initially thinking of using the original normalmap for the door and just clean it up, like I've done with a few others, but it was so pixelated when I looked at it that I decided to make it from scratch.
Some things, like the original windows textures, are "diry and gritty" because they used quite large brush strokes when they painted the texture, and I decided to make them cleaner and more 'neat', since I make them higher resolution anyway and can put in the extra detail.
I would also urge people not to judge my textures from those comparison screenshots alone. It looks a lot different when you don't have a direct comparison, plus the normal maps make a difference when viewed in various light, plus the textures look different from different angles. Plus there are like 400 other high res. textures in the pack.
Anyway - you can disable any high res. textures you don't like in the ibt_pathcer.exe interface.
Scrooge on 11/3/2007 at 12:10
Added a mirror for Collective Texture Pack v1.03 on my site
Xenith on 11/3/2007 at 12:57
well, they're nice but they drop the frames like heck. of course lowering res works but... not the best choice for improving frames (especially on a tft screen)
also, it's true that some textures looked better in their "dirty" version, but, yes, that can be fixed whit the installer.
