Chrono Trigger Remake Defilter

[RiverNyxx]

NOTE: Sometimes updates are being made to these utilities later in this thread, however the links on this top post will ALWAYS link to the MOST RECENT version of my tools, so you don't need to go looking thru the entire thread to find the most recent versions.


I wrote a patcher to remove all bilinear filtering from the game. This is most noticable on the titlescreen, GUI, and clouds in the overworld; as a lot of the game art actually has most of it's blurriness "baked in", which means removing the filter will do little/nothing to fix it.

It comes with instructions, however here's the coles notes:
This patcher works with the Steam release with BuildID 2563122. It _ONLY_ removes the bilinear filter, so the "baked in" blurriness will remain. Don't complain to me if you still see blurriness, as that falls outside the scope of what this patcher does.

*****FOR ANYBODY WHO'S PREVIOUSLY APPLIED THE DEFILTER*****
Before you can re-apply the defilter, you must restore libcocos2d.dll from it's backup that was automatically created when you applied the defilter the first time!
1) Delete libcocos2d.dll
2) Rename libcocos2d_0.dll to libcocos2d.dll
*************************************************************************************

Just extract the .zip into your Chrono Trigger install directory and double click CT_Defilter.exe. A console window will pop up with most of this info on it. If all is good, hit <Enter> to continue, and it should patch your game and report success. You can then delete the 2 files you previously copied from the .zip file, as they are no longer needed.

Play the game and enjoy a bilinear filter free experience!

Download here: http://www.rivernyxx.com/projects/download.php?pn=CT_Defilter

Also, I wrote a tool to allow anybody to mod the game's assets.
File -> Open Archive: Explore to the Chrono Trigger install directory and select resources.bin
File -> Save Archive: Save all configured "replacements" into the currently open resources.bin

Once you have resources.bin open, you can extract files to your hard drive and do with as you will. You can also drag/drop a file from explorer onto any entry in the list (or right click on the entry and select "Replace..."), to mark it as a "replacement".

Patch -> Save Patch: Saves all configured "replacements" as a patch file (*.ctp)
Patch -> Open Patch: Opens a patch file (*.ctp) as a collection of "replacements"

Download here: http://www.rivernyxx.com/projects/download.php?pn=CT_Explore

***** HOW TO CREATE A PATCH *****
1) File -> Open Archive on a fresh (unmodded) resources.bin file
2) Configure your replacements (by drag and drop, or context menu)
3) Patch -> Save Patch
4) Share your patch with friends!
******* ALTERNATIVE METHOD *******
1) Put all of your modded files in a directory structure that matches the paths shown in resources.bin
2) Create a single .ZIP file containing all of those directories
3) Change the extension of the ZIP file to CTP
4) Share the patch with friends!
*********************************************

***** HOW TO PATCH YOUR GAME *****
1) File -> Open Archive on a fresh (unmodded) resources.bin file
2) Patch -> Open Patch on a CTP file you've downloaded
3) File -> Save Archive
4) Play the game!
***********************************************

[Exiled Alchemist]

Nice work. As for the textures themselves I took a closer look, and come to find out they are using new larger sprites. When combined with the effects from the example_Sepia.fsh file found in the shaders folder it will blend the pixels together.

I then opened that example_Sepia.fsh file with notepad++ and changed the following lines to look like this:

final.r = (c.r * 0.0) + (c.g * 0.0) + (c.b * 0.0);
final.g = (c.r * 0.0) + (c.g * 0.0) + (c.b * 0.0);
final.b = (c.r * 0.0) + (c.g * 0.0) + (c.b * 0.0);

The results look like this when combined with the patch:

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1317651263

In fullscreen the pixels of the new sprites can now be seen.


http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1317647692

This is the the results of running the game in 800x600 windowed using both the patch, and the changes to the file.

[miguel_feliciano]

Thank you so much to both of you, just tested both solutions alongside running in 800x600 and it goes a long way to making the game look as it should. The lower resolution helps with tiling. Let's keep this bumped for everyone.

[PrettzL]

Excellent discoveries and contributions.

[Exiled Alchemist]

For my final trick I give you CRT shader for Chrono Trigger:

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1317698343

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1317698405

All that is needed is to install ReShade, and have it install for Chrono Trigger. You only need to have ReShade install the CRT effect, the rest can be left unchecked. Make sure to set ReShade to install for OpenGL because that is what the game uses. After that just download my preset, and place the file where you installed the game. You can get the preset here: http://sfx.thelazy.net/games/preset/9015/

After that just load the game, and set ReShade to load my preset, and you are good to go.

[Dzaka]

there its fixed. with scanlines there's almost no problems.. now can people quit griping?

[Molyporph]

Originally posted by Dzaka:

there its fixed. with scanlines there's almost no problems.. now can people quit griping?

And make the game look even worse? No thank you.

[Ziero]

Please make this into an actual guide, so it doesn't get lost. Leave it to modders to fix the game, go figure. I see almost no tiling with the CRT shader. Can we get the same results without the CRT effect tho? I'm not that big of a fan of it.

[bionicfemme]

I've installed ReShade, put the CRT filter in the main directory and select the filter in ReShade, but for some reason it's not applying it to the game. Is there another step I'm missing? I can't wait to see it with proper CRT scanlines! :)

[Dzaka]

Originally posted by Molyporph:

Originally posted by Dzaka:

there its fixed. with scanlines there's almost no problems.. now can people quit griping?

And make the game look even worse? No thank you.

everyone keeps harping about "go get the snes version" well.. scanlines just make it exactly like the snes version

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

Thanks for making this mod guys.

Originally posted by Dzaka:

there its fixed. with scanlines there's almost no problems.. now can people quit griping?

Didn't you went out of your way saying how the original looks bad? Also you still complaining about people for having their own opinion? Pretty sure everyone has a right to their own opinion to why they're bashing Square Enix on this.

[bionicfemme]

Reinstalled everything and finally got the CRT effect to work! And odd bool glitch error window pops up when I first start the game, but after clicking out of it everything is fine. Thank you so much for doing this! The game looks like 200% better! Thank you for taking care of what Square should have done in the first place with this release.

Originally posted by ExiledAlchemist:

For my final trick I give you CRT shader for Chrono Trigger:

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1317698343

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1317698405

All that is needed is to install ReShade, and have it install for Chrono Trigger. You only need to have ReShade install the CRT effect, the rest can be left unchecked. Make sure to set ReShade to install for OpenGL because that is what the game uses. After that just download my preset, and place the file where you installed the game. You can get the preset here: http://sfx.thelazy.net/games/preset/9015/

After that just load the game, and set ReShade to load my preset, and you are good to go.

[Self Destructive]

I tried the mod and while I like the removal of the filter,it seems that it also removes some effects?

Before:
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1317772006

After:
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1317772047

[Rhyagelle]

I had a feeling you would come to the rescue somehow Nyxo! :D Thank you for your efforts!

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

Hey Nyxo would you by chance be working on changing the UI?

Originally posted by Ziero1986:

Please make this into an actual guide, so it doesn't get lost. Leave it to modders to fix the game, go figure. I see almost no tiling with the CRT shader. Can we get the same results without the CRT effect tho? I'm not that big of a fan of it.

^This, because there's a chance that this discussion may get buried in the future.

[Exiled Alchemist]

Originally posted by bionicfemme:

Reinstalled everything and finally got the CRT effect to work! And odd bool glitch error window pops up when I first start the game, but after clicking out of it everything is fine. Thank you so much for doing this! The game looks like 200% better! Thank you for taking care of what Square should have done in the first place with this release.

Glad you got it to work. Sorry I didn't reply sooner I was creating a guide so other can find the CRT effect in the future.