Automata LodMod 0.77.5 (2025 update)

[Havoc]

2025 update: v0.77.5 is now available which fixes some of the remaining LOD issues, happy new year!

Download: https://www.nexusmods.com/nierautomata/mods/165/

[Havoc]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από TheIceCreamTroll:

Autodesk bought Scaleform from Criware, then discontinued it in 2018, so the current version is all we are getting. According to the documentation, there is a version of medianoche.exe called medianocheH264.exe that uses the H.264 codec. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find a single copy online and there is no alternative tool.

Would you be willing to share the 4GB-patched medianoche exe? It would greatly help with the upscaling project (which I'm also working on).

There does seem to be a newer encoder that Criware themselves provided: https://blog.criware.com/index.php/2016/02/16/sofdec2-post-2/

No luck finding that though, apparently the filename for that is sofdec2encwiz.exe, there also seems to be command-line versions sofdec2enc.exe / sofdec2encH264.exe / sofdec2encVP9.exe too.

For 4GB patching this tool should work fine: https://ntcore.com/?page_id=371

[TBBle]

Poking around, perhaps VGMToolbox[sourceforge.net] can manage the USM file format? I saw what appears to be a USM demuxer in the source[sourceforge.net], but didn't look any further than that, so it's possible it's only a demuxer, and can't be used to create new USM files from the upgraded video streams.

I also noticed a pile of CRI ADX SDK files on the Internet Archive[archive.org], perhaps there's a USM muxer buried in one of those packages?

[Havoc]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από TBBle:

Poking around, perhaps VGMToolbox[sourceforge.net] can manage the USM file format? I saw what appears to be a USM demuxer in the source[sourceforge.net], but didn't look any further than that, so it's possible it's only a demuxer, and can't be used to create new USM files from the upgraded video streams.

I also noticed a pile of CRI ADX SDK files on the Internet Archive[archive.org], perhaps there's a USM muxer buried in one of those packages?

Yeah seems that's just for demuxing, looking at the src it doesn't seem to try handling the USM format at all really, mostly just scans for bytes and copies out what's inbetween, good for extracting stuff but not useful for making anything new :(

I did find https://github.com/hcs64/vgm_ripping/blob/master/multi/utf_tab/usm_deinterleave.c which seems to parse a lot more of the USM format, nothing for writing there, but the reading code would probably be useful if anyone wanted to write a new muxer.

AFAIK most of those SDKs there like adx2le are evaluation versions, haven't found any modern full SDKs anywhere :/
(apparently Witcher 3 made use of CRIWARE/USM though, and there was a big leak of W3 stuff a few months ago... but don't think the password for it ever got out :()

LodMod v0.76.3 test-release

Uploaded LodMod v0.76.3 to https://github.com/emoose/NieRAutomata-LodMod/releases/tag/v0.76.3

(this is a test-release for anyone that wants to test 1440p/4K movies with it, if you encounter anything strange please let me know!)

This should let greater-than-1080p vids play on all the NA versions that LodMod supports (2021/2017/2017 debug...)

The buffer size increase can be changed in LodMod.ini, by default it's setup for 4K, but that might be wasting a few MB if you don't have any 4K videos to play, the INI explains how you can tune this properly (unfortunately I can't set this in LodMod automatically based on screen res/movie res, because these buffers are inited right as the game starts, before any config/movies files have been read...)

E: maybe I could make it use normal buffers by default, but check if a certain file exists in the movies folder, and if so set buffer size based on the file contents, then movie modders can just include a file with their release that tells LodMod what to use - would be a lot more efficient this way, let me know what you think.

Changelist:

• v0.76.3: Added [Buffers] section to INI, allows customizing the movie buffer size & toggling the 2017 buffer-size increase.
  
• v0.76.3: Added buffer-size changes for movie related buffers, allows greater-than-1080p movies to play fine, seemingly without issues

[TBBle]

The CRI Sofdec2 docs[game.criware.jp] say that some extra (Windows SDK) libraries had to be linked in, and a setup call made during init, to enable H.264 playback in Sofdec2 on Windows.

So it seems unlikely to me that the game had done that and then _not_ used H.264 video content, even though the version of Sofdec2 was likely new enough to support it.

[TheIceCreamTroll]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από Havoc:

There does seem to be a newer encoder that Criware themselves provided: https://blog.criware.com/index.php/2016/02/16/sofdec2-post-2/

I had assumed that the usm files Scaleform and Sofdec2 made weren't swappable, but it looks like they have the same chunk identifier and there's no mention of them not being compatible, so I may be wrong. Wouldn't know for sure until someone actually tests though.

[TBBle]

https://listed.to/@donmai/24921/criware-s-usm-format-part-1 suggests that the format remained compatible, and Scaleform was just licensing Sofdec2 aka CRI Movie 2 to bundle into GFx rather than forking it.

Huh. And that post's author has a WIP Python library for extracing and generating USM files[github.com].

[Havoc]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από TBBle:

https://listed.to/@donmai/24921/criware-s-usm-format-part-1 suggests that the format remained compatible, and Scaleform was just licensing Sofdec2 aka CRI Movie 2 to bundle into GFx rather than forking it.

Huh. And that post's author has a WIP Python library for extracing and generating USM files[github.com].

Nice find, I came across that page a few times looking up USM but didn't realise the author was working on a library, neat.

Managed to find some scaleform eval SDKs on web.archive org too (4.2 & 4.4, latest scaleform was 4.6...)

50KB/s download speed is awful tho.. downloaded 1GB after an hour+ but no idea how big it is >.>
Hopefully some video encoders might be part of that 1GB+, but knowing my luck it's probably just some sample game assets or something like that.

(...and of course the 4.4 download crapped out at 1.06GB, tried resuming the download and for some reason that cancelled the 4.2 download too ;_;)

[TheIceCreamTroll]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από Havoc:

(...and of course it crapped out at 1.06GB, tried resuming the download and for some reason that cancelled the 4.2 download too ;_;)

Link to the archive? I can try giving it a shot

[Havoc]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από TheIceCreamTroll:

Link to the archive? I can try giving it a shot

https://0bin.net/paste/WV2zfNe5#VGrWniCCGdd7fhmbSv2fMMTqRisCjEjIsWxAHwDZhAX

Not sure if more people downloading it might slow it down more though, or maybe it'd give a better chance one of us actually gets the full file, worth a shot I guess.

[TheIceCreamTroll]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από Havoc:

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από TheIceCreamTroll:

Link to the archive? I can try giving it a shot

https://0bin.net/paste/WV2zfNe5#VGrWniCCGdd7fhmbSv2fMMTqRisCjEjIsWxAHwDZhAX

Not sure if more people downloading it might slow it down more though, or maybe it'd give a better chance one of us actually gets the full file, worth a shot I guess.

sf_4.4_mobile_winstore.exe says it is corrupted when I try to run it. Trying the Unity plugin now

[Havoc]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από TheIceCreamTroll:

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από Havoc:

https://0bin.net/paste/WV2zfNe5#VGrWniCCGdd7fhmbSv2fMMTqRisCjEjIsWxAHwDZhAX

Not sure if more people downloading it might slow it down more though, or maybe it'd give a better chance one of us actually gets the full file, worth a shot I guess.

sf_4.4_mobile_winstore.exe says it is corrupted when I try to run it. Trying the Unity plugin now

What size was the winstore EXE for you? I think the download is stopping randomly which makes install think it's corrupted, largest it's DLed for me is 1.06GB, haven't found a way to make it resume the download yet sadly.
Found a few more eval SDKs, not all for windows though so might not be too useful: https://0bin.net/paste/ywkcM4w2#FlwMKuDhF2+HgL0DzVDBrG5HW1EihB4sG6H+gCRVhDe

[TheIceCreamTroll]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από Havoc:

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από TheIceCreamTroll:

sf_4.4_mobile_winstore.exe says it is corrupted when I try to run it. Trying the Unity plugin now

What size was the winstore EXE for you? I think the download is stopping randomly which makes install think it's corrupted, largest it's DLed for me is 1.06GB, haven't found a way to make it resume the download yet sadly.

The exe was 1,113,592 KB. I downloaded it twice, both seemed to complete without issue.

Unity package didn't have anything useful I could find. Also needed a license key to use some of it's features.

[TheIceCreamTroll]

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από Havoc:

Found a few more eval SDKs, not all for windows though so might not be too useful: https://0bin.net/paste/ywkcM4w2#FlwMKuDhF2+HgL0DzVDBrG5HW1EihB4sG6H+gCRVhDe

Doesn't look like a video encoder is included in any of them.

[Havoc]

LodMod v0.76.4 release

Uploaded LodMod v0.76.4 to https://github.com/emoose/NieRAutomata-LodMod/releases/tag/v0.76.4, and updated it on NexusMods.

Changes:

• Changed MovieMultiplier default to 1, since most people won't be using any modded movies, no point in several MBs of (V)RAM being wasted on it.
  
• Allow loading settings overrides from any LodMod.ini found in a game subfolder - now any movie mods can easily include their own data\movie\LodMod.ini file with overrides inside, which will get loaded after the main LodMod.ini. https://github.com/emoose/NieRAutomata-LodMod/blob/master/LodMod_MovieSample.ini gives an example of a LodMod.ini for 4K movies, change the wording as you see fit!
  
• v0.76.3: Added [Buffers] section to INI, allows customizing the movie buffer size & toggling the 2017 buffer-size increase.
  
• v0.76.3: Added buffer-size changes for movie related buffers, allows larger-than-1080p movies to play fine, seemingly without issues

I might try seeing if I can write a simple .usm parser so LM could work out the proper buffer-size by itself... will take a look over the weekend.

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από TheIceCreamTroll:

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από Havoc:

Found a few more eval SDKs, not all for windows though so might not be too useful: https://0bin.net/paste/ywkcM4w2#FlwMKuDhF2+HgL0DzVDBrG5HW1EihB4sG6H+gCRVhDe

Doesn't look like a video encoder is included in any of them.

Aw that's too bad, guess we'll have to just hope one of the GFx/CRI SDKs leak eventually, or hopefully that python library will get H264 support soon.

Αναρτήθηκε αρχικά από wmg317:

1. While 4K USM encodes are possible with the currently available tool with a little workaround, I wonder if the game could be "convinced" to play videos encoded with a more modern codec like H264 in a standard container, or if that's not really possible. Probably the only chance to have better quality at smaller size because the ancient MPEG1 we have to use needs massive bitrate especially at 4K. The H264 version of Medianoche also caught my attention but who knows if the game would play files encoded with it, and that's if it wasn't seemingly impossible to find.

2. Do you know if the older game builds ever actually used the 8 cutscenes that the current build removed (ev0480, ev0485, ev0640, ev0690, ev0692, ev0700, ev0702, evb060) or if they were redundant even in those builds? They don't contain anything that's not in the other videos so I can see why they removed them with the new build, they are just differently cut up videos already present. But if the older builds did actually play these at some point, it would likely be worth it to include these as optional download in cutscene mods as with LodMod some people do use the older build now.

Ah sorry, meant to reply to this sooner.
I didn't know about the DS4 issue, which program do you use for DS4 support?

Maybe I can find some other DLL to wrap, xinput1_4 is pretty inconvenient since both Win7 & 2017 need it renamed... maybe there's one that can work with all of them.

1: I did see one thing about some Sofdec version being able to play WMV without conversion, no idea if that's true or not though, haven't seen anything WMV related in the game at least...

Hopefully that python lib will add H264 soon, need to make sure game itself has support though... got a lot of the CriMana stuff named in the game EXE, but haven't seen anything H264 related yet.

(E: oh hmm... seems the game exe should mention "criV264Mft" if H264 support was added in, at least the 2020 version of CRI SDK would include that, but that's not mentioned in the EXE...
2020 SDK also imports MFCreateMediaType, which game doesn't seem to use neither :/
Also haven't seen anything about VP9 neither... might be stuck with whatever MPEG1 stuff Sofdec uses)

2: No idea, might be wrong but I think the ev****.evn file is what tells the game to play a specific USM, maybe they just changed those in 2021 so they point to other videos instead, I'll try taking a look at that soon.

[v00d00m4n]

I have idea, i saw this done in patches of few games - how about to wrap in game decoder features and re-route game to use another decoder and use some windows built-in mp4 decoders ???