MarteenDee

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I've decided to open this thread as I see huge potential in modding AP - maybe not to the extent of total overhaul, but IMHO altering some files might help fixing some minor issues, or even help dev team in creation of patch. In unlikely situation Obsidian wouldn't release any patch it might be the way to create community patch and help all those troubled souls who are whining about "unfinished" game. Personally I haven't noticed any major issues or things we mightn't be able to fix through careful tweaking. If any of forum moderators think that this thread belongs to PC tech part of the forum - please move it. If this thread will be interesting enough please make it sticky. To all posters: please refrain from spamming, irrelevant comments and regular trolling - I would like to keep this thread clean and easy to read. I would also ask people who don't have a clue about modding games not to post their silly questions. If myself or anyone involved draw any final conclusions there will be step-by-step guide for dummies how to make all the changes with proper explanation. For now it's more experimental and reverse engineering theories. Please keep this thread as "scientific" as possible - if you have some theory or opinion give us a hint of proof and a way to reproduce your effects. First post is a merged version of two posts I wrote earlier in another thread. I'll come with more later, when I'll gather all what I know so far. Hopefully the developers will eventually notice this thread and give us some hints or answers to our questions... Introduction: Unreal engine is highly moddable, even without tools exclusive for Alpha Protocol. Tools for modding Unreal engine are already common enough. What is even more pleasing - all settings for ie. AI perception range, weapons stats, character development, visual presentation or controls are in config files - easily editable through notepad or other common text editor. I had quick look through config files and made some changes already and I've changed so far: controls responsiveness, resources allocation (no more stuttering or textures popping) moving speed of both Mike and AI (which basically means - no sliding and synchronised walking and running animation when compared to movement speed), more aware AI (both sound and visual perception), more realistic damage system (on basic endurance - one shot one kill when you get spotted), tweaked guns spread and recoil, and I've opened texture packs to some extent. Hint for all people experiencing stuttering - first and foremost defrag your HD, and use all tweaks posted for ME and ME2 in the same subject as they all work. To all interested - I will release all ini files and changes only when I'll be sure that none of my changes cause any glitches or errors throughout the game. To the point: 1.Files structure. I have retail DVD version bought in UK, WindowsXP SP3, all drivers up to date and all XP updates done to my OS. Here's the structure I think is used: In your game installation directory, everything in APGame is what's game using. The rest is more-less irrelevant for modding. In CookedPC directory you have all packs and resources like sounds, textures, maps and missions. Localization directory is pretty self explainable. Movies: if you go to that directory and change extension of slate_ap.sfd, slate_obsidian.sfd, slate_sega.sfd - your game will load straight to the main menu without opening cinematic. This way you can easily remove any cinematic in game. For basic tweaks the most important directory is Config. These are the DEFAULT values for anything game related which is tweakable. If you remove all config files from MyDocuments/Alpha Protocol/Config and start the game again - it's going to create new configs from default files in game directory. I'm pretty sure that some settings *might* be saved in profile files but I'm not sure which elements are saved and which are directly read from ini files in MyDocuments. To be 100% sure if some value is or isn't used by the game it might be good to change values in game dir ini files, wipe configs from MyDocuments and start the game from the beginning. For now - there's only good few values that I'm sure are read straight from MyDocuments/Alpha Protocol/Config/xxx.ini files. Eyes colour and skin tone would be the best example as they're most noticeable. I'll post more later as I need to check what values I was changing and which were having any direct impact on the game. In the meantime take a look through MyDocuments/Alpha Protocol/Config/xxxxx.ini files. Some values are pretty self explanatory. Anything in sections [xxxx:APxxxxxx] is directly related and we can be sure that it's used by the game. You can also notice, that some ini files are cross referenced and in some other sections you have references to CookedPC packs. There are sections without any AP reference - they might or mightn't be used - here's where trial and error comes to play.

Firstly - I don't think these are review difficulties - it's more about the method with which proper and unbiased review should be made. As I can see - these days reviews on multiple gaming sites aren't written by professional journalists, and what really counts is popularity, lack of in-depth perspective and the fact that submitted review have to be easy to digest by mostly illiterate gaming-kids we have these days (I'm not talking about developers or big companies "financial contributions" as I never meet such practice personally and I don't like to talk about things I don't have real proof for. It's like with all conspiracy theories - it *might* be truth but equally it might be a myth). That's the way I see it: if major gaming site would bash really popular title, say MW2 - it would lose "credibility" in too huge gaming circles. Both casual and hardcore gamers would quote them as idiots or didn't quote them at all. Outcome - loosing readers and not being taken seriously by anyone. That's why - even if the next title or IP isn't revolutionary or have some problems they would give it higher notes, and eventually write few phrases about game flaws towards the end of the review. Statistical reader doesn't read whole review anyway - it's punchline, score and maybe two first paragraphs which counts. With rather "niche" titles, even if the hype is pretty big about them, like Alpha Protocol - when they bash it (even way more than it deserves) means that: it's going to be quoted and linked all over the web (doesn't really matter is it with agreement or not), and they're not afraid of loosing credibility within couple of thousands hardcore fans - as they're not the core readers or the majority of such site customers. What more - hardcore fans aren't interested in reviews anyway, and casual players are more "unforgettable" when it comes to bugs or glitches and are more likely to quote bad reviews (with agreement and praise to them) to confirm their trolling. Finally - to understand quality behind new cross-genre titles - there's a need to delve deeper into the game - and most reviewers don't have time or will to do that (there's so many games to write about and more reviews you write more money you get and more popular you are). The bottom line is: writing reviews for major gaming sites is a gutter... As to your question. Firstly - take into account that my changes are still in "experimental" phase and some aren't tested enough to say they work properly, don't break the game at some stage or are suitable for every system. Secondly, you have to tweak everything to be in connection to your hardware capabilities. Some tweaks are going to cause bugs or CTDs only because you might, for example cache too many files with having not enough RAM or load too big textures comparing to capabilities of your graphic card. There's Unreal engine wiki and you should check it always for explanation what particular function do. Also - some functions aren't used at all by the game. I have retail DVD version bought in UK, WindowsXP SP3, all drivers up to date and all XP updates done to my OS. Here's the structure I think is used: In your game installation directory, everything in APGame is what's game using. The rest is more-less irrelevant for modding. In CookedPC directory you have all packs and resources like sounds, textures, maps and missions. Localization directory is pretty self explainable. Movies: if you go to that directory and change extension of slate_ap.sfd, slate_obsidian.sfd, slate_sega.sfd - your game will load straight to the main menu without opening cinematic. This way you can easily remove any cinematic in game. For basic tweaks the most important directory is Config. These are the DEFAULT values for anything game related which is tweakable. If you remove all config files from MyDocuments/Alpha Protocol/Config and start the game again - it's going to create new configs from default files in game directory. I'm pretty sure that some settings *might* be saved in profile files but I'm not sure which elements are saved and which are directly read from ini files in MyDocuments. To be 100% sure if some value is or isn't used by the game it might be good to change values in game dir ini files, wipe configs from MyDocuments and start the game from the beginning. For now - there's only good few values that I'm sure are read straight from MyDocuments/Alpha Protocol/Config/xxx.ini files. Eyes colour and skin tone would be the best example as they're most noticeable. I'll post more later today as I need to check what values I was changing and which were having any direct impact on the game. In the meantime take a look through MyDocuments/Alpha Protocol/Config/xxxxx.ini files. Some values are pretty self explanatory. Anything in sections [xxxx:APxxxxxx] is directly related and we can be sure that it's used by the game. You can also notice, that some ini files are cross referenced and in some other sections you have references to CookedPC packs. There are sections without any AP reference - they might or mightn't be used - here's where trial and error comes to play. I will also move part of this post to another thread as this is waaaay off-topic in the thread we are posting now. See you there.

Thanks. Talking about bugs - ME and ME2 shares mostly similar type of bugs and glitches as AP - it's from a simple fact that all three games were created on Unreal engine. Even half-dumb person who have at least a hint of what the engine is in game creation process should understand which glitches are caused by the engine used and which are caused by lazy developers. I haven't found a single bug which wouldn't be related to Unreal engine limitations in Alpha Protocol - resource management, textures pop-up, problems with shaders - it's all engine side or linked with multi-platform release. All quests, items, rewards, textures and models quality, game mechanics - only parts of the game where Obsidian guys could fail - is working perfectly. Talking about problems - and I'm yet to post my revelations when I'm completely sure that my tweaks aren't game-breaking - in config files there's remedy for all problems pointed out in tech forum. Also for problem with AI not spawning after reload, popping textures and hardware AA removing dialogue options. I have hardware AA enabled on my Radeon 4850 1gb and - while I can clearly see that it's working - I have all my conversation options visible. Hint for guards: try to find caching options in configuration files, enable them and rise cache size to 2048 or more - you'll see what I'm talking about. Hint for hardware AA: Unreal engine isn't capable of using both AA and HDR/Bloom at the same time. Hence the need of using HDR/Bloom engine side and AA hardware side. I can only guess that the game is so "poorly" optimized because whole Obsidian devs department responsible for AP was working on all three platforms version. In almost all big companies every platform gets their own development team (programming and testing) working simultaneously. Also - caching, texture LOD choices and memory management was clearly prepared for consoles and when ported to PC they were left more-less unchanged, so the game could run on low-end hardware. On my system, when I removed FPS cap - without any other changes introduced I could get even +200FPS, after changes and vsync enabled - I'm getting constant 80FPS and memory consumption is ~2x bigger. I have basically no tearing or stuttering, mouse behaves properly enough, enabled smooth, multi-volume shadows and other bells and whistles. It was all disabled by default - and the reason for that isn't on Obsidian side but rather came from SEGA - to allow low-end hardware compatibility. I would love to hear what Obsidian guys have to say in this subject, but I bet that won't happen because of SEGA, who gives money for development. Final hint for all people experiencing stuttering - first and foremost defrag your HD, and use all tweaks posted for ME and ME2 in the same subject as they all work. Hell - I even made mouse behave MY WAY in hacking mini game. So stop bitching people and wait for proper patch for PC version. It's only week or two after the release, and developers need to take some break after months and months of hard work, no?

First of all: hello everybody, it's my first post on these forums. Few words about me: I really like AP so far, I'm RPGs veteran - from pen'n'paper times, through Golden Era of cRPG, still playing a lot. I'm writing articles about gaming (development, reviews, social reception) in couple national non-gaming magazines. Sorry for any possible grammar mistakes as English isn't my native tongue. Now - on the subject. I think, that the biggest problem about gaming journalism these days is "drawing comparisons". As it isn't bad method in general, problem arises when reviewers start to compare games without proper context. It's not so simple as "playing AP as an action title when it's RPG" issue so many of you stated in previous posts. It's more than that. Firstly - games are this kind of creation, where constant genre evolution is vital. It's basically identical as in music, film or any other type of creative art. Without genre evolution, cross-genre experiments art of creation becomes stale and developers can't spawn anything "refreshing" and "interesting". Secondly - there's certain thing with cRPG genre: lack of proper identification. No one is really able to say what makes game a "proper" cRPG, because in general every game uses mechanics taken from RPG. Example? Let's take three basic elements which are characteristic for cRPGs: playing a role, stats/character development and story. In basically every game you play a role of someone else: is it FPS, race game or being a manager of football team. Character development is also less or more present (is it visible or not), as it is the only way to show progression in the game world. Story is vital for almost every game too. Every situation player is dropped into needs proper context, which leads to some kind of story, scenario, introduction cinematic, background information... Conclusion - comparing games within a genre is one of the biggest mistakes in gaming journalism. Which becomes clear when you read AP reviews. Every bad review is based on comparison to, say, Mass Effect or Splinter Cell - even if AP never had an intention to compete with these titles. Every good review takes game into pieces and draws opinion on how those pieces were executed and how they all come together. But without comparisons like "story is better than in Dragon Age, but shooting and sneaking is worst than in Metal Gear Solid". It's clearly visible, that all positive reviews were looking at AP as an individual creation - which actually is how every "proper" review should be done. I've seen too many good games (films and books too, btw) which were bashed in reviews or throughout the forums only, because some idiots were comparing them to some other titles on the market: Fallout was bashed because it was too complicated, too adult story-wise, combat mechanics were odd, too many perks, too long character creation etc, Jade Empire was bashed because it introduced real-time combat and linear story, ARMA was bashed because it hadn't got arcade shooting mechanics and wasn't action driven enough comparing to other FPS titles on the market - I can go on and on with the titles - finishing the list with my favourite "Firefly" TV series which was bashed, because it wasn't neither western nor classical S-F... Enough to say, that every title bashed in the reviews for not being something said title never wanted to be, gathered huge fan-base, they're legendary IPs these days, treated as milestones in gaming industry and are games that everyone, who is seriously thinking about gaming, have on the shelf (or played at least once)... As a final word to all whiners on this forum: Unreal engine is highly moddable, even without tools exclusive for Alpha Protocol. Tools for modding Unreal engine are already common enough. What is even more pleasing - all settings for ie. AI perception range, weapons stats, character development, visual presentation or controls are in config files - easily editable through notepad or other common text editor. I had quick look through config files and made some changes already and I've changed so far: controls responsiveness, resources allocation (no more stuttering or textures popping) moving speed of both Mike and AI (which basically means - no sliding and synchronised walking and running animation when compared to movement speed), more aware AI (both sound and visual perception), more realistic damage system (on basic endurance - one shot one kill when you get spotted), tweaked guns spread and recoil, and I've opened texture packs to some extent. To all interested - I will release all ini files and changes only when I'll be sure that none of my changes cause any glitches or errors throughout the game. My only praise would be to the devs: please appear more often on the forums and discuss technical issues. Release some sort of documentation about ranges of hardcoded settings which would remove constant need of trial and error and reverse engineering methods and would greatly simplify tweaking. And for forum moderators to create modding section some time later... For all you visual b*** out there (some reviews call it "dated graphics"?):