I would like a custom mge 3.8.0b or a program that JUST does all of these things

FEATURES:
Anisotropic Filtering
Texture hooking
ps 1.4/1 mge water checkbox (my intel gma 950 supports up to ps2.0 but most ps2 shaders don't work and morrowind launcher won't let me enable pixel shaders)
Resolution changing (to 1024x600 at least)
outdoor lighting model clipping fix (if possible)
Mipmap lod bias
Macro editor
MWSE
Shader editor fix (it crashes when I try to do anything but press new, delete or shader editing in the shader editor for some reason)
VWait setting
z-buffer changing
using shaders up to ps2.0 (no extra shader support)
the mge 3.8.0b water opacity thing
and finnaly code optimisation wherever possible

If you can do this I will be in your debt for life!!! (no not really but you get the idea how thankful I would be)

This will help many people with low end pc's that want to use mge....

I'm sorry to say, but that whole list is rather unrealistic, the whole purpose of MGE was to bring morrowind into modern standards for moderate to "HIGH END" pc's, as the game looks fairly good already with just texture/mesh replacements for the lower end. Besides, you can already use MGE for the resolution, and AA|AF, without using Distant Land which can actually, very easily cripple even high end pc's.

I realise that there are some shaders that require distant land, specifically the shaders that rely on the depth buffer, but honestly, if you can't handle minimum amounts of distant land, you probably won't be able to handle those shaders either.

Beyond that, the most optimised version of MGE as far as speed goes is actually 3.8.2 SVN rev. 126 fixed, MGE 3.8.0b is actually very slow in comparison.

Best of luck, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

As stated, MGE is (and has been for a long time, now) aimed at more powerful PCs. The Intel GMA 950 does not have the necessary features or performance to do anything significant and is honestly pretty bare minimum for running Morrowind in the first place. My old laptop with a GMA 950 won't even run the game without heavy z-fighting issues.

The shader issues are moot; a GMA 950 wouldn't be able to do anything significant in the way of shaders having very limited pixel shader support. The chip claims PS 2.0 compatibility but it lacks hardware transformation/lighting and so it isn't even capable of Morrowind's pixel shader water, let alone anything MGE could do.

I'd recommend you either (1) use MGE 3.8.0b to manage internal MWSE, macros, and resolution settings and leave it at that or (2) edit registries to set your desired resolution and use an external MWSE version.

Already in progress.

I can hardly run MGE anymore, which is simply unacceptable, so I'm working on a replacement that follows proper coding practices and standardized shader-writing techniques. The problems with MGE are understandable, it's been around so long and through so many developers that the code is pretty messy these days which slows it down, but either way, I agree it needs a bottom-up rewrite. That and the fact the shader system ignores all convention and relies purely on magic names and not annotations and the material ("hook") system is fatally crippled, which make it almost impossible to write any truly advanced shaders. I tried to go in and fix the code, but it's not really possible at this point and I can't rely on my hack over another hack over that hack being worth-while.

And I have a running version of just that (not completely functional yet though).



Now, I'm not sure about distant land and full MGE water, those will obviously come after I get the basic shader stuff working. When I do add them, for the land, I'll use MGE's existing file formats to keep things as compatible as possible. (same with shaders, I'll be using the full language features, but a MGE-mode will remain, I'm not interested in making an either-or situation, just an alternative for those of us that have trouble with MGE).


Orly? Help test and we'll call it even.


Hooray for us! :foodndrink:

In the mean time you could try one of the http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/morrgraphext/index.php?title=Downloads#Older_versions. With that graphics chip it'd be your best bet until peachykeen works his mojo.

BTW, peachykeen I saw that Liztail had embarked on some code organisation and cleanup (rev186). Sadly he didn't get it finished though. I assume you're working off that, or not..?

I use rev118 usually, it has a decent feature/performance blend. 161? also works for me, although it's harder on the FPS.
But as Dragon32 said, with that chipset, you're going to have a hard time running much. I can make shaders you can run, but you have roughly ps1.4 support, and incomplete support for that, so there's only so much we can do for ya.


No, I'm starting fresh, using my own techniques from nwshader (MGE for NWN). Some MGE code might be used for the DX8-to-9 interface, but that's it.
There are some things that need changed, so it's best to have everything uniform and documented from the beginning, which can't happen with MGE's current code base.

I actually meant one of the waay earlier versions like 3.3.2 or 3.6.3 or 3.7.2
Ah, not having looked at the code I really dunno what it's like. And if I did I wouldn't know how to make head or tail of it Good luck though :thumbsup:

Well, while my pc is still broken I'd be happy to help test for you Peachykeen. I'm on a netbook atm

Amazing news! :woot:

Have you gotten very far with the project, or are you still in the initial stages of identifying what needs fixing and planning how to fix it?

Just, er... don't turn distant land on? It's not rocket science.

I'll let you know if I get anything good.


I had it running within Morrowind earlier, not doing anything really, but it had started itself and woven the interface in. I kept poking things and broke it a bit, but it's off to a good start for a week or so of effort.

Progress here is kind of... tricky, to calculate. I'm taking some of the code I have for another project and reworking it to be more of a multi-game system, so I have a completed copy, it just doesn't work with Morrowind... the Morrowind stuff works but doesn't do much yet. I'm trying to tie the two together, and account from some differences between games. I suppose you could say I've already identified what needs fixed and how to do it, for basic shaders, but the very MW-specific things (distant land, water, etc) I haven't tackled yet. Those are going to come later.

Thanks for replying!
I have done much that people said I couldn't with my GMA 950 (dx9 and 8 dlls from react OS are great!!!!)

and I am sure ps water is possible using hardware tnl emulation or software tnl
Unlike many people's netbooks morrowind works well on mine on MGE 3.8.0b
Anyway, my reason for this in the first place is because one day (a week or two ago)
I decided to see what morrowind was like without MGE, (after using MGE for so long you forget..) so I tried it!
I was shocked to see how much FPS I gained and the only reasons I put MGE back on is that Morrowind (with high res textures)
looked horrible (to me) without anisotropic filtering......
(other reasons include the lack of things on my first post...)

anyway....

NEW FEATURE REQUESTS:
Hardware tnl emulation (checkbox):
(may be laggy, but I don't care, I still want to see what ps water looks like....)

Optional reflection maps and hi res and better textures on water:
(the textures sould be made from a video of new MGE SVN water in medium to high depth edited and made transparent, for the reflection maps, it's so people with netbooks can still have water reflection, and bump maps would be nice too)

Great News PK!



Reflection maps aren't the same thing as water reflection, water reflection is actual reflected images on the water surface, reflection maps are merely offer reflection of light, not images.

Beyond that, bump maps(normal maps actually) and reflection maps are merely textures sources for objects, and you can have support for them by using one of the more recent versions of the MCP, MGE has little to nothing to do with them(outside of perhaps static generation, though I believe for distant statics its not really needed anyway).

Software TnL is already in DirectX, it's called the reference rasterizer. It's a fully software-side device, and supports everything, regardless of your video card. In a game like Morrowind, you'd be lucky to get 0.1 FPS with it, though. This is something that I probably won't implement, simply because it's a huge amount of trouble with no benefit, and already exists.


You mean static reflection maps? That's possible even on the current MGE, and it's basically what the original MW water does. Bumps maps are easier to do with a vertex-shader stage.

Honestly, your hardware is so crippled that while I can confidently say I can make a better MGE and most of your feature-list can definitely be done, I can't promise what will be usable on any Intel GMA chipsets. Some of it will be, undoubtedly (I suspect my original faster "bloom" shaders and such will, as well as a few other simple effects), but I can't give definite answers quite yet.



This is correct (although bump and normal maps are two separate things). The MCP does extend support for a few things, and DX8 had some built-in features that allow for reflection maps and a sort of bumb-mapping, but it doesn't open things up as much as even a simple material shader system.

You are right, and I do understand that they are different, however I find normal maps are more accurate in producing the desired "bump" effect than bump maps are, and therefore I substitute normal maps for bump maps, at least in this case. Of course, I also use Gimp, which produces somewhat sketchy bump and normal maps, I normally have to edit the normal maps after I use the plugin to create them to get the effect that I want..still, I find normal maps the better option personally.

Normal maps are better (and I already knew about the reflection map thing, it still makes stuff reflective, just not reflecting the environment)

@peachykeen:
I didn't request Bloom or HDR and I get fine performance on morrowind with MGE compared to other netbook users (something to do with hyperthreading?)

All I was realy asking for was a faster MGE that will work on MGE modsand have the newest MWSE (I hate the MWSE Launcher and prefer
"ye olde command line startup..."
I don't like MGE versions below 3.7x, don't ask why....)

and by the water opacity thing from MGE 3.8.0b is something that I read (I think in the MGE thread) about a feature that increases water opacity when it is farther away, It isn't a NEEDED feature so I don't realy need it.....

I guess I don't see the attraction to running Morrowind on a netbook - especially an Atom-based netbook. Atoms are more crippled than a socket 378 Celeron - which makes the core processor "low-end" even by the original game's specs. Then, there is the Intel graphics. I know Intel is attempting to get better at integrated graphics, but they still are terrible. They will probably always be terrible, though better than what we have now.

I know it's hard to believe, given how new these machines are, but when you run the numbers, you end up with a machine that would have been mediocre when Pentium III's ruled the Earth.

That said, if we could get MGE optimized enough to where it wasn't a slide show on a netbook, it would probably run like greased lightning on modern systems - so I certainly want to encourage attempting it.

Hyperthreading can help slightly. I was saying you probably can run basic bloom effects, but that's about it in the way of shaders (water will be difficult). If you're willing, I'll send you a test copy as soon as I get something useful together (still just debugging the interface).


I'd like to implement MWSE, but I'm not sure yet. Faster MGE is the goal, though.


Ah, that should be possible, in general. On your hardware, not sure again.



Exactly.

I'm more than willing to accecept a test copy

I will report bugs as much as possible (given I have time...)

So the way I interpret that is that you're not that concerned about the existing MGE mods (which use extra MWSE functions added by MGE, IIRC)?

Which mod does that? I'm genuinely curious here, as I thought the MGE commands were literally just shader applications..

My original concept, before discussing a MW component, was a fast shader framework. MGE adds a lot of Morrowind-specific stuff that would take some time to replicate, but I do plan on doing that. The MGE/MWSE functions in particular I plan on including and expanding, as well as compatibility with existing shaders and distant land meshes. Those more complicated/specific parts will take a bit more time to work out, so I'd like to get the basics down first. I am concerned with them and don't plan on cutting any functionality.

From the top of my head...

http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=Mods.Detail&id=5406
http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=Mods.Detail&id=6945

I think one of the big vampire mods had a MGE add-on too?

A few more on http://www.mwmythicmods.com/MWE.htm#MGE.
Glad you're taking it all into consideration, that was my main reason for asking: assuring it wasn't forgotten. Sounds like you're over it like a blanket though :thumbsup:

So peachykeen any progress?
As I said before, I'd be happy to accept a test build...