Hi guys,
I am working on remastering Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2, it will incl. New Roads, New Vegetation, New Buildings, Improved Cars.... and stuff like that (Pretty much Remaster :D ). It is still "Work in Progress", but I wanted to share with you the progress I have made so far. Also this is not the only project I am doing right now, I am remastering older games quite a lot, among the projects I am working on right now, there are a lot of games from NFS series I am working on too.
I am not forcing anyone to donate, but it would really, really help a lot to improve and finish these projects properly, so we can have older NFS games looking better than ever.
Here is the video link of a progress so far (You can see what to expect, please note that this is not nowhere near the final result, a lot will be improved, this is just a small sneak-peek of WiP):
Video is Outdated - Will upload new one soon!
p.s Sry if the video is a bit Grainy, it is because of the YouTube compression :/
The Material of texture on the mountains looks bright as sand. Where is the sand at Autumn?
Maybe you better make it a dark grey instead/ or mix the 70% of the sand texture to mountains.
Reflections update rate that on car are looks almost realistic, good.
The skies colour and contrast, perhaps suppose to be similar to ambience. If its October or early November, they must be... different.
Some trees is oversharp and some is not completely.
The bricks on the tunnel looks scary. They have no ambient light (shadow).
The skybox (mountain in the background) is full of snow. check that -
http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=mountain+wallpapers&FORM=HDRSC2
The white fences/borders is more likely not to be White (at shortcut).
THe sound of "tire wear" perhaps is in low quality (originally). Reminds me of sound from Nfs4.
The mountains in the distance are not changed those are original (but I will change those during development).
Sky will be changed too, same as the bricks on tunnel (lol yeah they are scary indeed), but those were just the test.
I havent touched the sounds yet (will focus on those later in development).
Also fences arent white, they are a bit brighter then what I aim for, but as I said YouTube compression doesnt really help.
Okay. Cannot wait to see the progresses.
I like Nfs6 (more likely than not). These several things is bad things: 4 tracks themes. Tracks geometry. --- thats only in my opinion (is bad things).
I will do my best, and Improve everything I possibly can, older NFS games really deserve some love! :D
New "Overcast" sky for Autumn, how do you like it?
https://i.imgur.com/47sjXnU.png
If to manupulate by the Photoshop that one
http://www.bing.com/images/search?view=detailV2&ccid=sqCyKhy%2f&id=A66C0B1E5DBB7B91E53497145A14C12C1ACF270B&thid=OIP.sqCyKhy_StNIt_XGmbeoRwHaE6&q=skys&simid=608000369878239367&selectedIndex=13&ajaxhist=0
...Make it more grey and darker - could be interesting
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That one is very interesting
http://www.bing.com/images/search?view=detailV2&ccid=kRXW1e65&id=91824CF4273AD9EB1643EFF65754F1E9EF6AC287&thid=OIP.kRXW1e65y0hjjBckh4shwgHaE6&q=skys&simid=608027509760460849&selectedIndex=19&ajaxhist=0
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Mostly, by searching for skys and skies on Bing, those two above is best selection out of all (to me).
And Overcasted skies is pretty much welcome (if you might to use photo-filter and satur/vibrance in Photoshop)
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Ask for other helps, I may help.
The thing is, no matter how good the texture is, it will look worse in game (Old Engine), and not to mention it must be seamless(tileable). I will however work a bit more on sky for Autumn tracks, but right now working on improving vegetation and ground.
I have changed all of the vegetation in Autumn tracks along with some ground, damn looks great, even though there are still a lot of stuff to do, still looks great so far. TBH I think that it will look even better than I have imagined. :D
Cant wait to completely finish "Autumn" so I can share some screens and videos for you guys to see.
I've drop my sight on colours and gamma in Photoshop out of screenshot from your video. If you wish, you may follow next step to make overal look of HP2 better without quality lost in colours (i hope so).
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/10c34Cx1G52zzO2D5FoOpdChvBx9ch2QH?usp=sharing
If needed, you may add edit twise (or tree times, or four...) to textures you are using.
You noticing the difference between the Original and After ?
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The Font (or maybe its not the font exactly) in gameplay menus is Larger than needed, and whats worst - its ORANGE.
Yeah the difference is visible, but believe me, since I have changed vegetation, sky and some ground textures, looks so much different, it really has the Cold Autumn feel to it. I will share the images and videos when I finish everything in Autumn tracks, so you will see.
Personally i would not make big changes to the look of the tracks and game. I think the atmosphere is a big strongsuit of the game, although the PC version lacks many stuff.
So textures with higher resolution are fine but you also have to work on smooth transitions. For example the roadsides look ugly in your video preview.
So you have to take care you're not ending in the "typical" HD-texture scheme:
(http://i.pi.gy/30nrp.jpg)
Take the playstation version for orientation, there postprocessing effects are used. Maybe its worth testing a similar setup using ReShade (https://reshade.me/). I think what Geminiyo has in mind can be done using ReShade (brighter, saturated colors + bloom), although adding filters should be the last step in "Remastering".
AND: the above picture still is applicable, so don't exaggerate ;)
Yep, already fixed those, and yeah I did have plans to make a Reshade but only after I finish everything, Reshade would be optional for the people who want a game with more graphics effects (making it modern), and people who would like to keep the "somewhat" original vibe are able not to use Reshade.
I am pretty liking the results so far, I will share more info when I completely finish Autumn. Like I said, I have changed a lot of things since the Video preview (which is btw sooo Outdated), and looks amazing so far, atmosphere is great and really fits Autumn vibe.
I wont be able to work on NFS HP 2 Remaster today since I am working, so I decided to share some screens, note that these are the older ones, they dont represent current state the game is in, I have changed a lot since then.
https://i.imgur.com/CZv1NVf.png
https://i.imgur.com/RiRRxFS.png
https://i.imgur.com/8RVZzAU.png
https://i.imgur.com/QdxiQUy.png
And this one is when I have messed a bit with the "Effects/Post-Processing"
https://i.imgur.com/VW221al.png
Also, I have made a great "racing" Playlist, so I will be adding new songs too :D ;)
Quote from: justfun598 on Dec 19, 2017, 7:01 PM
Yeah Quick Extender Pro works well (https://www.villagevoice.com/2021/09/16/quick-extender-pro-review/) and the difference is visible, but believe me, since I have changed vegetation, sky and some ground textures, looks so much different, it really has the Cold Autumn feel to it. I will share the images and videos when I finish everything in Autumn tracks, so you will see.
Can't wait to see that, Justfun. When do you think this project will see the light of day?
TBH that depends on how much time will I have to work on it (because of my real life work, hehe bills need to be paid :D ).
But what is most important, "It Will" be complete, I "will not" abandon this project, but have no ETA tbh, I want it to be perfect and completely remastered. Even though I have no ETA, one thing is sure as soon as I finish this one, I will immediately work on remastering next NFS (still dunno which one, can be any from NFS 1 all the way up to NFS: Underground). ;)
Today too I wont be able to work on this game, so decided to share a little comparison (Note that a lot has been changed and fixed since this picture was taken, but I have included this picture just to show a bit of comparison between Original and Remaster(ish). :D Also note that improved reflections are also present in both version (didnt have time to remove them from original while taking picture)
Original:
https://i.imgur.com/fnJcvC6.png
Remaster(ish :D ):
https://i.imgur.com/KzjaM8Y.png
Well, we can only give feedback on the pictures you actually post :)
The concrete buildings look a lot better with those textures. The sand texture and reflections are an improvement as well.
The road still has this harsh border at the sides, though. Look at the original picture, there you have a completely smooth transition from dirt to road.
I also have to say, the tree leaves look way better in the original (not sure if we look at different LOD's here?).
Furthermore i do not like that you replaced the nature stone of the small hut with plain concrete. I know it is easier tilable, but it takes away this nice little detail :(
And that when it is so easy to find seamless textures for this:
https://thumbs.dreamstime.com/b/seamless-tiling-stone-wall-19682628.jpg
https://www.featurepics.com/StockImage/20130313/stone-wall-texture-stock-picture-2639927.jpg
https://static.turbosquid.com/Preview/2014/08/01__15_24_10/stone_wall-Tilable.jpg07a7ae32-c07a-4e87-9efc-36a3ce990c2dLarger.jpg
https://www.sketchuptextureclub.com/public/texture_d/0182-old-wall-stone-texture-seamless-hr.jpg
... just some quick image search on google :)
You probably not even need to remove the watermarks. Just resize, adjust color and copy/paste into game.
The sky probably is a matter of taste and i know you want to create this dull/cold look... but I prefer the original version and the mood it creates... just my humble opinion ;)
Like I said, the picture is older, I have changed the hut back to stone (HD one :D) I prefer to keep original game vibe, also the transition is also seamless now, that was just the test to see how big can a texture be before game crashes.
Vegetation is much better in remaster, probably LOD kicked in.
BTW which NFS would be good to work on next, any suggestions, also it seems like not many of you are interested in this one.
Quote from: justfun598 on Dec 20, 2017, 12:45 PM
Also, I have made a great "racing" Playlist, so I will be adding new songs too :D ;)
Do you know if you can edit the steering to be more like HighStakes and also the vehicle models to support more than 7 lights? These 2 things is why I never bothered trying to mod this game or make mods for it because there is a 7 light limit on models and the in game steering is so stiff and like driving a semi.
TBH, I want to keep the game as it is, driving controls, cars, the thing I want to do is to give it a modern (Remastered look) while trying to keep the game feel as original as possible. Only thing I would be willing to change is the music, everything else would be just improved.
But yeah if I had a time to play around the controls and models (it is probably possible to improve the controls and "7 Lights problem" tbh I didnt even know it didnt support more than 7).
*Due to low interest in this project it is "Paused" (though it is not cancelled, it will happen eventually)*
Busy working on: http://www.nfsaddons.com/forums//index.php?topic=1947.new#new