Art In Pinkerton

Tag: Blake Stone

  • Blake Stone gets a glow up (PART 3)

    InGame

    Now the naming and image dimension issues have been resolved, so I loaded the game and it worked perfectly! Drunk with power, I ran a quick and dirty (i.e. impatient) bulk upscale on every texture just to get the payout of seeing that high resolution quality in gameplay. I wish I had a picture, but I don’t sorry. So you’ll just have to settle with one of my test pictures. The ultimate result of that initial effort was a messy, uneven upscale that wasn’t very good.

    WTF is upscaling?

    I’ll take this hot second to address this topic for those not in the know. One of the first “AI” booms was image upscaling using an algorithm model called ESRGAN (it stands for something, but no one cares). There are many models now, but that one paved the way. Note, when I say “AI”, that’s really just the media branding of this technology because the technical stuff is not as sexy. It (and most of the current AI stuff) is nothing more than highly sophisticated pattern recognition software. You teach it what 200 apples look like in low resolution and high resolution. It learns that when it sees a low resolution apple what the approximate of a high resolution apple might look like and gives you that. See how boring that already got….hence “AI”.

    I use a program called CUPSCALE, which is a frontend for the tech behind it. It allows bulk upscaling, supports most common image formats, and allows switching between different models. Best part, it will install all the needed files (python and all things related) for you, so it’s as close to plug and play as possible.

    Almost a mod?

    I spent many hours trying different combinations of upscale models. Finally, I settled on a workflow that best accomplished the cartoon look I wanted. I started with 1X upscales (meaning no change in size) just to clean up details. I focused on de-dithering, which was often used in old games and extremely low rez art, and sharpening detail a little, so colors weren’t bleeding as much (refocus model). Then I scaled it by 2X using 4XNickelBack model and reducing 50% afterwards. After much trial and error, I found this was the best option for Blake Stone art as it was the least destructive to the essence of the picture. After that I hit them with a couple rounds of a FSManga model to make them more cartoony, with a 50% resizing here and here. Ultimately, I ended up with game textures that were 6X the size of the originals that had a more cartoon appearance.

    UP NEXT TIME….A new mod is born!

    Part 4 will be about releasing my first full HD texture mod. But it doesn’t stop at Part 4 (wink wink).

    – Martin

  • “Extracting art from Blake Stone” is not a very funny title (Part 2)

    “Extracting art from Blake Stone” is not a very funny title (Part 2)

    Collecting Pixels

    Step one is figuring out how the game stores the art files (textures). Normally what I do is check for the largest files, as they are usually the texture and/or sound archive. However, with Blake Stone, I knew that this game used Wolfenstein 3d-style archives. Blake Stone’s format was slightly different and used the extension BS6. But it was close enough that Slade, a popular tool for actual Doom and Wolf3D games, worked perfectly to extract the files.

    FUN NOTE: I started this many months ago. I JUST noticed that BStone has a command-line option to extract textures. #facepalm #hashtags #DOH

    You may call me…”Tim…er… I mean SPRITE”

    The BStone program looks in the “aog” folder for any textures (Planet Stike has it’s own folder, “ps”). If it finds a texture there, it will use that texture instead of the original. Unfortunately, BStone only supports sprite and wall files. That means some elements can’t be replaced currently (mostly UI and cut scenes). For Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold, there are 1017 sprite and wall textures but there isn’t a folder structure. They all just go into that one folder which makes it easier to manage.

    I extracted all textures to a working folder and hit it with a quick and dirty upscale so I could check how it works in-game. After dumping them into the “aog” folder, I booted BStone and enabled “External Textures” in the option menu. It didn’t work. Turns out that the extracted files were names were very slightly misnamed when extracted (SPR instead of SPRITE, etc.). It was easy enough to fix with a utility called Bulk File Renamer. A quick touch up and I reloaded BStone to see if that fixed it.

    Stretching them on the rack (by rack I mean in Photoshop)

    It worked…sort of. The textures were definitely upscaled but many of them looked squished (skinnier than normal). Quick glance at the readme revealed that rendering of sprites was not 1 for 1 in-game.

    After a little experimenting, I realized that every texture just needed to be perfectly square. Maybe the extraction method was flawed, not sure. To fix it, I just made a quick macro on my Logitech keyboard (frequently my savior for repetitive tasks), dumped 100 or so textures on photoshop and ran the macro (it resized the canvases to be 64×64, saved and then closed the file). I just needed to hold down the macro button and let it work through each file. After finishing all 1017 textures, I saved a backup for the inevitable time I make a drastic mistake. (I will share the reformatted originals when I get around to doing Planet Strike)

    Up next time…..Version 1 of my Blake Stone HD texture mod

  • Wait! I’m upscaling a 1993 game?! (Part 1)

    Its more an obsession at this point

    I have a weakness for mucking around trying to create HD art packs for games. The bulk of them don’t get completed, partially for technical reasons, but sometimes because something else catches my eye. Others are technically “done” but just aren’t up to my personal release standards. I can’t help it and my ADD frenzy usually kicks off when I see low resolution or blurry artwork in a game. Blake Stone by Apogee is a perfect example of that. I am not the biggest fan of pixel art, so it was an ideal candidate to be upscaled.

    I forgot it even existed

    I should note that before this, I never played Blake Stone or even remotely desired to play it. I had barely even remembered it because Doom overshadowed everything at that time. But I stumbled upon a source port for the game. The project called BStone, an open source port for Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold and the Planet Strike sequel, is a windows port for the DOS game.

    Wait it does what?!

    As I love game engine ports because they usually bring features and Quality of Life improvement to older games, I couldn’t resist checking it out. A quick search revealed that I actually owned both games on the GOG platform (I have over 2000 games…so….whoops). So using the BStone, I gave the loaded up Aliens of Gold. While tweaking the settings, I saw a few interesting options. First, you could use image filters which are OK but tend to just make the game look blurry to me. Second, the “upscale filter” applies an XBR filter that looks pretty nice for what it does, however there are limitation to how good pixel art can look that way. Last, there was an option to turn on “External textures” and…the fuse was lit. I knew that by just “merely” replacing the images, I could make the game look so much better and my obsession was triggered.