BeelzeRog Episode 11: Adventures in Modding Deus Ex
On February 26, 2023 by beelzerog
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Video Script:
Time for a deviation once again. On this channel I spend a lot of time talking about other people’s mods, but you’ll notice a few times I’ve threatened to make my own. As can be seen in the Saints Row the Third episode, this is not an idle threat. While I am not a programmer, I am a graphic designer by trade, so I do have some of the skillset required. And if there is a philosophy that has gotten me into trouble throughout my life, both good and bad, it is that sometimes, if you want something, you have to do it yourself.
So let’s get into it. I had originally planned to show a couple of mods, but realized just doing this one will take an entire episode. And it will be my attempt to do a better mod than the one that I had complained about loudly on my first episode: the original Deus Ex. I mean, I wasn’t attempting some HD upgrade, I wasn’t adding new items, I was simply wanting to re-skin the existing models. Easy, right?
Well, there is an easy part of this. One thing I like is when there are environmental mods which alter photos and ads in such a way that makes having characters running around topless and naked more immersive. Most of the wall and art textures are stored in the Texture folder and are easy to access through the included UnrealEd program, which I didn’t realize was actually included with the game until I started this project. I exported the desired ads and art and used them as a template for my new ads. Unlike Denadin, I don’t have a back catalog of screenshots to work from, so once again I went into my porn collection and made a set of ads and framed artwork. Also again, I attempted to make things somewhat consistent in-universe, if it was supposed to be a painting, I found appropriate classic art. I also had to keep some things consistent because the game has a habit of focusing on sections of artwork in order to add some variety to the displays. Only difference was I changed cigarette ads to ads for things like bars and cell phone companies.The only character image I used was to replace Sarah Renton’s portrait in the ‘Ton with her appearance post-mod.
I even decided to change the TVs in the game, using individual frames from animated GIFs. But it wasn’t until I changed the subliminal displays in VersaTech that I realized that there was a way to change the speeds of the images, which ran incredibly fast because there was no delay built in. I’m still considering changing out some of the static screens with looped porn because, well, I can.
Doing the character skins was a whole other story. First of all, you can’t simply replace the character skins. Importing new skins in forces them into a new UTX file rather than the .U file they reside in, so you have to edit the settings for the game to look for the skins in a new Texture file. And finding those setting were a pain, mostly because a lot of the old Deus Ex tutorials were a nest of broken links and the most I could find was on importing new models or making new maps. Finally, after digging around, I found a reference to someone wanting to change some weapons stats that involved exporting the class files to text, altering the files, and then restitching them back together.. So I attempted it with character skins… and these were the results. Opps.
More and more digging, lots of just clicking around and I finally figured out UrealEd had the ability to edit the class files the entire time. For whatever reason, restitching the files back together zeroed out the skins I wanted to changed, leading to the ghost figures I showed. The edits were made and I could finally, actually, get to work.
I had originally thought about simply fixing the original modder’s work, mostly just adding contrast to the skins they’d already made since doing that actually helped a lot, but there was another problem. They had also changed the models that the NPC’s used and, in retrospect, I can see why. There are two different breast configurations. While some models had individual breasts, several models have what I call ‘uniboob’, where there is just a shelf and no actual separation. They had also changed out several of the women who were meant to be older and, well, wider. Then there were the characters who’s appearance hadn’t been changed at all. So I felt it was better to start from scratch. It did give me a better appreciation as to why they made some of the decisions they did, even if I disagreed with their solutions.
I took a lot of cues from Denadin’s work, in that rather than just outright stripping everyone nude, I would simply add cutouts and see-through bits to the clothing, eliminating the need to struggle with the models so much. First problem was my new base textures weren’t properly transparent in some places, as seen with these skirts and collars. This required fixing how the colors were indexed in Photoshop, which I got a clue about in a Deus Ex Modding Discord. This also gave me other options in clothing. I was now able to create cutouts on skirts, exposing the crotch underneath. For the models with uniboob, I decided to treat them like they were wearing a kind of corset, with the boobs pushed together and up. A little bit more finesse was required because there was some texture stretching in the models and I had to correct for it. Looking at the flat texture makes the nipple look pinched, but they become rounded when stretched out. I also had to deal with shared textures, as some of the men used the same jeans textures as the women, as well as some different women used the same legs under their skirts. Since I can change out textures, I did manage to give the NPCs their own separate pants textures. The last big problem was characters with separate coat textures, specifically the punk girls and the female scientists. Attempting to create cutouts only left a transparent section showing the back of the model, since the shirt textures do not extend under the coats and there was no way I found to expand the shirt coverage. I left the punk girl’s fishnet top alone and simply gave replaced the shirt texture on the scientists with skin so their nipples kind-of showed
As you can imagine, this required a lot of back-and-forth where I would edit a texture, load the skin into the Texture file, load up Deus Ex to check my work, make some notes, go back to Photoshop, make the changes, and then import the changed file into Deus Ex and keep going. Some textures simply got to the point of me going “Good Enough” and moving on, though I may go back to them later. Also helped that some of the skins use the same models, so I could use what I did on one texture on a different character with some edits.
Last little bit of modding involved a pinball machine that is all over the game from the UNATCO base to dive bars in Hong Kong to Majestic 12 locker rooms. It was so blazingly generic, i decided to spruce it up a bit, again, taking a cue from Denadin reskinning the video game cabinets in Postal 2. Since this was not simply a case of swapping out a texture file, but also editing the DeusEx.u file, I decided I couldn’t simply look through my porn collection again, because I would rather the work be more original if I’m planning to send it out the wild. While debating which character skin to screenshot for the art, I stumbled on a screenshot from “Deus Ex Mankind Divided” in the Red Light District. There was one image of a topless female cyborg on a billboard. After confirming it was really part of the game, I grabbed it and centered it in the pinball machine artwork, giving it a name from a nearby Red Light District shop “Peep Hole”. And voila! an inside joke only someone who’s played both the original and Mankind Divided might get.
So that is the what and why with my current adventures in modding. I will be putting up another video detailing ‘how’ I did my Deus Ex skin mods, since I had so many problems finding the information myself, it says to me that this information needs to be put out there for others to use. Also expect it to be drier and less adult since more people would not be using it for salacious reasons, though one can hope. If there is something I missed, please let me know and at some point I will try to make the character & pinball mod available, maybe at Lover’s Lab if they’ll take it. Meantime, stay tuned for more mod review videos. Later!
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