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Revenant100

Doom 2 Minor Sprite Fixing Project - v2.0 Release (updated 11/28/22)

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In the next revision, you might also consider correcting the offsets for POB1A0 and POB2A0, which always appeared like they were slightly below ground level and sort of shifted around in strange ways when you moved. Just look at the pile of gore under the hanging body at the start of MAP21 and you'll see what I mean: It looks like it's sort of sunken into the platform it's sitting on.

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This is a great project! However, if you can make it happen, I'd like to request a version which only provides fixes for the monsters (no other improvements, e.g. HUD weapons, pickups, decorations or whatever).

Reason: I am using PerK's smooth HUD weapons and also 2x res sprites (from the Skulltag site). These don't mix well with your current pack, weapon alignment gets screwed and sprites start to switch between normal and 2x res, depending on which frames you have replaced in your WAD.

I know I can manually remove all the problematic stuff on my own, but maybe more people have the same issue and would appreciate a workaround to be available in the first place. :)

Anyway, this is a cool mod and is easily as important to have as PerK's highres sounds or smooth HUD weapons.

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Egregor said:

I nominated this for Cacowards 'best mod'.

Thanks! Looks like it didn't make the cut, but I much appreciate the consideration.

Megamur said:

you might also consider correcting the offsets for POB1A0 and POB2A0, which always appeared like they were slightly below ground level and sort of shifted around in strange ways when you moved.

I agree. I've always personally been bothered by BRS1A0, the little brain and spinal column, that I've always noticed just behind the spawn point in MAP30. I'm not sure if everyone would deem these outright errors that need "fixing", but I would argue these sprite offsets were set by the same auto-center option which, while appropriate for large monster sprites that have depth and perspective drawn/photographed into them, is not suitable for very small, short, and shallow objects like the pool of blood decorations.

I just made some slight offset adjustments to these decorations that I believe retain the perspective consistent with the rest of the sprites yet don't have the weird sunken look in motion. The update will come in a few days after some further testing.

NightFright said:

I'd like to request a version which only provides fixes for the monsters (no other improvements, e.g. HUD weapons, pickups, decorations or whatever).

Reason: I am using PerK's smooth HUD weapons and also 2x res sprites (from the Skulltag site). These don't mix well with your current pack

I just checked the Skulltag Hi-Res Items pack, and you can avoid any conflict with these sprite fixes simply by loading the Hi-Res Items WAD after the sprite fixes WAD, thus giving the former higher priority. The Hi-Res Items include full replacement sets for the affected items, so they'll properly override my sprite fixes if loaded second.

Perkristian's Smooth Weapons, on the other hand, is a trickier situation. There are a handful of different versions of his pack currently available (including your own), all requiring different source ports, whereas my sprite fixes are essentially vanilla executable compatible. It would be remarkably trivial for all iterations of Perkristian's Smooth Weapons pack to add full compatibility with other graphic-altering mods by simply including the few dependent unaltered weapon sprites to the WAD itself so it fully overrides anything else, whereas I would need to release two additional cut down versions of my sprite fixes just to accommodate a handful of other WADs.

In my opinion, it would be far simpler and much more ideal for these smooth weapon packs to address the compatibility issue rather than I as they only need to pack a few extra sprites into their WAD files. It might add a little redundancy, but this small change would produce identical results, have a negligible effect on the file size, and completely guarantee compatibility with any other graphic-altering modifications as long as they're loaded with the higher priority.

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To ring in the new year, I present the release of version 1.2 of this project. In addition to a number of more monster animation tweaks, the main focus of this update was on the projectiles, decorations, and other visual effects. I took care of errors such as the Baron's/Knight's fireball explosion appearing below the point of impact, the Revenant's rocket explosion appearing above the point of impact, the Mancubus's fireball appearing to shift up and down between rotations, and a whole bunch of other minute alterations including the sprite offset adjustments made to the pool of blood decorations as previously discussed.

Probably the most exciting part about this particular update to me (and likely nobody else) is that I came across some mostly obscure official artwork worth restoring while looking through the shareware versions of Doom. It turns out that 1.0 shareware's Baron of Hell sprites do not possess the brighter horns/hooves or darker pants errors illustrated in the images above. I'm guessing these errors were inadvertently introduced some time during the preparation for Doom 2. Whatever the case, I used these fixed sprites to replace the manual image edits I made. The end visual result is virtually indistinguishable from my previous releases (my edits weren't far off!), but it's nice knowing even more official artwork can be utilized to complement this pack. If nothing else, discovering sprites I never even thought existed after all this time gives me a little extra hope that, one day, we may somehow acquire the full 8-sided Player sprite set.


(Outdated, see original post)

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I love this project. Have you thought about tackling Heretic or Hexen in this way? They would benefit greatly from a project like this. Also, the enemies in those games simply don't have enough animations overall as well. They always look shudder-y because of this. Any way you could use your magic to bring them up to Doom par?

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I'm not averse to the idea of tackling Heretic, Hexen, or even Strife in a similar fashion, but my qualm there is the fact that I'm not nearly as familiar with those titles as I am with Doom. I'd effectively be going into those games blind. That's not necessarily a bad approach if you want to view everything objectively, but I think the many, many years of amassing Doom knowledge and minutia as well as getting a good feel for how everything in the game works really helped me with this project. I basically had everything planned out before I even started. For now, I'd rather encourage anyone else who has a greater passion for and experience with the inner-workings of Heretic/Hexen/Strife to try their own hand at this idea. Believe me, you'll gain a much deeper appreciation for the games once you've meticulously gone through every one of their sprites frame-by-frame.

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Unfortunately there generally is no such person or group with that passion for the non-Doom Doom engine games. Everytime enhancement projects like this pop up, I always hope it'll extend to Heretic, Hexen and Strife, hell, even Chex Quest and HacX. Doom Expanded really presses this home with its many improvements while keeping the gameplay the same. Maybe one day..

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There are several known problems with Heretic sprites.

- Black lines on the weredragon (beast) sprites
- ugly black squares on the firemace and some other weapon HUD sprites
- bloody axes from undead warriors do not rotate since their B frame is a copy of the A frame

- Optionally: status bar graphics aren't widescreen-friendly

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Ragnor said:

Unfortunately there generally is no such person or group with that passion for the non-Doom Doom engine games. Everytime enhancement projects like this pop up, I always hope it'll extend to Heretic, Hexen and Strife, hell, even Chex Quest and HacX. Doom Expanded really presses this home with its many improvements while keeping the gameplay the same. Maybe one day..


Many would argue that the likes of Doomsday and Risen3D already make the Doom engine games look nicer than most of the so called 'enhancement wads' for GZDoom.

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Upon these recommendations, I've taken a look at the Heretic and Hexen IWADs (Strife and such may come later). Honestly, I think Raven did a pretty solid job when it comes to their sprites. Applying the same principles I used here for Doom, there aren't nearly as many issues in either game in need of fixing. Nonetheless, there are still a few worthwhile changes to be made, so I'll undergo a crash course in Heretic and Hexen and see what I can come up with. It looks like making the HUD/weapon graphics widescreen-friendly will be most challenging aspect there, if even possible.

However, that isn't to say I'm done with Doom 1 and 2 just yet. I'm definitely winding down to the last changes at this point, but there's always a little extra fine tuning that can be done. Due to the revelation in this thread, I scoured through the shareware and pre-1.9 versions of Doom in one final pass and found yet more official artwork worth restoring, most notably the original front-facing Lost Soul sprites that have long been broken inadvertently since the 1.666 patch:

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Thank you x1000 for considering Hereitc/Hexen, those two need more community attention.

Whats the issue with the Lost Soul? It looks like the first one made his body flicker with the light of his own flames. I know the sprite was changed, but how was it broken?

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The "After" version looks more menacing. The subtle changes done to the nose and brow gives it a darker gaze, and the cleaned out mouth delineate its teeth more. The flickering light on the before pic is a bit annoying, and I don't understand how it has this peculiar jaw movement where the back moves but not the front. The horns also seem to oscillate up and down.

That said, the fire mane animation from both could be combined somehow, since it seems a bit static in the after pic.

Heretic bugs, now:
Firemace spot

Some other mentioned here

Other graphic bugs: 1, 2, 3.

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Gez said:

The subtle changes done to the nose and brow gives it a darker gaze, and the cleaned out mouth delineate its teeth more.

The nose is just mirrored, so I'm pretty sure that the "After" version is actually the earlier one.

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Ragnor said:

I know the sprite was changed, but how was it broken?

The "After" sprite is absolutely what id intended to be in the game. It was included in registered version 1.1 of Doom and remained until the 1.666 patch which also introduced a number of other graphical oddities (again, assuming by accident) that weren't originally broken, namely to the Baron of Hell's sprites as the images in my first post illustrate. Also, close examination of the Lost Soul's angled walking and front-facing attack frames exhibit qualities that indicate the "After" version is the correct iteration for the full sprite set: the fully black nose, the two defined brow ridges above the eyes rather than the single unibrow ridge, the style of the fire with more jagged edges and floating single pixel embers, the lack of light flickering on the forehead, and so on.

Da Werecat said:

The nose is just mirrored, so I'm pretty sure that the "After" version is actually the earlier one.

The "After" version is definitely the later one. It uses the second frame of the "Before" version as a base with the left half mirrored, likely done as an easy way to address the oddly wobbling horns and chin.

Gez said:

Heretic bugs, now:
Firemace spot

Some other mentioned here

Other graphic bugs: 1, 2, 3.

Thanks for these. I hadn't browsed the ZDoom forums much during this project, and within a few clicks through those links, I stumbled across the author of the SS sprites I used here. Much obliged for indirectly helping me solve this mystery!

I was aware of the transparent pixels in the Doom 2 sky, but I shied away from including the change earlier since it technically wasn't a sprite and I wasn't sure if replacing a single patch could cause any adverse side effects. Since this WAD is nearing its final release, I'll go ahead do the testing for this change now. I suppose it won't cause any conflicts. As for the Imp gibbing frames, that could arguably be thought of as a bloodied, declawed Imp hand emerging from the gore. I know it looks visually identical to the Zombie Man's (technically Shotgun Guy's) gibbed arm, but this lies in a somewhat gray area as to whether or not it's a technical error. Since this couldn't be obviously fixed without some original art, I'm going to err on the side of caution and assume that id believed the possessed human gibs were artistically close enough to suit the relatively humanoid Imp.

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Revenant100 said:

Also, close examination of the Lost Soul's angled walking and front-facing attack frames exhibit qualities that indicate the "After" version is the correct iteration for the full sprite set: the fully black nose, the two defined brow ridges above the eyes rather than the single unibrow ridge, the style of the fire with more jagged edges and floating single pixel embers, the lack of light flickering on the forehead, and so on.

It is possible that front-facing idle frames were specifically retouched to address ugly pixel banding at the center of the skull caused by its symmetry. Dunno how they screwed up the outlines though. Maybe during additional lighting work.

Well, anyway, I think the "After" version is more adequate in its current state.

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If you are looking for Heretic and Hexen widescreen HUDs, these have been done already and can be found in this thread (among some other stuff).

The widescreen HUDs available there have been done quite well and don't require a remake IMHO.

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Now THIS is a kind of mod I wouldn't mind using, great job!

Revenant100 said:

If nothing else, discovering sprites I never even thought existed after all this time gives me a little extra hope that, one day, we may somehow acquire the full 8-sided Player sprite set.

IIRC, I think a guy called JoeyTD had gotten those extra angles for the player sprite, but I don't remember if he found them somewhere in the Doom alphas or if he made them himself.

http://forum.zdoom.org/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=15080&start=3585#p544545

I searched around and found this post, and he must've put it on the Skulltag forums a little while back, but unfortunately they're closed down now so I can't be sure of this.

EDIT: I think I found the WAD file, but I'm still not sure if the angles are offical or not:
http://devilhunter.rfc1337.net/wads/Skins/Player678.zip
From the looks of it though, they might be custom-made.

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I have edited my "PerK Enhanced" weapon animation mod and added all your changes regarding weapon realignments. This way, it should be fully compatible to this mod.
I still recommend loading the sprite fixes first, then the animation mod second. Get the new "PerK Enhanced" version here (ZDoom/GZDoom only)!

Hoping for a new release with the fixed Lost Soul soon, looks really cool. :)

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NightFright said:

If you are looking for Heretic and Hexen widescreen HUDs, these have been done already and can be found in this thread (among some other stuff).

Much appreciated. These will definitely be included. Also, thanks for updating your smooth weapons pack. The compatibility is rockin' now.

Triple_sSs said:

EDIT: I think I found the WAD file, but I'm still not sure if the angles are offical or not:
http://devilhunter.rfc1337.net/wads/Skins/Player678.zip
From the looks of it though, they might be custom-made.

You're correct, the sprites in that WAD file are fanmade. No offense to whoever made those, they're a noble effort, but they look pretty wonky.

The Doom alphas do indeed possess official sprites for the missing rotations, but it's only for one walking frame (and that WAD you linked to doesn't use them for some reason). Nonetheless, I'm fairly positive that id did in fact create full 8-sided rotations for all of the Player's animations. We can even see one of the missing rotation sprites for the Player's shooting state in shareware Doom's buy screen. There's just the question of whether or not these sprites still exist somewhere today, and if they do, if they'd ever be publicly released. The likelihood is low, but I want to believe.

However, there is a guy on the ZDoom forums by the name of ItsNatureToDie who has created some absolutely stellar recreations of the missing Player rotation sprites as seen here, here, and here. He even used the few available alpha Player sprites as a base. Unfortunately, he still hasn't finished them yet, and I wouldn't include them here with my Sprite Fixing Project since they're not official. That's something more for a Missing Sprite Rotations Project, but that's a tale for another day.

Anywho, for anyone curious about the current status of my sprite fixes, I'm nearly finished with Heretic and will begin Hexen soon. It looks like Hexen is going to be quite a doozie, though, mainly because of the work needed to make the weapon sprites widescreen-friendly. As for Doom, I've already done most of the work for the next update, but I'm holding off on thorough testing and the release until I've finished the Raven games first.

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Maybe there is also a widescreen HUD for Doom which is interesting for this project. You can see it in this post I made.

Basically, it doesn't do anything but simply remove the HUD "gaps" to the left and right if you have a widescreen resolution, e.g. in ZDoom. According to the author, it also fixes a small HOM effect at the bottom which can occur in some resolutions.

It was made by MG_Man --> original post with download

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NightFright said:

Maybe there is also a widescreen HUD for Doom which is interesting for this project. You can see it in this post I made.

Basically, it doesn't do anything but simply remove the HUD "gaps" to the left and right if you have a widescreen resolution, e.g. in ZDoom. According to the author, it also fixes a small HOM effect at the bottom which can occur in some resolutions.

It was made by MG_Man --> original post with download

Oh sweet, I'd totally like this included myself, especially since it doesn't change that much.

And Revenant100, I figured those were custom from the looks of it, though the other ones you linked do look better.
Also if you really want to know if the missing player sprites still exist, perhaps you could try to contact "the Two Johns" themselves and see if they know anything. Maybe they don't know either, but it could be worth a shot.

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Can only agree to what the others said. Cool project, looking forward to 1.3 and Raven packs.

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Sorry for the double posting, but I'm curious to how things are progressing with this project?

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This project is still very much in the back of my mind, but I simply had to step back and take a short break. Combined together, Heretic and Hexen are host to over 4,000 sprites, triple that of Doom 2's sprite count, and each one of those I have to individually check at least once (ideally twice, if not much more) for the sake of consistency and thoroughness. It's the quite the laborious and tiring endeavor on the mind, but I assure you I'll be back on it soon now that I've given my brain a bit of a breather.

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No problem, just wanted to know that the project is alive and well. Thanks for the reply! :)

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I'm sorry that I keep nagging you about this project, but it's been a while, and I'm really curious whether you've made any more progress on this yet?

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Sorry for resurrecting this thread, but it's been near 4 months... any update on your progress Revenant100?

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