Skyblivion Potential

umm the skyrim project is a lot more difficult project, how are you going to replace all those illegal meshes and textures?

LASentry

So, I've been looking thorugh both Skyblivion and Skywind. Skyblivion is obviously a lot easier project because we can use mainly the same textures or textures from mods and all the NPC's are voice acted. Skywind on the other hand is basically a daunting task and we have all done really well so far to get it to the point where it is basically as developed as Skyblivion even though it is not a "Conversion project". Just a message to everyone to keep their heads up :) 

PS, working on a trailer for Skywind atm... promise it'll look great... I'll be working on Skyblivion next!

I'm not sure want you mean by "is not a 'Conversion project'". Skyblvion converts Oblivion just like Skywind converts Morrowind. The main issue is nobody really cares about Oblivion and because of that it is highly unlikely that Skyblivion will be more then a couple of quests (not a complete conversion like Morroblvion or Skywind). Plus in a massive mod sense, it's better to work harder for a better product then to, work less for a worse product. Also awhile back Clint mentioned that if we try to do both projects at once, both will fail, so we choose Skywind over Skyblivion, and until Skywind is complete not much stuff will be done on Skyblvion( but who is the judge of when Skywind is complete). And in if there is any doubt, I mentioned a long time ago( back when it was still called MorroSkyrim) that most modders who want to see Skywind complete are either gonna fall off the side of the earth(quit) when Skywind is done or continue polishing Skywind until tesVI. So yeah no one here has any real faith in Skyblivion any more.

(sigh)... I kinda feel like making a trailer of skyblivion is tricking people into coming here, I mean most people here don't think Skyblivion is going anywhere and it kinda is tricking people if we say this is what you could be playing in a couple years, knowing that it won't get done.

It's true that if we want skyblivion to be completed we need a whole new team (skywind and skyblivion fans are usualy not the same people, but it probably won't be hard to find people interested by skyblivion (just watch the comments on the videos)). Btw supreme, are you going to switch to the new master for your mod? (it could be nice because at least this can be finished before tes6).

And about the "illegal meshes and textures", honestly who cares? : / I mean, you'll never replace all the meshes in skywind anyway (unless you hire a whole team of professional developers) so don't even think about skyblivion...

 

thats just negative SupremeEpicness and no 1 is saying u need to work on skyblivion there are those that wanne work on it but if u gone hit it in the ground before it really starts its not gone fly u need to push it of a clif and if it drops screw it but if it fly u gone hate u kick it in the ground (hope u get what i am saying)

and from what i saw if it only gets the help and tips in what needs to be done it can be done 

 

@anthelius: You know what, that's not a bad idea, how much can a professional team charge to make all the assets of Oblivion again.(probably not more then $15,000 at the very most)

Anyway I highly HIGHLY doubt enough people care about Skyblivion(or care more about Oblivion then Morrowind) to make a team so yeah, I mean, let's say down the road in a couple month, when Skywind is completely playable and new people come here, I still think they would rather polish Skywind than finish Skyblivion. Even Clint said that Converting Oblivion was only a "maybe", and that was back when Skyblivon was converted by the andoran thing (and before Skywind was converted) so it's not like this is a new theory even from the beginning there wasn't much faith that it would get done.

@no1:I think that's a the problem. Although I like Oblivion more then Morrowind (because it felt more epic, like the world could really end soon), Most people like Morrowind more, and if they do like Oblivion more they(myself included) would rather see Skywind over Skyblivion (Morrowind to Skyrim is bigger upgrade then Oblivion to Skyrim). When we first started ,or what ever ,we had already made up our minds that we wouldn't do to much work on Skyblivion until Skywind was rolling. The main issue to me is that Skyblivion isn't gonna get a whole team behind it. The current modders aren't gonna switch over even if skywind is near completion, and new modders are just gonna join the skywind side even if Skywind is near completion. Half the people I talk to on the nexus don't even know that skyblivion is a project so it's safe to say most people are coming here because they want to follow Skywind, not Skyblivion. 

Back@anthelius: Yeah I kinda have to convert all my work in the 4E provinces to the new Skyblivion due to an issue I mentioned a short while back. I tried to merge every thing and it loaded fine... in the creation kit so I remade all the backups off it, but in game it always crashed so I had to go back to using the original Skyblivion master but because it still had so many corrupt forms (that were not in my custom master) The mod became way to large for the creation kit to handle ,so I got the out of handle Array error thing, and with that the mod is dead (well at least until I manage to merge the new plugin to the old master. Or until I remake several month of work on the new skyblivion master).

@ Supreme: the question is: WHY would we replace any meshes and textures? I understand that they are a bit outdated in skywind but in skyblivion?Seriously, we already ask people to install the original games with the installer, and bethesda probably doesn't care at all about our mods (we'll never be on the nexus or other mainstream sites anyway) so we'd better focus about something more useful and achievable than redoing everything...

For the second part, I hope you'll suceed to port your work ; ). I don't really care in fact if we don't have the original quests back, I just wanted to go back to cyrodiil in skyrim (and also places like the oblvion realms and the shivering isles) but it's fine too if the quests are completely new.

You HAVE to find a replacement for all of your meshes/textures/sounds in order to be legal.

The only work around I can think of is what I thought about doing with Skywind music and Skyblivion's music/voices. Create an installer that copies the player's voice bsa, and converts it to a Skyrim bsa, and copies all of the Oblivion music, and copies it to your Skyrim music folder.
There is actually a mod called Musichaul for Skywind that allows you to play your Oblivion/Morrowind music in Skyrim, but requires you to copy your Morrowind/Oblivion music and convert it to .wma your self.

I think you know where I'm going with all of this, and how this approach can be used towards texture/meshes. I doubt it's a good idea, and would be tough to pull it off, but it's just an idea.

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/18987/ Link to Musichaul

</span>Mehh<span style="font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.5;">You HAVE to find a replacement for all of your meshes/textures/sounds in order to be legal.

The only work around I can think of is what I thought about doing with Skywind music and Skyblivion's music/voices. Create an installer that copies the player's voice bsa, and converts it to a Skyrim bsa, and copies all of the Oblivion music, and copies it to your Skyrim music folder.
There is actually a mod called Musichaul for Skywind that allows you to play your Oblivion/Morrowind music in Skyrim, but requires you to copy your Morrowind/Oblivion music and convert it to .wma your self.

I think you know where I'm going with all of this, and how this approach can be used towards texture/meshes. I doubt it's a good idea, and would be tough to pull it off, but it's just an idea.

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/18987/ Link to Musichaul

I doubt replacing the files would make it legal regardless.  Bethesda owns Oblivion. You wouldn't get away with disputing a Cease and Desist order from them just because you slightly modified what the Anvil castle walls look like.  You'd still lose because you had the Anvil castle itself, for example.

If Bethesda was against popular mods, they'd have gone after these projects by now.  Morroblivion has gone on for quite some time and they haven't shown any action to my knowledge of wanting it gone.

Regardless, Bethesda is the mod-your-game-to-all-hell video game company.  They aren't at risk of getting sued by another company for you taking another company's content.  It's Bethesda's content.  I don't see any motive Bethesda has for angering part of their modding community by going after some randomly assembled team of modders who just want to play a better looking Morrowind/Oblivion.

</span>SupremeEpicness<span style="font-size: 1em; line-height: 1.5;">The main issue is nobody really cares about Oblivion and because of that it is highly unlikely that Skyblivion will be more then a couple of quests (not a complete conversion like Morroblvion or Skywind).

Modding communities for both Morrowind and Oblivion are still active.  People still play both, the comment sections on both youtube videos have people, so on, so forth.  You're fabricating this concept of a lack of support on the skyblivion project.

SupremeEpicnessPlus in a massive mod sense, it's better to work harder for a better product then to, work less for a worse product. Also awhile back Clint mentioned that if we try to do both projects at once, both will fail, so we choose Skywind over Skyblivion, and until Skywind is complete not much stuff will be done on Skyblvion( but who is the judge of when Skywind is complete). 

Skywind is the priority until it is done, and then Skyblivion will have more development.  That's what I've been hearing.  I don't know what the rest of this part even means.

SupremeEpicnessAnd in if there is any doubt, I mentioned a long time ago( back when it was still called MorroSkyrim) that most modders who want to see Skywind complete are either gonna fall off the side of the earth(quit) when Skywind is done or continue polishing Skywind until tesVI. So yeah no one here has any real faith in Skyblivion any more.

I don't understand.  You posted an opinion and now suddenly the forum has given up on skyblivion?  Wat?  Seems active enough to me.

SupremeEpicness(sigh)... I kinda feel like making a trailer of skyblivion is tricking people into coming here, I mean most people here don't think Skyblivion is going anywhere and it kinda is tricking people if we say this is what you could be playing in a couple years, knowing that it won't get done.

If you'd check the latest youtube video on the apavtech channel, it's pretty clear a lot of progress has recently been achieved.  Oblivion's just easier to convert, from what I've heard.  The several people on this forum who want Skywind and don't care about Skyblivion do not represent all of Bethesda's gamers.  There are plenty of people who want Skyblivion just as they want Skywind.

Osiris pretty much summed up my feelings exactly.

Assuming I ever have time to work on this again, I'll only keep working on Skywind until it's quest-complete and playable. After that, I'll hop over to Skyblivion.

Actually Morroblivion was banned by bethesda and the nexus on the basis that bethesda didn't own the meshes and textures of morrowind. They even said that if it were only up to them they wouldn't do it, but they had no choice in the matter. If you make every thing from scratch and it is a replica of Oblivion then no, bethesda can't ban it, but when you do direct converts that's when the legal team has to put a stop to you. so yeah it is important to make our own assets. Even though we will never be completely legal we might as well try to be as legal as possible( as to not anger the legal team of bethesda and provoke them into action). I mentioned this in the topic eso use. If we use the stuff from eso we will be illegally ripping the latest stuff from zenimax and using it for our own gain then bethesda is gonna get mad because it's like "they're not even trying to be legal" rather then let's at least try to not get bethesda sued.

You missed the point. You can't set a line saying skywind is done now, let's move on to skyblivion. Who sets the line, is it when all the quest of the main game are done or when all the dlc quests are done (last time I checks morroblivion still doesn't have all the dlc quests). Even still, if you do set a line say ,okay let's move on to skyblivion now, you could be depriving skywind  from the true greatness it could have. If you don't make the line no one will ever move on. So which is better: one great mod, or two half complete mods.

You're only half right on the modding community thing. Morrowind's community is far more active with OpenMW and tamriel rebuilt still going on (not to mention walk-throughers making new... walk-through for morrowind all the time) it's not a fabrication ,half the elder scrolls fans say Oblivion is the worst game and the other half say Skyrim is (well most say skyrim is). But really, does anyone really expect a project like OpenOB to ever happen. Not many people care about Oblivion and you never here of any major mods that might be headed for oblivion soon (you do for morrowind). So no... they don't have equal activity.

Nah. The forum kinda always knew that we would have to choose. I mentioned Like the day I first came to this site that Clint told me:

 

Osiris

If you'd check the latest youtube video on the apavtech channel, it's pretty clear a lot of progress has recently been achieved.  Oblivion's just easier to convert, from what I've heard.  The several people on this forum who want Skywind and don't care about Skyblivion do not represent all of Bethesda's gamers.  There are plenty of people who want Skyblivion just as they want Skywind.

Oblivion is easier to convert in the sense that more of it can be converted,(not we can make stuff faster) but it just got converted and it's still not a complete as skywind, so yeah... it's not like we're so much farther ahead in skyblivion then we are at skywind. BTW a lot doesn't mean enough, we'll need a load of modder if we plan to get skyblivion done before TES6, and considering how unpopular skyrim is, it's safe to safe that when TES6 comes out not many people will continue to work on anything for it.

Edit:@anthelius: I hope you realize I was joking about the hiring a team to remake all Oblivion meshes.

Legality is not an issue because even I can make an installer which will copy and update meshes/textures/sounds using binary diffs directly from Oblivion's BSA files into Skyrim. No need to even discuss it. The final downloadable Skyblivion package won't have a single asset file from Oblivion.

I already mentioned that my current aim is to make a stable and good looking Skyblivion package that can be used by anyone for further improvements. This requires:

1) Fixing bad and missing meshes (and redirecting texture paths inside them to not overlap with original Skyrim's textures). Also create LOD meshes for Objects's lod.

2) Converting grasses and trees, without them Skyblivion is not "Oblivion". Create trees LOD meshes and trees texture atlas for Tree's LOD.

3) Create custom imagespaces/weathers, without them Oblivion's textures aren't looking good. Optionally add LCTN locations records, needed for quests/dialogs/AI.

And that's all. After that Skyblivion project can be freezed, and anyone from outside who wishes to work on it can come, get a stable master/assets, and improve anything he/she wants.

@zilav: it will probably be really hard, but that's the still the best idea for now ( because honestly, redo all the assets just for the sake of being "good boys" :/ let's just close this project instead...). Once again, thanks for your hard work ; ) Skyblivion has less publicy now but considering all the people who miss oblivion I'm sure there is a potential army of modders for this mod.

As you said skyblivion can be "freezed" once everything is converted and stable, I'll be happy just by visiting a good looking cyrodiil^^ ( and if we don't want to recreate everything people can write their own 4th era quests, it doesn't matter for me, maybe it's even better...)

I don't mind (once I finish debugging Morroblivion's expansions that is) to do the quests for Skyblivion.

But yeah, I have my hands pretty full at the moment. :)

@supremepicness

I've pretty much retracted what I've said there. I'd like Skywind to be the main focus, but, really, it's up to the community and the developers what they want. But it sounds like Skyblivion's doing pretty good thanks to Zilav.

Pretty much, like Thermador said, the workers decide what happens. It's a meritocracy.

 

I know I'll work on Skyblivion's quests when my Skywind work is in bug fixing mode :)

you need help im good with the creation kit

You can create faces for NPCs to match the Oblivion's ones, or fix black spots and abrupt texture seems on landscape for example.

Once we are done with Skywind I will surely help with Skyblivion. That's a certainty.

I am still having fun with what there is to work with. Who knows by the time I get good at this stuff maybe I'll be of some use around here. Until then I'm gonna work with what I got and what I know, and keep learning along the way. Right now I keep playing around with the same room learning more and better ways of doing things. Maybe some folks visiting will see that they can have fun while learning new skills, see instant reward for their work, and join in when ready. It's what I plan on doing.

Mystic Emporium again, Got navmesh worked out after finally getting it through my thick head not to let CK do any generating  ;) and gave Calindil a basic home owner package for now. And tried to put what I was using in similar places as their original counterparts.

I think the next thing I'm gonna learn when I'm happy with my CK skills, is how to convert my own master, so that my esp files wont be crammed full of all the stuff they have to delete. I'd like to get it down to just land and buildings and working decor so that maybe you could get the whole thing to load with skyrim in CK instead of the stripped skyrim.esm. I know that is probably just wishful thinking.

looks good turn2 ceep up the good work