Metal Gear Solid 4 Noesis Plugin (Models, Anims)

[JayK]

I've released a plugin to view models and animations from MGS4. This will allow you to view textured models without having to extract textures from their cache files, you can also view animations. To view animations you have to select 'Prompt for Motion Archive' in the tool menu. You can grab it here. https://github.com/Jayveer/MGS-MDN-Noesis/releases

It is worth reading the usage to see the various options. In particular if things aren't looking right you can choose 'Skip Normal Maps' in the options as there are material flags I haven't researched yet. As stage and slot files are linked the stage related slot files may require the DLZ and TXN files from their related stage files to be placed in their directory. In order to make sure you have the files extracted properly it's best to use the MGS4 extraction tool I made here here. https://github.com/Jayveer/Solideye/releases

EDIT: In a recent update I have added support for Metal Gear Arcade files and started implementing different material flags. I noticed a problem with Noesis when exporting an FBX file and having Multiple UVs. It creates a 'LayerElementMaterial' for each UV and only applies the material to the last one rather than all of them. There is something manual that can be done to resolve this. If you export with the -fbxascii flag, open the generated fbx file in a text editor of your choice, and then find and replace all instances of 'NoMappingInformation' with 'ByPolygon' and save it, then materials should resolve properly afterwards.

[Pepsee]

I know this isn't that relevant to the topic but will there be support for Portable Ops/Portable Ops Plus? It has some great character models and animations

[JayK]

Eventually I'll add that to the peace walker plugin.

[voyennyy]

Whoa Jay! This works like a charm! Thank you so much for releasing it. I was able to utilize the tool successfully with no problems at all.

The only thing I was having trouble with is that some models are separated from each other and the animations are out of sync when trying to link them all together. For example, Raven's wings are separate from her body and the animations don't line up when they are both imported and playing. It seems the animation sets are not lined up with each other and play independently. The same is true for Crying Wolf, the railgun, and the character inside the bot. For Wolf specifically, it's interesting because some of the railgun animations line up with the wolf-bot but then it gets out of sync as the sequence progresses. I also had to roughly line up where the railgun would be oriented and constrain it to the bot and it looks right until the animation desyncs.

In all honesty, it's nothing wrong with your plugin/script, just a technicality I suppose. I don't really know how you would fix this, perhaps having the animations split into separate clips instead of one whole sequence/file would make it easier to line up where the animations fit? Or maybe an option for the plugin could put the parts altogether when imported into Nosesis? Or maybe another solution? I wouldn't know. But either way, it's not a problem at all, more of a suggestion. I can get around this, it's just takes more time to split up all the animations into clips and to find the right one and line them up manually, just another project for me!
Still, excellent work, great stuff and let everyone know if you have any updates! Thanks again!

[JayK]

It was mentioned previously that you could use this command to split animations when exporting maybe that will help?

Single fbx file with the animations split inside instead of a single one long animation : -fbxmultitake

[Sypheria]

Does this work on stage/map files?

I'm trying to use it on the MGO maps specifically, I don't have MGS4 downloaded.

As I understand it, textures are stored in a dlz file. How do you extract those textures? Noesis seems to be able to pull the textures, but only when you open an accompanying mdn file from the slot folders. The stage folders don't have mdn files, but geom files instead. And Solideye doesn't seem to work on the qar/dar in there either.

I found a download for the MGO maps in obj format, but they don't have textures or even UVs. I'm at a loss on how to extract the models/textures myself. I don't mind having to sort and apply the textures completely manually, or manually fix bugged textures. But I can't manage to get the textures or UV'd models in the first place. I found a video of C.C. with textures, so it must be possible somehow.

[bestgj]

Very good. I learned to use it

[bestgj]

Finger animation stiff

[JayK]

I have posted an update to the Solideye tool which now allows you to decrypt files from the stage folders of the MGS4 Database, Metal Gear Online and the MGS4 Demo package. It also adds basic Dar and Qar file repacking features. You can get the update here;

https://github.com/Jayveer/Solideye/releases/tag/1.2

[jimmy12345]

This tool is for PS3 Game iso?

[JayK]

This tool is for PS3 Game iso?

yes

[darkside970]

One question, is there a possibility to import models from MGS3 HD to noesis?

[JayK]

Yeah there is, but it's not high on the priority list for me to make that plugin right now.

[FatTpose]

Thanks for this plugin tool, works like a charm.

Just a question though, are the cutscenes pre-rendered or are the animations stored inside one of those MTAR files

[JayK]

They're not pre-rendered except for the Eastern Europe river custscene. They use mtar's as well but there's more to those ones and I haven't worked on those ever.