Oblivion Character Overhaul: Not looking right (I think it isn't?)

[ShadowSora94]

Hello, good people of the Oblivion nexus community c:

 

So, I've had Oblivion installed for a long time, but haven't played it until recently. Since I really am not fond of the original appearances of NPCs, I downloaded nuska's Oblivion Character Overhaul to try to make the game look more visually appealing, I don't like unrealistic extreme beauty mods, and for me this was just the little improvement I like to enjoy my character's appearance.

 

The first character I attempted to make was a female Dunmer, which along with the beast races were (imo) my favorite enhancements. So I began to play it, and it just... didn't look like what I was expecting.

 

To compare, here is a female Dunmer with age and complexion on their lowest settings, and well... it didn't look like. a TREMENDOUS improvment, but only for the Dunmer. The first is without (bad screenshot timing ahoy), the second is with the mod.

 

http://i.imgur.com/qwLpgg6.jpg

 

http://i.imgur.com/xnRi92d.jpg

 

In this first, we have a male Khajiit. The first is without OCO, the second is with. As you can see, an improvement, but it isn't as it looks in the mod's previews.

 

http://i.imgur.com/UTN2Y8v.jpg

 

http://i.imgur.com/xxIA3NR.jpg

 

And finally, an Imperial female, again with complexion and age on lowest. This is the most jarring with almost no difference beyond the eybrows. As usual, the first is without, the second is with.

 

http://i.imgur.com/RZxbAE2.jpg

 

http://i.imgur.com/oDLioWu.jpg

 

So, here is my question: Is this how OCO usually looks? I'm loading it last as it recommends (and using BOSS to help sort all my mods). I don't have any character appearence mods: all my mods are really just the Unofficial Patches doing their thing and the Mannimarco Revisited mod. I did, however, install Universal Skeletons for the combat appearence mod (since I remember from the little I did play Oblivion I didn't like how they looked fighting). Could that have been it? Or do I just have to play around more with character creation? I thought the Dunmer eye thing at first was just a separate eye color, but I can't find it without.

 

Can anyone clarify what's going on with this game? If so, I'd really appreciate it c:

 

(And I am using the latest version btw)

Edited November 15, 2013 by ShadowSora94

[severr]

I do use OCO and from your screenshots the dark elf looks exactly the way she's supposed to look with OCO. However i do think the other two races havn't been affected at all. Do you have any quest mods(like integration the stranded light) installed? Any way keep OCO's esp at the very end, before the bashed patch if you have one. Boss doesnt place it were its supposed to if you have integration installed. I would also recommend using a bashed patch. I dont know about the universal skeletons mod but it may very well be the cause so why dont you try temporarily uninstalling it?

[ShadowSora94]

Hello, good people of the Oblivion nexus community c:

 

So, I've had Oblivion installed for a long time, but haven't played it until recently. Since I really am not fond of the original appearances of NPCs, I downloaded nuska's Oblivion Character Overhaul to try to make the game look more visually appealing, I don't like unrealistic extreme beauty mods, and for me this was just the little improvement I like to enjoy my character's appearance.

 

The first character I attempted to make was a female Dunmer, which along with the beast races were (imo) my favorite enhancements. So I began to play it, and it just... didn't look like what I was expecting.

 

To compare, here is a female Dunmer with age and complexion on their lowest settings, and well... it didn't look like. a TREMENDOUS improvment, but only for the Dunmer. The first is without (bad screenshot timing ahoy), the second is with the mod.

 

http://i.imgur.com/qwLpgg6.jpg

 

http://i.imgur.com/xnRi92d.jpg

 

In this first, we have a male Khajiit. The first is without OCO, the second is with. As you can see, an improvement, but it isn't as it looks in the mod's previews.

 

http://i.imgur.com/UTN2Y8v.jpg

 

http://i.imgur.com/xxIA3NR.jpg

 

And finally, an Imperial female, again with complexion and age on lowest. This is the most jarring with almost no difference beyond the eybrows. As usual, the first is without, the second is with.

 

http://i.imgur.com/RZxbAE2.jpg

 

http://i.imgur.com/oDLioWu.jpg

 

So, here is my question: Is this how OCO usually looks? I'm loading it last as it recommends (and using BOSS to help sort all my mods). I don't have any character appearence mods: all my mods are really just the Unofficial Patches doing their thing and the Mannimarco Revisited mod. I did, however, install Universal Skeletons for the combat appearence mod (since I remember from the little I did play Oblivion I didn't like how they looked fighting). Could that have been it? Or do I just have to play around more with character creation? I thought the Dunmer eye thing at first was just a separate eye color, but I can't find it without.

 

Can anyone clarify what's going on with this game? If so, I'd really appreciate it c:

 

(And I am using the latest version btw)

 

Hello, and thanks for replying back c:

 

So, I recently just completely uninstalled Oblivion and also deleted the files in the My Games, and even deleted all my old mods to make sure they'd be fresh. I'm only currently using the main file of the OCO. Nothing else since it states you need no other mods. Things still mostly look the same (in particular Dunmer don't have the red eyes: wha'ts up with that, anyway? It won't let me change Dunmer eyes either). I'm using the newest version, too. What do you think could possibly be wrong?

 

For a compare and contrast, I did this: I took screenshots of every race as female with age and complexion set at their lowest. Then again with males. Some characters in particular seems good: in the female set, High Elf, Orc, and Dark Elf are still leagues above their vanilla counterparts. But at the same time, some still look the same. Same goes for males.

 

(Females) http://imgur.com/a/oodcN

(Males) http://imgur.com/HNBit4c,YIVWHCC,wt9tFvG,jiRkNgC,AgIg7tW,UC6ZsIS,czP3BbG,lsKZ3w5,MPnnTiQ,2h76zMk#0

 

Is this mod really working properly? If it changes anything at all: does the fact I use a Steam copy of the game have a factor in it? One of the optional files?

 

(Also, really, dunmer eyes: How do I get that working like it shows in OCO?)

[MadWizard25]

How are you installing your mods; manually, Oblivion Mod Manager, Wrye Bash etc?

 

It looks like some other mod may be overriding OCO in certain parts, which can happen if you install another mod (that conflicts with OCO) after installing OCO. The install order of mods is important, on top of using BOSS for the .esp/ .esm load order.

[ShadowSora94]

No other mod is currently installed right now. So far it's just Oblivion, and all the official DLCs (I'm using the Game of the Year edition with all DLCs and plugins), and OCO is last in the loadorder. I'm not launching it with OBSE right now. With everything else, it's currently 12th in the load order. Does using the GOTY edition do anything? I've heard that Skyrim Legendary Edition has issues with mods.

Edited November 25, 2013 by ShadowSora94

[severr]

It looks like only your human races(imperial,breton,nord) are ****ed up. Trust me they look WAY better in my game. How exactly did you install the mod? Manual or obmm? Also make sure you are using the latest version(1.2). Make sure every file in OCO archive reaches were its supposed to. It looks a lot like the human faces aren't being replaced at all. And what exactly do you mean by 'main' file of oco? I don't know about the steam version but check if your data folder structure is the same as a normal version.

[MadWizard25]

GOTY should be fine. Make sure the game is version 1.2.0416. GOTY should be by default already patched. Double check in any case.

 

I would also recommend installing the Unofficial Oblivion Patch (UOP) and the Unofficial Official Mods Patch (UOMP), and OBSE. These three are for all intents and purposes almost essential.

 

 

 

Its important for us to know *how* you installed the the game, DLCs, and OCO. Even if its the only mod, we still need to know your install order and any utilities you used.

 

This issue has all the classic signs of a corrupted install, so thats why we need this specific information :smile:

 

 

 

I would recommend using a mod install utility like OBMM or Wrye Bash.

 

Wrye Bash is especially useful because it check for conflicts between mods, and makes sure that mod overrides are applied correctly. Manual installs are not recommended since the risk of breaking something is much higher.

 

After installing Oblivion GOTY and DLCs , you should do the following (using one of the utilities);

 

1. Install UOP

2. Install UOMP

3. Install OBSE

4. Install OCO

5. Activate all plugins (.esp/ .esm)

5. Run BOSS

6. Run TES4Edit and clean plugins (if BOSS reports any dirty plugins)

7. Defrag

8. Play

 

Also, did you try installing any other mods prior to or after OCO?

Edited November 25, 2013 by MadWizard25

[ShadowSora94]

Well, my game is fully updated: i never uninstall automatic updates so that I think has never been a problem.

 

I play Skyrim through steam as well, so I'm used to modding through Workshop and Nexus. When I download through nexus, I save my mods in a different folder and drag the .esp, Meshes, Textures, and whatever additional files I need myself into the SteamApps>Common>Data folder. I use Nexus Mod Manager to manage the mods in my games (primarily New Vegas and Skyrim). I've neve rued anything like WyreBash: never needed it from my experience. I've never had mods conflict with one another and I generally try avoiding downloading multiple mods that do the same thing.

 

When downloading OCO, I download the "Oblivion Character Overhaul" file in the MAIN FILES section. Version 1.2. In my folder, it appears as:

Oblivion Character Overhaul test-43612-1-2.zip

 

I have cleaned all dirty edits with TES4Edit after sorting it out through BOSS. I was gonna have a list of how it looked beforehand, but I just learned the hard way that the Nexus Forums do not save what you have written so far when you accidentally go to another page. However, I do have how it looks now:

 

http://i.imgur.com/VqI5Xhz.png

 

Before, it was the same: just without the Unofficial Patches installed. However, either way, the same problems persist. Non human races (with the exceptions of Khajiit and to a weird extent Wood Elfs: they look physically better but not completely, like with their lips as you can see in my screenshots which seem to still be Vanilla, pretty unsettling. I still cannot change the eyes of Dunmer to look like their Skyrim counterparts like the mod advertises). I'm running using vanilla launcher, not OBSE.

 

So, again. Unofficial Patches installed, installed manually by importing .esp, Meshes, and Textures into the Data folder, dirty edits clean, only have OCO and UPs and their master files installed, BOSS was used to decide mod order but I made sure that OCO is always last on the list.

 

Does this clear up anything?

[severr]

Wait a minute Oblivion Character Overhaul test-43612-1-2.zip? Weird, my file is named Oblivion Character Overhaul 1_2-43612-1-2.zip and I'm pretty sure mine is the latest version. Are you absolutely sure your downloading the right file?

[DrakeTheDragon]

I'm not reading anything about "Archive Invalidation" anywhere. Though especially with a Steam game all 'replacement' files will just not work without it.

And if the BSA files coming from Steam are still dated more recent than any replacement file, they won't even work 'with' Archive Invalidation applied properly.

 

You're using the NMM I see. There should be a means to apply a proper approach for Archive Invalidation available in this one as well by now. But for reference, anything else than BSA Redirection / Archive Redirection / ArchiveInvalidationInvalidated! (or however the different mod managers may call it) is not recommended and either just not working right or simply asking for trouble on the long run.

I don't know if there is a means to reset the BSA archives' file dates as well in the NMM, but in the Oblivion Mod Manager (OBMM) for example there's the button "Reset BSA timestamps" inside the "Utilities > Archive Invalidation" dialog.

 

Once the BSAs aren't dated more recent than any replacement file will ever be anymore and the proper approach for Archive Invalidation is applied, there shouldn't be any issues anymore with the game not using replacement files and sticking to its Vanilla resources for a long time to come.