Morrowind Graphics Extender

[Starsickle]

It would be very neat if, either using MGE's distant statics or perhaps a feature for OPENMW, if you can see the weather elsewhere on the island.

 

One of the complaints I've heard as I've shown this program to others is that "you can see too much!", which I think is a little silly, but justified given that Morrowind doesn't always clear weather, and the fog of the main game was used to deal with this issue, as well.

 

Just putting it out there.

 

At any rate, I have a request: Is it possible to keep an updated list of the current really good MGE mods on the description page on TES nexus and the sourceforge site? It seems like they are all here and there, and I'm not sure what is being included in new revisions and what isn't.

 

ALso - it's still very strange that I can't get the newest revision to work without pasting it over the older stable one.. I always get "is no configed" errors otherwise.

[smash016]

OK, I have a small problem with MGE.

 

I've started using it recently, and it runs fine, except for one thing: in indoor locations, the game crashes randomly. That seems odd to me, since MGE is mostly concerned with outdoor graphics, right? Still, that's what's happening, and the crashes are mostly of this kind: the screen hangs, but the rest of the game keeps running, if I wait long enough my display turns itself off, but if I alt-tab back to windows, and then back to Morrowind, I can continue play, albeit at a lower framerate. It appears to me MGE is restarting itself, since the MGE message is showing in the top left corner of the screen, like when you launch the game.

 

The crashes are because of the mere usage of MGE, not of its Distant Lands feature. When I stop using MGE altogether, the game is absolutely stable. The thing is, I've recently upgraded my graphics card, so that could be an issue. However, Oblivion and Splinter Cell did not crash at all on my new card, as is true for Morrowind w/o MGE, so I guess the card is okay.

 

Another thing: I see no fog at all. Not sure if this is supposed to be so... I've turned on all fog options in MGE. I don't mind having no fog, it's just that this might be a hint to the solution for all you experts out there.

 

Anyone?

 

My specs: P4 3.0GHz, 1GB RAM, 1GB Radeon HD4670, WinXP. I'm using Distant Lands (default settings), Anti-Aliasing (4x) and Anisotropic Filtering (16x) @ 1280x800 60Hz, all other MGE settings I left at default. Also, I use the improved water shader (which is not the cause). And I've disabled all options in ATI Catalyst Control Center so as to give MGE full control.

[Starsickle]

What you're describing is normal for me. I'm not sure if the hanging crashes are the same, but I want to bring up a few things:

 

1. MGE is running with MWSE and actually competing with Morrowind as a program. It's likely to crash because it's literally running on top of Mlorrowind. There's no way around this danger until a project like OPENMW is finished that integrates it into one smoothly built program.

 

2. The Fog does go away. I've heard complaints about it as being unrealistic, but so is not seeing anything in the distance because the fog was put there to mask the limitation on distance in the first place. Maybe we'll get a happy medium. Personally I'd love to see weather made out of distant statics and see it from across the island.

[smash016]

I was just wondering whether the kind of hangs that I get are a hint to some cause or solution, like "don't use this setting", "disable ATI control center" or something, because it seems to be rather specific, since I haven't read about it in other MGE topics or in the help file.

 

It seems to me the ATI driver and MGE are conflicting somehow, and cause a lockup, and when I alt-tab back to the game, everything gets re-launched, but it's just too much of a hassle. Sometimes alt-tabbing doesn't work, and I have to reboot. In general, I think for MGE to work properly you need to have a particular optimal combination of a graphics card, a driver, and the right settings. I've tried, but I give up, until somebody knows how to solve it.

[Starsickle]

In general, I think for MGE to work properly you need to have a particular optimal combination of a graphics card, a driver, and the right settings. I've tried, but I give up, until somebody knows how to solve it.

 

That is what you think, but it's definitely not true.

 

Not to vent at you, I can tell you I've been in your situation, but you just have to ask questions and understand how everything works, or you just get used to crashing and move along.

 

Firstly, get more RAM. 1 gig won't cut it anymore for XP, and I'm pretty sure that 2 gigs doesn't cut it anymore for XP...

 

Now, your card drivers matter if you are running incorrect or unstable drivers. Look into that.

 

Also, I forgot how old the 4800 line is, but I've played MW MGE on a x800, a GTS8800, and now a HD5850. Sapphire, EVGA, and now XFX. The card isn't an excuse, and the drivers shouldn't be, either, as long as they aren't garbage.

 

I've already mentioned that those crashes are common to folks, including myself, and are just something you have to get used to. I'm thankful it works at all, but considering what this program is trying to accomplish, It's nice enough, and I hope OPENMW makes it much better, maybe even without the crashing.

 

While I'm at it, some suggestions:

MGE needs a larger team and a Knowledge Base. It's getting kinda silly that between the Elder Scrolls forum, this forum, and whatever goes on on Sourceforge, that there isn't something I can just google and go to a cetral site where I'm sure questions will be answered and previous fixes posted. A lot of folks are talking about the same things and not really picking up anything. Maybe I'm just being salty, maybe it's the orginization freak in me wanting things to be organized and clean.

 

At any rate, only other thing I want is for everyone to drop MGE and move onto OPENMW, no I won't shut up about it, because the idea is so exciting that if I got any real steam behind it I'd say it'd put 8 more years on the game.

[smash016]

I know my computer is old, perhaps even too old for a revamped Morrowind of some sort, but that's no excuse for the erratic behavior of MGE. Having more than 1 GB of memory isn't a system requirement as far as I know (and it shouldn't be). More importantly, I get no error messages, no log files of any help, and generally it's just not user-friendly. Same is true for the documentation which is just a grabbag of tips & tricks and it raises more questions than anything else for me.

 

And that's all very, well... very reasonable, since it's a free, DIY software package, more or less home-made by the Morrowind community. I except such a piece of software to behave like it does, especially since the game itself isn't very reliable in the first place. That being said, however, it's still a pity that the enormous improvements and capabilities of MGE come at a potentially big price. For me big enough to get rid of it and rely on conventional texture overhauls and the like.

 

I've been using this graphics card with other games (mostly Oblivion and Splinter Cell) and never ran into any similar problems. Drivers are up-to-date and stable as far as I can tell. I'm not an expert on these things, but I believe one of the trickiest things about programming is to make it work under different circumstances. Big-budget software is extensively tested before it's released, but stuff like MGE isn't, and it actually makes sense that there are cards out there that are ill-supported by MGE. Mine could be one of them, since it's an *AGP* HD4670, which is quite rare. Still, other applications run just fine, so no need to go into any technical specifics anyway.

 

I absolutely agree that what's missing is a general knowledge base. I posted my problem on a handful of websites but didn't get much feedback, because most talk is about which HDR shader kicks ass and other stuff I couldn't care less for or just don't understand.

 

Still, if anybody knows anything remotely helpful about the crashes that I experience, let me know. (The screen hangs, the game keeps running, my monitor shuts off, I alt-tab to desktop and back to the game, and continue play, sometimes I get serious errors like blue screens and need to reboot.)

[finestanonymous]

Hiya just downloaded this and it doesnt seem to work, i mean none of the changes are showing it just looks like same ol'morrowind to me ... i really want this to work could somebody please help me?

 

EDIT- Haha! .. i got it to work .. i was just being a fool XD i really like this mod! makes morrowind look so much better, i do wish the water had a bit more ripples ! but its still very nice. thanks !

[smash016]

OK, I now know with 99% certainty that anti-aliasing is causing the crashes.

 

- If I use MGE without AA, the game doesn't seem to crash

- If I don't use MGE at all, but force AA with the ATI drivers, I get pretty much the same crashes

- However, anti-aliasing in other games works just fine

 

So there's a conflict between Morrowind and my graphics card's anti-aliasing. MGE is apparently not involved after all...

 

Anybody else with AA problems in MW on ATI cards?

[rchoski]

Hi,

 

Hopefully someone can provide a bit of help.

I have two, probably very noob issues with MGE which otherwise works fine:

 

1. I am using Vurts Ascadian Isle Mod and a lot of the trees only appear as I get close to them rather than being drawn all the time. This may be happening with other objects but those are the ones I have noticed whilst testing thus far. Am I doing something wrong in distant land creation?

 

2. Whatever shaders I use seem to mean I get massive glare from any light sources. I followed the set up guide on the mge wiki but when I start a new game, if I look at the lantern in the ship cabin the whole screen whites out.

 

Any advice would be much appreciated.

Specs in case they are important - Win 7, Intel i7920, 4gb RAM, Nvidia GeForce GT 220

 

Thanks

[Geekcraft]

MGE must be installed to Morrowind's installation directory.

 

How can I do this? It should work perfectly fine with the steam version.