SSE BSA Packing Questions

[NexBeth]

I'll soon be uploading a mod with a good amt of custom files. I'd like to pack in a BSA. In fact, I already have packed the files successfully using the archive.exe tool. Within the BSA are: Meshes, Textures, Seq, Sound, Scripts files However, I did compress all these files.

 

Now, new info I got from fellow modder is that I should not compress wav files.

 

Also, is there an advantage to placing texture files into a separate BSA: mod - textures.bsa?

 

Any tips or heads up on things to consider would be helpful. Thanks.

[Charles17]

If you are trying to maintain a high quality sound, compression levels do matter. Compare lossless audio such as flac, to lossy audio like mp3. The higher the compression the worse sounds you are going to have. Advantages to seperate bsa I can't really see any unless you have a quite large file size. All just my opinion.

[NexBeth]

Actually I only have 3 tiny wave sounds that are just a sound effect that are on a script to turn on/off when NPCs enter trigger. They sound fine in the BSA I'm currently testing, but I don't want them to cause other problems like CTD, etc.

[FiftyTifty]

The reason that textures are packed into a separate archive, is that there's an engine bug with reading them. If the texture archive isn't compressed, the game will not read the archive, then it will crash as it failed to load it. You can actually decompress the texture archive (use the argument "-af:0x3" when packing it via BSArch), but you should still keep textures in their own archive.

 

 

If you are trying to maintain a high quality sound, compression levels do matter. Compare lossless audio such as flac, to lossy audio like mp3. The higher the compression the worse sounds you are going to have. Advantages to seperate bsa I can't really see any unless you have a quite large file size. All just my opinion.

There are two types of compression. Lossless, and lossy. Archive compression is lossless, like FLAC is.

Edited September 7, 2020 by FiftyTifty

[NexBeth]

So if all files are compressed, still keep 2 BSA's--one for textures, and the 2nd BSA for everything else? Is there a reason not to compress other files, scripts, meshes, etc?

[FiftyTifty]

So if all files are compressed, still keep 2 BSA's--one for textures, and the 2nd BSA for everything else? Is there a reason not to compress other files, scripts, meshes, etc?

Texture archives only work without the embed file names flag, whereas the other archives typically require that flag. Don't risk game engine f*#@iness, keep 'em separated.

[NexBeth]

What are those flags (ignorance on that)? Is that new to SSE? So, create separate archive using achieve.exe then rename to mod - textures.bsa?

 

And compress all files in both BSAs?

 

I wasn't going to have any loose files.

[FiftyTifty]

What are those flags (ignorance on that)? Is that new to SSE? So, create separate archive using achieve.exe then rename to mod - textures.bsa?

 

And compress all files in both BSAs?

 

I wasn't going to have any loose files.

A flag is an on/off setting. The archives for Bethesda's games have specific flags for the types of files contained in them. Don't use archive.exe, instead, use the BSArch tool made by Zilav.

 

Sound files will not work in compressed BSA archives. So make your main archive uncompressed, and it's up to you if you make your texture archive compressed or not.

[maxarturo]

@ FiftyTifty

I've read in so many post to not use "Archive.exe", but none of them explain the why.

I've packed a lot of bsa files using "Archive.exe", and i've never encounter an issues.

Is there something i don't know about ?.

Thanks.

[FiftyTifty]

 

@ FiftyTifty

I've read in so many post to not use "Archive.exe", but none of them explain the why.

I've packed a lot of bsa files using "Archive.exe", and i've never encounter an issues.

Is there something i don't know about ?.

Thanks.

 

IIRC, it doesn't set the flags properly. BSArch is what you should use.