Quake 3 fans look here! 7 Unique High Res S3TC maps!! Works on Radeon and GeForce cards

[oldfart]

You've see the S3TC high res textures for UT. Well, check this out. There are 7 unique DM maps for Q3 that S3 has for their Savage cards. Radeon and Geforce cards support S3TC, which got me thinking (it happens). I did some digging, found some files, tried it, and it works perfectly!! The quality of these maps are stunning. I wont elaborate, but trust me, its worth the effort. To get these, you have about 120 meg of downloading to do (so what else is new).

Step 1: Go to this location and get the dmmq3.exe executable.

Step 2: Go to this location and get all 7 pak files (dmmq3d1-7.pk3)

Step 3; Go to this location and get the 7 tga files. They are dmmq3dm(1-7)_tga.pk3. If the files come through with a .zip extension added onto the end of it, remove the .zip (rename them).

Now that you have all the files (7 pk3, 7 tga.pk3 and one exe), add all of the pk3 files to your Quake3a/baseq3 directory except for dmmq3dm2_tga.pk3. Just put this one aside somewhere. Add the dmmq3.exe file to the Quake3a root directory.

EDIT: Look at my post below to explain this. You will need to edit some of the tga_pk3 files. Open Winzip 8. Choose open archive. Point it to the dmmq3dm1_tga.pk3 file. Open it up. Carefully delete all of the jpeg files, and keep the tga files. Choose close archive. Do the same for dm4-7. Leave dmmq3dm3_tga.pk3 as is. This should work pretty well. There are a couple of jpeg files that are needed that were removed from the above step. If anyone wants to figure out which ones, be my guest!

The dmmq3.exe is based on 1.15. I put it in my 1.17 build of Q3 and it works fine.

To start a game, launch the dmmq3 executable. Bring down the console with the ~. Type "/map dmmq3dm1" through dmmq3dm7 (without quotes). This will launch the game. From there, you can add bots through the normal menu method.

I have a Radeon 64 on a PIII 733 256 meg ram, and it runs very well. I don't have a Geforce, but it should work. Anyone who tries it let us know.

If you try this, post how it works for you and what your system specs are.

Edit again.. Looks like the Radeon has a problem with the S3TC. You shouldn't need those TGA files at all. Look down farther for more info.

 

[RoboTECH]

hehehe....bro, where ya been? Those maps have been out for several months.

They run slow as dogs, too. But they sho' do look nice.

 

[oldfart]

Slow as dogs? Not on my system. Very smooth. Are you running a card that supports S3TC? If not, I'm sure it wouldn't work right. I did see somewhere that someone converted the maps to non S3TC versions. Haven't tried them.

 

[SuperFreaky]

Downloading... gonna try on a PII450 w/ Geforce MX running Win2k

You got any links to the UT maps?? I'm new to having S3TC textures...

 

[RoboTECH]

oldfart, what do you consider "smooth"?
The non-S3Tc maps look about the same, but play much faster. The textures just aren't so ungodly huge.

 

[oldfart]

Super, go HERE.

Robo, there is no timedemo for them. If I have the frame counter on, playing with 5 or 6 bots, the framerate is 50-90 1024 x 768 x 32 everything max. Its very smooth. Doesn't seem much different than the regular maps.

 

[SuperFreaky]

Hmm... I didn't notice any quality difference??

And they played perfectly smooth... Is there a setting somewhere I need to enable?

 

[oldfart]

Texture compression has to be enabled in your video card settings as well as in the game. See an update in the original post also. You didn't see any difference? What levels did you try?

 

[MustangSVT]

Dang, it doesnt work with Quake3 demo hehe

 

[SuperFreaky]

I tried maps 1 and 3... I have the 6.34 drivers and can't find any option to enable S3TX

 

[oldfart]

Super, be sure in your Q3 config you have: seta r_ext_compress_textures "1" try out maps 4 5 and 6. Check out the sky.

Ok, this turned out to be more difficult than I thought. The pk3 files have most of the pieces needed with the tga_pk3 files filling in the rest. The problem is the tga_pk3 files also have files in them that overwrite the HQ textures and use normal ones. If I use Winzip to upen up the pk3 file, there are tga files, and jpegs. The tga are the HQ ones that you want. The jpegs are the low quality textures. I deleted all of the jpegs from the tga_pk3 files and left in the tga's. This gets it to 99% except for dm3. for dm3, you have to use teh whole file it seems. The other issue is there are some jpegs that are still needed. the missing textures that this causes is pretty minor. I dont have the ambition to try and figure out which ones are need. So, in summary, you need the pk3 files, the tga_pk3 files with some customization. If you want to try this, my original ost is updated with a better setup.

 

[SuperFreaky]

cool thx... I'll give it a try

Edit: I tried level 3 (only level I got all of) to see if the giant globe looked any better, I didn't notice anything, but the lights on floor were incredible... Downloading the rest of the levels now to see the sky...

 

[oldfart]

Super, YGM. I sent you some screenshots. This will give you an idea how it should look.

 

[pen^2]

could you please post which jpeg files to keep? you knew this question was gonna come up sooner or later... thanx for your effort, i appreciate it!

 

[MustangSVT]

oldfart send me those kewl jpgs this way i wanna see what im missing and maybe get that Q3!
thanx

 

[oldfart]

Mustang, on their way. Brother, I wish I knew. If anyone wants to figure it out, be my guest.

 

[pen^2]

damn, it doesnt work on mine! in fact it halts the computer at the end of each level's load up screen
here is my autoexec.cfg:
//Open up Notepad by clicking the "Start" button at the bottom left of your screen.
//Choose "Run" and type "Notepad" then hit Enter on your keyboard or click "OK".

//Highlight all the text in this window with your mouse (or hold CTRL and press A on the keyboard).
//Right click and choose "Copy" (or hold CTRL and press C on the keyboard).
//Switch back to Notepad by holding the ALT key and hitting the TAB key.
//Choose "Edit" at the top of the screen, then click "Paste". All the text in this window will now be in Notepad.

//Choose "File" at the top of the screen, then click "Save As...".
//Type "C:\Program Files\Quake III Arena\baseq3\autoexec.cfg" (INCLUDING the quotes) and choose Save.
//If you installed Quake3 Arena to a different directory, you will need to type that path instead.

seta r_ext_compress_textures "1"
set r_swapinterval "1"
set r_lodbias "-2"
set cg_simpleitems "1"
set cg_gibs "0"
set r_dynamiclight "0"
set cg_marks "0"
set cg_drawgun "1"
set r_fastsky "0"
set cg_drawfps "1"
set in_joystick "0"
set r_vertexlight "0"
set r_smp "0"
set cg_lagometer "1"
set s_loadas8bit "1"
set com_maxfps "0"
set rate "25000"
set r_gamma "1"
set scr_conspeed "3000"
set cg_shadows "0"
set con_notifytime "3"
set com_hunkmegs "100"
set s_khz "22"
set cg_crosshairsize "24"
set cg_zoomfov "22.5"
set cg_railTrailTime "400"
//r_subdivisions "1"
//r_lodcurveerror "100000"
GL_LINEAR_MIPMAP_LINEAR
i have a slotA athlon classic and a radeon FYI... any ideas?

 

[oldfart]

Bro, not sure. What build of Q3 are you using? 1.17? What options to you have set in your Radeon OpenGL settings? Try this: rename your q3config.cfg and autoexec.cfg to .old. Fire up a dmmq3. Set to "high quality", change res to 1024 x 768. Dont change anything else. Try it then. When you launch a dmmq3 map, do you get the grapic of the map?

 

[BenSkywalker]

Oldfart-

I have no problems with any of the levels I have downloaded yet, without modifying anything at all. All of the textures are present and look sweet, not sure what your problem is but I think I may have an idea. I'm still working on that thing, if anyone knows of utility to create .pak files, please let me know(already tried WinZip, didn't work).

Robo-

Slow? Runs very smooth for me, and I have a lower end system then you in nearly every way. Running UHQ, everything cranked all game options on everything plays very nice.

 

[oldfart]

Ben, are you using the .pk3 and the complete version of the tga.pk3 for each level? If you are, some of the HQ textures will be replaced with normal ones. If you run the game without the tga.pk3 files, some levels will be missing textures. Notably dm3 and dm7. Here is a test. Run dm1 with just the .pk3 file, no tga.pk3. Look at the wood grain on the stairs. HQ. Now put the tga.pk3 file in. You will see the stairs now have a low quality look. This is why you need to customize the tga.pk3 files and remove all the jpegs and keep the tga files. BTW, I sent you a shot of this. The missing textures that are a result of this are extremely minor. For instance, in dm6, there are a couple of plaques that say Savage 2000. With the jpegs, the lettering is like a red lava look (I sent you a shot of this). Without the jpegs, its plain. Very minor.

I also was looking for a pk3 tool. I have Qped II, but it looks like it will only work with pak, not pk3 files.

 

[BenSkywalker]

oldfart-

"If you run the game without the tga.pk3 files, some levels will be missing textures. Notably dm3 and dm7."

I don't have the tga.pk3 files, and dm3 has every texture in place.

Level one and seven I have problems with(can't dl several levels), I already emailed you about that

"I also was looking for a pk3 tool. I have Qped II, but it looks like it will only work with pak, not pk3 files."

Could you send me that(is that a freeware/shareware program)? pak files are zip files with a name that Windows won't recognize. If you rename them to zip files then they will unzip just like a regular file, but Windows won't "take" them being swapped back to pak. If the app you have makes .pak files, just rename them to .pk3 and it should work no problem.

I just got your mail and looked at the shots, the thing is that I don't need to add any files. Every board I have run through has had every texture in place just using the regular .pk3 file, nothing else needed.

 

[oldfart]

Interesting. So you can use dm3 with no tga file....and you can see the eath and all....hmm. Looks like we have a problem then.

Edit. I took out the tga file for dm3. I turned off texture compression in the Radeon OpenGL settings and fired up dm3. It loaded, and the map has all the textues. Only problem is that it runs at about 1/2 fps. Real slideshow . Looks like the Radeons S3TC is funky. Oh well.

Ben, Qped wont work with pk3 files even if you rename them to pak. You can get it here.

 

[pen^2]

no, i dont get anytyhing... it locks up immediately after it finished drawing the character icons...

 

[WhiteMagicRaven]

I am very very sorry for bumping that thread,
i need exactly this file dmmq3.exe
did someone still have it?

 

[Head1985]

I think you are 20years late