No sexy NPC X4 FOUNDATIONS mods?

[Lorphe]

Game is sandbox, NPC are fine but can be enhanced, there is humanoid alien races!

It's curious we don't have any sexy mod for that game, it's like Kenshi but in space.

 

[gimmedope]

Hey, new guy here.

 

Just found this topic and wanted to add that it's currently impossible to add custom NPC models, animations and the like. There's no tools for those, because the devs are using some third party program that's unavailable. No chance to do anything like this. Also means no Stormtroopers for the already existing Star Wars mod.

 

For those interested: X4 uses .xac files for the characters. And while a converter for xac/xmf files already exists, it doesn't work properly on the npc models. So no lewd mods.

[megaman12321]

1 hour ago, gimmedope said:

Hey, new guy here.

 

Just found this topic and wanted to add that it's currently impossible to add custom NPC models, animations and the like. There's no tools for those, because the devs are using some third party program that's unavailable. No chance to do anything like this. Also means no Stormtroopers for the already existing Star Wars mod.

 

For those interested: X4 uses .xac files for the characters. And while a converter for xac/xmf files already exists, it doesn't work properly on the npc models. So no lewd mods.

I suspected something like that. X4 has a ton of ship mods but if the ability to mod the NPCs was a thing they would have been changed since day 1.

[Lorphe]

What a shame -_-

[DeathBringer0xL]

That is quite annoying. Or they just don't want anyone to improve their game. I mean   T&A  fixes a lot.

[gimmedope]

After checking again, it looks like EMotion FX is the tool the devs used. I don't think you can get it anywhere any more, and certainly not for cheap. Unless of course you sail the cyber seas with your digital tricorn hat. And even then it's a big IF.

 

Maybe the new upcoming X5 or X4 standalone addon will have a different tool. But I honestly wouldn't hold my breath.

[Lorphe]

This curious, because XRebirth has lot of mods on Nexus with X4 Foundation both has already several Workshop mods on Steam too with people managing to tweak NPC face etc

Edited July 18, 2022 by Lorphe

[gimmedope]

You can change textures, as that doesn't require you to convert the models / xac files. But once you want a proper body overhaul, add new outfits, uniforms and such, you are in big trouble. The file converter only works in one way. You can convert NPC models into a useable format for Blender and other programs. But if you make changes, and try to convert it back, the file won't work. I tried that some time ago, with my very limited skills. And of course I checked the forums and reddit for information to see if it was possible. And the answer was a resounding no.

 

That means no NPC overhaul in the proper sense is possible. The Star Wars Interworlds mod for X4 faces that issue, as it has all the cool Star Wars ships and none of the characters in it as far as I know. No Darth Vader, no Storm Troopers, no clones, no Twi'leks and no Mandos. Maybe someone with good knowledge in coding could 'fix' the file converter, so NPC models convert correctly. But after nearly ten years of it being out (since X Rebirth), it's safe to say that it seems far fetched and unlikely.

 

I also doubt anyone of the good modders and coders here have enough interest in X4 to even bother trying to get it done. I mean, nothing is impossible, but the odds are quite stacked against this possibility. At this point, it's really up to the game devs to change the file format to something that can be modded. And that might only happen for the next X game that is in development. But even then I assume Egosoft won't change their NPC creation tool and keep going.

[gimmedope]

Hey there,

 

I want to use this topic to update a few things. After the devs announced another dlc for X4, they also announced to update a lot of their tech while they were at it. Besides a new physics engine, the devs also want to release new  and improved modding tools and such.

 

The characters aren't part of that yet, but at least the devs do want to make them moddable too. That is, after they are finished with changing their character creation tools from paid software to open source ones.

 

So we may get the ability to change character meshes in the somewhat near future. Maybe even faster than I expected.

[Lorphe]

This is a great news, and clearly promising!

[gimmedope]

The devs recently hired two well known modders into their team. Egosoft did that in the past once and it may not be the last time to happen. They also seem to abandon any kind of licensed or paid dev tools in the future. Instead, they embrace open source programs and tools openly. The CEO of the company gave an interview recently and wasn't all too happy about licensed tools suddenly being outdated because that company went bankrupt or got bought up.

 

One of the devs in the forum has recently confirmed the use of Emotion fx for characters and their animations. And also stated that they can't provide any tools or info about dealing with those due to that program being outdated (and being a former licensed product). But they are currently trying to change the tools there.

 

Their main pipeline for assets was 3ds max for ships, stations and the like for decades. But now they are switching over to blender. And at least that part of the modding pipeline, will be made even more accessible in the upcoming update, as it seems. The characters won't be moddable though, at least for some time now. And I don't know how the future open source tool for those wil look like. Maybe they will switch over to blender too. Or maybe they use some other open source program for characters and animations.

 

What I do know is, the upcoming dlc with patch 6.00 will improve modding quite a bit. But the characters at least will stay out of it until later. Maybe it'll be patch 7.00 or 8.00. Not sure. But the devs are certainly willing and seem to push hard to go the open source route. It's also one of the reasons they are now using Jolt as the physics engine for the game. The CEO also stated that they aren't done with X4 by a long shot. So future updates seem to be almsot guaranteed.

 

And yes, all the changes to the engine will be savegame compatible somehow. Supposedly it's possible to even use a version 1.00 save from release day without issues in the current and future game versions. So things are looking a bit better than a few weeks or months ago. And for any possible modders, it may be now the time to get familiar with the game and it's modding and scripting capabilities. Either that, or wait until 6.00 drops with the Kingdom End dlc. Release should be this Spring for that, hopefully.

[gimmedope]

Another update again.

 

The new patch and dlc is dropping today. But sadly, no new info on any new modtools or anything like that yet. Even though character modding is still a bit further away. At first I wanted to wait until there would be something new on that front. But sadly, it'll take a while there it seems.

 

However something got me thinking. Even though people can't lewd up the npc characters, modders still do have access to other parts of the game. So things like posters, statues and such could work. Interior modding may also be a thing, but I am not knowledgeable enough to talk about that. But we do have player logos and paint jobs for ships which could be of lewd nature (like an anime skin or something).

 

So even right now, there are options available for something. And we do have a luxury space yacht already, with swimming pool, bar, and statues that could be modded.

Edited April 12, 2023 by gimmedope

[Yotix]

They have this page with mod tools ... https://wiki.egosoft.com:1337/X4 Foundations Wiki/Modding Support/

 

... only I'm not good enough at graphics stuff to tell if this would be at all helpful for creating lewd mods.

[gimmedope]

On 9/9/2023 at 10:57 AM, Yotix said:

They have this page with mod tools ... https://wiki.egosoft.com:1337/X4 Foundations Wiki/Modding Support/

 

... only I'm not good enough at graphics stuff to tell if this would be at all helpful for creating lewd mods.

That's a good link. However, quite a few tools listed there are outdated or don't work properly. The issue with the unaccessible character meshes is also still there as far as I know. Even though the devs recently updated some of the mod tools again.

 

Anyway, I tried to see if I could add some custom 'logos' into the game. The result can be found attached here. It's not much, and more of a test. But at least it's something I guess. It honestly took longer to find fitting artwork on the usual 'resarch' websites, than it took me to put them into the game, lol.

[gimmedope]

Has anyone tried to work with the scripting language? I tried my luck with it, but I don't think I'll ever warm up to it. I had to deal with an earlier version of it more than a decade ago in their older X3 games, and wasn't a big fan back then either. They had another scripting language back then, which I liked more and was also more popular with scripters too.

 

So, has anyone else tried? I did read up on stuff in the link provided above. But I can't really wrap my head around it yet. I'm not sure if I have the patience and time for this one specifically. Although it may not help that my scripting plans were a bit more complex and I am not great at coding either. It wasn't an nsfw related idea or anything.

 

If not, maybe getting this game on people's radar might attract modders with the skill. Starfield seem to have created more interest in space games in general. So showing those people that there's a more complex space sandbox out there might help.

[Fnray]

All of the problems with creating mods for this have changed with the latest update...
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/392160/view/3646281279393578329?l=english

[Anonymous]

On 10/4/2023 at 1:52 AM, raz334 said:

All of the problems with creating mods for this have changed with the latest update...
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/392160/view/3646281279393578329?l=english

Pretty sure there's still no way to export character models back into X4 supported file types. The best you can do are textures.

[Fnray]

On 10/28/2023 at 3:38 AM, Anonymous said:

Pretty sure there's still no way to export character models back into X4 supported file types. The best you can do are textures.

[gimmedope]

As far as I know, character files still are unavailable for modding. I tried to find some new info on it (including the article linked above), but there's nothng to be found.

 

The animation part of said news article seems to be about ship based animations. Which are extremely important for smaller ships to function (landing gear, cockpit animations and such).

 

In regards to character animations and meshes, there is simply no new development yet. And yes, I actually downloaded the new blender tools to get the readme (and also checked it in Blender). And it doesn't mention character meshes (Emotion FX files mentioned above) at all. I also checked the X wiki which is also linked in the above news article with no results either. Someone could of course ask on the official forums if things have changed. But the current lack of response from the normal mod community is quite telling.

 

Maybe I missed some news about Egosoft switching the file system. Maybe someone is on the dev discord and knows things I do not. Or I misunderstood something here (or when I checked the tools in blender). But as far as I can tell right now, there is still no way to change the meshes of characters, or do any kind of animations for them yet.

 

The news anyone wants to look out for is when the devs specifically state that they changed the file system in regards to characters and the animations for them. Or when mods like the Star Wars mod start putting out lore friendly NPC's instead of reusing existing assets or changing textures here and there.

[gimmedope]

Double post for an update:

 

After looking at the new tool kit itself, I can say with some confidence that Character modding is NOT included in the package. Just as I thought, the new package is mostly for the main game assets of X4. Ships, stations, interior rooms, celestial bodies, other objects etc.. Character meshes and animations are not part of it. Any animations that can be done right now, are for the aforementioned game assets, but not for characters.

 

This also fits into what the devs talked about around a year ago. As long as Egosoft uses that damn third party program for characters and its file system, there will be no character modding, animations and such.

 

A lot of things can be modded right now, but that one aspect of the game isn't possible yet. Of course people can and should check out the tools themselves, just to make sure I didn't overlook anything or screwed up somewhere. But from what I can tell, character modding is and stays unavailable until the devs finally go open source with their pipeline.

 

 

[LaboriousFighter]

What a shame!

[Lorphe]

After Starfield huge disappointement Im looking at X4... But the mods are still going nowhere T_T

[gimmedope]

It's a little infuriating for sure.

 

The devs are slowly working on patch 7.0 and the new DLC. But NPC modding doesn't seem to be coming at all. There's literally nothing new on that front. And I checked the forums once in a while over the last few months.

 

Some modders have done station- and ship interiors. Or changed ads on stations or added paintjobs for ships (I once saw some ahegao paint job somewhere). And with some scripting, a really good or patient modder could maybe pull off something like Bannerlords captivity events, as a text based alternative or minor background stuff. (Or Starsector text based stuff idk.)

 

But animations or better character models? Nah. Probably not going to happen any time soon. In all honesty, I wouldn't wait for that to change. As someone who did mod the older games (SFW mods), X4 is kinda dead in terms of modding when compared to the older entries of the series. And sadly the comparison isn't even remotely close. So getting your hopes up will most likely only lead to disappointment.

 

 

[gimmedope]

I thought I'd give everyone here an update on what's happening with X4, as there is some recent development. Some guys on the official forum asked about NPC modding, and one of the devs responded.

 

In short, there will be no NPC modding tools for X4. They do not plan on changing their old Character pipeline any time soon. Materials and shaders are accessible for modders, but that's about it. So no animations, changing character meshes or creating outfits etc..

 

The devs have stated that they do want to change their tools to something else like blender later on. But that isn't going to happen with X4 according to the dev. Only maybe with X5 in a few years. So I guess this thread can be closed. X4 won't have NPC overhaul mods, animations or anything like that. Rather disappointing to be honest.

[Linxd]

Maaaan, i was hoping there was lewd content for x4 right now... i build a fucking space empire yet there is no romance in the base game. What is the use of grinding yourself up if there is no legacy ? i mean... and ending goal. i don't feel like we enjoy the money we sit on other them building a bigger army. There is no civilian structures or ships, with tides of avarice we get one yatch and that it. the only civilian ship we have.