New video format now available for Tiberian Sun!
As a modder at heart still, this has been something I have dreamed of getting added to the Tiberian Sun engine for almost 10 years now. It has taken a few months of work, but I have finally managed to implement and hook a Bink video format player into the Tiberian Sun engine via the ts-patches project, many mods already us this project to enhance the engine thanks to the great work of Rampastring, E1Elite, and more.
How it works:
Here is a breakdown for this new system and how it works;
This new video system is optional; If no .BIK file is found, it will revert to searching for the .VQA, so this system has no effect on existing projects. It implements the RAD Bink video (Version 1~), three conditions must be met for the game to play a Bink video;
• The .BIK video must exist in the game files or root directory (for example, WWLOGO.BIK).
• The user's resolution must be at least 800x600 (4:3) or 1060x600 (16:9), otherwise, the video will fail and fall back to look for the .VQA file.
• The Bink library "BINKW32.DLL" (Version 1~) is found in the same directory as the game EXE.
It is suggested you create videos at a resolution of no larger than as mentioned above. The game will attempt to show an error message when the video is larger than the users resolution, but may also crash. So please keep this in mind!
This new implementation also supports Sidebar/Radar videos which are played via the map triggers. The resolution of these videos must be 140x110.
Another improvement of this system is that it also supports 44100hz, Stereo, 30FPS playback. In theory, it should support 60FPS, but this will produce very large file sizes and might not be suitable for your mod. The system should also support videos up to the size of 4K, but as mentioned above, please make sure the end-user/player is considered when creating your video sizes.
The videos will also scale-up/stretch to the users resolution (providing it is larger than 800x600) if they have ``StretchMovies=yes`` defined in their SUN.INI config file.
For creating the video, you can download the RAD Video Tools from here: http://www.radgametools.com/bnkdown.htm
BINKW32.DLL
The implementation is based on the same version that Red Alert 2/Renegade uses, thus only works with Bink v1.0~. If you have Red Alert 2 or Renegade installed, you will find this DLL in the installation directory. Myself, the ts-patches project or any associated developer does not condone sharing this file, the mod creator must have either of these games installed to be able to use the DLL.
Some additional notes:
Due to the use of the older version of the BINKW32.DLL, please make sure any .BIK video you produce sets the "Compress level" to the desired compression level +100. For example; A audio compress level of "4" should be "104", this makes the encoder produce the BIK video file with the older audio format which is required by the older DLL. Otherwise, you will not hear any audio when your video is played back by the game. See the screenshot below for the best options to use when creating the Bink video.
Optional settings for creating .BIK;
Also, an optional compile option can be used if you wish to make the Bink video playback interface exit on failure to play or find the .BIK, just compile the project with BINK_REQUIRED. If you have any issues with cloning the ts-patches repository and enabling this, I will be happy to help.
Acknowledgements:
Big thanks to tomsons26 for assisting with the process of researching the RA2 Bink video player and extensive testing, and to Rampastring for taking the time to review the code.
I look forward to seeing some great CGI/FMV animations and videos added to Tiberian Sun mods!
Enjoy!
-CCHyper
