Transparency

You know how in Cave Story, black is rendered as transparent? Well I'm having a problem where colors that are almost black but not quite (i.e. #010101) are also being rendered as transparent. And it ONLY happens in TWoR. At first I thought the images files had been corrupted, and that the almost black pixels had been changed to fully black, but the eyedropper in MSPaint disproved this theory. Earlier versions of TWoR didn't have this problem. I'm wondering if anyone else has had the same problem? A good way to check is to look at the "cracked ground" tiles in the mountains (here's a savegame). If not, I'm wondering if it's my computer that's messed up, or my copy of TWoR, since it's entirely possible that I messed with it somehow without remembering.

 

It happens to me sometimes; in such cases, I just try to make it a little more not black.

 

I've had this problem appear randomly quite often. Usually happens because windows 7's paint blackens any colours that are nearly black. Never has cavestory done this though, but...If my memory doesn't trick me then yeah I had the same problem in wrath of revorshkenahl.

 

I'm having the exact opposite problem with noxid's mini mod, where boxes around sprites come up as black.

I vaguelly remember this happening during the summer, with mac mods I was testing, something about the tileset not being 8-bit or something?
Anyone know how to fix this?

 

Oh, that's probably my fault... In an effort to reduce file size, I reduced the bit size on the bitmaps as much as possible - mostly to 4-bit, with a few 8-bit and 1-bit. Sometimes the thing compresses the colors and makes what should be black into an 'almost black'. I thought I went and fixed them but I must have missed some, which sprites in particular?

 

Oh, that's probably my fault... In an effort to reduce file size, I reduced the bit size on the bitmaps as much as possible - mostly to 4-bit, with a few 8-bit and 1-bit. Sometimes the thing compresses the colors and makes what should be black into an 'almost black'. I thought I went and fixed them but I must have missed some, which sprites in particular?

The main character spritesheet, the teleporter looks funky, and there are others, but I can't remember ATM.
I will attempt to play it at half speed later today.

 

Really? Even I would have noticed if the MyChar was out of whack, and double-checking in Paint, PDN and GGFree confirms that it should be 000000.
Plus, MyChar is a 4-bit 16-colour bitmap, which is what most of the originals were if I recall.

 

Really? Even I would have noticed if the MyChar was out of whack, and double-checking in Paint, PDN and GGFree confirms that it should be 000000.
Plus, MyChar is a 4-bit 16-colour bitmap, which is what most of the originals were if I recall.

Maybe my computer is just automatically saving them with the problems.

 

I think I'm having the same problem!

I'll not even start to play it before I fix it...

Any sugestion?

 

Are you running a windows emulator on a mac system?
Imperfect emulation of DirectX has been determined to cause this effect sometimes.

If that's not the case, there are a few things you can try such as running the application in different settings (regular fullscreen, fullscreen 32, fullscreen 24, 320x240 mode). If that still doesn't work, maybe your DirectX needs to be updated..? Doesn't seem likely though since you appear to be running win7

 

Tried all video configs and didn't work! And yes, running on Win7 x64 btw...

 

Have you tried running the program in different compatibility modes? It's not something that's ever worked for me, but I guess it's worth a shot.

If nothing else works then as a crazy last-ditch attempt try replacing "prtCave.pbm" in the data/Stage/ folder with this file or this file (The second one you'll have to remove the '2' from the name). It's crazy and probably won't work but if the background shows up as anything other than hot pink in the Start Cave then that's progress.

 

Yeah, I tried compatibility modes aswell...

As you can see I'm having this problem from the very start.

And I got the Pink Background as you said after using the files you told...

Any other sugestion? ^^

 

I'm afraid that's all I can think of. Unless anybody else has some insight, you may need to just play it on a friend's computer.

 

Well, to be very honest to you I'm trying to run Cave Story in a Dell's Vostro Notebook with an Intel(R) Graphics Media Accelerator HD as video board which can be the real problem! Later, at home I'll try to run in my personal Notebook which is a ASUS G2S with a GeForce 8600 as video board and if I have the same problem I let you know ok!?

 

Well, to be very honest to you I'm trying to run Cave Story in a Dell's Vostro Notebook with an Intel(R) Graphics Media Accelerator HD as video board which can be the real problem! Later, at home I'll try to run in my personal Notebook which is a ASUS G2S with a GeForce 8600 as video board and if I have the same problem I let you know ok!?

Yep, I was right! Worked perfectly at home...

The game is awesome by the way and I know I'll get addicted to it at some point. lol

Thanks for the support anyways...

 

I had the same problem back when I was running Windows Parallels on my mac, but when I switched to dual-booting, it ran fine.
Sorry if that isn't helpful at all.