Rose

Infernax ultrawide and wider (partial) solution

Added 2022-02-15 22:31:06 +0000 UTC

Looking for a texture in the memory of a program is like looking for a needle in the hay. In 3D games, there will be thousands upon thousands, and their actual size would not be known just from having a look. It may not even be stored in the code. A 2D game limits the scope but still contains many.

When you have file access, you could try using a tool that identifies textures as shaders, such as Special K. What do you do on Game Pass though? A developer I talked to today would just avoid supporting the "sh*t store" that disallows file access. As for me, I like a challenge every now and then.

Before I realized it's to be a challenge though, I looked all around the Unity code of the just released Infernax for anything that would resemble my prior findings related to the display resolution, but found nothing of value. Then began the hard work of finding the coordinates of the black bars as a texture. I don't think I've done anything like this without file access.

After many hours, I had the objects located but that revealed the inherent problem of a game like this, which I talked about when explaining why certain games cannot be fixed.

The game was so heavily based around 16:9 that removing the black bars exposed the limitations of the textures. For example, the main background textures of its levels were limited to roughly 16:9 and just moved with the character, so the pillarboxing-like void still remained in those areas (though now behind the trees). Some ground textures were wider but still limited in their width. Some cutscenes contained a combination of wider and narrower squares that would not be exposed at 16:9. Some trees were floating. Sounds bad? Even the rain seemed limited to 16:9 when it rained, and it also moved with the character. Pure magic!

Nevertheless, when I shared a couple of screenshots on Discord and asked the community whether this look was more preferable than the black bars, they chose it. Feedback accepted! The beauty of memory hacking is that I can allow the user to toggle the bars off and on in real time for them to see what is lost or gained, so everyone is free to try. Either that, or you can check out the screenshots!