AndrewT

Features: replaces stock water textures with textures based on carefully edited photo references.

Installation: Copy the DATA folder into the Commandos 2 install directory.
Removal: Delete all .H2O files from the subfolders in \DATA\MISIONES\

Recommended to use it with the wonderful Commandos 2 HD project by @stankan: Hdproject.altervista.org

Special Thanks: @herbert3000 for the support throughout the process.

Download

I'm starting to believe that this isn't the most practical way of catalogizing titles, nontheless here's the update. And also, maybe I should start a new topic, reserve the first post for this image that I can regulary swap if needed, instead of spamming this topic...

Hopefully the absence of the studio won't throw back the genre to its dead-and-alive state we experienced from mid 2000s to mid 2010s. Shadow Tactics, Desperados and Shadow Gambit are all state-of-the art titles which set the bar extremely high for competitors, and not many of those was able to get just even close to this standard, maybe War Mongrels and Partisans were among the few, and maybe we can rely on the studios behind them.

I think we owe Mimimi Games a lot for their efforts, the love, time, heart and soul they put into their games, and wishing them the best for the future. We see a lot of once great studios going down unwillingly, going bankrupt, producing low quality games or getting involved in scandals. Mimimi Games however is going out with a bang, at the very height of their power, which is more than respectable.

As many of you that are subscribed to, I also have received a newsletter from Mimimi Games recently, explaining why they find it adequate to refer to the genre as Stealth Strategy instead of Real Time Tactics.
https://www.mimimi.g...nd-here-is-why/
https://www.rockpape...cs-genre-behind

What do you think about the term Stealth Strategy?
What kind of games do you think of when you hear the term Stealth Strategy?
What do you think the best way would be to describe the line of games consisting of Commandos, Desperados, Blades of the Shogun, Partisans, War Mongrels, etc?

Here's what I think, but you might only want to view it after you thought about the above yourselves.
 

Back in the mid 2000s I used to drag my far-from-state-of-the-art compact camera everywhere I went, capturing possibly everything that, after some adjustment, could end up in one of my favourite games Blitzkrieg. Trees, bushes, terrain, houses, literally anything, as the game had a surprisingly user-friendy resource editor. As you know about old habits, they tend to die hard, so when I'm dragging my current far-from-state-of-the-art DSLR camera with me on locations, I still think how awesome this or that could look like ingame, and I'm still thinking about older games, and this time Commandos 2 specifically. One of the few things I really envy of C2HD, are the beautiful weather effects, including water, and I think that put the bug in me like two years ago, obviously knowing that it would be impossible to match visually. As it happens, I live in a city commonly referred to as "The city of rivers" for a literal reason, so during the years I have accumulated a decent amount of photos of water body rippled by the wind, lakes, rivers, ponds, streams, that again after certain adjustments could end up in Commandos 2. I know it's not a game changer, only a minor aesthetic upgrade, but I still would be glad with some feedback of the first prototype from Burma. Thank you.

Burma: https://drive.google...iew?usp=sharing

 
Update, Colditz: https://drive.google...iew?usp=sharing

Update2, ocean tiles from Das Boot: https://drive.google...iew?usp=sharing

Ocean v2: https://drive.google...iew?usp=sharing

(This is the topic where the procedure was discussed: https://forums.revor...ing-wiki/page-2, and again, thank you @herbert3000 for that )

Yep, it works, indexed bmp back into h2o, h2o into data\misiones\folder\, many thanks @herbert3000!

I also believe that the original Commandos 2 engine is the way to go, and not the Unity engine despite all of its promises. Great to see you being active again though @stankan.

To answer your question about unpacking Unity files, there is an utility called Unity Asset Bundle Extractor, quite a while ago I was for example able to extract UI elements of Shadow Tactics.

Even though in theory the Unity engine is a super flexible and accessible platform for developing games from scratch, and therefore maybe modding existing ones, in this case I just don't think it's worth the effort. Commandos 2 and other games in the genre are meant to be played from bird's eye view, and from that distance it doesn't really matter if you look at a 64x64 texture stretched onto a 200 poly model or a 512x512 texture on a 700 poly one. An ingame man is barely a centimeter on the display, you normally wouldn't even notice the difference. Surely the new water and weather effects are easy on the eye, but the original ones look toally fine as well, and because the developers didn't delivered a quality retouch on the level bmp files, the contrast to the rest of the elements is tremendous. If you consider the numerous bugs and glitches, the removal of functions, and most importantly, the complete removal of the cooperative multiplayer, I simply don't feel any reason for this excuse of a game to be exist other than for the publisher to rip off honest veterants seeking for nostalgy. That's just my opinion, your experience may differ, as they say.

I'm much more interested in stankans wonderful Commandos HD Project Mods, uniting all the levels of all three games under the same platform in glorious full hd resolution. I would love to see it continued and finished, because that's the true love letter to Commandos.

Ever since it has been announced that the old Commandos episodes would receive official HD remasters, I wished that the developer/publisher contacted stankan. He figured out a way to recreate stuff in HD, so the devs don't have to, and with some official support he could have the chance to finish the job properly and soon and even get rewarded for it. I like to think that something like this could happen even these days. But I'm afraid at the same time, that stankan's hard work might be already abandoned, and the official remasters will lack the heart and soul.

I've found this google map in my stuff made long time ago, with all the city-level locations of the missions from commandos 1-3, maybe someone would find it interesting

https://www.google.c...66049999999&z=3

Edit: link should work now, sorry

 

is it possible that the english version has italian manual ingame?

 

Oh, it was an oversight. It is easy to fix. It's necessary the "manual.txt" file of the English version to be copied into the "interfaz" folder. Someone who has the original file may attach it here? Thank you.

 

I just deleted it from the interfaz folder to make the game read it from the package file. Thanks for the info and for your work, this HD compatibility make the game worth playing again.

The splash screen on their homepage has just caught my eyes:

The pictures around that warrior character pretty much resemble the La Pallice base from the Das Boot, Silent Killers mission. Two of them seems to be the main entry fron different point of view, and the left one looks like was capped inside the hangar.

Bad thing, their homepage feels like _________, I couldn't really find anything else about this, no other pictures, no explanations or descriptions, nothing.

Looks like a simple cartoonish recreation of a classic for mobiles : /