Difference between revisions of "CMDL (Tropical Freeze)"

Revision as of 10:32, 14 November 2016

See CMDL (File Format) for the other revisions of this format.

Tropical Freeze features a new model format (necessitated by the hardware jump from Wii to Wii U) that bears little-to-no resemblance to the CMDL format of past games. There are three extensions used for models:

• CMDL: Generic models
• SMDL: Skinned models (ie. animated characters)
• WMDL: World models (ie. level geometry)

All three share the same basic format, with SMDL and WMDL each containing an extra data chunk at the start of the file.

This file format needs more research There's still a lot of unknown data. The entire optional section at the end of HEAD is completely unknown to me and there's lots of scattered unknown values.

Format

After the RFRM Header, the first section of the file is SKHD in SMDL, and WDHD in WMDL. Following those extra sections, all three formats start with a header.

Skinned Model Header

World Model Header

Render Octree

This seems to be an updated version of the AROT format seen in previous Retro games.

Model Header

Model Data Source

Type 0: UV Animation

To do: Needs research. The loader function doesn't reveal much because the game just loads all the data into a couple big buffers.

Type 1: Wind

Wind Set

Type 2: Caustic

Type 3: Fur

Material Data

The MTRL section has a 32-bit material count, then lays out its materials one after the other. Materials are composed of basically a MTRL asset ID which contains the shader the material is rendered with, then per-instance material parameters (textures, scalar/color parameters, etc).

Material Parameter

Each parameter has a fourCC parameter ID as well as a parameter type enum. There are five possible parameter types that each have a different layout in the file.

Type 0: Texture Token Data

Type 1: Color Data

Type 2: Scalar Data

Type 4: Layered Texture Data

Type 5: Int4 Data

Texture Usage Info

Meshes

The MESH section does what the name suggests: it defines submeshes. The MESH section header is as follows:

Each submesh definition is structured as follows:

Vertex Buffers

The VBUF section defines vertex buffers; each buffer can have different vertex types, with different strides and attributes.

Header

Vertex Buffer

Vertex Attribute

Index Buffers

Just like how the VBUF section defines vertex buffers, the IBUF section defines index buffers. Each index buffer only has one value associated with it, so it's fairly simple, and you generally will only see one or two index buffers per file.

Header

Index Buffer

GPU Data

The GPU section contains raw buffer data that's fed to the GPU. It's essentially just a giant blob with all the vertex and index buffers laid out next to each other. The tricky part is, all the buffer data is LZSS-compressed, and the metadata needed to decompress it is stored in the pak rather than in the files themselves; not only that, but that metadata is also the only way to distinguish the different buffers from each other.

As such, this section can't be read correctly if the model file is unpacked and completely left as-is; it needs to be either read directly from the pak, or the metadata needs to be added to the file in some way. A good unpacker should append the metadata to the end of the file; a pre-decompressed file needs the buffer sizes or offsets inserted into the file data somewhere.

PAK Metadata

The pak metadata for the model formats contains mainly information related to the size and layout of the GPU section, and the metadata required to locate and decompress specific buffers within it.

GPU Chunk

For large models, the GPU section might be split up into multiple chunks, rather than read as one data buffer; all offsets into the GPU section will be relative to the start of the chosen chunk.

Compressed Buffer

The format for compressed buffer definitions is the same regardless of buffer type (vertex/index).