There Is A Circular Shadow In The Middle of The Ring.

[CyberOcelot]

Just as the title says. Any idea what that is and how to fix it?

It's driving me mad now, because I don't know if it was always there and I didn't notice?

I tried installing a ported arena mod, and when I saw this circle-shaped shadow on the mat, I assumed I did something wrong. I restored a backed up game directory and save. It seemed to be gone. But, I installed the GFX for my Smackdown on FOX arena, and now it's back!

Any ideas?

[mattfick]

15 minutes ago, CyberOcelot said:

Just as the title says. Any idea what that is and how to fix it?

It's driving me mad now, because I don't know if it was always there and I didn't notice?

I tried installing a ported arena mod, and when I saw this circle-shaped shadow on the mat, I assumed I did something wrong. I restored a backed up game directory and save. It seemed to be gone. But, I installed the GFX for my Smackdown on FOX arena, and now it's back!

Any ideas?

only one arena? or any arena? can you provide a screenshot?

[CyberOcelot]

34 minutes ago, mattfick said:

only one arena? or any arena? can you provide a screenshot?

Multiple arenas. So far, confirmed in Smackdown on FOX, TLC, and Night of Champions. Seems to go away intermitently during entrances. For example, it may not be there during the stage portion of an entrance, then come back for in-ring and in matches. Have you ever seen this before?

Edit: Hmm... Won't let me insert image into post. Click here to view.

Edited March 7, 2021 by CyberOcelot
Typos and added link to image.

[Cave Waverider]

Does it happen with any wrestlers or just specific ones?

Have you recently updated your video card drivers or changed some settings when you started to notice it and which video card do you have?

[CyberOcelot]

On 3/7/2021 at 5:10 AM, Cave Waverider said:

Does it happen with any wrestlers or just specific ones?

Have you recently updated your video card drivers or changed some settings when you started to notice it and which video card do you have?

I'm not gonna lie. Your post made me roll my eyes, because I thought you didn't see the image, and was convinced there was no way video settings could cause a circular shadow in the ring. But yet, here we are!

I was experimenting with video settings trying to get it as close to 4K as I can, and found a resolution that seemed to work on my TV. I reverted back to 1080P, and the circular shadow was gone. But, I don't understand. How can a resolution change cause a specific type of shadow intermitently during gameplay? Is it a bug?

[Cave Waverider]

14 hours ago, CyberOcelot said:

I'm not gonna lie. Your post made me roll my eyes, because I thought you didn't see the image, and was convinced there was no way video settings could cause a circular shadow in the ring. But yet, here we are!

I was experimenting with video settings trying to get it as close to 4K as I can, and found a resolution that seemed to work on my TV. I reverted back to 1080P, and the circular shadow was gone. But, I don't understand. How can a resolution change cause a specific type of shadow intermitently during gameplay? Is it a bug?

Of course I saw the image, yes.

It's an odd shadow, but it could very well be a bug with the game or it's some object in a mod (possibly invisible?) throwing that whacky shadow, a driver issue or something else.
The position centered in the ring reminds me of the shadow of title belts hanging above the ring in Ladder Matches, but that would look different, at least on my video card.

Which video card are you using, anyway and are your drivers up to date? If you have any Anti-Aliasing or Anisotropic Filtering or Ambient Occlusion forced through your driver control panel try to disable it to see if that changes anything.

What happens if you use the 3840x2160 resolution (I'd assume your 4k TV should support that natively).

What you could also try is delete your DirectX (you can use Disk Cleanup for that) and Video card driver caches (depends on your card/driver) as well as the Temporary WWE 2k19 folder (%Temp%\WWE 2k19), restart your computer and see if it gets rid of this shadow, in case it was a fault in a compiled shader that the game keeps reading from the SSD/HDD.

[CyberOcelot]

9 hours ago, Cave Waverider said:

The position centered in the ring reminds me of the shadow of title belts hanging above the ring in Ladder Matches, but that would look different, at least on my video card.

Which video card are you using, anyway and are your drivers up to date? If you have any Anti-Aliasing or Anisotropic Filtering or Ambient Occlusion forced through your driver control panel try to disable it to see if that changes anything.

What happens if you use the 3840x2160 resolution (I'd assume your 4k TV should support that natively).

What you could also try is delete your DirectX (you can use Disk Cleanup for that) and Video card driver caches (depends on your card/driver) as well as the Temporary WWE 2k19 folder (%Temp%\WWE 2k19), restart your computer and see if it gets rid of this shadow, in case it was a fault in a compiled shader that the game keeps reading from the SSD/HDD.

Honestly, I only changed resolution settings for the hell of it. Without HDR and full 4K available for the game, a resolution increase doesn't do much for me. But, I'll definitely experiment. Thanks!

My new video card is an RTX 3090. A completely clean installation. Always updated. It's overclocked slightly, but I don't force anything through my GeForce settings. 

At first, I was entirely convinced it was me. I had meticulously uninstalled previous arena mods file by file to make sure I didn't miss anything before installing the WWE 2K15-18 arena port mod. When I discovered that two small files were corrupt in the mod, I replaced those two files with vanilla versions to see if I could make it work. One of them was an ar_floor file, so I was sure that was the culprit. But, when I restored my backups and it was still there, I was in a panic that maybe it was there the whole time and I didn't notice, with no chance of discovering which mod caused it. 

[Cave Waverider]

7 hours ago, CyberOcelot said:

Honestly, I only changed resolution settings for the hell of it. Without HDR and full 4K available for the game, a resolution increase doesn't do much for me. But, I'll definitely experiment. Thanks!

My new video card is an RTX 3090. A completely clean installation. Always updated. It's overclocked slightly, but I don't force anything through my GeForce settings. 

It's odd that you can't run 3840x2160 (which the industry calls "4K"). I have the same video card and the game runs at that resolution just fine on both my 4K TV and my 4K Monitor. Maybe it has something to do with Windows scaling settings (Windows typically enables scaling for 4K Monitors/TVs). Try to right-click on WWE2K19_x64.exe, click Properties->Compatibility->Change High DPI Settings, tick Override high DPI scaling behavior and choose Application. Then click OK->OK before you start the game (You can also try to tick Disable Full Screen Optimizations and see if that helps). 
If that doesn't help Perhaps your TV doesn't fully support 4K at 60Hz (or perhaps you need to change the settings on the TV for HDMI ports to allow a "4K" signal) or your HDMI cable isn't good enough for it, or it may be a driver issue (I don't remember which driver version had problems with certain 4K TVs, but it was one of the more recent ones).
Try the latest Nvidia 461.81 hotfix driver (Standard version, not DCH) if you haven't already. Use Display Driver Uninstaller (aka DDU) in Safe Mode (in DDU, also go to Options and tick the "Prevent Downloads of drivers from Windows Update..." checkbox on the bottom of the options to ensure Windows doesn't install a random driver for the card) before you install new drivers (also  just in case there are some conflicts that stem from bugs in older drivers.
You may also want to clear the Nvidia Shader Cache by deleting the contents of %ProgramData%\NVIDIA Corporation\NV_Cache\ folder clear the DirectX Shader Cache by running Windows' Disk Cleanup and ticking the DirectX Shader Cache box and delete the %Temp%\WWE 2K19 folder, then restart Windows, just in case there are shader cache leftovers from your old video card, older drivers or the shader cache got simply corrupted.

7 hours ago, CyberOcelot said:

At first, I was entirely convinced it was me. I had meticulously uninstalled previous arena mods file by file to make sure I didn't miss anything before installing the WWE 2K15-18 arena port mod. When I discovered that two small files were corrupt in the mod, I replaced those two files with vanilla versions to see if I could make it work. One of them was an ar_floor file, so I was sure that was the culprit. But, when I restored my backups and it was still there, I was in a panic that maybe it was there the whole time and I didn't notice, with no chance of discovering which mod caused it. 

Have you tried going back to a completely unmodded version of the game files (don't forget to backup your whole game folder with mods before trying that so you can go back to it without hassle)? Perhaps it's simply a modded file you've missed. It might be worth a try if nothing else works.

[CyberOcelot]

On 3/6/2021 at 10:34 PM, mattfick said:

only one arena? or any arena? can you provide a screenshot?

After some more testing, I can better answer this now...

screenshot

It occurs in any arena where certain superstars are present. In one test, AJ Styles (Vanilla) w/ Omos Vs Braun Strowman (Modded CH only) the circular shadow in the middle of the ring is present during the match (not entrances, usually)

In the second test, Natalya (Vanilla) Vs Raquel Gonzalez (mod) w/ Dakota Kai (modded ch and GFX) the black circular shadow never appears. But, during Natalya's entrance, and only during the stage portion of the entrance, there is a shadow cast on the arena ringside floors. The shadow kinda looks like shallow water.

I can have these matches in any arena, whether vanilla or modded arenas, doesn't matter. 

Any ideas?

 

On 3/10/2021 at 5:25 AM, Cave Waverider said:

Have you tried going back to a completely unmodded version of the game files (don't forget to backup your whole game folder with mods before trying that so you can go back to it without hassle)? Perhaps it's simply a modded file you've missed. It might be worth a try if nothing else works.

Well, I can now confirm they're not video settings, as the wrestler(s) selected appear to control what kind of shadow specific anomaly I'll see. (See details above).

If it's simply a mod file I missed (and that's definitely a possibility considering how much I've installed already) is there any easy way to go about finding it or is the task as daunting as it seems?


SUSPECT: While I was testing the arenas, I found out my Hulk Hogan was invincible (Health bar is always full and green). His attributes also reach 150 in some categories. Even when dropping his attributes back down to normal, he still remains invincible. Is there such a thing as "hacked" superstars? Can these kinds of Superstars cause issues with the game maybe?

(FYI: Bonus points if you can tell me how to get rid of his invincibility and make him behave normally)    

[mattfick]

1 minute ago, CyberOcelot said:

After some more testing, I can better answer this now...

screenshot

It occurs in any arena where certain superstars are present. In one test, AJ Styles (Vanilla) w/ Omos Vs Braun Strowman (Modded CH only) the circular shadow in the middle of the ring is present during the match (not entrances, usually)

 

normal with mods, some mods do it, some mods dont

[CyberOcelot]

1 minute ago, mattfick said:

normal with mods, some mods do it, some mods dont

Wait... Really?! After all this time and testing, and this is perfectly normal?! I don't know whether to laugh or cry! LMAO!!!

[Cave Waverider]

8 hours ago, CyberOcelot said:

Wait... Really?! After all this time and testing, and this is perfectly normal?! I don't know whether to laugh or cry! LMAO!!!

Well no, not normal, it means the mod is just messy and has some object (as I said before, it could be invisible) somewhere that casts a weird shadow. Find out which mod it is (most likely one or more of the Wrestlers you mentioned it happening with) by using someone else in the match.

As for your invincible Hogan, which Wrestler ID are you using for him? It could be that the slot was originally configured for a referee or other invincible NPC.
It could also be that the .pofo and/or .moveset file are messed up somehow (or perhaps one from an invincible NPC used as a base? Not sure if that is even possible, though - if it was it would be an interesting find), in which case it's likely best to back up the current ones and create new ones with Data Editor.

[CyberOcelot]

15 hours ago, Cave Waverider said:

Well no, not normal, it means the mod is just messy and has some object (as I said before, it could be invisible) somewhere that casts a weird shadow. Find out which mod it is (most likely one or more of the Wrestlers you mentioned it happening with) by using someone else in the match.

As for your invincible Hogan, which Wrestler ID are you using for him? It could be that the slot was originally configured for a referee or other invincible NPC.
It could also be that the .pofo and/or .moveset file are messed up somehow (or perhaps one from an invincible NPC used as a base? Not sure if that is even possible, though - if it was it would be an interesting find), in which case it's likely best to back up the current ones and create new ones with Data Editor.

What I meant by "normal" is that, if there is no alternative mod for that character, you basically say you'll deal with the shadow bug since it's always better to have than to have not. 😛

In one of my test cases, Omos by JoeMashups was the offending mod. I had him as AJ Styles' manager in the test match. WHat part of the mod do you think would cause this? ch, pofo, moveset?

Should I create a new topic for Hogan to avoid us going off topic?

The Hulk Hogan mod also causes this shadow. He comes complete (CH, Pofo, moveset, etc) from here, and is using the Hulk Hogan slot in CCT. I have to ask about additional features in Data Editor because I use a 4K TV and Data Editor doesn't display properly. I can only see a small part of the application and saw a post that the creator of the software doesn't know how to make compatible with 4K displays, unfortunately. 

[CyberOcelot]

On 3/12/2021 at 6:03 AM, Cave Waverider said:

As for your invincible Hogan, which Wrestler ID are you using for him? It could be that the slot was originally configured for a referee or other invincible NPC.
It could also be that the .pofo and/or .moveset file are messed up somehow (or perhaps one from an invincible NPC used as a base? Not sure if that is even possible, though - if it was it would be an interesting find), in which case it's likely best to back up the current ones and create new ones with Data Editor.

Well, I guess we have that "interesting find" now. I'm using slot 475, which is an unused slot labeled for Hulk Hogan in CCT. I've triple checked that matched up with his wrestler ID in Data Editor, as well. Unless all of these movesets from here, here and here I just tried are from the same source, Hulk Hogan remains invincible. His health bar flashes (showing that it recognizes he took a hit), but his health bar never budges. It appears intentional. He had attributes set to well over the limits originally and, because of that, I would be able to punch someone just three times to have their health significantly depleted and ready for a finisher. That third link above is where I got him and his pofo/moveset originally if you want to experiment too. 

I have yet to try different pofos and moving him to another slot. Hope to get around to that tomorrow.  

PS: Sorry I didn't immediately recognize you made Data Editor. I knew you developed something I was using, but didn't realize it was Data Editor. 

[Cave Waverider]

1 hour ago, CyberOcelot said:

Well, I guess we have that "interesting find" now. I'm using slot 475, which is an unused slot labeled for Hulk Hogan in CCT. I've triple checked that matched up with his wrestler ID in Data Editor, as well. Unless all of these movesets from here, here and here I just tried are from the same source, Hulk Hogan remains invincible. His health bar flashes (showing that it recognizes he took a hit), but his health bar never budges. It appears intentional. He had attributes set to well over the limits originally and, because of that, I would be able to punch someone just three times to have their health significantly depleted and ready for a finisher. That third link above is where I got him and his pofo/moveset originally if you want to experiment too. 

I have yet to try different pofos and moving him to another slot. Hope to get around to that tomorrow.  

PS: Sorry I didn't immediately recognize you made Data Editor. I knew you developed something I was using, but didn't realize it was Data Editor. 

Very odd, I don't have such problems with Hogan in that slot. Try this Hulk Hogan .pofo and .moveset and see if that helps (Yes, he has high values, but try it the way it is first). If not, something else may be messed up in your game, but I have no idea what it could be.

[CyberOcelot]

On 3/15/2021 at 2:34 AM, Cave Waverider said:

Very odd, I don't have such problems with Hogan in that slot. Try this Hulk Hogan .pofo and .moveset and see if that helps (Yes, he has high values, but try it the way it is first). If not, something else may be messed up in your game, but I have no idea what it could be.

 Whew! Your Pofo / Moveset worked. So, I guess all three pofo/moveset sources I had were all pulling from the same place? I was sure it was on my end after all that testing.

What's also interesting is that, Hulk Hogan was one of the mods that triggered the black circular shadow in the middle of the ring, and now it's gone. So I assume that side effect is also pofo/moveset related. I'll continue to test to see if he had adverse effects elsewhere in my game. 

Meanwhile, since invincibility seemed to surprise you, maybe you would like to take a stab at recreating my issue using the same pofo/moveset I used on your end and see if you get the same results?  You would be more qualified than most to better understand how it occured and possibly replicate it (if someone out there is looking for a way to make characters invincible through mods). Just a thought.

Thanks again for the help, Cave! 

 

[Cave Waverider]

32 minutes ago, CyberOcelot said:

 Whew! Your Pofo / Moveset worked. So, I guess all three pofo/moveset sources I had were all pulling from the same place? I was sure it was on my end after all that testing.

What's also interesting is that, Hulk Hogan was one of the mods that triggered the black circular shadow in the middle of the ring, and now it's gone. So I assume that side effect is also pofo/moveset related. I'll continue to test to see if he had adverse effects elsewhere in my game. 

Meanwhile, since invincibility seemed to surprise you, maybe you would like to take a stab at recreating my issue using the same pofo/moveset I used on your end and see if you get the same results?  You would be more qualified than most to better understand how it occured and possibly replicate it (if someone out there is looking for a way to make characters invincible through mods). Just a thought.

Thanks again for the help, Cave! 

You're welcome, glad it's working for you.

It's really interesting. I guess one of the still unknown bytes in either the .pofo or .moveset files triggers this invincibility then.
The shadow thing being caused by this data is even more crazy, though, but I guess it's in the realm of possibility as there is quite a few bytes that are still unknown - perhaps it's a leftover from previous games which triggered some sort of graphic but triggers this shadowy thing in this game instead).
I might have a look at those .pofo and .moveset files down the line when I find the time (probably not before the summer) and see if I can find bytes that are different and could trigger this.
It's an interesting find, though.