[Witcher 3] Certain repacked USMs don’t load

[K0stov]

Describe the bug
Certain USM files, when put into a mod with WolvenKit and packed into the game, are skipped completely when they’re meant to play ingame, instead only flickering black for a second. This happens regardless of whether the files themselves are changed in any way or not. Unfortunately, I don’t know whether this is a problem with WolvenKit or the game itself.

This seems to happen for all storybook cutscenes and more.

Video demonstration

To reproduce

1. Use WolvenKit 0.7.0.3 (last supported version for The Witcher 3).
2. Make a new mod.
3. Add the file movies\cutscenes\flashbacks\rs_1a.usm.
4. Pack and install the mod.
5. Download this test save.
6. Launch the game, load the save.
7. The cutscene should play after approaching the hanged Baron and talking to the sergeant, specifically after either one of these two lines (depending on the chosen dialogue):
   1. Yeah… Always knew the hooch'd be his end.
   2. He was what he was, a right bastard. But I respected him.
8. The cutscene doesn’t play. The screen just flickers black for a second and the game continues as normal.

Expected behavior
The cutscene should play where indicated between step 7 and 8.

Game version: Witcher 3 GOTY, 1.32, GOG
OS: Windows 10

[rfuzzo]

Interesting, thank you for the report.
Unfortunately we always lack developers for Wolvenkit - and currently no one is actively supporting Witcher 3, but I will be looking into it.

[K0stov]

Thank you for the reply. You'd be doing a favor to my Serbian translation.

[K0stov]

Update: it's actually not just for content4, but for several other .usms in content0 as well. I have no idea what the criterium is for the file to break, but the issue still stands.

[abheekda1]

Have you tried using the standalone ScaleForm Video Encoder to re-encode the USMs outside of WolvenKit?

Edit: Link

[K0stov]

I can try, but doubt this has anything to with encoding or how the files are changed at all. You can literally extract a .usm, put it back into the game as a mod without any changes and it won't load.

[abheekda1]

I'll give it a try using both WolvenKit and SVE + wcc_lite to test out the functionality.

[K0stov]

Please do. I’m not very familiar with the latter two programs.

[abheekda1]

No problem. Would you mind sending me your save as well as the name of the specific USM file you are having trouble with?

[K0stov]

No problem. Would you mind sending me your save as well as the name of the specific USM file you are having trouble with?

It's all in the original post.

[K0stov]

Delved deeper into this. I haven’t found any clear pattern to the broken files, except that several ones closer to the endgame work whereas all the early game .usms never play when packed. Here’s a more comprehensive list with findings (working files are ticked off, broken files aren’t):

• movies\cutscenes\pre_rendered_cutscenes\cs002_wild_hunt_chase_p2.usm
• movies\cutscenes\pre_rendered_cutscenes\cs002_wild_hunt_chase_p4.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_1.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_2.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_3.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_4.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_5.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_6.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_7.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_8.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_9.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_10.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_11.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_13.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_14.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_15.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_20.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_23.usm
• movies\cutscenes\storybook\st_23.usm

I haven’t checked st_12.usm nor st_19.usm, as I have no saves where those files play.

What’s interesting to me is that cs002_wild_hunt_chase_p4.usm gets broken, but cs002_wild_hunt_chase_p2.usm doesn’t. Both files from the same sequence. Interesting what causes this.

[abheekda1]

That is quite interesting. Sorry I haven't been able to take a look yet, I'll try it tonight.

[K0stov]

Sorry I haven't been able to take a look yet, I'll try it tonight.

Any findings?

[K0stov]

Sorry I haven't been able to take a look yet, I'll try it tonight.

I count 23 days since this statement. :)

[abheekda1]

Really sorry about that, I'll try to do it sometime this week. Mind sending the specific file you encoded to a USM? If not, did you encode it to a USM or did you use an MP4 in Wkit (unfortunately I've never done video modding in Wkit so I'm not sure how it works.)

[K0stov]

Nothing was encoded—I repacked the game's own .usm files just as they are. You can follow the steps in the original post to reproduce.

[abheekda1]

Awesome, I'll give it a shot 👍🏽 .

[abheekda1]

Ok @K0stov, I manually imported a USM (using wcc_lite) from the Witcher 2 and it worked great (even included the subtitles!) I'll see if I can find the specific file and reimport it instead of replacing it with a custom one.

[K0stov]

I'll see if I can find the specific file and reimport it instead of replacing it with a custom one.

That would be good.

[abheekda1]

Do you by any chance know what bundle it's stored in? I extracted movies.bundle and it only had the subtitles for flashbacks and not the USMs themselves.

[K0stov]

Probably content4\bundles\movies.bundle. You can try any of the unticked .usms in this reply, though:
#3

[abheekda1]

Awesome I'll take a look.

[abheekda1]

@K0stov I packed it with wcc_lite from the official mod tools and same deal -- flashes to black but skips the cutscene. It may very well be a problem with the way it's packed or the way the USMs are encoded or a combination of both but this doesn't seem like a WolvenKit error and rather a problem with the official mod tools.

[K0stov]

I feared the worst.

[abheekda1]

I'm really sorry about that, what was your specific use case?

[K0stov]

Translating the game into Serbian. What I could do, though, is replace the bundle files themselves, even though that's not what I'd want to do.

[abheekda1]

Theoretically you could extract and then re-encode the USM file with your audio and subs.

[abheekda1]

If you're willing I could try and help you with that (decoding could be done with UsmToolkit or VGMToolbox and VGMStream, re-encoding could be done with ScaleForm Video Encoder which has support for multiple audio channels and subs.)

[K0stov]

If you want to help, you can send me detailed instructions on my mail. You'll find it on my profile.

[abheekda1]

@rfuzzo I'll be working on this separately and update if any new revelations occur. It can probably be closed soon though.