VTF size reduce -HOW?

[roboticmehdi]

Hi!

I have original HL2 demo from 2004 (build 2229). I am trying to if it on a CD with some other demo games, for my retro pc. But to achieve that I really need to reduce it in size.

I have tried other method, no success for now. This is for another topic.

To main question, I want to reduce vtf files in size. For example, in materials/dev/water_normal.vtf, there are are 29 animations with mipmaps from 256x256, 128x128, ...., down to 1x1.

How can I easily delete biggest mipmap (256x256 in this case) from any vtf file, thus reducing it in size? In game texture quality can be "normal" instead of "high", that's not a problem for me.

The method must be easy because I will probably apply it to about 100-200 vtf files.

Hope someone can help me!

Thanks!

[The32bitguy]

To reduce the size of textures in Half LIfe 2, you need VTFedit, which requires .NET 3.5 to run.

For some reason you have to convert VTF files in PNG before changing their size, so you select 'Convert Folder' and select the correct input folder of your Half Life 2 texture files and an output folder. Make sure "To png *.vtf" is in the dialog.

You should  now have a folder of PNG textures that maintain the same folder structure, select 'Convert Folder' again and make sure "To VTF *.png" is in the dialog, select your folder of PNG files as an output and another folder for your changed VTF files, untick "Create VMT Files". From here you can go into 'Options' and 'Clamp' texture sizes to a certain value. In the 'Advanced' tab of the options change the VTF version to 7.0.

Unchecking 'Generate Mipmaps' will reduce the VTFs size by %30 but will cause noticeable artifacts and pixelation at a distance.   

Once you have your final folder of VTFs, you can drag them back over the originals and overwrite them. The original  VMTs remain so they will load correctly with all properties and lighting.