Various graphical issues in WWE games

[FMecha]

PCSX2 version: v1.5.0-dev-3324-g9c65b73ae

PCSX2 options: Default (Safe speedhack)

Plugins used: GSdx32-AVX2 1.1.0 (Direct3D 11, mostly default settings) (all other plugins are defaults)

Description of the issue: In WWF SmackDown! Just Bring It, some lower on-screen HUD appears to be shifted way to the top - this also affects entrances that causes the entrance video to go full screen, where you can see the arena on the bottom, as well as entrance name panels. See this video for proper 4+ man match wrestler HUD position and this video for how entrance videos and name panels should look.

In WWE SmackDown! vs Raw 2006, entrance videos do not play at all in the arena. Additionally, in Hardware mode, Hollywood Hogan's entrance (which requires the screen to go grayscale) is broken with the screen going full black, with ringside guardrail occasionally visible. The shifting mentioned above with JBI also seems to affect SvR06's startup "now loading" (with WWE logo, during memory card data load). A proper example of how entrance videos appear on the stage (along with how Hollywood Hogan's entrance should look like) can be seen here. It is also possible the entrance video issue may also affect later SvR games.

Also attached is how Hollywood Hogan's entrance looks like in software mode:

How to reproduce the issue: JBI: Start any match, particularly any match that involves more than two wrestlers and with entrances enabled. To demonstrate the how this affects entrance videos, at least one of the chosen wrestlers should be either The Rock or Chris Jericho.

SvR06: Start any match with entrances enabled. A good example is Chris Jericho vs Hollywood Hogan - Jericho's entrance is supposed to display a full-screen video, but it results in blank screen instead, while Hogan's entrance is full black with occasional gray stuff such as ringside guardrail. (Note that Hollywood Hogan's entrance issue only occurs on hardware, and is best reproduced on WrestleMania IX arena.)

PC specifications: Acer Aspire A315-55G (Intel Core i5-1021U / NVIDIA GeForce MX230 / 8 GB RAM / Windows 10 1903 [10.0.18362.1016] 64-bit)

EDIT: Title changed due to more affected WWE games. Here's the gist of it:

• Just Bring It: shifted entrance movies when they're supposed to be full screen, entrance name panels and lower HUD misplaced
• Shut Your Mouth: shifted whole screen in Moves menu of Create A Superstar
• Here Comes The Pain: shifted loading screens, flickering tip screens after ring entrances
• SvR 2006: shifted startup loading screen, entrance movies not playing in the arena, Hollywood Hogan glitched entrance in Hardware mode
• SvR 2007: as above except for the startup loading screen bug, previewing a entrance movie when changing it can cause the game to soft lock (possibly related to entrance movies not playing in arena?)

[tadanokojin]

Cursory glance and I would guess it's a PCRTC issue.

Can you upload some gsdumps? https://forums.pcsx2.net/Thread-How-to-create-a-proper-GS-dump

[FMecha]

It's probably going to be an hard task/time uploading the GS dumps with my potato-ass connection, unfortunately, as the GS dumps I produced turned out to be that big (covering all entrance sequences when this happened, as well starts of the match in JBI).

Anyway, I can confirm the SvR06 entrance video issue too on SvR07 - related to game soft-locking when previewing entrance videos from Create An Entrance's Easy Creation mode?

[tadanokojin]

It's probably going to be an hard task/time uploading the GS dumps with my potato-ass connection, unfortunately, as the GS dumps I produced turned out to be that big (covering all entrance sequences when this happened, as well starts of the match in JBI).

They compress pretty well with 7zip if you haven't tried that. I don't really need a GSdump of every example of the bug. Let's start with one single frame dump at a time and if I need more I'll let you know.

[FMecha]

GS dumps: https://gofile.io/d/PSnDiz

This also includes a GS dump for WWE SmackDown! Here Comes The Pain, which also suffer from not only shifting in loading screens, but also flickering in some of them (mostly tip screens after entrances).

EDIT: The Hollywood Hogan entrance bug also is in SvR07, as the entrance is also there under the name of "Superstar 2" according to this list.

[FMecha]

As it turns out, WWE SmackDown! Shut Your Mouth also has a screen shifting in the moves editor in the game's CAW mode.

GS dump for this game

[refractionpcsx2]

I noticed you're running a very old version of PCSX2, can you try the latest development build just to confirm this is still an issue before we spend time looking in to this please? Thanks!

Here's a link to get the latest development builds: https://buildbot.orphis.net/pcsx2/

[FMecha]

1.7.0 GS dumps

Addendum: JBI seems to have shifting also in opening movie:

Hollywood Hogan's SvR06 ("Superstar 2" in SvR07) entrance is still glitched on hardware, but entrance movies now play in the arena (and entrance name panel on SmackDown arena).

[tadanokojin]

Holywood Hogan thing is a pretty big headache.

Two big problems:

1. Broken shuffle heuristic which makes a lot of bad assumptions
2. TC

[FMecha]

Online Pro Wrestling (SLPM-65586), being a based heavily on Shut Your Mouth, also inherits SYM's bug in the moves editor menu. GS dump

[refractionpcsx2]

Hopefully the mentioned FMV problems are all solved with #5173

The Titantrons now work in said PR

[Rex000]

SvR 2006's Hollywood Hogan entrance glitch in HW mode still happens even in the latest build 1.7.2746.

The same glitch also happens whenever a wrestler does a slow motion finisher (If you tap L1 whilst performing your finisher, you should get the slow motion effect in black and white).

[Mewsey85]

As of 1.7.3220 the glitches above are still a problem

[StillPlay2]

Titantrons still busted on WWE Smackdown vs Raw 2006 using Vulkan HW but fine on software. Using latest PCSX2 1.7-3487

[waspennator]

WWE SmackDown! Here Comes the Pain Flickering loading screen.zip

WWE SmackDown! Here Comes the Pain Flickering Pause Text DX12.zip

The Tip Screens for WWE SmackDown! Here Comes the Pain don't seem to flicker on software mode when I tested on the latest nightly build, but on hardware mode with all renderers, the tips screen before the match actually starts (After the entrances are done), have this black flickering box that shows up on the top left of the screen now.

Also when pausing during a match using the DX12 backend, the highlighted text on the pause menu seems to flicker in and out periodically. None of the other renderers that i've noticed seem to have this problem.

[refractionpcsx2]

do you know what build these problems started on?

[waspennator]

For the DX12 flickering highlighted pause screen text, I went through the builds on the site and narrowed it down to 1.7.3720 being the last version that was working correctly with it, the next downloadable build I tried, 1.7.3721 was when the regression began.

For the tips screen bug: I bisected, and it seems like on most builds up to 1.7.4022, the entire tips screen would flicker on and off, but 1.7.4023 was when only the top left of the tips screen started flickering.

[refractionpcsx2]

ok thanks :)

[waspennator]

ok thanks :)

Retested HCTP again, seems like as of nightly 1.7-4125, the entire tips screen before the match starts is now back to flickering entirely, as opposed to the top left only flickering on 1.7-4124

Also a new regression has popped up on the DX12 backend that seems to have started around build 1.7-4137, the names on the pre-match confirmation screen don't seem to show up if your using DX12 rendering.

DX12 Renderer:

DX11 Renderer:

WWE SmackDown! Here Comes the Pain - Missing Pre Match confirmation screen text DX12.zip

[waspennator]

Tested it out again on my end, the DX12 back end no longer seems to be showing the regressions anymore on the pre match confirmation screen or during the pause menu.

The flickering that used to happen during the loading screen before the match actually starts (When you turn off entrances) doesn't seem to be happening anymore too.

EDIT: I tested out some of the other games I have and while I cannot seem to replicate the issues with Shut Your Mouth or Just Bring it Anymore on Vulkan, the issues with 06 (Except for the shifting load screens) are still occuring with Hollywood Hogan's entrance and Slow motion finishers effects glitching up the screen, though both of them do seem to be fixed if you swap between hardware rendering to software (or just pause and unpause the game during the slow mo finisher)

There is however a new issue i'm noticing with 06 though, if you preview an entrance in hardware rendering, not only does there seem to be some pixelated garbage on screen for like half a second before the loading screen transitions to the actual entrance (Too fast to get a screencap of), but when the entrance preview finishes and you are back on the menus, if you back out, you can notice the menu highlighters are broken.

How it looks before previewing an entrance:

How it looks after previewing an entrance on hardware rendering:

WWE SmackDown! vs. RAW 2006 Broken Menu highighter after viewing entrance.zip