Here's how I got ahold of the harder-to-find models so far because I'm still excited that I managed it.
If you've seen my older tutorial on how to rip the easier-to-find models, this other tutorial right here should allow you to get ahold of anything else, just as long as you can find it within the many many files.
VERY LONG POST INCOMING.
You need:
1.) An Illbleed ROM (.cdi, .gdi, or .iso)
2.) GDRom Explorer (program that can export files from within Dreamcast ROMs)
3.) PVRViewer (view and extract textures)
4.) HxD (the hex editor I use)
5.) Noesis (model viewer and exporter)
6.) Whatever 3D model program you like using (I personally use Blender 2.79)
Steps:
1.) Open Illbleed (cdi, gdi, or iso format ROM) into GDRom Explorer.
2.) Extract either a .CGM file or a .PMC file.
In my experience .CGMs tend to contain entire rooms/areas of a level and may or may not contain characters inside. While .PMCs are usually for traps and other cutscene things.
If you are looking for an entire room/area .CGMs are best, if you're just looking for a character or something then .PMCs will usually have less stuff to clean up once you get to editing the model in Blender or whatever you use.
I recommend digging through either type of file using PVRViewer first to glean what's inside them a little quicker.
In PVRViewer change the filetype dropdown to All Files, navigate to the folder you saved the .CGM/.PMC, right click the .CGM/.PMC, Scan For PVR Files.
3.) Open the .CGM or .PMC you want in HxD.
4.) Click around the top of the "Decoded text" on the side, CTRL+F , search for "NJTL" and set Search Direction to All.
There should be results at the bottom, double click the FIRST result.
5.) Now, where that took you in the decoded text, highlight the one character BEFORE it says NJTL, don't highlight the NJTL text itself:
6.) Right click it and hit Select Block. It should have the start and end automatically set to the one character you highlighted. Enter zero in the Start.
7.) Hit OK and it should have highlighted everything before that first NJTL, but not the NJTL text itself.
Just delete all of this ^. A warning will pop up, just hit OK.
8.) Now File > Save as..., whatever you decide to name the file *make sure you change the extension to .NJ.* I like just keeping the name the same as the original file (I used HK00A044.PMC) and only changing the extension.
9.) Now it should open right up in Noesis! My example appears to be the scene where you give Hell Cake the severed head.
You can export the model to whatever format you like using from here.
10.) Now you can import to Blender or whatever you use and clean it up or whatever you want with it!
You will probably have to extract the textures via PVRViewer and apply them manually in Blender or whatever you use. Sometimes .CGMs will have like two textures applied to absolutely everything but that's it.
(...I'm not sure whether that is my fault, but I can't get the model to open any other way than this method I just taught y'all. If I figure out a better way I'll update.)
The UV Maps are intact and everything though so it's literally just a matter of importing the right image onto the right piece.
(I managed to get the main area of the park and finding where everything goes is kind of hell, it exported in at least a couple hundred pieces. Just be aware of that if you try all this on an entire room/area. It'll be worth it though. I took a break from working on the park but I'll get back to it eventually.)
I'm not sure if anyone on Tumblr that could help out will wind up seeing this, but I'll post this anyway.
I'm still trying to look for some models in Illbleed's files.
TL;DR before getting in, I most likely need to figure out how to pull models out of the .CGM files of Illbleed. That's the most important part. I need somebody who possibly knows how to do that.
I've already shared in the past that I've been able to find some, but not all, models (TL;DR all [selectable] player characters and their variants, enemies/bosses, Control Operator Jackson, one skydome) from the game.
They were very straightforward to get, .NJ Ninja Chunk models sitting out in the open, can be opened and exported with Noesis.
BUT I'm missing basically everything besides that.
I really want to get ahold of the level meshes and the remaining characters, the non-hostile NPCs such as the remaining Illbleed workers.
Here's what I know. If anybody can help me with the .CGM files specifically I could really use it.
The .CGM files contain textures (and apparently models***) for level stuff, and I think the NPCs are inside here too since their textures are here.
I can use the program PVRViewer to pore through and export the texture files, but I have no clue how to get the models out.
***A Reddit user claims these also have Ninja Chunk models inside but I don't know how I'd get those out. I asked them about it but their comment is two years old so I don't know if they'll even get back to me.
If I can just figure that out I think this is the way to get the level meshes and the rest of the characters.
There are also some .NJ files out in the open that Noesis refuses to preview or export which is weird. If anyone knows alternate ways to open models of this format I'd like to know because I don't know what the hell these even are. Not pictured: TPIC.NJ, about 2MB in size.
How To Rip (Many, But Not All) Models From Illbleed.
(✅ This works for: All (selectable) player characters incl. Brainless Randy and all True Ending Eriko phases, all enemies and some of their attack particles/effects, Operator Jackson, characters holding Cashman's controls, a skydome. ✅)
(❌ This does not work for / I cannot find: anything else basically. I'm missing Cork/Inda, NPCs like Cunningham, Jason, etc as well as weapons and interiors. ❌)
You'll need:
GDRom Explorer.
An Illbleed ROM that is .cdi, .gdi, or .iso.
Noesis.
Your usual model editing program.
Pop the Illbleed ROM into GDRom Explorer (Open the cdi/gdi/iso, not the bin files). It should load everything inside the ROM for you to browse.
You're looking for the .NJ files. Dunno if it's different from ROM to ROM but mine are within a bright yellow folder called AMAZON.
Names are not obvious but different models are in sections, I recommend just extracting them all and sifting through them in Noesis to find what you want.
Selectable player characters are C00 through C04.
Enemies (plus some attack particle thingies) are E00 through E36C.
O039 is Operator Jackson, and O329 though O333 is everybody holding the Cashman controls.
Select whatever then right-click and you can extract the files to wherever.
Open em in Noesis now. Noesis will open these right up as Ninja Chunk Models. They contain the fully-rigged models with all their textures and even animations.
Just hit File > Export on your desired model (I also pause and slide the animation timeline back to the very start first, not sure if that matters though).
Choose your desired filename and location, change "Main output type" to your desired format.
Textures should export along with the model on their own, as .png. "Additional texture output" is not necessary to set unless you want the textures converted to other formats such as .dds.
If you check the "No Animations" box, it'll come out already T-Posed if it has one!
Some model formats should retain the animations if you want them though, .dae is one I know. If you use Blender you can look at the Dope Sheet to see all bones' frames laid out in one place.
Things of note:
Some formats (like .dae) you will have to Remove Doubles on each piece as they'll have many doubles.
In .dae bones are not connected to each other so you may only have a tiny floating dot to grab for posing, in my experience.
In programs like Blender (in .dae again) the material for each part may look cloudy. For that I would just replace the material with a new one entirely, I dunno how to remove the cloudiness on the material it exports with...
I personally downloaded an XNALara plugin for Noesis to export. That removes the doubles for you, you won't have cloudy materials in Blender, and the skeleton will be nice and neat and connected how it should. If you want animations unfortunately XNALara format will not keep them.
I then have an XNALara plugin for Blender as well to open the models up and do whatever with, I've never tried opening one straight from Noesis to XNALara itself without any Blender editing so I don't know how that turns out.
However, I notice the plugin adds "_diffuse" onto the end of the filename in the directory that it's looking for the textures in.
To fix this you could re-add the textures manually, remove "_diffuse" from the source directory on every piece ("Image" dropdown > "Source" in the Blender texture properties tab), or literally just rename the actual texture files to add _diffuse at the end.
After all that, there you go! Now you have whatever models to do whatever with. If anyone knows how to get other NPCs and interiors I would love to know.
