Features

This page attempts to keep track of features added to OpenMW that were not part of the original Morrowind engine.

Scripting

• Stricter compiler and compiler warnings. Error handling in the vanilla MW script compiler was very limited.
• Function arguments can now be expressions of arbitrary complexity. Vanilla MW would not even allow simple variable arguments for some functions.
• Arbitrary limitations on code depth/size are not present anymore. For example, there was a limit on how deep you can nest if/endif clauses. And there was also a limit on the length of a if/endif block.
• Fixed a large number of miscellaneous pitfalls and limitations.

GUI

• World map adjusts automatically to fit new landmass from mods such as Tamriel Rebuilt
• Improved save/load dialogs. Saves are organized by character
• Improved item selection dialog
• Improved and resizable alchemy dialog
• Allow keyboard input for item count dialog and trade window price
• Improved console (colors, tab completion of commands and object IDs)
• Copy&paste from system clipboard
• When placing items, irrelevant windows (stats, map and spell windows) will turn transparent on mouse-over and allow click-through

Controls

• Hardware cursors - this means the GUI cursor is always fluent, independent of the framerate.
• Keyboard Layout Support - original Morrowind would always use QWERTY keyboard regardless of system setting; OpenMW will correctly map the buttons
• Held attacks (e.g. a nocked arrow) may be canceled by using the Ready Weapon key.
• The annoying "Finish your current attack before equipping a new weapon" error has been removed and instead plays the weapon equip animation.

Media

• Image formats: all formats supported by FreeImage
• Audio and video formats: all formats supported by FFmpeg

Graphics

• Unclamped lighting
  • Morrowind used the fixed function pipeline which imposes a limit on the maximum amount of lighting. This typically made day-time lighting look flat. (Add comparison screenshots)
• Support normal, specular, and parallax maps (TextureModding)
• Support for all resolutions
• Adjustable field of view
• Anisotropic filtering
• Depth shadow mapping
• More accurate sun flare using occlusion queries
• Smooth cloud transition when switching to a different weather

Terrain

• Uses alpha-splatting (fixes all visible texture seams)
• Built-in distant terrain support

Misc

• Camera zoom in third person mode
• Multiple data directories (see Mod installation)
• Replaced the content file limit of 255 with a content file limit of 2147483646 and a per content file limit on the number of dependencies of 255.
• Various options available to facilitate game testing (see Testing#Game_Arguments)

Selected Bugfixes

Since OpenMW is written from scratch, almost all bugs in the Morrowind engine do not affect OpenMW in the first place. Attempting to list them all would be a futile effort, but the most game-breaking ones are worth mentioning:

• Infinite merchant restock fix
  • Selling an item to a merchant would permanently increase the restock capacity of that item, making it easy to buy enormous amounts of an item very quickly. This exploit no longer exists in OpenMW.

• Owner contamination fix
  • When an item owned by an NPC is stolen, it could "contaminate" a stack of similar items and flag the whole stack as stolen. OpenMW creates a separate stack for non-stolen items.

• Savegame doubling fix
  • Morrowind's savegame system suffers from a design flaw that could cause objects to duplicate. This should never happen in OpenMW.