So I used to be an avid skinner, doing commissions and making skins from the ground up so I feel like I still generally know my way around things, but somethings changed since I've come back from my (2-ish year) break. It's also been awhile since I've made skins. I'll provide some images to give examples.
I use this mish-mash of reused, test skins/custom made skins and templates as my personal skin, don't ask me why I never really took the time to custom make one for myself fully.
I know McOsu is completely different than osu stable in terms of code but it seems to read my skin more normally than stable does now so I'll use it for reference.

Current osu stable version of skin:
Image 1: https://imgur.com/jI2wxqp
Image 2: https://imgur.com/Xco8gp6
Image 3: https://imgur.com/BcbskjR

McOsu version of the same skin:
Image 4: https://imgur.com/zhDabT0
Image 5: https://imgur.com/xUvieV7
Image 6: https://imgur.com/OCUFXCN

Issue #1: First off (the main thing) is the circles now have this "glare" or glass look on top of them, vs the McOsu version doesn't (the "correct" looking version, reference images 2/3 & 5/6). Do I need to make a new file an invisible .png, if so which one?

Issue #2: In the song select screen I have the Nekopara girls I made for a different skin for mode selections which weren't there before, and are actually stored in a separate unrelated folder in the skin that it should NOT be detecting and using, but now is? Not a huge deal, just curious as to why this is. (reference image 1)

Issue #3: The 5 colors for the approach circles are ; dark blue, maroon, cyan, lime green, purple (won't bother copy pasting color codes, sorry). Now in the osu stable skin this stays true, only after the skin did weird things, I recall there being a period in-between my break I came back briefly and saw the skin randomly picked colors depending on the song and thought "weird, need to fix that" but now it nearly broke the skin entirely but keeps the colors as intended (so far), why is this? Also (reference image 5) in McOsu it does change colors randomly, example: the really light green shown.

Issue: #4: Some elements are entirely missing now despite the files being there still. Like in osu stable I no longer have a combo counter (reference image 1/2/3) vs in McOsu It's still there. Also the font is larger than it was before (score/acc numbers, etc.)


Remember, this skin has remain UNCHANGED for years, so this isn't a result in moving/replacing files on my end. Is there a "rework" as to how the game reads/uses skins, and anything else I should know, or a breakdown perhaps as to what has changed?
There's also other things that are "broken" but these are the key things that are problems or puzzling me so I'll try to keep it ""short"".

Issue 1: looks like McOsu isnt properly loading some overlay file. That should be hitcircleoverlay which needs to be blanked out.

Issue 2: They should be in your main folder else it wont show. Can not comment on this further without seeing your skin in my own hadns

Issue 3: Sounds like you didn't turn off beatmap skins, which can change hitcircle colors. Don't really see anything on the images that match your explanation, but sounds like beatmap skins toggle.

Issue 4: Just like with issue 2, cant really say much about this without seeing your skin in my own hands. Could be that you have an incorrect path specified for those assets in your skin.ini but mcosu still somehow managed to resolve it (incorrectly)

Overall, whatever you see in osu! is the 'correct' way how things should behave, anything difference between it and McOsu are due to the later not copying osu! exactly.

RockRoller wrote:

Issue 1: looks like McOsu isnt properly loading some overlay file. That should be hitcircleoverlay which needs to be blanked out.

Issue 2: They should be in your main folder else it wont show. Can not comment on this further without seeing your skin in my own hadns

Issue 3: Sounds like you didn't turn off beatmap skins, which can change hitcircle colors. Don't really see anything on the images that match your explanation, but sounds like beatmap skins toggle.

Issue 4: Just like with issue 2, cant really say much about this without seeing your skin in my own hands. Could be that you have an incorrect path specified for those assets in your skin.ini but mcosu still somehow managed to resolve it (incorrectly)

Overall, whatever you see in osu! is the 'correct' way how things should behave, anything difference between it and McOsu are due to the later not copying osu! exactly.

I wouldn't understand if nothing has changed with skinning it would start acting up now of all times. This skin has remain unchanged entirely for so long now, and at the point before my osu "break" was working as intended, no issues. Suddenly when I come back there's a ton of anomalies and broken elements in the skin when nothing has changed (perhaps except the way osu deals with skins now?).
I know McOsu isn't the "correct" way, but displays my skin (mostly) the way it was before it broke so that's why it's a reference since I know McOsu really just isn't the same.

Issue #1: I checked hitcirlce overlays and basically anything to do with the hit circle and here's all that's in the main folder https://imgur.com/o8w5Kvb
Nothing I can see that would create that glass looking overlay. Also note that it worked fine up until I came back in which still nothing has changed.

Issue #2: My issue was more with that they're there and not supposed to be. Albeit it's not a big deal because I can always make new ones that are actually intended or move them completely out of the folder. My main inquiry was as to why the skin is pathing into a separate folder within the skin to grab them when before it never did this.

Issue #3: Beatmap skins for me have been disabled permanently since probably 2015, and still is. Since this is SO FAR working as intended (although with some hiccups previous) I'm going to leave this alone until it decides to do it again. I was just inquiring about it since I know it was doing it in the past.

Issue #4: Although possible pathing issues it doesn't make sense to me as to how the pathing previously (before my break) didn't have an issue and always worked as intended in osu stable, but now suddenly I just can't see these elements despite the skin remaining untouched for years (even years prior to the break). I can't fathom as to why pathing would now out of the blue become an issue unless osu changed the way skins are handled/read by the client. Also the fact that you say McOsu may have not copied osu stable exactly, yet McOsu still reads my skin mostly correctly further drives my suspicion osu stable changed the way it handles skins.

1. Animated hitcircleoverlay (e.g. "hitcircleoverlay-0") support has been disabled a little while ago in stable because people were cheating with it like this. McOsu doesn't care about that so I didn't port the change over. Rename your "hitcircleoverlay-0.png" file to "hitcircleoverlay.png" to fix it for stable.
2. No idea.
3. Options > Skin > "Ignore all beatmap skins" in stable and Options > Skin > "Ignore Beatmap Combo Colors" in McOsu.
4. Weird, maybe something to do with @2x skin element loading and in-game resolution? Were you using below 1600x900 before where it all worked? McOsu ignores resolution and instead has Options > Skin > "Load HD @2x" which is always enabled by default.

It would be a lot easier to diagnose if you upload the skin somewhere for testing.

McKay wrote:

1. Animated hitcircleoverlay (e.g. "hitcircleoverlay-0") support has been disabled a little while ago in stable because people were cheating with it like this. McOsu doesn't care about that so I didn't port the change over. Rename your "hitcircleoverlay-0.png" file to "hitcircleoverlay.png" to fix it for stable.
2. No idea.
3. Options > Skin > "Ignore all beatmap skins" in stable and Options > Skin > "Ignore Beatmap Combo Colors" in McOsu.
4. Weird, maybe something to do with @2x skin element loading and in-game resolution? Were you using below 1600x900 before where it all worked? McOsu ignores resolution and instead has Options > Skin > "Load HD @2x" which is always enabled by default.

It would be a lot easier to diagnose if you upload the skin somewhere for testing.

Okay wow. That is some very interesting information: I didn't know people were abusing skins of all things for altered AR or "appeared AR". I would have never guessed that, especially since I took such a long break from both osu and skinning.
For some reason when I renamed that hit circle overlay it worked, it looks normal again AND all the missing elements are now appearing again. Just out of curiosity I set the resolution to lower that 1600x900 and it completely changed the skin. I've actually never worked with lower resolutions other than 1920x1080, why does the skin decide to use different elements in replacement of the standard ones, what exactly happens there?

I also didn't upload the skin for a couple reasons. Some of my personal skin (maybe more than some) is using elements from commissioned skins and the owners have explicitly asked me not to distribute their skin elements to other people. And since I was paid for them I feel morally obligated to respect that. It also contains "artwork" that I don't have explicit permission to use and I think I read it's against the rules to upload them if that's the case? Whether they actually enforce that I don't know, since most skins use characters from a variety of pixiv and anime. Also a lot of people don't trust a mediafire that I would probably upload it to.

Always Handsome wrote:

Just out of curiosity I set the resolution to lower that 1600x900 and it completely changed the skin. I've actually never worked with lower resolutions other than 1920x1080, why does the skin decide to use different elements in replacement of the standard ones, what exactly happens there?

1600x900 is the resolution where stable starts loading @2x versions of skin images if they exist, instead of the "regular" resolution skin images. If your resolution is 1280x720, then "hitcircleoverlay.png" is loaded. If your resolution is 1600x900 or higher, then "hitcircleoverlay@2x.png" is loaded. If your skin only provides "hitcircleoverlay.png", then that is what will be loaded even if @2x is enabled.

Your skin is an inconsistent random mix of elements, some which have correct @2x variants and some which don't have a non-@2x version or where the non-@2x images are completely different and you never noticed/checked. This is what you see below 1600x900.

Always Handsome wrote:

I also didn't upload the skin for a couple reasons. Some of my personal skin (maybe more than some) is using elements from commissioned skins and the owners have explicitly asked me not to distribute their skin elements to other people. And since I was paid for them I feel morally obligated to respect that. It also contains "artwork" that I don't have explicit permission to use and I think I read it's against the rules to upload them if that's the case? Whether they actually enforce that I don't know, since most skins use characters from a variety of pixiv and anime. Also a lot of people don't trust a mediafire that I would probably upload it to.

I understand, but it makes it very annoying for anyone trying to diagnose problems.

I must say for something so simple as hitcircleoverlay.png I'm surprised it caused so much chaos within the skin. However it does give me the motivation to build a skin from the ground up for myself this time around. Since yes, it's honestly more a storage file or one big template than it is a refined skin.

Yeah I agree it does make it a tenfold challenge, the equivalent to calling a mechanic and describing the noises the car is making over the phone. Luckily the fix was simple at least.

I must express my gratitude for your help as I probably wouldn't have figured that there was a "ban" on an image because of abuse, thank you.

EDIT: and many thanks for the information regarding lower resolution skins! Might be able to lighten up some skin sizes removing 2x files for exclusive higher res skins.