Import and export Monster Hunter Frontier 3D models, skeletons, animations, and stage maps in Blender.
Supports:
- FMOD - 3D model geometry (import/export)
- FSKL - Skeleton/bone hierarchy (import/export)
- MOT - Animation/motion data (import)
- Stage containers - Map/stage files with multiple models
Install as any Blender add-on:
- Download this repo as a ZIP from the latest release
- Open Blender,
Edit > Preferences > Add-ons > Install...select the ZIP folder.
Locate the data you want to import, have a look at the documentation section to find them.
Open Blender, File > Import > MHF FMOD, select the file.
Add the "skeleton" (hierarchy of axes), File > Import > MHF FSKL.
Convert the skeleton to an armature, Object > Create Armature from FSKL Tree.
Your model is imported with the textures, and you can change its pose.
To import animations, first create an armature as described above.
Then with the armature selected, File > Import > MHF Motion (.mot).
The animation will be imported as a Blender Action and automatically assigned to the armature. You can view the animation in the Timeline or Dope Sheet editors.
Import entire game stages from container files or directories:
- Container mode:
File > Import > MHF Stage- Select a .pac stage container file. The add-on automatically decompresses JKR-compressed data and extracts all models. - Directory mode:
File > Import > MHF Stage (Directory)- Select a folder containing multiple FMOD files to import them all at once.
Embedded OGG audio files in stage containers are also extracted.
Export your modified models back to Frontier format:
- FMOD export:
File > Export > MHF FMOD- Export selected meshes or all scene meshes. - FSKL export:
File > Export > MHF FSKL- Export from an armature or empty hierarchy.
The important part of the addon is in the "mhfrontier" folder. You only need to create a ZIP of this folder to build it.
If you have Blender 4.2+ use:
cd mhfrontier
blender --command extension build
Otherwise we provide a legacy Python script:
python extra/zip_addon.py
Tests are performed with unittest.
You need to manually add model folders in tests/models/.
Then open a terminal in the main folder and run:
# Run all tests
python -m unittest discover -s tests/
# Run specific test module
python -m unittest tests.fmod.test_fmod
python -m unittest tests.stage.test_stage_containerAn online documentation is available at Getting started (Frontier Z).
To get any data to extract, you need a Monster Hunter Frontier Z game. Then, the game data need to be decompressed, you don't need to decompress everything as the monster models are in "[your MHFrontier folder]/dat/emmodel[_hd]".
To known which file is which monster you can use monster_ids.md as a reference. To decompress data use ReFrontier. You want .fmod (3D model), .fskl (skeleton), and .mot (animation) files. Animation files can be found in "[your MHFrontier folder]/dat/motion".
For the next steps, you can follow the Blender tutorial.
New features:
- FMOD/FSKL export - Export models and skeletons back to Frontier format.
- Animation/motion import - Import .mot files to animate armatures.
- Stage/map import - Import entire stages from .pac containers or directories.
- OGG audio extraction - Extract embedded audio from stage containers.
- Weapons such as lance or models with different parts can now be loaded with a skeleton assigned.
- Fixed models that could not load with the original add-on.
- Compatibility with Blender 2.8+.
Changes:
- Correctly scales and orients models.
- Abstracted Blender API for testability (unit tests run without Blender).
- Replaced print statements with proper logging.
- Added type hints throughout (PEP 561 compliant).
- GitHub Actions CI for automated testing.
- Less memory usage, preventing crash.
- @AsteriskAmpersand / *& - Original author.
- @MHVuze / Vuze - For the Frontier Recursive Block Format documentation used to build this importer.
- @Silvris - For the Materials and Skeleton documentation used to build this importer.
Licensed under GPL v3.0, courtesy of @AsteriskAmpersand.