Since 2.0, a ton of the game shadows have been borked especially in Photo Mode. This is a massive and noticeable pain if you're like me and Photo Mode is 95% of what you do in this game. The worst offenders are the ugly T-Pose hand and finger shadows for FemV and MascV supposedly has no shadow mesh at all. 

This mod fixes those broken shadows. Yes, daytime and sun shadows work too.

This mod utilizes ArchiveXL's new material patching to nuke the existing FemV body shadowmesh and switches two values in the player body .app files to cast shadows off the meshes instead. It's a hacky and simple hotfix, but it works until CDPR fixes the shadow issue on their end. This mod is compatible with FemV and MascV, PMU 2.0.4/2.0.42, PMU's FaceFix, Nim's Head/Body Meshes, custom body mods, and most other mods. I do not know if this fix affects other Photo Mode shadow fixes as I have not used them.

Some research: From messing around with the files, I noticed that the 2.0 Photo Mode ent has the female player body shadowmesh always "on," causing the ugly shadows on the hands, fingers, and elsewhere. I'm positive this is due to a new component in the 2.0 Photo Mode ent that's not present in the pre-2.0 Photo Mode ent. Either the component is screwy, the FemV player body shadowmesh is rigged wrong, or something else was not done properly under the hood. I also compared numerous pre-2.0 .app and .ent files and noticed that for some strange reason, shadow casting got borked in 2.0 unless the "castShadows" and "castLocalShadows" values were set on "Default" instead of "Always" and "Never." Why? No clue. Additionally, changing the values only in .app files would "fix" the shadows, and applying the same changes to .ent files didn't do anything. Hopefully, this information helps anyone else looking into another fix that's a little less hacky.  Hopefully, the shadow issue gets fixed or a better solution is found for this issue.

This is intended to work with patch 2.13 and is compatible with no PMU and PMU 2.0.4/2.0.42. This mod may not be compatible with PMU 2.0.3.

This hotfix is not perfect. Please report any issues and I will do my best to fix them.

You absolutely need the latest version of Archive XL or this will not work!

** USE ONE .XL FILE AT A TIME **

If you play MascV, you can download whichever file. FemV: UVF and VTK switchy/toggle/whatever feet have different paths and I'd rather not risk crashes, so download the appropriate archive, please.

Notes:
- If a sub-mesh on the player's body is chunkmasked out and a worn garment does not cast shadows or has no shadowmesh, expect the chunkmasked component to not cast a shadow at all.
- I'm not sure if I missed any specific components, but if I did, please let me know.
- Works with Johnson's Unique V rigs as of 9/20. Oops.


** UPDATE **
This mod is now pretty much almost obsolete. Yay!
Please download KiasuBurger's Universal Raytraced Player Shadows instead!
Kiasu's mod is script-based and much well put together, not to mention it works for *all* meshes! If KiasuBurger's mod doesn't work for whatever reason, this mod will still work.





.archive and .xl files go into archive/pc/mod/
To uninstall, just yeet.

Folders are labeled as necessary in the .rar files under Installation.





Aeryn, Rev, Leel Duck, Spaniard, Emmjay, and Misu for testing and dealing with my nonsense. 
Rev for being amazing, the best bae a girl can ask for, and for letting me borrow Sofia and Cass!
SilverEzredes, for being one of my best friends and encouraging me to mod. 


Don't hesitate to @ me on the Discord mentioned above if you have any questions.