ROM Hacking Discussions

[deoxys121]

EDIT: I have decided to remove this post and add all Pokemon from the Unova Pokedex and address my biggest issue, the incompatibility of moves for Klink/Klang/Klinklang, when it comes.

[Dark pokemon]

I have two questions

What makes Pokemon Emerald unstable and can someone give me a list of Pokemjn emerald hacks I can look at

[Banjora Marxvile]

Originally Posted by Dark pokemon

I have two questions

What makes Pokemon Emerald unstable and can someone give me a list of Pokemjn emerald hacks I can look at

The ROM isn't unstable, that's a false rumor. What makes Emerald seem unstable was the lack of support of tools, or the tool creators using Ruby and Sapphire offsets when Emerald's are different. The ROM isn't unstable, otherwise you can't play it without it crashing, it's just the tools.

Emerald hacks are kinda uncommon, but Flora Sky is one I'd look at.

[jabberjabber8]

Hey there,
i needed a bit of help and could not find anywhere more suited to put this so...

I need names for the first 3 city's of my hack pokemon rumble rock... any ideas?

[NarutoActor]

Today I can gladly say I did not work on my hack. Instead I finally organized all my files associated with my hack. So I was wondering, how organize are you guys with your hacks?

[Binary]

Originally Posted by NarutoActor

Today I can gladly say I did not work on my hack. Instead I finally organized all my files associated with my hack. So I was wondering, how organize are you guys with your hacks?

I try to be as organized as I can. A few years back, I would just scatter files associated with any project all over the HDD.
Rom Hacking is the main root folder. And it's pretty much like a Tap Root System where all the other roots divide from the main root, and there are secondary roots, tertiary roots, etc. Within the Rom Hacking folder, I have Projects, Tools, Resources, etc. Under Projects, folders with the name of the hack, and in them, other folders like scripts, maps, tilesets, etc. Yeah, that's pretty much how I organize myself.

[Ninja Caterpie]

I am bad organised. I have all my junk heaped into the one ROM Hacking folder. The tools that come with multiple other files are all in their individual folders, with the ROM itself in the A-Map folder, as it makes it faster to run. I barely back-up anything and... yeah. Disorganised as heck.

[Team Fail]

Hey, I want to ask of your opinions, but how do you feel when someone steals a tutorial that you wrote? I found that someone posted my DS Music hacking tutorial without my permission. And get this- it's a PC user. And he put it on his forum.

[Banjora Marxvile]

Originally Posted by Team Fail

Hey, I want to ask of your opinions, but how do you feel when someone steals a tutorial that you wrote? I found that someone posted my DS Music hacking tutorial without my permission. And get this- it's a PC user. And he put it on his forum.

It's stealing, plain and simple. Ask him kindly to credit you or take it down. May not comply, but... It's the internet, it's hard to actually fix these things.

[Cao Pi]

ok so now that I am going to attempt to make my own hacked game pretty soon I was wondering if there is a certain pokemon game that is easiest to hack and if so which one it is.

[colcolstyles]

Originally Posted by Team Fail

Hey, I want to ask of your opinions, but how do you feel when someone steals a tutorial that you wrote? I found that someone posted my DS Music hacking tutorial without my permission. And get this- it's a PC user. And he put it on his forum.

If you wrote your tutorial to help out those eager to learn then you should be happy because 1) having it posted on another site will expose more people to it; and 2) this "thief" obviously thinks your tutorial is helpful and/or well-written. So yeah, I would feel happy if someone did that.

If this guy isn't citing you as the original author, however, then that's a problem because the tutorial is your intellectual property. But if he agrees to mention that you were the author then I (if I were you) would let him keep the tutorial up. After all, what reason do you have for keeping it PC-exclusive?

Originally Posted by Cao Pi

ok so now that I am going to attempt to make my own hacked game pretty soon I was wondering if there is a certain pokemon game that is easiest to hack and if so which one it is.

If you search this thread (and these forums), you'll find this question has been answered countless times. Basically, each ROM has its pros and cons. The choice is up to you and you aren't putting yourself at a disadvantage by choosing one particular ROM.

[Darthatron]

Originally Posted by Team Fail

Hey, I want to ask of your opinions, but how do you feel when someone steals a tutorial that you wrote? I found that someone posted my DS Music hacking tutorial without my permission. And get this- it's a PC user. And he put it on his forum.

I think it's rude not to get your permission, but that's about it. As colcolstyles said, he should at the least credit you as the original author. If he didn't you could probably get his hosting shut down for theft of intellectual property. Be sure to inform him of this.

[deoxys121]

OK, I want the opinions of some of you. In my Ruby hack, Wally will be replaced by another trainer. I want to ask you guys who I should use in place of him. I'm thinking it's gonna be one of the following: Red (FRLG Male player); Leaf (FRLG Female player); Ethan (HGSS Male player); Lyra (HGSS Female player). I would appreciate your opinions on which one I should use.

[Ninja Caterpie]

Make a character of your own.

[Poster]

Originally Posted by Ninja Caterpie

Make a character of your own.

Easiest thing to say.

The choice is actually yours, deoxys121, because using an existing character ties them to a sort of premade scenario. You can erase their backgrounds, of course, but that would lead to a confusion for those playing the hack. So I suggest you sit down and think which background of the suggested characters will fit your story best.

[DrFuji]

I don't think there is any reason to use player-characters who have appeared in previous games - They've all been silent protagonists with little to no characterisation. Creating a completely new character like Ninja Caterpie suggested is a superior choice (in my view) as you can insert a new personality and backstory if required.

[deoxys121]

Originally Posted by DrFuji

I don't think there is any reason to use player-characters who have appeared in previous games - They've all been silent protagonists with little to no characterisation. Creating a completely new character like Ninja Caterpie suggested is a superior choice (in my view) as you can insert a new personality and backstory if required.

Well, I'm not good at all at making battle sprites from scratch. Overworld sprites, on the other hand, I can make. So, as far as making a completely new character, if one of you wants to make the battle sprite, I would definitely give credit.

Another idea would be to take one of the aforementioned characters and suggest that they decided to start over fresh in the Hoenn region.

EDIT: I would also need the back sprite where the character throws the Poke Ball during the Pokemon catching tutorail.

[Random One]

I have a question: Is Photoshop a requirement to being able to hack certain parts of the graphics?

It seems the more and more I try to do on my hack, I run into the problem that if you don't have Photoshop you're screwed. I can't change the intro hero, I can't insert tiles, heck I can't even unlz to its fullest potential (or at all).

The problem seems to be with palettes, Photoshop lets you import and apply palettes etc. I have GIMP, Infranview, and Graphics Gale, and not one of them it seems, lets you apply the palettes or work with them the way photoshop can. Is there anything out there that lets you manipulate palettes like Photoshop? Because I'm getting sick of reading "oh do this and that and this and use Photoshop for this and that and this and it'll work no problem" in tutorials and if I attempt to even try I end up screwing up my maps, tiles, or my rom.

For the record, I've tried to download the free trial of Photoshop Elements 9 and... it's still loading. x.X Since it's you know, 1.75 GB just for the first part of it. Bleh.

Do I really have to spend over $100 for something just so I can hack a rom?

[Crimson Stardust]

Originally Posted by Random One

I have a question: Is Photoshop a requirement to being able to hack certain parts of the graphics?

It seems the more and more I try to do on my hack, I run into the problem that if you don't have Photoshop you're screwed. I can't change the intro hero, I can't insert tiles, heck I can't even unlz to its fullest potential (or at all).

The problem seems to be with palettes, Photoshop lets you import and apply palettes etc. I have GIMP, Infranview, and Graphics Gale, and not one of them it seems, lets you apply the palettes or work with them the way photoshop can. Is there anything out there that lets you manipulate palettes like Photoshop? Because I'm getting sick of reading "oh do this and that and this and use Photoshop for this and that and this and it'll work no problem" in tutorials and if I attempt to even try I end up screwing up my maps, tiles, or my rom.

For the record, I've tried to download the free trial of Photoshop Elements 9 and... it's still loading. x.X Since it's you know, 1.75 GB just for the first part of it. Bleh.

Do I really have to spend over $100 for something just so I can hack a rom?

hmm..if you are talking about the palletes,
you could always manually key in the palletes on infranview without exporting..
That is what i do always for my tile inserting without the use of photoshop

[Random One]

Originally Posted by Crimson Stardust

hmm..if you are talking about the palletes,
you could always manually key in the palletes on infranview without exporting..
That is what i do always for my tile inserting without the use of photoshop

So... well I'll give that a try and see what happens. But what can be done for other things like the intro hero?

www*pokecommunity*com/showthread.php?t=165124 (15post rule)

I having trouble coming up with a workaround for this, and that's a lot more than 16colors.

[Saten Ruiko]

Originally Posted by Random One

So... well I'll give that a try and see what happens. But what can be done for other things like the intro hero?

www*pokecommunity*com/showthread.php?t=165124 (15post rule)

I having trouble coming up with a workaround for this, and that's a lot more than 16colors.

You can increase/decrease the color depth with irfanview. You can also edit the palette to your needs, just play around to get the best results.

[Random One]

Originally Posted by Saten Ruiko

You can increase/decrease the color depth with irfanview. You can also edit the palette to your needs, just play around to get the best results.

I guess I'll get to know Infranview really well over the next few days, though it's still a pity it won't let you apply a palette. But hopefully a lot better alternative to shelling out a lot of money for Photoshop. Thanks for the tip.

[Team Fail]

Hehehe... He went and deleted the tutorials, as well as everything else he had stole.

Now, am I able to go and get my tutorial copyrighted? Or should I just paste a copyright symbol? I can see that Hackmew has done some copyrighting on his things, seeing as it says, "This thread, layout included, is Copyright © 2010 by HackMew. You are not allowed to use anything without permission!". "The Thread" referring to that specific thread and it's contents, which include the tools.

Le edit:

I am starting my new hack, and I thought I would post a little musical teaser:

Yes, I just threw it together with Movie Maker.

Le edit 2: It seems my tutorial is so popular it has hit 2500+ views. WOW.

[Deokishisu]

How do you guys decide what Wild Pokemon to include in your hacks? Especially choosing the ones incredibly early on? On one hand, variety is important, but on the other, you don't want the player to have so much available so early. I guess my question is, when and how should you transition from the "start crap" to more variety and slightly more powerful (base stat-wise) Pokemon?

[Ash493]

Originally Posted by Deokishisu

How do you guys decide what Wild Pokemon to include in your hacks? Especially choosing the ones incredibly early on? On one hand, variety is important, but on the other, you don't want the player to have so much available so early. I guess my question is, when and how should you transition from the "start crap" to more variety and slightly more powerful (base stat-wise) Pokemon?

Imo you should put 3 different pokemon on the starting routes with 1 special (you know some hidden one that's very hard to find and it's very good).
But those 3 shouldn't be so annoying like Rattata, Pidgey, etc... Maybe one of them, but others should be somehow of better use.
That's my option.