[Other] Why has Mystery Dungeon never been hacked?

Im Just wondering why the Pokemon Mystery Dungeon series has never been hacked Nor had any tools developed for it I Mean it uses 2D Sprites so It can't be that hard to hack it

Although the Latest Pokemon Mystery Dungeon 3D Magnagate or something won't be editable for a long time I would love to see Mystery Dungeon hacks it might be interesting

I think thethethethe and sebbe were working on hacking the gba one years ago. I can tell you however that from looking at the ROM in tile molester the images are uncompressed and it's very easy to replace Pokemon images.

Because 90% of the game is randomised dungeon crawling.

Ninja Caterpie said:

Because 90% of the game is randomised dungeon crawling.

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This and the fact that it is a spin off game series. I want to say that someone built a script editor (or maybe just a dialog editor), but that was a good ways back.

Because no one cares about Mystery Dungeon.

/thread

Chaos Rush said:

Because no one cares about Mystery Dungeon.

/thread

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This. I'm sure there are some people have tried to hack it, but when it comes down to it, they don't have a large enough fan-base for anything to have really happened.

On the topic of mystery dungeon hacking, has anyone tried getting vba-sdl-h to work with it? For some reason I got endless breakpoint on reads when I started running it. Any ideas why?

I think it's interesting because I know there's a ton of rps and fanfic out there set in the mystery dungeon universe, but I think that's mainly because they're the only games that really star pokemon as opposed to humans. Game-wise, there's not a ton of mechanics to them that are very interesting to work with, and they usually have a slightly stronger (or at least more obvious) plot than the main games so there's less of a drive to "correct" them to a better plot as some hacks try to do. That's my two cents :3

I've only ever played the first mystery dungeon though, so I may be over generalizing based on my experience with that >.>

Small fan base, like the other guy above said.
/nowdefinatlythread

The only hacking tool I've seen for PMD:1 B/R is the starter editing tool, which won't get you far in a 'decent' hack.
The ''closet'' thing I've ever seen to MD hacks is hacks that claim to be a port of Mystery Dungeon onto Pokemon Ruby, when really the dungeons aren't mysterious, and not randomly made at all.

I concur with Nintendork15. I've just registered to this forum (hi!) after searching for the past couple of hours trying to find a way to customize my PMD Red Rescue that I plan to play with VBA and a smart phone emulator. The most I have found is Sebbe's starter editor, an upload of a table file, and some limited gameshark codes that focus primarily on editing stats and inventory (there is a way to modify the pokemon species of your team members, but it's a temporary and possibly cosmetic fix only).

I don't know about you guys, but I make rom hacks because I think it's fun. I like the Mystery Dungeon games, but I feel like they wouldn't be that fun to hack. Assuming a lot of other rom hackers feel the same way, that's probably one of the bigger reasons why.

Thethethethe and I made some progress, 2007/2008. Unfortently I keept most of my discoveries on my computer, and they're long gone... I can't remember much (if anything), but the game had some easy parts as the plain ascii text and way the sprites are storred.

I think we got pretty well into scripting and got quite a bit of the language documented, so we could do some scripting, while we never even got started on maps or any visual work.

I also started programing during that period, and wrote some kind of editor. Heres a screenshot. Since the picture was taken, I think I only added 2 or 3 extra programs too it, (Which all was just able to perform simple hex edits). I never released it officially, but sended some betas around on msn, which I think are propperly gone forever.


It's not that people haven't thought about going into the game since, I get about 2-3 people on average per year asking for info on the games, and mainly just the tool.

Its already so random why bother?

All you could possibly change is text and possibly pokemon square. The rest of the game is random generation like Minecraft without seeds. If it WAS possible to change it, it would probably be very hard.
So yeah, The only way to hack MD is to make a spin-off of it on ruby or something like that.

Nay, I say. None y'all get it.

It's a very good game to hack - the only difference is, is that there's a randomized dungeon.

It's in no way like Minecraft. It's a deep story, has cool graphics, and is very fun to play, at least in my experience.

That's the problem, though. Everyone just thinks "oh f that it's just minecraft with Pokémon", and thus, we never make any progress on it.

It's sad ;;

The_CGC said:

All you could possibly change is text and possibly pokemon square. The rest of the game is random generation like Minecraft without seeds. If it WAS possible to change it, it would probably be very hard.
So yeah, The only way to hack MD is to make a spin-off of it on ruby or something like that.

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Like pokemon ruby destiny rescue rangers by destinedjagold

droomph said:

Nay, I say. None y'all get it.

It's a very good game to hack - the only difference is, is that there's a randomized dungeon.

It's in no way like Minecraft. It's a deep story, has cool graphics, and is very fun to play, at least in my experience.

That's the problem, though. Everyone just thinks "oh f that it's just minecraft with Pokémon", and thus, we never make any progress on it.

It's sad ;;

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>just like minecraft

why is anything with random generation like minecraft these days...anyway.

No, this is not great to hack. Simply because the gameplay is generic/trivial when the main draw is the plot. Dungeon trawlers are not hard to make, good plot IS. (likewise with the main pokemon line but inverted, I would split hairs trying to balance that crap meanwhile it's plot ain't all that great.)

Think of it like this, without the dungeon trawling, what exactly is lost from the game...
Nothing really, because it plays out like a picture book.
Whereas with the main pokemon line, taking out the battling just makes it a moot point. Thus you see people trying to unmoot this point as well as expanding into it's gameplay. Or you know, hacks. Dohohoho.

Look, just go google 'pokemon rougelike' or 'pokemon dungeon trawler' with your advanced search to filter out the word mystery.

have fun~

Also make your own. :) go git yo programun finguhs awn.

@bigro - Having played many other roguelike games and dungeon crawlers, I can safely say that, as far as gameplay goes, PMD isn't generic, and you'd be hardpressed to find many of the mechanics found in PMD in other roguelikes.

People do play for the gameplay, too. It's actually hard to find a game that sells based solely on story and sells well these days.