ROM Hacking Discussions

[Corvus of the Black Night]

Woot! That's awesome, Wichu. I hope the interface also doesn't require to click to change every... single... last... bloody... pixel...

Well, I have hacked a little into Emerald and I quite agree with most of the other people's opinions here - it's really not all that much unstable, unless you're a complete idiot/n00b/idon00b and don't know what the hell you're doing. Heck, if you can find the tables, you can make any program work with it. The only thing I don't feel comfortable with Emerald is the fact that it has a lot less freespace (which to me, is a bit of a cozy blanket), but ROMs can be expanded to suit the needs (even though LIPS won't work with it after that)

...Am I the only person here who gets bored sometimes and removes stuff out of the rom just to see what it glitches up? It's a good way to learn what things do and where they are located.

 

[Vrai]

but ROMs can be expanded to suit the needs (even though LIPS won't work with it after that)

Isn't that what UPS patching is for? I never really understood the difference between the two; does UPS patching allow for expanded ROMs, or what? If someone would explain, that'd be nice. ;3

...Am I the only person here who gets bored sometimes and removes stuff out of the rom just to see what it glitches up? It's a good way to learn what things do and where they are located.

No, I don't, but it sounds like a good idea. How exactly do you remove stuff? Just like open it up in a hex editor and replace some stuff with free space?

 

[colcolstyles]

The only thing I don't feel comfortable with Emerald is the fact that it has a lot less freespace

True, but if necessary you can just decompile a bunch of the original scripts with XSE and use it's cleaning preprocessing directives. It might take a while but it's probably a lot more convenient that expanding your ROM. I'm reluctant to try ROM expansion because doing so would require a different type of patch (according to some people) and I'd rather stick with the more commonplace method.

 

[BananasGoMoo]

True, but if necessary you can just decompile a bunch of the original scripts with XSE and use it's cleaning preprocessing directives. It might take a while but it's probably a lot more convenient that expanding your ROM. I'm reluctant to try ROM expansion because doing so would require a different type of patch (according to some people) and I'd rather stick with the more commonplace method.

yea, you have to use UPS, but its pretty easy.

 

[colcolstyles]

yea, you have to use UPS, but its pretty easy.

Oh I think I can handle it. I'm not worried about that. I just don't want to have to explain to other people how to patch :p

 

[Corvus of the Black Night]

Thing is, new people don't. I have to remember that not everyone knows how to use it. They have a tutorial for IPS, but not for UPS.

When I remove data, I simply convert a couple hundred bytes to 0x00 or 0xFF just to see how the game will react. This way, I learned how to tell what many kinds of data are just by looking. Funny thing is, I use a Tile Editor for hex editing, but they are practically the same (each number is shown with a different colour on a 16 colour palate). It's actually much easier to read pointers this way.

Also... I went in to image hack Pokemon Pinball R/S, and practically EVERYTHING is uncompressed o.o

 

[colcolstyles]

When I remove data, I simply convert a couple hundred bytes to 0x00 or 0xFF just to see how the game will react. This way, I learned how to tell what many kinds of data are just by looking.

Hm, sounds interesting. I'll have to give it a go sometime.

Here's a question that I've been curious about for a while: who here uses the grid in AdvanceMap while mapping? I didn't even know it existed until somebody posted a mapshot in the MR/RT with the grid on, so I've learned to map without it.

 

[Aljam]

Hm, sounds interesting. I'll have to give it a go sometime.

Here's a question that I've been curious about for a while: who here uses the grid in AdvanceMap while mapping? I didn't even know it existed until somebody posted a mapshot in the MR/RT with the grid on, so I've learned to map without it.

The grid function is a great feature in advance map. It helps me find tile errors easier.

 

[Tropical Sunlight]

I don't use a grid, no way!
It'll spoil the joy of mapping!

 

[sasquatchd00d]

I don't use a grid either. It just annoys me and it makes it harder to spot tile errors when I'm mapping. I learned to map without it and I don't intend to use it anytime soon either.

 

[Conan Edogawa]

I didn't even know there was a grid feature in A-map.

On the topic of UPS I've used it a couple of times and it isn't difficult to use. and that's coming from a new hacker.

 

[Vrai]

I use the grid occasionally, when I have to count tiles (to see the player's view limits, etc.). I'm never going to map with it on, though; I learned to do without.

On another topic of A-Map; has anyone else realized that there's an option for setting the opacity of the movement permissions? I guess I never found it before, but it's pretty neat. Much easier to map the permissions when I can see what I'm mapping the movements over.

 

[Corvus of the Black Night]

Wat grid feature wat

Actually, I knew about it, but I never use it. I count the tiles... normally... without a grid... o.o

 

[Ninja Caterpie]

Wat grid feature wat

Actually, I knew about it, but I never use it. I count the tiles... normally... without a grid... o.o

Same here, and it hurts when it's grass.

The opacity of the Movements? Yeah, I've seen that, I just never changed it because the default is fine with me.

 

[sasquatchd00d]

On another topic of A-Map; has anyone else realized that there's an option for setting the opacity of the movement permissions? I guess I never found it before, but it's pretty neat. Much easier to map the permissions when I can see what I'm mapping the movements over.

I knew about that, and I end up changing it A LOT. Seriously, one day it'll be one setting and the next, I'll change it to a different opacity. I guess it changes with my mood or whether or not I feel like wearing my glasses. It's a nice feature though.

 

[Corvus of the Black Night]

The opacity for me is set pretty low, because I sometimes have trouble determining what the hell the tile is underneath. So it's .7 for me. I agree, however, it's a very nice feature.

Lol. I've been hacking Red Rescue Team for the lulz. Turns out most of the sprites are uncompressed and can be easily edited in any tile viewer. See attached images for an example in which I changed Eevee to a Venus Djinni and Torchic to a Mars Djinni. The colours aren't exact due to the palate restrictions, however... and I got lazy so I just changed a few of the sprites instead of the whole sheet.

 

[Wichu]

I haven't used AdvanceMap very much; the last time I used it was a few months ago, when I was messing around with tilesets (I was bored).
Anyway, in RPG Maker XP, the tile passability is set for the tileset, rather than the map. For example, a tree tile is automatically unpassable. So, do you think the system in ROMs is better (setting the passability for each tile on the whole map)? It gives you a bit of flexibility, at the expense of mapping time. Would implementing a system in AdvanceMap that automatically set the passability of every tile on the map, based on its position in the tileset, improve the ease of mapping, or just make it more confusing?

For that matter, does it bother anyone else that ROM hacking is so separate from game development? They're both basically the same thing, yet half the people in the ROM Hacking forum have never heard of the Game Development forum, let alone been there... I think the two activities should be closer together (hence my tool actually being made in RPG Maker XP, and also being compatible with the graphics naming scheme and format of the icon files in Pokémon Essentials, a starter kit for RPG Maker XP).

 

[colcolstyles]

On another topic of A-Map; has anyone else realized that there's an option for setting the opacity of the movement permissions? I guess I never found it before, but it's pretty neat. Much easier to map the permissions when I can see what I'm mapping the movements over.

Yeah, I initially had trouble finding a good one but I eventually settled at 0.65, I believe.
I was thinking about maybe making a document that explained all of those little AdvanceMap features that most people don't know about (although in this case it seems a lot of people have already gone exploring).

@Wichu
Well as for your first suggestion, I think it would be nice to have a button or something which will set all the tiles to their respective movement permissions but afterwards, the player could go in manually and edit some if they didn't like what they saw. That way you get the best of both worlds: less mapping time and full control over passability (maybe we should suggest this to LU-HO, eh?).

 

[Corvus of the Black Night]

I haven't used AdvanceMap very much; the last time I used it was a few months ago, when I was messing around with tilesets (I was bored).
Anyway, in RPG Maker XP, the tile passability is set for the tileset, rather than the map. For example, a tree tile is automatically unpassable. So, do you think the system in ROMs is better (setting the passability for each tile on the whole map)? It gives you a bit of flexibility, at the expense of mapping time. Would implementing a system in AdvanceMap that automatically set the passability of every tile on the map, based on its position in the tileset, improve the ease of mapping, or just make it more confusing?

A-Map has no such function to my understanding, but I see what you're getting at. Most of the time when mapping, the tiles are usually the same when it comes to impassable tiles, but the system would fail with maps featuring several levels and requiring the 0 tile passibility setting (overlap of layers). You see, Pokemon, when generating maps like Lilycove City, requires different passibility levels even though they use the same tiles, just so they don't have to put an obstacle every single time there is a level change (like a row of rocks).

In the end, it would be a very useful feature, if it could be used in an .ini file, but in the end it would need to be an option or else it would be very difficult to work with maps like Lilycove.

 

[Wichu]

Yep, as colcolstyles said, such a feature would be used once when the map is finished (mapping-wise), and then the hacker could simply edit the tiles normally afterward. It could be a useful head start.