Topic: Developing FF4kster: a comprehensive editor for FF4

[Grimoire LD]

While not official in any sense, as it was done by "Sight by Sight" instead of any real hacking, maybe it will be of some help to you somehow, it's the full notes on what each Sprite, Sequence, Pointer 1, and Pointer 2 use.

http://slickproductions.org/forum/index.php?topic=1713.msg19441#msg19441

[chillyfeez]

I haven't ever been able to find them in Tile Layer either...

I recently discovered where in RAM the current map's palettes are stored, and by way of that knowledge, I can say pretty confidently that they are 3BPP. But by playing around with the palettes, I also discovered that some map tiles use different palettes within an individual tile. For instance, the edge of the mountains - the mountain portion uses the mountain palette, but the grass portion uses the grass/forest palette. This would suggest that world map tiles are - or at least are set up to allow - two separate graphics tiles overlayed. I suppose, knowing where the palettes are, that informtion could be traced back to the entire graphics loading routine... But what a pain in the neck. Maybe when I take some time off next month I'll look into it.

Maybe.

[JCE3000GT]

PinkPuff I don't know if this will help but I posted this in another thread.

$7FC0 = Title in ASCII for LoROM (22 bytes in length, some ROMs have 21 bytes)
$7FDB = Version # (1 byte (is X, V1.X))
$7FD6 = ROM Type (1 byte)
$7FD7 = ROM Size (1 byte)
$7FD8 = SRAM Size (1 byte)
$7FD9 = Country Code (1 byte)
$7FDA = Publisher / Company (1 byte)
$7FDC = Checksum (2 bytes)


ROM Type:
ROM = 00
ROM+RAM = 01
ROM+SRAM = 02
ROM+DSP1 = 03
ROM+DSP1+RAM = 04
ROM+DSP1+SRAM = 05
ROM+FX Chip = 13
ROM+RAM+Super GameBoy = E3
ROM+DSP2 = F6

ROM Size:
00-07 = Invalid Size
08 = 2MBit
09 = 4MBit
0A = 8MBit
0B = 10/12/14MBit
0C = 24/32MBit
0D = 48/64MBit
0F-FF = Do not know any factory ROM with this size

SRAM Size:
NONE = 00
16KBit = 01
32KBit = 02
64KBit = 03
128KBit = 04
256KBit = 05

Country code list:
Japan (NTSC) = 00
USA (NTSC) = 01
Euro+Asia+Oceania (PAL) = 02
Sweden (PAL) = 03
Finland (PAL) = 04
Denmark (PAL) = 05
France (PAL) = 06
Holland (PAL) = 07
Spain (PAL) = 08
German+Austria (PAL) = 09
Italy (PAL) = 0A
Hong Kong (PAL) = 0B
Indonesia (PAL) = 0C
Korea (PAL) = 0D

Publisher (Only listing a few exmamples):
Acclaim = 33
Enix = B4
TAITO = C0
Square+Squaresoft = C3

The bits in bold may be of some use?

[Grimoire LD]

That's some interesting information there JCE. Do any of those 7FXX values actually correspond to these changes? Like for example, what will changing the country code of FFII do? Will it cause it to play at 30 FPS due to it being in PAL? And would changing the ROM type or size do anything now that the game has been compiled?

[JCE3000GT]

That's some interesting information there JCE.

1. Do any of those 7FXX values actually correspond to these changes?

2. Like for example, what will changing the country code of FFII do?

3. Will it cause it to play at 30 FPS due to it being in PAL?

4. And would changing the ROM type or size do anything now that the game has been compiled?

1. Could you be more specific on this one?  I'm not understanding the question.  :(

2 & 3. Changing the country code alone doesn't change the 60hz NTSC output to 50hz PAL, there is another spot that is changed at though I'm not 100% sure where this is in FF4/FF2us.  I only dabbled with it on Terranigma. 

4. It is only an internal identifier though I haven't really played with this much.  I may run a test by expanding the ROM and repointing some data after 8MBit to see if the game/system actually uses this.  I guess one could change J2e's FF4 translation's ROM size byte (make it 4MBit for example) to find out since it is already expanded?

[Grimoire LD]

That's some interesting information there JCE.

1. Do any of those 7FXX values actually correspond to these changes?

2. Like for example, what will changing the country code of FFII do?

3. Will it cause it to play at 30 FPS due to it being in PAL?

4. And would changing the ROM type or size do anything now that the game has been compiled?

1. Could you be more specific on this one?  I'm not understanding the question.  :(

2 & 3. Changing the country code alone doesn't change the 60hz NTSC output to 50hz PAL, there is another spot that is changed at though I'm not 100% sure where this is in FF4/FF2us.  I only dabbled with it on Terranigma. 

4. It is only an internal identifier though I haven't really played with this much.  I may run a test by expanding the ROM and repointing some data after 8MBit to see if the game/system actually uses this.  I guess one could change J2e's FF4 translation's ROM size byte (make it 4MBit for example) to find out since it is already expanded?

Ah, yeah that's what I meant. I basically was curious to know if these internal identifiers actually had any function, you pretty much confirmed that they likely do not, but it will be curious to know.

And checked... yeah it's all internal identification, I did not know that companies were given their own identifier byte though, odd that they never thought they would reach above 255 game companies, hehe.

[JCE3000GT]

The funny thing is why would these even be in there if the SNES console hardware doesn't use these to alter anything?  I do know that emulators read the SRAM size byte to generate SRAM.  I have tested that and successfully had each emulator generate different SRAM sizes.  Try altering FF4 to use 256KBit SRAM and you'll see a 32Kbyte SRAM file get generated.  The puzzling thing is $60 is the byte that gets generated past $2000 when FF4 saves the data in to SRAM.  This makes me wonder if the remaining 224Kbytes can be used for other things in RAM. 

Anyone?

[Pinkpuff]

I got it! There was a messed up loop index. Anyway the fixed version is uploaded.

I should take a stab with Geiger's to find whether the game uses a table or some other math formula to locate those base addresses so we can find the others.

Would be much appreciated 

Unrelated question, is the way spell animations are stored well known?  I have done a bit of deciphering on them, and want to know if it would be new useful information to post what I have.  It might be lengthy..

That would also be quite awesome! Not sure how long it'll be before I get to doing spell animation previews but it is on my list of things I'd love to see FF4kster capable of one day.

The bits in bold may be of some use?

In terms of FF4kster becoming compatible with other versions of FF4 I assume this is for? If so, being able to detect the version of the ROM dynamically is certainly half the battle. The other half though is knowing what to do with that information; what are the differences between the versions in terms of where and how things are stored. If someone expands the ROM for example, it's great to be able to detect it, but at the same time, not much good unless I know how they've jiggered around the data...

On a tangential note - do you happen to know anything at all about world map graphics? Like, where the graphical data and/or tile assembly data are?

This is currently a huge glaring hole in the map-related portions of FF4kster. Having a functioning world map editor would just be the icing on the cake but from what I understand we're missing a few key components.

[chillyfeez]

The information about map formation data and how it's manipulated is documented. It works much like location map formation, with the exception of each map row being terminated with an FF.
Triggers also work pretty much the same, except they are stored in a different place  in ROM and treasure chests are not allowed.
I documented tile properties myself, I believe on on of your wishlist threads.

World map tile graphics are still a big mystery.

[avalanche]

World map tile graphics are still a big mystery.

Challenge Accepted.

[chillyfeez]

Challenge Accepted.

chillyfeez likes this

[Pinkpuff]

Another update: animated tiles now actually animate!!

[Grimoire LD]

Not only do tiles now animate (or at least appear correctly) you've also enabled tile editing in full! This makes things Much easier for me, all in all another fantastic update PinkPuff!

[avalanche]

Another update: animated tiles now actually animate!!

Congrats! I'm glad my first post was of some help! (I have to enjoy that one as much as I can because the overworld map graphics might not work out so well)

[Grimoire LD]

Avalanche, have you seen the old World Map Editor that Yousei made (for 1.0 only, bah)? Maybe you could find something to help you out there.