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Print Page - Who Appears in Scenes
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Library of the Ancients => Final Fantasy IV Research & Development => Topic started by: fedorajoe on May 22, 2011, 12:34:40 AM
Title: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: fedorajoe on May 22, 2011, 12:34:40 AM
I haven't found any documentation on how the game determines which sprites appear in a given scene. Take the Fabul crystal room scene for example. If I wanted to change Golbez to Lugae, how would I go about that? Is this part of the event data (can't find it if it is) or is there some sprite index tied to each location map?
Please note that I am not simply talking about switching one sprite's tile graphics for another's, like you can do in TileMolester or such. I'm talking about changing which sprite ID is used in a scene.
Any help is appreciated.
Thanks!
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on May 22, 2011, 01:31:47 AM
I currently have this same issue. From what I understand, there are certain sprites loaded to each map, which seems to mean this...
top of the tower of zot, for example we have Cecil, Tellah, Yang, Cid, Kain, Golbez, and the lightning bolts he shoots at you
however in the next map you have Cecil, Yang, Cid, Kain, Rosa, Valvalis
in an event, the same instructions that would say show npc sprite number ??? "here" using this same instruction in the next map that sprite number "???" might show a different sprite
the instruction to show npc# whatever does not specifically mean a specific sprite, so the number for the sprite you manage to display on one map will be for something else in another AFAIK :(
so honestly i do not know what to do... I hope someone is more familiar with this, there might be an instruction to change sprite #??? into sprite #??? but i dont know how...
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: fedorajoe on May 22, 2011, 06:59:23 PM
I bet Phoenix knows, since he created both an event editor and a map editor. Hopefully he will see this thread and share his expertise.
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Vehek on May 22, 2011, 07:11:26 PM
Phoenix posted the kind of information you want before, over here (http://slickproductions.org/forum/index.php?topic=1286.msg12981#msg12981).
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: fedorajoe on May 22, 2011, 11:07:38 PM
Neat! I knew somebody could help!
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on May 28, 2011, 03:16:33 PM
Ok so i am aware of Phoenix's info on "who appears in scenes"... my question is, is anyone experienced with it? because, for one thing, i just totally remodelled Damcyan and i need to shift some npc's around... id also like some of them to still be preasant since I added places to have weapons/armor/item stores
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: fedorajoe on May 29, 2011, 02:56:45 PM
This stuff is a complete pain in the @$$. Over the last few days I thoroughly remodeled the scenes where you meet Edge, find Edge's parents, and then the Rubicant fight and aftermath. This required a lot of switching and moving around of sprites, and it is a nightmare.
Here is an example that might help you to make sense of how it works.
I replaced the Queen of Eblan with Cid during the "Rubicant confrontation" scene, since Cid is in the party for this scene and the queen is already dead anyway. Now, the data for placement of the instance of the queen sprite on that particular map is from 098F18-098F1B. Here are the values for those locations: 84 0F 11 CE. I needed to move the sprite down so that it would appear with the other party members when I toggled party member map sprite visibilty during scene editing. So, I changed the values to 84 0E 14 CC. That second bit (0F) is the X value on the map and the next bit (11) is the Y value. So, I moved the sprite left one step and down three steps.
Palette and direction are tricky. Both are controlled by the 4th bit. Now, when you change NPC sprites into PC sprites, as I did here, you don't have to worry about palette, because PC sprite palettes override NPC sprite palettes. Going the other way is tricky. Anyway, changing that fourth value from CE to CC made the sprite switch from facing south when it appears to facing north when it appears. Since my comprehension of this is not the greatest, I literally experiment with all of the values until I find the palette and direction combination that I'm looking for.
The last thing is changing which sprite appears, but that is easy to do. There is a big table that controls which sprites appear where; it's included in the zip file that was linked to above. Once you know which sprite is controlled by which bit (which the zip file can tell you), it's easy to swap sprites around. In my example, I had to change location 097284 from 50 (queen sprite) to 0A (Cid sprite).
EDITED TO ADD:
If you'll indulge me, here are some screencaps of my handiwork.
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on May 31, 2011, 09:07:01 AM
So, it shouldnt be too hard if the main thing i want to do is change all the spots where you have "rosa' to appear as edward then? using her lines and such right? since i don't have a lot of instance where i need to move around sprite locations etc.
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: fedorajoe on May 31, 2011, 06:04:12 PM
No dude, it's super easy. If that's all you want to do, you just have to replace all instances of the Rosa sprite that you want to change with Edward's sprite instead. The sprite table is from 97200-973FF. Instances of Rosa appear as an 05 and instances of Edward appear as an 04. Sometimes it is hard to tell by looking at the table which instance is which, but just experiment and you'll find what you need. It's VERY roughly chronological, with overworld at the top and underworld and moon toward the bottom. But there are exceptions. There are also some instances where two maps or two scenes will reference the same sprite, perhaps when you don't want them to. But this can be fixed as well.
Now if you also want to change the X/Y location, movement speed, direction the sprite is facing when it appears, etc. then you have to get into the more advanced stuff that I referenced above.
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on June 01, 2011, 01:44:43 AM
oh ok, the main thing is that i can change who appears in the party in special scenes since u lose rosa at babil.
the only special thing i might want to do is make anna be standing in front of the door in the cave with the trap doors. so she can join at a decent time + give you the luca key...
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: fedorajoe on June 02, 2011, 07:20:30 PM
Yes. To change who appears in special scenes, all you have to do is swap the sprites in the big table as I described before.
With that said, I do not know how to add additional sprites to a scene. I only know how to switch existing ones for new ones. However, there are some maps and scenes that have unused or duplicate sprites, which are perfect for this purpose. (Example: the scene where Kain steals the Dark Crystal actually has two Kains... one that moves at normal speed and one that is faster. So, I took the second one and made it into Golbez.)
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on June 02, 2011, 08:35:55 PM
ohhh well that is the scene that i need, well that, but for the scene when you first get there? is there a scene when you first get there i dont recall.
at any rate i need one that would show anna (paladin cecil sprite overworld sprite) standing in front of the sealed door as if shes about to open in with the luca key, this is exactly the perfect point for her to join as the 5th character. using the luca key sets a flag right? so could i not tie getting her in with having used the luca key (set flag) so it hides that sprite after that point?
(i learned too that the game associates later actors with whichever sprite they load from the shadow party, so in my patch any scene with paladin cecil always looks like dark knight cecil without glitches)
Edit: I have managed to change the "Captains" that look like generic baigans, to look like blue guards (redwing sprite) in order to make Baigan unique... So i think im slowly figuring it all out
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: fedorajoe on June 03, 2011, 01:22:48 PM
Any of the sprites that appear in the scene where Kain steals the crystal can easily be set to appear automatically when you enter that map for the first time. All you have to do is tinker around a bit to find out which sprite is the one that you want to edit, then change the 4th bit for that sprite. You can use the 4th bit to change whether or not the sprite is visible when you enter the board, as well as what direction it is facing (as well as its palette, walking speed, whether or not it walks in place, etc.). And then you can set the sprite to being permanently invisible after the scene is over.
You can definitely do what you imagine, it just takes some edits to the sprite table and to the code for the scenes attached to that map.
Since I just made edits to this map myself (Yesterday!), I will get my notes on what sprite is what, and where each is located in the code, and send it your way.
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on June 03, 2011, 03:22:49 PM
I very much appreciate that! thats one of the main things i have to change
btw i did an interesting event edit when cecil normally would meet baigan inside baron, instead all dialogs are removed and the game takes over and walks cecil strait to the throne room (reluctantly, i make him pause look downcast for a second then turn around and take a few steps closer) and stops just in front of the fake king. of course i had to do that because baigan is in your party here and doesnt betray you (yet) but i thought it would be fun to fill in the space of that event instead of completely removing it.
oh there is another thing. what if i want to change a specific npc's color palette? for example, rydia's dead mother, what if i wanted to make it so that npc is using the same palette as ryidia (or even just a different npc palette for that matter)
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: fedorajoe on June 03, 2011, 06:19:28 PM
OK. You will have to change the sprite placement information for the character you are switching.
The placement information for the 2nd Kain (the sprite I changed in my hack) is at 0995D0. Whe you go to that location, you see this:
0F 04 05 C2
0F = ID for Kain sprite 04 = X value on map 05 = Y value on map C2 = direction, palette, speed, etc.
I wanted this sprite to be Golbez, who appears in the entrance to the Sealed Cave. So, I changed the values to:
13 04 0B 54
(Normally you would use 24 for Golbez rather than 13, but I switched Edge and Golbez in my hack.)
I think you said that you used the Paladin Cecil slot for your playable Anna's sprite. Now, I haven't tested this yet, but try changing the values to something like this:
C3 04 03 54
C3 = ID for Paladin Cecil sprite 04 = standing in front of the door on the X-axis 03 = standing in front of the door on the Y-axis (I think) 54 =normal walking speed, facing up toward the door, not walking in place
You don't have to worry about palettes when placing player characters, because the player character palettes override whatever townsperson palette would otherwise be displayed. But, you might have to try different values for that fourth bit to get the direction and movement speed that you want.
I don't have very good comprehension of how that bit works, quite frankly, so I just experiment with it.
When messing with non-player sprites, just play with the value of that fourth bit to switch the palette. Bumping it up by 10 seems to cycle through the palettes. Each time you loop through the palettes, the movement speed increases. Changing the value by 1's instead of 10's will cycle through all the directions the sprite can face. Just play with it a bit and you'll see what I mean.
So if you want to change the palette of Rydia's mother, you would just have to find her sprite in the placement data and alter it. I don't think you can apply Rydia's palette to her, though... I think it only loops through the three townsperson palettes plus the Black Chocobo's palette, but frankly, I haven't experimented enough to know for sure. The ID for Rydia's mother's sprite is 5A, woman lying down. I think there are only two instances--Mist and Toroia.
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on June 03, 2011, 08:10:42 PM
thank you, that info is very helpful.
i bet i can manage by using the "silf" palette which is like 7 or something like that. even tho that was just an example. Now I also have 2 characters: Anna and Baigan that use palette 04 (03 being cecil's and the last pc palette) but since i have set it up for the game to look for their PC palette i hopefully won't have a problem when placing them on maps.
I'm using cecil's pally palette to make a black and gold golbez instead of the bright blue.
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: fedorajoe on June 06, 2011, 10:41:16 PM
I'm curious, how are you making your hack? I just play through the game and make changes as I go. Are you the same?
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on June 07, 2011, 08:55:40 AM
thats pretty much what I do, except I end up having to restart for things like pre-learned magic and replaying event's i've already passed. I also have to go back and set some of the characters to higher levels since all of mine start on level 1. It might be a bit odd to meet tellah at level 1 for example lol but the only people who will get benefit out of that is the ones that use a save state edit and want to start them on low levels. the only thing is i have to set the calculated "already" earned exp in there too sigh what a pain lol.
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on June 09, 2011, 03:24:20 PM
Ok, so I think ive got a pretty good hang of this thanks to your assistance as well as the info i collected here. Now i've changed the baigan looking Captains into normal guards, I noticed that the Captain that attacks you and rydia at the inn in Kaipo also uses the Guard sprite now instead which is excellent. and now Baigan's map sprite is unique to him (in place of cecil's paladin).
I now have enough space to do some special npc's:
Sandy Cindy Mindy, they just use one frame, I can make them all look unique on the map. I made some decent battle sprites for this trio as bonus characters, but I don't know how to add them in at the end of the rom so I'll just have to do without.
Harley, I have enough space to give her an npc sprite in Damcyian (but will i be able to use the desired character palette?)
Leanora, That should be simple enough of course she will look much younger here.
Yang's wife Sheila, Ill make her look a bit foxier even tho I will no longer be using her as a player in my patch.
---ones that already exist but updated---
Luca make her look like a child version of the tay version
Elder, using the black outline for his black robe is tacky, I'll attempt to give it more detail
Rydia's dead mommy, Making her look more similar to rydia. (how did a green haired girl come from a redhead anyway? lol)
As you can see I plan to play with overworld sprites a bit. I used to love spriting and so arranging npcs on the map is really the last obstacle I have left in order to have my changes make more sense. Im really hoping to be able to make better use of certain ones tho, Like turning naminguay into a special shop or something.
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: fedorajoe on June 10, 2011, 12:44:49 PM
Hmmm, you remind me. I wanted to see about making a Call Shop item.
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on June 10, 2011, 03:36:04 PM
Yeah, I might use either naminguay or harley as a moving shop for special items. I like the Idea of using Harley, as shes a non official blue mage and traveling the world would make sense in that aspect, especially after Damcyan. That would only be a side project tho.
As far as making a call shop item? Don't the summon orb drops that teach Rydia summons count as small events? I mean I assumed that they do which would make it easy to use for that purpose instead if you can find them?
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: fedorajoe on June 11, 2011, 05:33:29 PM
Yeah, I ended up using the (stupid) dummied-out Magazine item for this purpose. Just replaced its normal event code with the Humingway Family shop.
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on June 11, 2011, 08:18:10 PM
I'm glad to hear they can be used this way. that magazine plus the 3 summon orbs makes 4.
I might use them for the purpose of getting back certain characters.
I'm still trying to work out how I would go about getting back party members.
I have to deal with the fact that the following characters would default to their original level:
Tellah Yang Baigan Cid Edge Palom Porom
That is not such a big deal with exception of Palom and Porom who learn spells. since there is no event instruction to REMOVE spells from their lists when they leave, i cannot allow them to be added back to the game for bug purposes...
Those damn twins also create a second problem as well because Golbez and Anna are linked to the Twin command even if they do not have it.
Oh and then a THIRD problem with the twins because of the twin command, you would have to always have both of them and not just one.
as a result, they are gonna be the only 2 characters that you cannot get back at all....
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on June 13, 2011, 12:36:48 AM
Ok, so I am understanding a lot more about npcs, I guess i still dont quite understand everything but I have many scenes where the game apparently re-uses the same npc, mainly the characters that are supposed to be in the party. is there an instruction to make an npc change its gfx? i know theres one for the pc... (at zot, you see baigan where yang would have been, but edward is supposed to be there...)
Also... I'm getting there a little more.. So now I have Anna standing in front of the sealed door, i made her facing you and walking in place. so i am figuring it out a little bit... now the whole speech data thing and all of that? well I basically need her to be the event trigger and not the door... (I am using npc B2 FuSoYa) as i ended up using Paladin cecil for Baigan's sprite. But he doesn't seem to have speech data or whatever, nothing happens when you try to talk to the npc..
Ok so clearly Im not sure what to do. the information on npcs confuses me. like i can find how to change ones appearance, but not the other part with the direction facing and palettes etc...
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on June 19, 2011, 01:55:46 AM
sweet. scene edit: Anna departs from Kaipo on foot instead of disappearing like a ghost, hinting at her reappearance later. In pursuit of the Dark Crystal, you next see her trying to access the Sealed Cave
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: fedorajoe on June 19, 2011, 04:42:23 PM
Hey man, looking good! Keep it up, I enjoy seeing what you come up.
OK, you've inspired me to post more pics. Please indulge me.
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on June 19, 2011, 05:02:58 PM
oh sweet! Btw I notice that edge and Golbez appear to have the npc blue palette. any bugs?
I myself have actually made use of palette 04 (Red/Gold/White) (after altering the yellow chocobo palette)
i think 05 is the blue one yes?
On a side note, I still see kain in your party. If you have him that means his shadow party slot and 3rd actors are free right? you know if you have an empty party slot or are about to remove/add a character you can Add Golbez, remove him and then add whatever other character is going to go there for now, all during the same event; then when it is REALLY time for him to be in your party, his level will be closer to the same level as your party. of course you have to load him back through another actor, perhaps Kain's freed up actor.
Then I have another question. I see that Golbez has only "Black" visible in his magic set, I was using the original Golbez actor in mine and in the menu, even though he doesn't have White or Call magic, they show in the menu as well. Did you completely dummy out Edge for Golbez's sprite? (I dummied Piggy and Mini status instead, preserving all the characters) (Golbez Portrait overwrites the Piggy, portrait, His map sprite also overwrites the Mini sprite, and his full sprite starts where Piggy originally starts (leaving exactly enough sprite space for a Full FuSoYa if you remove the moon Gfx from the title)
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: fedorajoe on June 20, 2011, 01:02:08 PM
I kept Golbez's palette exactly as it was. Edge was demoted from a playable to a non-playable character (think Siegfried but less weird), so his palette got demoted as well. But I'm actually pretty proud of how he turned out with so few colors.
I have encountered two bugs so far:
- Any palette assigned to a playable character outside of the "normal" selection of palettes will fail to appear inside the Chocobo Forests. I'm willing to live with this, although if I could find a fix, I'd take it.
- In some dungeons, Golbez does not display properly if you save, exit, and resume the game. Not a huge deal since this is all on emulator anyway.
The Kain actor was used for Cid #2. Cid rejoins when he rescues the party from the Tower of Bab-il, and he stays until you get the Big Whale. Golbez then took the Edge actor's slot.
So yes, Edge is completely dummied out. Or rather, converted into Golbez. Really, I just switched the two characters. Edge is the one who fights beside FuSoYa at the end of the game. I did not take the "real" Golbez and try to turn it into a 100% playable character. This seemed to me like more trouble than I could handle. Much easier to take an existing character and change him into Golbez.
Nothing against Edge, but he is my least favorite and is less important to the story than Cecil, Kain, Rydia, or Rosa. So he's the one who got the boot. Edge is also the closest thing to what I think playable Golbez would be like. So, using Edge means fewer tweaks are needed to stats, etc. I even kept the portrait palette the same.
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on June 20, 2011, 06:18:12 PM
i swapped cid and golbez sprites. since the last 2 character slots magic doesnt display in the menu.but cid has a full sprite so you cannot tell the difference.
btw about the golbez and baigan npc palettes 04 and 05 u can change the chocobo palette to match the baigan palette then re organize the chocobos colors to make it look normal again. do the same with palette 05 golbez, and you can make your 'black' chocobo use the blue palette
problem 1 solved.
i know how to fix problem 2 (the save/reload black palette issue) but i havent done it yet. you just have to assign the maps that he does that in the npc palette use. which most dungeons dont use normally being zero'd out by default
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on June 21, 2011, 05:09:55 PM
Harley's npc which is the blue/gold npc palette, also shared by golbez and cid
Successful Npc replacement. Harley replaces the Piggy map sprite. so she has all 8 animations as if she were playable. perfect for reappearances where i might need those frames.
This is a shot of the 2 NPC's in Damcyan that were standing next to the pot of recovery.
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: fedorajoe on June 23, 2011, 12:38:55 PM
Wow, nice!
Title: Re: Who Appears in Scenes
Post by: Zozma on June 23, 2011, 03:05:43 PM
ok so how has it been doing dialog edits for you? I only attempted to change her lines here as my first dialog change and learned that this game uses a lot of double letter combinations to save event space... pain in the butt...
but i changed this npc's lines to:
"Harley: We helped a wounded young lady get to the pot of life just in time..."
Indirectly hinting that it was Anna after Cecil and Edward leave Damcyan after the event, however to make it so that Edward doesn't assume shes still alive, I make Harley very vague about it as if to say she is not familiar with Anna.
Btw i should show you my version of Golbez, he looks a little more detailed with the gold and the blue as you see on harleys palette is the same.
Have you figured out how to eliminate the npc palette issue? I know what to do but I don't know the locations for changing them. I know they are listed but i havent looked into it. it should be as easy as assigning the common "town" npc palette set to all the dungeon areas that dont have anything there.
now then, you had mentioned how npc palettes appear to loop over a few palettes when you tested out different values. Here's what appears to be the case:
each map is assigned a set of npc palettes consisting of 3 palettes. but from what i see, they almost always include the red/gold/white and the blue/gold/brown npc palettes, and then the third is whichever else is needed (for towns it is usually the purple/gold/bown palette but things like chocobo forest use the white one (for the white chocobo) and then places ----
Ugh, finding that some of the specific npc's is a pain in the butt. I can't seem to find the Cid npc used at toria around Edwards bed. the only thing i need to do is make his npc use the blue npc palette but i could have sworn i changed all of Cid's to the blue one.
(the reason why need this is because i swapped Cid's sprite with Golbez (who replaces the mini sprite overworld. the pig, frog and mini do not hold player palettes when used as npc's)