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chillyfeez

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Re: Chillyfeez's Mods, hacks, research notes, etc.
« Reply #75 on: February 26, 2015, 04:54:29 PM »
I am indeed, digitsie.
It's slow going, because I'm easily distracted with side-hacking ventures, but I am very close to finishing the next chapter. Once that's set, I plan to start a thread on RHDN to try to get some feedback.

I have the basic plotline planned out, as well as a bunch (but not all) of fine details.
The limit system has evolved quite a bit since my first demo. It now works much like that of ffviii. I've also built in a chocobo catching sidequest - the chocobo forests are gone and you now encounter them randomly in the field - which will be part of the larger sidequest to get Mog.

The next chapter has also taken extra time because it involves the first "epic choice" (as I've come to call them). At one point, you have to make a decision to do one thing or another, and the subsequent events play out differently (including who joins your party and which boss(es) you fight) depending on that choice.

So, yeah, still working on it, but there's a lot to do and I'm taking my time.
I want it, above all, to be something that people play and while it will be recognizable as a sequel and something that is built off of the original, still definitely a fully unique and rewarding experience.
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Digitsie

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Re: Chillyfeez's Mods, hacks, research notes, etc.
« Reply #76 on: February 26, 2015, 05:06:07 PM »
Does it also take in account 'The After Years' or is it some sort of alternative universe?
I'm kinda really curious about this, I admit, to see what the plot/script itself is like.
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chillyfeez

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Re: Chillyfeez's Mods, hacks, research notes, etc.
« Reply #77 on: February 26, 2015, 05:33:54 PM »
It does take TAY into account.
Admittedly, I started dreaming up the plot before I knew TAY existed, so some changes had to be made here and there.
Some characters will be there - Ceodore and Ursula are both main party characters. Some are gone completely with no real rexplanation I've thought of - the Eblan Five are nonentities, as will be I think the little girl maenad Rydia adopts in the end of TAY. Some will be there but not playable, like Edward's girlfriend (you know... Whatsername). Some will be gone, but for reasons that are fully explained, like Leonora (sorry... Spoilers, dearie).

Also, I started really working on this after I learned the basic plot of TAY but before I had seen the ending, so as it stands there are references to the crystals having shattered, as though they never came back. So now that I know they did come back, I guess I have to rework it so that they are back but no longer have their power. That Cid had been drawing on the power of the wind crystal to make the airships go is kind of an immutable plot point, as is the loss of the power of the fire crystal for the Damcyan hovercraft.

Have you played the original demo yet? It'll take less than an hour of your time, and if you play through, you will get to a sort-of developer's room that will divulge a lot of plot details if you want them.
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avalanche

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Re: Chillyfeez's Mods, hacks, research notes, etc.
« Reply #78 on: February 26, 2015, 05:42:47 PM »
Quote from: chillyfeez on February 26, 2015, 03:08:32 PM
the first thing I noticed was one of those routines that stores the value into RAM and does a whole lot of ROL-ing... So I have that kind of headache to look forward to  :childish:

Are they bank 3 routines?  I have some thoughts what a few of those do in that bank.  For example, one that uses ROLs, 03:8407 I think is a 16-bit division, which produces a 16-bit integer division result and possibly a modulo or remainder.
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Digitsie

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Re: Chillyfeez's Mods, hacks, research notes, etc.
« Reply #79 on: February 26, 2015, 05:49:39 PM »
Quote from: chillyfeez on February 26, 2015, 05:33:54 PM
It does take TAY into account.
Admittedly, I started dreaming up the plot before I knew TAY existed, so some changes had to be made here and there.
Some characters will be there - Ceodore and Ursula are both main party characters. Some are gone completely with no real rexplanation I've thought of - the Eblan Five are nonentities, as will be I think the little girl maenad Rydia adopts in the end of TAY. Some will be there but not playable, like Edward's girlfriend (you know... Whatsername). Some will be gone, but for reasons that are fully explained, like Leonora (sorry... Spoilers, dearie).

Also, I started really working on this after I learned the basic plot of TAY but before I had seen the ending, so as it stands there are references to the crystals having shattered, as though they never came back. So now that I know they did come back, I guess I have to rework it so that they are back but no longer have their power. That Cid had been drawing on the power of the wind crystal to make the airships go is kind of an immutable plot point, as is the loss of the power of the fire crystal for the Damcyan hovercraft.

Have you played the original demo yet? It'll take less than an hour of your time, and if you play through, you will get to a sort-of developer's room that will divulge a lot of plot details if you want them.

I can think of ways to explain the Eblana ninjas (i.e. they went off to spy on other villages, and if you make NPCs in other villages, there's your 'shhhhh, busy'. Unless Edge's in the party, in which case...

Curore, I think, would have gone off to explore the world on her own or taken over as summoner of Mist or something.

And no, I got stuck around Agast with four keys. What did I miss?
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chillyfeez

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Re: Chillyfeez's Mods, hacks, research notes, etc.
« Reply #80 on: February 26, 2015, 07:12:02 PM »
If you got all four keys, then you can open the door to the well in Agart, but you have to use them in the right order.

The names of the keys are a reference to FFVIII. Specifically, the sorceress's theme music, "Liberi Fatali."
The phrase that is repeated constantly in the song is "Fithos Lusec Wecos Vinosec." So, there you have it.

I clearly thought that was more well known than it actually is because you're not the first person to tell me they got stuck there.

No, Edge is not a playable character, so that wouldn't be an issue. I may include various nods to the Eblan Four, but they'll never really be in the spotlight.
Cuore is a bit more of a problem... Rydia HAS to be the last of the summoners. It is among the most essential plot points.
Maybe Cuore lost her power or something... I guess I can't just ignore it completely. I'll figure it out once the game gets up to the point where the player travels to Mist (which is part of the next chapter, so sooner rather than later).
« Last Edit: February 26, 2015, 07:17:50 PM by chillyfeez »
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chillyfeez

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Re: Chillyfeez's Mods, hacks, research notes, etc.
« Reply #81 on: February 26, 2015, 07:28:00 PM »
Quote from: avalanche on February 26, 2015, 05:42:47 PM
Quote from: chillyfeez on February 26, 2015, 03:08:32 PM
the first thing I noticed was one of those routines that stores the value into RAM and does a whole lot of ROL-ing... So I have that kind of headache to look forward to  :childish:

Are they bank 3 routines?  I have some thoughts what a few of those do in that bank.  For example, one that uses ROLs, 03:8407 I think is a 16-bit division, which produces a 16-bit integer division result and possibly a modulo or remainder.

I (on some level) figured that the ROLs had something to do with generating the proper integers. I think what I have to do is take care of everything else first, then just spend a bunch of time studying the inputs and outputs of these routines to see how they can be manipulated to serve my needs. If you're keeping an eye turned in this direction, avalanche, I may bend your ear when I get to that point, since you seem to know more about this kind of thing than I.

The good news here - it's actually quite easy to make the game display five digits. Only requires changing three bytes in ROM that essentially were there to set the upper limit to four digits. It's almost as if their original plan was to use five digits but then was scrapped - most likely because other workings of the game made 99,999 impossible and/or impractical.
So anyway, I've got that part taken care of, and I was originally pretty worried about that.

I know the info about how to change the actual damage limit is out there somewhere, so that'll be next (as I recall, it needs to be changed for several different routines... One for fight, one for magic, etc, but just taking care of one should be enough for the testing phase of this project).

Probably won't get to work on that too much more today, but this is coming along better than I expected so far!
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Digitsie

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Re: Chillyfeez's Mods, hacks, research notes, etc.
« Reply #82 on: February 26, 2015, 07:48:30 PM »
Quote from: chillyfeez on February 26, 2015, 07:12:02 PM
The names of the keys are a reference to FFVIII. Specifically, the sorceress's theme music, "Liberi Fatali."
The phrase that is repeated constantly in the song is "Fithos Lusec Wecos Vinosec." So, there you have it.

I clearly thought that was more well known than it actually is because you're not the first person to tell me they got stuck there.

Considering I'm deaf, no, the music means less than nothing to me.

I'd consider setting up an NPC that sings Liberi Fatali with that phrase.

Quote
No, Edge is not a playable character, so that wouldn't be an issue. I may include various nods to the Eblan Four, but they'll never really be in the spotlight.

That's fine, though the oldest one probably should be dead - just say 'I took over for Grandpa (name), when he died.'

Quote
Cuore is a bit more of a problem... Rydia HAS to be the last of the summoners. It is among the most essential plot points.
Maybe Cuore lost her power or something... I guess I can't just ignore it completely. I'll figure it out once the game gets up to the point where the player travels to Mist (which is part of the next chapter, so sooner rather than later).

Easy answer - a Maenad isn't a summoner - they had to basically 'steal' Rydia's Eidolons. With Rydia in full control of her summons and probably holding on to it, Curore can't access it unless Rydia wills it... and she probably didn't will it for -some- reason that might be useful to your story.

See (from the After Years wikia):
'The Maenads are powerful sorceresses able to teleport, use telekinesis, cast high-level Black Magic including Meteor, and summon Eidolons. Their capacity to summon Eidolons consists of petrifying their material forms and corrupting the Eidolon's mind, but Fusoya says this is not simply petrification, but a casting of the Eidolon's spirit into another dimension. This process can be disrupted by evoking an emotional response from the Eidolon. When this "awakening" occurs the Maenads lose the ability to summon that Eidolon. '

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Grimoire LD

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Re: Chillyfeez's Mods, hacks, research notes, etc.
« Reply #83 on: February 26, 2015, 08:07:43 PM »
Quote from: chillyfeez on February 26, 2015, 03:08:32 PM
If I can get it to work, my plan would be to use it conditionally upon certain late-inning equipment... Either "ultimate weapons" or maybe a "break damage limit" relic. The limit would still be only around 16,000 anyway, because the top two bits of the upper "damage" byte represent healing and MP, so you're limited to what can be expressed in 14 bits. So you still wouldn't be able to one-shot monsters with 65,000 HP.

Anyway, the big thing is to get it to work at all first, and I think the biggest part of that for me will be figuring out how exactly the game converts the hex values into decimal, because I really am clueless about that, and the first thing I noticed was one of those routines that stores the value into RAM and does a whole lot of ROL-ing... So I have that kind of headache to look forward to  :childish:

I sort of forgot about that. Yes, that seems the preferable way to go about it. I'm looking forward to the results then.
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chillyfeez

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Re: Chillyfeez's Mods, hacks, research notes, etc.
« Reply #84 on: February 26, 2015, 08:25:23 PM »
Ah, yes, that certainly would have kept you from ever having known how to use those keys... Sorry bout that 
:blush:
I was just thinking that same thing about having an NPC sing the song. I think the next demo release will have a training room accessible from the Eblan Barracks, anyway, so that would be a good place for that. The other option would be to rename the keys to something that would be obvious to anyone who's played FFIV, which would probably be a better idea, except I can't think of anything that would specify a particular order. I am open to suggestions on this front.

That settles the maenad problem, too, though I can't have Cuore joining the party either, so I'll have to say she and Rydia decided not to develop her magical abilities at all... Perhaps for her own safety or something.
« Last Edit: February 26, 2015, 11:28:50 PM by chillyfeez »
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Digitsie

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Re: Chillyfeez's Mods, hacks, research notes, etc.
« Reply #85 on: February 27, 2015, 12:53:29 AM »
Well these keys then:
Eenie
Meenie
Miney
Moe.

And given the context that Curore would be what, about 45? Just have her focus on magic because if she tries to control creatures, she takes away Rydia's connection to the Eidolons, and she wouldn't want to do that to her 'mother', so to speak. She could stand guard somewhere, using her magic to protect something until Rydia asks her to let the party in, and then... she opens it up, lets them in, then stands guard against... whatever it is. sorta like what Fu So Ya did on the moon.
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chillyfeez

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Re: Chillyfeez's Mods, hacks, research notes, etc.
« Reply #86 on: February 27, 2015, 07:53:19 AM »
It's 40 years after the original ffiv, so ~20 years after The After Years. Cuore would be around 25.
I'm leaning towards the idea that she didn't develop her magical abilities at all. Like maybe she's sort of the mayor of Mist, but entirely because of administrative prowess and not magical ability. After all, Rydia is the last summoner (and by the way, having spent lots of time in the Feymarch, she's very old - she is quite notably the Tellah of this game). Mist will need a new identity for itself beyond being the haven of summoners.
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avalanche

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Re: Chillyfeez's Mods, hacks, research notes, etc.
« Reply #87 on: February 27, 2015, 09:09:55 AM »
Ah, the ROLler you are talking about is 02:852B which oddly enough is the same division routine I mentioned from bank 3, but for some reason coded slightly differently.  In any case, it divides and produces an integer division in $2A and remainder/modulo in $2C.  The former is used as the next digit, while the latter is used for calculating the next digit on the way down.  Interestingly that does indeed work for 5 digits.

I would bet that the routine at 02:86BF is probably used for any decimal conversion for display, at least in battle, including the party battle window HPs, and perhaps the monster HP in a Peep result, which actually needs 5 digits.

I tried setting the damage to 12345 and while this routine did calculate 5 digits properly, only 2345 displayed in bouncy numbers, thus whatever 3 changed bytes you mentioned must be needed to setup the bouncy sprites.  You're already past this part, but I was curious how they performed the decimal conversion, so I popped in to take a look.
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chillyfeez

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Re: Chillyfeez's Mods, hacks, research notes, etc.
« Reply #88 on: February 27, 2015, 09:11:39 AM »
Hmm... it seems I've missed something.
five-digit display works fine for one monster, but for multiple monsters (and presumably party members) I get results like this:


The damage readouts should say "12345," "67890," "54321" and, "98760."
Only the first one shows up correctly (the top imp, with 12345). Looking at the data just before it's loaded for visual processing, I can see (inasmuch as I understand everything) that, for certain pieces of data, it's still assuming that it's counting four digits per target. So hopefully it's just a matter of finding those instances of multiplication and changing them to five instead... which will in fact require some extra code, since x4 is only two bytes (ASL A, ASL A) and x5 is at least seven bytes (STA [dp##], ASL A, ASL A, CLC, ADC [dp##]).
 :bah:

Oh well, I'll get there eventually, it's just gonna take some time...
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chillyfeez

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Re: Chillyfeez's Mods, hacks, research notes, etc.
« Reply #89 on: February 27, 2015, 09:13:44 AM »
Quote from: avalanche on February 27, 2015, 09:09:55 AM
Ah, the ROLler you are talking about is 02:852B which oddly enough is the same division routine I mentioned from bank 3, but for some reason coded slightly differently.  In any case, it divides and produces an integer division in $2A and remainder/modulo in $2C.  The former is used as the next digit, while the latter is used for calculating the next digit on the way down.  Interestingly that does indeed work for 5 digits.

I would bet that the routine at 02:86BF is probably used for any decimal conversion for display, at least in battle, including the party battle window HPs, and perhaps the monster HP in a Peep result, which actually needs 5 digits.

I tried setting the damage to 12345 and while this routine did calculate 5 digits properly, only 2345 displayed in bouncy numbers, thus whatever 3 changed bytes you mentioned must be needed to setup the bouncy sprites.  You're already past this part, but I was curious how they performed the decimal conversion, so I popped in to take a look.

Well that's good to know... so assuming I can get the bouncy number display routine to properly  display for multiple monsters - and of course re-set the damage limits - the decimal conversion shouldn't be an issue?
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