Author
|
Topic: Hacking Utilities... (Read 2 times)
|
Bongo`
Guest
|
 |
« on: July 28, 2008, 04:46:54 pm » |
|
I was wondering...What utilities ( if any ) would be useful at this point in time?
I think Tile and Hex editors are pretty much covered. Dumpers and Inserters as well. Hmm, any ideas?
|
|
|
|
|
Gil Galad
Guest
|
|
« Reply #1 on: July 28, 2008, 05:17:35 pm » |
|
I was wondering...What utilities ( if any ) would be useful at this point in time?
I think Tile and Hex editors are pretty much covered. Dumpers and Inserters as well. Hmm, any ideas?
A Atlas output compatible script dumper. That is my suggestion. |
|
|
|
|
Bongo`
Guest
|
|
« Reply #2 on: July 28, 2008, 07:19:24 pm » |
|
I was wondering...What utilities ( if any ) would be useful at this point in time?
I think Tile and Hex editors are pretty much covered. Dumpers and Inserters as well. Hmm, any ideas?
A Atlas output compatible script dumper. That is my suggestion. Yeah I guess that would be quite useful. I would have to study Atlas and stuff. I never really used it. I always coded my own inserters that used a form of scripting. I assume that is the way Atlas works.  \ |
|
|
|
|
Gil Galad
Guest
|
|
« Reply #3 on: July 28, 2008, 07:58:28 pm » |
|
Yeah I guess that would be quite useful. I would have to study Atlas and stuff. I never really used it. I always coded my own inserters that used a form of scripting. I assume that is the way Atlas works. \ Atlas seems to work well for a lot of people. I've started using it myself, since it's capable of inserting scripts in games other than SNES now days. I have used it a couple of times without pointer support in the past. Atlas takes some getting used to, once you do it seems to be able to handle a lot of games. Not to mention the fact that I'm not a HLL programmer, so Atlas is a good option for me. |
|
|
|
|
KaioShin
Guest
|
|
« Reply #4 on: July 29, 2008, 02:51:08 am » |
|
RedComet is already working on exactly that, a Script Dumper made specifically to create Atlas compatible script files (and to replace romsuckjuice).
As for hacking tools I'd like to see, there is one thing. Something like Feidian with a live preview, so that you can play around with the different values and get instant feedback if you're getting better or doing worse with the image. Of course this means having a full GUI and not just a command line tool. It's true that there are a ton of tile editors out there, but most are just not flexible enough.
|
|
|
|
|
Nightcrawler
Guest
|
|
« Reply #5 on: July 29, 2008, 10:01:15 am » |
|
I was wondering...What utilities ( if any ) would be useful at this point in time?
I think Tile and Hex editors are pretty much covered. Dumpers and Inserters as well. Hmm, any ideas?
I would have to disagree. This topic seems to imply hex editors still aren't there... http://www.romhacking.net/forum/index.php/topic,6563.0.htmlAs for tile editors. Well, they're still pretty lousy for doing font editing for example where you'd need FEIDIAN, nor can any edit Mode 7 graphics for example number two. I'm sure I could list quite a few others if I get into it. What tile editors do we have? Tile Layer Pro, yychar, and Tile Molester? They all leave some to be desired. We still don't have really good tools in any area! We have enough to get buy with workarounds, shortcomings, limitations, and obstacles. I typically don't complain because I'm not willing to do a better job myself, but I would certainly say there is a need for better tools in all areas. With said, what would be MOST useful? I agree with what was already mentioned. 1. Flexible Atlas like script dumper. (Hopefully without the learning curve.) 2. GUI based FEIDIAN replacement with real time preview such as Kaioshin suggested. After that we could use better hex and tile editors and some more specific tools covering less common things. Also, while Atlas is by far the most flexible insertion tool we have, it also leaves some to be desired. I've also always envisioned a similar tool with a GUI for ease of use to do such things as automatically stick in the commands based on setup, select file/s via GUI, and more. P.S. We need a decent up to date SNES debugger as well. We're trapped in a time warp currently as there is no debugger for any current SNES emulator. |
|
|
|
|
Dragonsbrethren
Guest
|
|
« Reply #6 on: July 30, 2008, 08:03:09 am » |
|
As for tile editors. Well, they're still pretty lousy for doing font editing for example where you'd need FEIDIAN, nor can any edit Mode 7 graphics for example number two. I'm sure I could list quite a few others if I get into it. What tile editors do we have? Tile Layer Pro, yychar, and Tile Molester? They all leave some to be desired.
...
2. GUI based FEIDIAN replacement with real time preview such as Kaioshin suggested. Personally I'd be really happy with a YY-CHR clone that supported displaying and going to a specific offset, had an improved color replace interface, supported any tile height and width, and supported SNES 3BPP graphics. Loading custom tile display definitions and formats from external files would also be a major improvement. It has the nicest interface and the most tile display options of any tile editor I've used, I'd much rather work in it that export to bitmap and deal with reimporting, the only time I'd use a feature like that is for large graphics such as titlescreens. |
|
|
|
|
Spikeman
Guest
|
|
« Reply #7 on: July 30, 2008, 11:06:25 pm » |
|
I second/third a rewrite of FEIDIAN. It's so unclear how it works with higher bitplane fonts that I've always resorted to coding my own utilities instead.
|
|
|
|
|
Kagemusha
Guest
|
|
« Reply #8 on: August 01, 2008, 09:40:42 am » |
|
I wouldn't mind a simple script inserter. I don't know how to use Atlas and I don't feel like learning how to use it. I only work on simple NES games and I don't need anything complicated. I'd prefer something that has a basic frontline and all the options a inserter needs.
|
|
|
|
|
Lindblum
Guest
|
|
« Reply #9 on: August 07, 2008, 03:42:31 pm » |
|
 What exactly *is* script insertion, and what do these programs offer to help me with it. I'm working on a translation, but I have to update pointers for every change I make to the text. I'm just guessing that's what script inserters are to help with.
|
|
|
|
|
Bongo`
Guest
|
|
« Reply #10 on: August 07, 2008, 09:28:19 pm » |
|
I was wondering...What utilities ( if any ) would be useful at this point in time?
I think Tile and Hex editors are pretty much covered. Dumpers and Inserters as well. Hmm, any ideas?
We still don't have really good tools in any area! We have enough to get buy with workarounds, shortcomings, limitations, and obstacles. I typically don't complain because I'm not willing to do a better job myself, but I would certainly say there is a need for better tools in all areas. Crap! I was gonna suggest you write something. I was sure of all the hackers you were the one who has enough experience in both hacking and programming to give us agreat utility.  |
|
|
|
|
RedComet
Guest
|
|
« Reply #11 on: August 08, 2008, 11:39:40 am » |
|
What exactly *is* script insertion, and what do these programs offer to help me with it. I'm working on a translation, but I have to update pointers for every change I make to the text. I'm just guessing that's what script inserters are to help with. The script inserter does just what it says. You supply it with a script (usually a text file), a table file and an address to insert the script at and it will encode the script using the table provided and place it at the address specified. Some of the more sophisticated inserters like Atlas even allow you to embed commands in your scripts to handle pointer recalculations for the new text.  |
|
|
|
|
Lindblum
Guest
|
|
« Reply #12 on: August 08, 2008, 12:40:36 pm » |
|
Atlas is probably what I should be using for my FF7 translation project. I'll see if I can port my project over to Atlas, but I'm probably just going to ride this one out my own way since I've come this far. BTW, my ROM's text uses both 1-byte characters and 2-byte characters. Can Atlas handle this?
|
|
|
|
|
Kitsune Sniper
Guest
|
|
« Reply #13 on: August 08, 2008, 12:50:57 pm » |
|
Yes, yes it can. Several translations I've done used one and two bytes per character / word. A few used more.
As long as it fits in the Thingy "standard", it can be used in Atlas.
|
|
|
|
|
Lindblum
Guest
|
|
« Reply #14 on: August 08, 2008, 01:33:10 pm » |
|
There are things I'm having trouble finding in the basic TBL documentation. Yes I can do:
40=@
I want to do something like:
B0A1=å·´
Which requires Unicode characters...
|
|
|
|
|
|
RHDN Forum Archive
