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Can I increase the number of sprites and formation images in the BIN files?

Started by cadence, May 12, 2019, 04:09:26 pm

cadence

Hi! This is my first post here. Sorry if this is a basic question; I couldn't find a straightforward answer after a couple days of digging.

I've read the tutorials I could find on Shishi and FFTEVGRP. The tutorials address *replacing existing formation images*, but I couldn't find any indication of whether adding entirely new formation images and spritesheets is possible without overwriting existing content. I can't tell whether this is as simple as expanding the ISO and following a couple steps in an existing GUI tool or whether it would require significant/impractical manual restructuring of files. I'd appreciate being pointed in the right direction. Thank you!
  • Modding version: PSX
  • Discord username: cadence#6190

Nyzer

I'm very confident that there are no tools capable of this.

That said, FFTEVGRP is no longer needed for the Formation sprites & portraits; Shishi has been updated to be able to handle that itself.
  • Modding version: Other/Unknown

cadence

OK, thanks for letting me know! Shishi's wiki page should probably be updated to reflect that but I don't know if I'm the person to do it.

Followup question, if that's alright: can formation and spritesheet slots originally intended for monsters be repurposed for fitting more generic units? My guess was no due to size and structure differences, but it's difficult for me to test currently without PC access.
  • Modding version: PSX
  • Discord username: cadence#6190

Xifanie

More generic units? Choto made a hack to use the Bard's female slot and the Dancer's male slot to create a new properly functioning job, but that's all that can be added. There are so many routines that call for unit data that would need to be altered to add new generic jobs that I don't think we could realistically expect a working hack in anything shorter than hundreds of man-hours from someone better at ASM hacking than FFH ever had.
  • Modding version: PSX
Love what you're seeing? https://supportus.ffhacktics.com/ 💜 it's really appreciated

Anything is possible as long as it is within the hardware's limits. (ie. disc space, RAM, Video RAM, processor, etc.)
<R999> My target market is not FFT mod players
<Raijinili> remember that? it was awful


cadence

Well, I've gathered from the fact that RAD exists (even in a buggy form) that more jobs are possible within a specific set of restrictions (shared JP/JL/Learned bools are the ones I know about)--I'm just trying to figure out to what extent spritesheets and formation graphics are among them. But if I'm off-base about all that it would be good to know!
  • Modding version: PSX
  • Discord username: cadence#6190

Xifanie

RAD is more of a fun "let's break the game" hack rather than a functional one for a normal gameplay. It would require heavily modifications to work on real hardware and actually be useable in a serious mod. UNIT.BIN still has a bunch of unused human sprites you can use for special characters at least. Converting human to/from monster sprites would be possible, but I wouldn't try that unless you really needed extra monster/human sprites in formation.
  • Modding version: PSX
Love what you're seeing? https://supportus.ffhacktics.com/ 💜 it's really appreciated

Anything is possible as long as it is within the hardware's limits. (ie. disc space, RAM, Video RAM, processor, etc.)
<R999> My target market is not FFT mod players
<Raijinili> remember that? it was awful

cadence

I can live with making something that's emulator-only, but if you can expand on what you mean by a "serious mod" (or link to something already written about it) I'd appreciate it. I'm new to FFH but have a programming background so more specificity is helpful to me if you have time.
  • Modding version: PSX
  • Discord username: cadence#6190

Nyzer

A mod meant to be played like a finished product, as if the modder actually tried to develop a balanced gaming experience, rather than essentially debug or god mode or whatever.

For example, a mod that turns Ramza into an innately dual wielding Orlandu with permanent Haste and Regen would hardly be serious. Nor would a mod in which all the formation sprites are incorrect.
  • Modding version: Other/Unknown

cadence

Right, but I want to know how that applies in this context. Are you saying that incorrect formation sprites are the reason it's not serious, or am I misunderstanding? Because that's the reason I'm trying to figure out what my options are for using the formation sprite space available to me. Calling RAD not serious seemed to imply a more fatal design flaw than e.g. cutting out some monsters or making sprites gender-neutral.
  • Modding version: PSX
  • Discord username: cadence#6190

Nyzer

It isn't used for serious projects because, based on the talk about it (as I've never used it myself) it doesn't actually fully set up separate, functional jobs.

It would be like modding in a new Skyrim dungeon but making said dungeon look like it was ripped right out of Minecraft. It "works". But it doesn't look serious, and won't be taken seriously by players.

I don't know if it's possible to work around this by (for example) slashing different male/female jobs and linking, say, the female Monk skillset/stats/etc to special jobs in order to establish a female-specific equivalent for Monk, but offhand I'd guess not.

No, the issue isn't just the formation sprites, it's the fact that you asked about expanding the generic job wheel as well. RAD broke the game in a way that seemed to allow FFH to start the foundations of properly expanding the job wheel, but it was never able to advance beyond being a buggy debug menu sort of thing at best.
  • Modding version: Other/Unknown

cadence

Not sure what "talk about it" you're basing that on; I haven't been able to find anything concrete from rereading the thread, searching the forum and wiki, etc. I was asking for specifics earlier because this reply doesn't help me understand the problem.

Like I mentioned, I'm aware that RAD's "extra" jobs aren't fully separate and need to share JP, job levels and learned ability flags; those aren't major issues for my usage case. I'm also aware that some UI (listing which jobs can use a piece of equipment, finding the new jobs on the battle status screen, maybe others I don't know about) don't automatically update to reflect the new jobs, but those don't seem like hundred hour problems (but I could be wrong!). If RAD breaks the game in more fundamental ways that are impractical to fix, then that's the sort of thing that would be good to know upfront.
  • Modding version: PSX
  • Discord username: cadence#6190

Xifanie

Well, hopefully someone who tried the hack can tell you how stable/unstable it is, or you can just test it out thoroughly yourself.

Though I'm confused why you would care about formation sprites when using a hack like that. Regardless, the best you could manage, comparing to vanilla, is about 5 extra special human jobs and 2 monsters, IIRC. Going by the number of unused formation sprites, that is. It's not possible to expand the file because the PSX has very limited VRAM; there would be nowhere to load the extra sprites unless you did something major like cutting the world map's resolution in half.
  • Modding version: PSX
Love what you're seeing? https://supportus.ffhacktics.com/ 💜 it's really appreciated

Anything is possible as long as it is within the hardware's limits. (ie. disc space, RAM, Video RAM, processor, etc.)
<R999> My target market is not FFT mod players
<Raijinili> remember that? it was awful

cadence

That's helpful to know, thanks!

The reason I care about formation sprites is that I'd like any new jobs to, well, have them... so I was trying to figure out to what extent I would need to remove other content to make that happen. Hopefully I'm not misunderstanding something fundamental there.

I guess I'll mark this as resolved and report back somewhere if I ever get far enough with RAD to have findings worth talking about. I know I'm not the first or most experienced person to try, but it can't hurt, hey.
  • Modding version: PSX
  • Discord username: cadence#6190