Final Fantasy Hacktics

Brave Story is a long time coming. It's primarily a script update for Final Fantasy Tactics. It uses TLW as it's base, and because I'm a serious procrastinator, I've waited until now to actually get started.

Similar to my other project, Secret of Mana: Relocalized, Brave Story is going to be a re-interpretation of the existing English translations. Both the original and re-release, have huge problems. In most cases, Brave Story will find a compromise between it's original translator's script and Tom Slattery's rewrite.

I'm not going to go super fast. I'll probably drop a script for an event every couple days. The idea is to get feedback and criticism from the community. I'll be upfront though, this script will not be beholden to the nostalgic quirks of the original. Also, this draft is going to be rough.

Also, I want to give a special thanks up front to MostSeriousness who's script dump I shamelessly borrowed from Gamefaqs and Elric for letting me bend the rules of this forum for this post this.


A couple notes:


Again, I'm looking for feedback and criticism. I want to know what people think about my choices. I'm not going to have arguments though. I'm not interested spending more of my free time fighting people over nitpicks than I am working on this mod. I'm not very worried about this. FFHacktics is a great community with excellent people working behind the curtain.

I made a hack for Secret of Mana that overhauls a lot of the equipment, balancing most of the each piece to eliminate redundancies in a variety of ways.

https://www.romhacking.net/forum/index.php?topic=27615.msg368504#msg368504

I made a hack for Secret of Mana. It's primarily a text hack. The goal was to improve upon FuSoYa's script expansion by removing censorship and improving the localization.

For more info and a proper download link go here:

https://www.romhacking.net/forum/index.php?topic=27418.msg368191#msg368191

As some of you know, my current project is implementing a new script for Final Fantasy Tactics. It's based off of an alternate translation that aims fix the wonkiness of the original script without going over the top with faux-Shakespearean dialogue. Basically, I'm trying to clean it up and class it up a bit.

Patch Goals

  1. Implement a new script that improves upon the original without the flagrant overembellishments and errors of War of the Lions.
  2. Update naming conventions to current Final Fantasy standards.
  3. Provide a patch that can be used as a base for other patches.
  4. Avoid change just for the sake of change.

Unfortunately, because I don't know ASM, I'm faced with some limitations regarding naming conventions. I can choose between Vanilla's FRAME.bin & WLDTEX.tm2 or the lengths of names used in War of the Lions. I chose the latter, which means that the game will have current Final Fantasy status effect names but in exchange a couple locations names had to be shortened. For example Murond Holy Place became St. Murond, Bethla Garrison became Fort Bethla, and Bariaus Valley became Bariaus Vale.

The thing I'm struggling with is how to separate the iconic from the nostalgic. Obviously lines like " l i t t l e  m o n e y" have to go and lines like "Blame yourself or God" need to stay but naming conventions make things feel a little trickier. While I guarantee almost everyone prefers Algus to Argath, Rad to Ladd, and Magic to Magicks, there are probably other names that are more contested like Balbanes to Barbaneth, Malak to Marach, Barinten to Barrington, or Aeris to Aerith godsakes. Which is why I'm asking for feedback.

Are there any if WotL naming conventions that you prefer?

Click here for reference:http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Final_Fantasy_Tactics/Translations

One thing I've noticed is there are a lot of Weapon Strike and Oil Fixes. I'm not sure which ones to use. Would anyone care to make a suggestion?

I want to delete hair adornments and create a new type of headgear? Where are the "Item Type" graphics located and how can I edit them?

So, my love affair with WotL has officially ended. The Onion Knight is boring and either utterly worthless, or totally broken. The Dark Knight is broken and nearly inaccessible. The new story battles are uninteresting and easy. The new equipment while nearly impossible to get only serves to further break the game. The sound quality is terrible and the graphical slowdown, until it was corrected by a member this community made the game unplayable. The only features that are worth a damn are the expanded roster size, the cut scenes, and the translation which divides the fan base in half on a love it or hate it basis. Ultimately the good, does not outweigh bad. So, I'm officially reversing my stance, The PSX version is the superior version and I'm sorry it took me so long to come around.

Over the years I've made several patches but I've never actually released any of them. The early ones were either unbalanced or suffered from quality issues and buggy, unpolished, mechanics. The later ones made so many compromises that they were utterly forgettable. Finally, my most recent patch while being excellent in terms of quality and balance suffers from being on the wrong platform and is therefore lagging behind in terms of innovation.

I popped back in here out of boredom the other day and like always, I was blown away at the innovative progress that the community here has created in the time that I've been gone. After wandering into the Completed Projects section, I noticed something, outside of Completed, there isn't a vanilla patch in the child boards anymore.

So I started thinking, "Maybe I that's something I could contribute?" Then naturally, I realized that this patch would have to compete with KO in terms of scope and function as well as add some quantifiable innovation, and then when I remembered a suggestion Toshiko made a long time ago: Use a different script.


My design goals are as follows:

• Implement a new script that updates and improves upon the original, without going over the top, while maintaining much of the original game's more iconic elements.


• Provide a more balanced gameplay experienced.


• Incorporate many of the new innovative gameplay elements introduced by the community such as the Soldier Office Hack, the Synth Shop, and Smart Encounters.

Why am I posting this so early in the development cycle? The short answer is that since I actually want this mod to be played, I need feedback from the community I'm making it for. I'll maintain an updated list of questions in this post comprised of the questions I've asked throughout the life of this thread.


List of Questions for community feedback:

• What do you think are the original game's missed opportunities?


• Out of all of the innovative features created by the community here, which would you like to see implemented?


• What would you like to see changed or eliminated?


• Since Plus and 1.X are taken, what should I name this patch


• How do you feel about the Magic Guns are they worth keeping?

So, I added a character to this event. I just want him to join at the end of the event, he doesn't need to speak or anything. In fact I'm trying to hide him off-camera in the corner of the map. I've done this before in other events but it's not working here for some reason. Can someone lend a second set of eyes to this problem and tell me where I screwed it up?

Object reference not set to an instance of an object. What does this mean?

I started getting this error on my most recent revision of tactext. It doesn't happen on my file from the day before. I've taken it back to that version and started over several times but I can't seem to isolate what is causing this error. I've only changed a handful of things. I've changed two ability descriptions, three job descriptions, four job names, and one ability name. I've tried it on both clean and dirty iso files and I get the problem no matter what. I need some help figuring this out.

I replaced all of my merged all of my guest units with join and/or enemy units to free up space for new jobs. Today I ran into a problem that I expect will be a problem in the future too.

Specificallly. I changed all of the Gafgarion 17's to Gafgarion 11's and they no longer join the party. Now when I bring the new job that occupies job 17 to Dorter Trade City 2, he deliver's Gafgarion's lines instead. If I don't bring them Gafgarion 11 deliver's his lines as he should. I did not change the unit ID's by the way.

How do I fix this?

I thought for sure that someone (possibly fdc) out there made an ASM that allows monsters to use their monster skills innately but I can't find it. Can someone hook me up with a link?

I heard this Arena turns the lights on in the Deep Dungeon. Would you mind sharing the ASM?

I was just wondering how the game converts skill CT to speed? For example Cure has a CT of 4 and a speed of 25 and Cura has a CT of 5 and a speed of 20.

I intend to make the Zombie status cancel dead so that it can be used to raise units from the dead at 0 HP. The problem is that I'm not sure how to get the AI to actually use it correctly? Should I flag cancel status, add status, hp? Any suggestions would be very welcome as my AI knowledge is shite.

Once upon a time someone made an ASM that removed the speed bonus from the ability Scream but I can't find it anymore and search is bringing up nothing for me. Does anyone have this or a link handy?

I just had an idea. Would it be difficult to create a list of events that call the summon angel and summon demon skills/abilities? I'm sure every patch maker wants to use those slots for more abilities. Here's what I'm thinking: What if we moved those effects to different effect slots, or substituted them for the summon ultimate effect? Could we open those ability slots up for use?

There has got to be away to free these slots up.

Tried a search of the above keywords, came up with zilch. Where can I find these buggers on the cd?

I'm not finding it in the ASM threads or with the search function. Did I dream this up?

I made a few title screens. They are nothing spectacular, but I'd like some criticism anyhow. What do people think?

It's my firm belief that creatures without noses should never cover their mouths, the Lancer is no exception. I've always liked the Vanilla Lancer/Dragoon Sprites and loathed their portraits. Back in May, Mobius made a gorgeous Portrait for the male Lancer. Tonight I finally got off my but and made a new portrait for the female. Compared to Mobius's, mine is quick and dirty, but it's probably the best I can do. These should come in handy for anybody not ripping off Jot5.

This is not a request or anything, I was just wondering if anybody has all ready managed to cobble together a working Jump ability that jumps and lands normally, that can be used in a normal skillset? If you have done it, would you mind sharing it?

I was planning on changing Entice to add Charm instead of Invite, relying on Train to recruit monsters. The battle mechanics guide says that Train only works on monsters and not humans. However, I've added several recruitable special monsters to the game, will Train work on them? They occupy job slots 3C-49 and they are not immune to invite.

I know War of the Lions isn't exactly popular around here but I'm sure there are some people here like myself who prefer certain aspects of it. Whether or not you like the translation or not the game is considered a failure by most of our community for several reasons. Throwing in new classes and cameo characters is fine but it does nothing to correct the games most obvious problem: gameplay.

I started this project a few years ago with the goal of expanding gameplay. I completed the patch; abilities, jobs, enemies, items the works, but I realized that this patch was not something that I would probably ever be able to share with anyone seriously. So I through it out, took a break and started fresh. I got pretty far too. At least until Eternal released KO. KO was basically everything my patch was going for: Straight Vanilla gameplay improvement, and there were a lot of similarities too, the only thing was, he did it better. So I threw out my patch again, this time only half completed.

Now, I'm back. I have clear and distinguishing design goals. Some of these probably won't see the light of day for some time.

1. Use the War of the Lions Script from FFT: Complete. This will be implemented at launch.

2. Updating balancing and improving all of the games human jobs. Some of these skillsets are adjusted for both mechanics and flavor. This will be implemented at launch. The Knight's is now much more offensively minded, his stat break skills were removed and given to the squire. The Knight is armed with a few new close range attack skills that focus on battlefield control and action denial, whereas  the squire is oriented more towards melee support and stat debuffing. The Thief also gets a couple new tricks up his sleeve, one of which is Sneak Attack. Sneak Attack is a weapon attack that can cancel out negative status and does 1.5 damage if it does so. Combined with Steal Heart the Thief becomes a real lady killer/man eater, he works really well when paired with an Oracle. Special Characters are not forgotten either. Beowulf gets an entirely new skillset. Based on the Templar from FFTA2 and the Mystic Knight's Spellblade skills from FFV. He pairs Elemental MA based Sword spells with Templar style action denial and MP destruction.

3. Improving and updating all of the games monsters. Each monster family has a design goal. For example: Tortoises are slow moving tanks, melee tanks. They have high HP and PA but low speed and 3 move. They use mantra magic to damage and immobilize foes from range in order to close in on a target so they can do serious damage/disabling. The individual Tortoises have specialized ways of dealing with foes from there. In addition to improving monsters I've expanded them as well. Goblins, Skeletons, Mindflayers, and Ghouls are no longer regular breeding monsters. They are now all special monsters like Byblos and yes they are still recruitable. In their place are Tonberries, Lamias, Tortoises, and Flans.

4. Re-create the WotL FMV sequences, and new cutscenes, using event editing. This will not be implemented at launch.

5. Maintain that Final Fantasy flavor. Spells Like Fire, Fira, Firaga, etc, gil toss, aqua breath, all make/maintain their appearance. A lot of patches and patch makers aren't really interested in this aspect of the game. I am.

6. Special Characters. Thank goodness for the Party Roster Hack, without it I probably wouldn't have bothered to make this hack. Unfortunately because of the amount of portraits and formations sprites adding in 13 monsters takes, I'm only able to add 4 special characters. Two of these are an Onion Knight and a Dark Knight but I'm unsure about the other two. Based on the goals of the patch I almost feel those spots should got to Balthier and Luso. Though I'm not terribly excited about the latter. If I use them, they will get different skillsets than the lame ones they all ready have. If I use Balthier, he will probably be very similar to his Parted Ways counterpart. I've no idea what to do with Luso, I could use the sprite space for something different like a Red Mage, Green Mage, or something that doesn't use up ability slots as I have absolutely none left. I would love some input and direction in this area.

If you are interested in this patch let me know. I'd love to hear from you.

Can I do these things with Event Editing?

1. Recreate the FMV sequences from War of the Lions, using sprites and probably lots of compromises?
2. Create events and battles that start by listening to rumors at the bar?
3. Recreate the Agrias' Birthday sequence(See the spoiler box below for how it works.)?
4. Add new events without deleting old ones?

I want to move the Lucavi Jobs 3C-47 down to the empty and spaces below near the bottom of the Jobs section. Since UWentries doesn't go below 50 I need to make room for monsters that I can link portraits to. Will this cause any problems beyond having to re-sort  the ENTD section?

I'm making a couple new abilities and I'm torn on which effects to use.  Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Warcry: range 0  area 2 allies only add defend.
Piercing Cry: range 0 area 2 enemy only cancel defend/charge.

I'm working on a WotL patch. I'm not really talking about it much right now, as its still a little ways off. If enough people like it, I'll balance it and continue to update it until I'm satisfied.

Right now, I'm at a crossroads. I'm creating new graphics for abilities and I'm unsure of what to cut.  I need as many opinions as possible. I completely changed Beowulf's Job. Instead of being a single target super Oracle he's a combination Templar/Parivir. Now, there is no need for two sets of similar looking abilities. So, one set is going to get cut in order to grow the effects pool.

The Mystic Spells are gorgeous. All of those spirits meld into the graphics quite well. My plans up until today were to keep them, and cut Beowulf's. The problem is they are really slow and bloated. Cutting these would allow me to add big spells like Flood, the Blood Gigas Summon, and unique sword skills for the Dark Knight. This would of course send me back to the drawing board for awhile, and delay patch progress for a week or two.

The Beowulf Spells on the other hand are downright bland in comparison. Some of the spells move too fast and others are lacking. Zombie and Chicken in particular are simple puffs of colored smoke. Cutting these adds room for simple spells and one or two of the smaller sword skills.

What would you do?

It's always annoyed me that Knights can't break accessories and Divine Knights can't break Shields. Would it be possible to change Weapon Break and Hellcry Punch to break Weapons & Shields, to change Shield Break into Accessory Break, and to merge Steal Weapon and Shield? I know when you use it on a two-weapon user it breaks one of the two weapons, so it seems doable. The only thing that makes me think its impossible would be the fact that the ability slots are hard-coded to the item type.

Would someone please do this for me? This would allow for more complete sets for Meliadoul, the Knight, and a much needed more diversified skillset for the thief, all without using up precious ability slots.

Can you have more than 9 sprites on a map if they aren't all on the map at the same time. I want to add an ally to the Monastery Vaults 2nd Floor, since Izlude leaves before the battle begins, can I add a guest unit to the fight? Or is it possible to reduce the amount of units a player is allowed to bring to a fight?

How can I tell if a sprite is type 1 or type 2? I'm using the PSP Onion Knights, Female Dark Knight, and a variant of the Aliste Sprite. Does anybody know what their types are?