Messages

1

Game Modification Station / Re: FF6 Improvement Project

« on: March 08, 2013, 09:06:31 PM »

ok, Novalia's added to the patch documentation to address this.  the patch itself is unchanged, indicating he's confident it works.

i can't think of any other patches in the Improvement Project that edit Maranda's interior map (nor Jidoor's, as previously stated).  if one interprets the Readme warning verbatim, simply modifying the ROM with a map editor is enough to possibly cause clashes, even if it's a different map you're editing.

Hmm. That's good to know, and your previous post indicating changes made by map editors adding kilobytes to a patch size would explain why my patch size was way bigger than it should have been several versions ago. I did make a couple of map changes using FF6LE (not in Jidoor or Maranda, but it sounds like that doesn't matter), so if that's what is causing the conflict, then I owe Novalia Spirit an apology. And I won't be able to use  that patch, because I want to keep the changes I've made. Although it might be worthwhile to look into getting those changes made manually, though, if the map editors are that destructive.

So is 1.07 safe to use currently or should I hold out for your next release?

1.07 is fine; I was playtesting to evaluate the extra patches that have been put out since the last time I checked, for the next version.

2

Game Modification Station / Re: FF6 Improvement Project

« on: March 06, 2013, 02:26:09 PM »

More evidence that playtesting is always worthwhile.

Novalia Spirit's "The Sealed Door Fix v1.0" for a door in Jidoor is instead breaking the interior maps of Jidoor in a spectacular way. I noticed that his Fridgia Nova site is offline atm, so hopefully he can fix both the site and this issue. Never mind, it's loading now.

I'm making a note of this on the first page.

3

Game Modification Station / Re: FF6 Improvement Project

« on: March 04, 2013, 01:11:10 PM »

Also, the translation appears to have some rough edges I hadn't caught since my last revision - I'm fixing those as I find them.

I hate finding text bugs. Usually right after I've submitted a new version, too. I guess it's just Murphy's Law...

It has to be. There were a couple of blatant misspellings, and some text that ran on into a new page that hadn't looked like it would. That's the kind of thing I tend to catch right away, so I'm not sure what happened there.

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Game Modification Station / Re: FF6 Improvement Project

« on: March 04, 2013, 01:07:06 PM »

In the readme, where you list my website, you list my old angelfire page, which hasn't been updated in 7 years. It would be much better to give my current address: http://drakkhen.jalchavware.com

I will do that, Drakkhen. Thanks for the clarification - I had been to your newer site, but hadn't noticed the different URL. The next version will have the proper address.

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Game Modification Station / Re: FF6 Improvement Project

« on: February 27, 2013, 12:31:18 PM »

From playtesting, what I can see is that the Ready Stance patch is not fundamentally different from the Speed-Up patch - the gauge fills faster than before in both patches. What is different is that as you choose higher number techniques, the wait time between choice and execution is longer. So there won't be as noticeable difference to players as I was expecting.

Also, the translation appears to have some rough edges I hadn't caught since my last revision - I'm fixing those as I find them.

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Game Modification Station / Re: FF6 Improvement Project

« on: February 23, 2013, 09:41:02 PM »

Hmm...the folder of optional but awesome patches is a good idea. There are a couple of other patches I could think of that I would like to endorse as a quality addition to the improvement mod. I'll get the list together and ask the authors for permission, and as long as they're OK with it I'll pack them together in the archive.

Thanks for pointing that event out, Leno! Is there a "basics" thread or other doc for event editing? I'm more than willing to do the research, but I'm not sure where to start looking where the events are concerned.

I'll get the SwordTech Ready Stance patch included in place of the speed-up tweak and start testing it right away.

Thanks for all the feedback and advice!

7

Game Modification Station / Re: FF6 Improvement Project

« on: February 23, 2013, 01:44:02 PM »

Hatzen just added about 3-4 more patches since then

I know, and most of them are really interesting!

Have Mog choose a dance, he does one attack from the dance routine and then goes back to being controllable? 
Make Umaro so you can equip anything on him and still have him be able to perform all his random attacks?
Reset Terra's Morph gauge to full at the end of every battle? Double magic damage done to her as an attempt to balance it out?

All of those are AWESOME ideas! But on the flipside, they're treading that line where I feel the original intent would not be preserved, and that's one of the key principles I'm trying to stick to with this mod. The SwordTech Ready stance I'm willing to use, though, since he preserves the charge time for each attack and just allows you to choose the technique when you choose the command. Doing it this way lets you work with other characters while Cyan builds up to his technique. This makes Cyan a more desirable choice, and is a change in design I'm willing to put up with. I think it's obvious I feel SwdTech is lacking, since I put in the speed-up tweak to begin with.

Speaking of the SwordTech Ready patch, HatZen sent me an alternative version where he uses some of that big area of free space in the C2 bank instead of blanking out the Retort code! There's good and bad news with this. The bad news is that, using mblock's Patch Conflict Finder, I saw that he put the majority of his 27 bytes of new code right in the same spot as Imzo's Color Coded MP patch.

The good news is that he sent his hex changes along with the patch, and using those I was able to move it to a different spot in the same area of free space that isn't being used by any of the 109 other patches I'm using. I've asked him to vet my changes, but I'm pretty sure it will work as is. So I'll be testing that soon!

That does bring up a question though: Which patch would people like to see more: the speed-up patch, or the Ready Stance patch? I'm curious as to which patch people think improves SwordTech more appropriately, or conveniently.

One tiny update: so far it looks like the extra bugfixes by assassin, Lenophis and Novalia Spirit are co-existing nicely with everything else on my test ROM, so I may be putting out another version soon!

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Game Modification Station / Re: FF6 Improvement Project

« on: February 23, 2013, 01:43:05 PM »

Also, I wasn't able to find anything on Twitch, but it'd be really cool to see!

Whoops, forgot to link it.

That's a cool idea, and the comments are very helpful! For instance, on part 2 with the lady in Vector who tests your loyalty - I agree that the attack if you say no should be a pincer attack. I could probably create an enemy formation that has two guards that can pincer, but there are two things about that:

1) I'm not sure which (supposedly) empty formations are safe to use - this isn't too big a hurdle, but
2) I'm not at all familiar with event editing, and I don't have the slightest idea how to find that event, much less make it call the enemy formation I could set up.

I wouldn't mind getting into event editing; there are a few event bugs that still need to be fixed, such as -

* White Drgn misplaces the room camera
* Phoenix chest in the Phoenix Cave closes again after you leave, even though it stays empty
* Music volume when you first enter the Opera House is louder than it should be

I'll take a look around and see if there's any information on how event editing works - but I admit I wouldn't be put out if someone were to point to a resource as well!

9

Game Modification Station / Re: FF6 Improvement Project

« on: February 20, 2013, 11:03:19 AM »

I did a scan for any updates to the patches I use for the improvement, and I ended up finding new fix patches from assassin and Novalia Spirit - one of which I was really glad to find.

After getting the Opera timing pretty much to my satisfaction on my translation test ROM, I played ahead and noticed that the game hung right after the scene that's supposed to be fixed with the King of Vanity patch (regressions, grr!) I had previously applied the patches that FF3usME 6.7 breaks, since I had a similar problem in Zozo when it came time for the Always Jump Left in Zozo patch and re-applying fixed it. But for some reason, the King of Vanity patch still wasn't working right.

Thankfully, Novalia Spirit has released a patch called Blush Disease to address the same issue. I removed the King of Vanity patch and applied this one, and it worked, apparently with no issues - Edgar and Celes were in the party, but only Celes blushed.

At any rate, I'll be doing an evaluation of the new fix patches and will add them in if the playtesting works out.

Something I'm on the fence about - there are two patches by HatZen08 that I would like to consider adding to the improvement (as tweaks instead of fixes, obviously), but I'm uncertain as whether it would be in the spirit of keeping as close to the original intent Square had for this game. In particular:

The Runic Forever patch causes Runic (and as a side effect, Cyan's Retort technique) to stay in effect until it is triggered, while allowing the characters to make command decisions in the meantime. While I personally like this change, and may include it in my personal copy of the improvement, my problem with officially putting this in the project is that I believe this was not the original intent for either action, so changing them will potentially make both techniques overpowered. I'll be testing this patch regardless, but I would like opinions on whether this takes the technique behavior too far away from the original behavior.

The SwordTech Ready Stance patch changes SwdTech/Bushido so that you choose the technique you want up front, and the technique will charge in the background during battle. This patch, in its current state, also changes Retort to an immediate strike once chosen. I really, REALLY like the main intent of this patch, as to me it is a much more elegant solution than the SwordTech gauge - even with the Speed-Up tweak patch I currently have in place - as it (allegedly) preserves the original charge time of each technique without breaking battle flow. The secondary effect of the patch, though, is unacceptable for the improvement as Retort was most definitely designed to counter a physical attack.

I've messaged HatZen08 to see if he would be amenable to modifying the patch. If he is, then I'm inclined to include it (barring any conflicts) because it would improve battle flow with Cyan in the party without (IMO) taking him too far away from his original design. But again, I would like opinions on that.

Please let me know what you think!

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Submissions / Resubmission: [FF6] Invisible Chests in the Phantom Train fix v1.1

« on: February 19, 2013, 02:45:40 PM »

Link.

Fixed non-headered version of the patch based on a user report. Contents of the patch have not changed.

Also, screenshot at link.

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Game Modification Station / Re: FF6 Improvement Project

« on: February 19, 2013, 12:20:04 PM »

Well, now I'm kicking myself for not just buckling down and getting the Opera scene taken care of - I've spent about 18 hours on it, and it's almost done. The timing codes are pretty straightforward, once you get used to how they're tweaked. I've got all 3 of the major scenes mostly done, and all that's left is to polish the timing in the few places where it's still a bit off.

Also, since this work is going more smoothly than I'd anticipated, I'll see about fixing the timing for the Opera scene in the base and complete patches, since there are a couple of parts where it's GAH-awful.

Once I have the Opera scene working to my satisfaction, barring any reports of glitches or crashes, I think this project will be mostly done! I will do another scan to see if any fixes have updates, and there are a couple of patches I'd like to try and add, like Lenophis' Fancy Walking patch...but other than that my goal for making the original FF6 as stable and bug-free as possible, as well as making the story read more smoothly, will be met!

12

Game Modification Station / Re: FF6 Improvement Project

« on: February 18, 2013, 12:58:55 AM »

I got a 403 when I tried that link, LM. It's OK though, I found that I had played up to Kohlingen not too long ago, and moved it along. Also, I wasn't able to find anything on Twitch, but it'd be really cool to see!

So I'm finally, finally getting around to tweaking the Opera scene, and it's as delicate as I was fearing it would be. I have the first scene with Draco (O Maria...) timed out nicely, but the text won't disappear without manually closing the text box with the A button, which I don't remember having to do before. I compared it to a clean ROM, and the opcode placement looks right, so I'm not sure what the problem is there. Otherwise, it's just a tedious process of making a change, loading the game, opening the state, watching, repeat ad nauseum.

I'll keep everyone posted on progress - it'll be good to get this out there the way it ought to be!

13

Game Modification Station / Re: FF6 Improvement Project

« on: February 15, 2013, 07:48:41 PM »

*drumroll*

Version 1.07 is out! Get it here.

EDIT: Looking back through the last few pages of this thread, I realized that I also added the fix C.V. Reynolds had come up with for the Sabin/Vargas scene! So here's a proper changelog:

- Applied the fix for Esper Battle Menu to fix the short window persisting after a command is chosen (thanks, TheNattak!)
- Applied the fix that restores the Blitz tutorial during the Sabin/Vargas battle (thanks, C.V. Reynolds!)

The translation is still at an almost complete status - if I can ever get up to the opera with a savestate so that I can start messing with the timing codes, that's the only thing that still needs to be done.

As always, the base patch is missing the 6 patches that get corrupted by FF3usME 6.7 so that hackers gonna hack can (the readme has the patches); the complete patch has all the patches applied, and the translation patch is complete + translation. Also, basic script fixes are in the base and complete patches.

Also ALSO as always, please report any issues, glitches or crashes that you find.

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Game Modification Station / Re: FF6 Improvement Project

« on: February 13, 2013, 08:48:02 AM »

So I found the culprit causing the Row window issue, and it wasn't the patch I expected...the Esper Battle Menu fix is causing this issue on a clean FF3us 1.0 headered ROM.

It's these 3 bytes here that is causing it. 
C2/DE93: 02 04        COP $04
C2/DE95: 00

They are changed to: 8C 03 8F with the patch, for whatever the reason may be. (Leno?)
Changing them back seems to keep the Esper Battle Menu fix intact, and fixes the window, so that's good.

So changing these bytes back fixes the window issue and leaves the battle menu fix intact? That's great news! I can do that and put out a new version, so people who like using the custom window aren't left out in the cold. Thanks for sharing, TheNattak!

Regarding the item/attack bug mentioned - I tried to be as explicit as possible in what version of whichever patch I used in the improvement. I thought at one point that I may need to rebuild the improvement ROM and do a diff as I add each patch, to see what is changed, as most of the older patches don't include the changes that were made. It appears I may indeed have to do that, if for no other reason that to allow people to review the changes.

If that can be useful, I can get started on that and publish the results, per patch.

Some of the recently released patches are pretty awesome

- Runic Forever
- Swdtech Ready Stance


Any plans to implement these?

Also.. Is that guy new to the romhack scene?

I took a look through his patches, and some of them do sound awesome. The Guest Adder patch, if it's usable with the improvement, would be an awesome addition to a project!

If the Runic Forever patch works the way it's intended, then I think it's really cool, since if I was building the Runic ability from scratch, I would design it to stay active until triggered. But I don't like how it changes Retort.

The SwdTech Ready Stance one is intriguing - choose your technique and then it will charge. I think that is more elegant than the gauge speed-up...but again, I don't like what it does to Retort.

I agree with koala_knight on the True Duel patch - I don't like seeing games play themselves either, which is why I don't like the PS2 FF games. Actually, I'm on the fence with this one - it obviously breaks the original intent, but it would be a test to see if you could kill a tough beastie with one character. I could see this adding to replay value - take a "gimp" character in, and the challenge is to see if you can win anyway.

Now Lucky Slots - I'll have to take a close look at what he's done there, because if he did a good job I could possibly use that over the Slots Derigged fix. It sounds like it could be overpowered, though, so no guarantees on that.

Yeah, he has some good ideas - it's always good to encourage newcomers!

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Game Modification Station / Re: FF6 Improvement Project

« on: February 13, 2013, 08:24:42 AM »

Anyone been in touch with Darkmage?

Has he stopped working on this?

He literally has the best translation patch I have yet seen and I would love to have a way to apply it to other patches without it destroying everything LMAO

Thanks for the kind words on the translation! It's not all my work - I just pulled stuff from the Lina Darkstar walkthrough and the FF6Advance dialogue, and made them sound as natural as I know how. It's not like I went and translated the Japanese myself! 

As to just releasing the translation, that's something I hadn't thought of...I'd assumed people would want to either play FF6 with all the bugs fixed (including in the dialogue!), or use this as a base to make their own projects without having to apply all the separate fixes themselves. Also, a couple of lines depend on patches that I've used - they wouldn't be used if you put this on a clean ROM. That was why I released two versions of the patch - one to use right away, and one to work off of.

Is that something people are wanting - just the translation by itself?