Due to circumstances mostly out of my control, I had been unable to update the NSFE's sent in over the last couple of weeks. Naturally, they built up, almost to the point where it was insurmountable. However, with sanity returning the NSFEs were taken care of.
All of that babble you just read means that bucky sent in a few NSFEs for fixing, a bunch more new ones. Also, Teppic sent in Robin Hood, Anticipation, and an update to Rollergames which I almost typed as Rollerball 3 times.
In addition to the NSFEs, two documents were updated, both for FF6. The C3 bank saw massive updates from C3/0406 to C3/F000 (or thereabouts). That range is exclusively for the ending, and much more still needs commenting.
We've also dabbled into many engine tweaks, the first and most prominent of them being a complete overhaul of the physical damage formula. This change is part of the massive balance overhaul we are still doing. Other engine tweaks include some additions to the battle and engine cores, as well. To get an idea of those changes, you can view the playlist set up at Youtube.
With a balance overhaul also comes many bug fixes, and in fact many bug fixes. To keep some sanity, a complete list of bug fixes was put together at Mnrogar's Den. These bugs are being fixed to level the playing field on both sides. This will no doubt cause some gripes, but the only thing I can say to that is “if you want to play the broken system, play the broken game.”
But, enough about the past. We're here to stay positive, and talk about the future. And that future is now. So, what's new? To mark the occasion, we are proud to show another new feature recently implemented, a Doom Gaze radar (this is 60 megs!). This radar works like how you would expect a radar to work. If you get close to Doom Gaze, he will show up on the minimap. It will make finding him to be much easier than it ever was. Note, a Youtube version of this movie was made, but the quality of it turned out to be bad enough that the minimap was far too grainy to show off what this did. It has since been removed. Various and numerous attempts were also made to get the filesize of this movie down to a respectable level, but all attempts also made the minimap too grainy to show off this new feature.
“Use a screenshot, fool!”
That won't show you how or when it works, despite anybody's best efforts to do so. Either bite the bullet and download or simply ignore it. And yes, as a dialup user, this is a very hard thing for me to say, but I'm at wit's end about this.
Anyway, another new feature, though not nearly as flashy or even as fancy, is one that will make dialogue nice. For whatever reason, Final Fantasy 6 never had a center tag, it instead used a tab tag. Well, we decided that the tab tag needed to go. In its place, a center tag. Ok, crappy job of building that one up.
Those that have been in RHDN's IRC channel may have noticed me continuously bugging everybody for possible ideas that we could implement into the hack. Gemini did step forward with one, an item that will increase encounter rates. Specifically, this will double the encounter rate. A perfect gift for all of the masochistic grinders out there.
Finally, there's something we've been wanting to show off for a while now. Earlier in development we toyed with changing some of the character spritesheets. One such example was a revision to Mog. We have since expanded on that, giving some alterations to Celes and Edgar.
On a sad note, I am reluctant to announce that I do not believe we'll be able to get anymore new music into the hack. Those that have assisted in the past seemed to have moved on to bigger and better things. To counter this, some have suggested that we learn the inner workings of the SPC700 to get more songs in. However, we feel that delaying the project for another many months to learn the chip just to get a few more songs in is not worth it.
To wrap this up, I'll say that we hope that 2009 will be the final year of development. I won't put a date on when we'll be done, because adding pressure will not ensure quality. We thank those that have been patient with us during this project's development.
Today we see the closing of 2008, a year with many ups and downs.
On the rom hacking front, Pandora's Box has seen much progress, mostly in terms of new features and oddities. This includes new targeting, some varying-width font goodness, hell expanded, a different element, and coloration differences in battle. With the many new features (and more yet to be implemented), the worst thing that could happen would be to lose focus. And that we did, slightly. However, with the new year ringing in, there's still plenty of big splashes to be made, and one should be made very shortly. So, for those that have been patiently waiting on us, your patience will be rewarded.
Not related to Pandora's Box, Dragonsbrethren also released a couple new Goldeneye hacks. They can be found on his front page.
Outside of us, a Japanese hacker, Rock5easily, made 2 Megaman hacks. Well, Rockman, actually. One of Rockman 5, which now seems to be complete, called Rockman 5 Endless, and another of Rockman 3, called Rockman 3 Endless. Both were made in inspiration of Megaman 9's Endless mode. Since the hacks were updated continuously, and since Rock5easily never archived older versions of the hacks, Dragonsbrethren set up two archives for the hacks, here and here. Both are quite fun, in their own quirky ways.
2008 also saw the fall and revival of Zophar's Domain, neither of which were fully expected to happen. Things have a way of clinging on for dear life, and ZD certainly did that for many years.
Outside of "the scene" and emulation entirely, we saw many new games, including the much anticipated Super Smash Bros Brawl. 2008 also saw a new game with a retro look, Megaman 9. There was also Lost Oddysey, Infinite Undiscovery, and Metal Gear Solid 4 for games on the new front. The DS saw some highly anticipated titles, the two biggest being Final Fantasy 4 and Chrono Trigger. 2009 looks to be a good year for the DS, at least in terms of games. Titles will include many from the Dragon Quest series, which has many people smiling. If you look beyond the games, another new version of the DS will be seen, this one called the DS-i. This new version will eliminate the backwards compatibility with Gameboy Advance games (among other things). This leads me to believe that Nintendo still hasn't really "gotten it" from the stuff they pulled in the mid-90's, but I am merely one person.
Going into reality, it was an interesting year for sports. In baseball, the Tampa Bay Rays came from out of nowhere, certainly surprising the hell out of everybody they ran over. They did what only one team before them had done, go from worst record to the World Series the next year. The other team that did this was the 1991 Atlanta Braves. The Braves lost the World Series in 7 games, and the Rays lost the World Series in 5 games. With what the Braves did, they set up a foundation that would last for the next 15 years. Now, I don't see the Rays winning 14 consecutive AL East titles, but they will be contenders for many years to come.
In basketball, the Boston Celtics essentially traded away for an NBA title. It worked. Usually something that like doesn't go over well, since there's things like team chemistry, ball-hoggers, and etc that can ruin things. The Celtics got the right players, and they steamrolled everybody.
In hockey, the Red Wings returned to glory, beating the up-and-coming Pittsburgh Penguins for the Stanley Cup. That was one of the better Stanley Cup series I had seen in many years. Sidney Crosby has a solid team, and assuming injuries don't overtake them, they should be set for a while. Along with Crosby, his "rival," if you want to call him that, Alexander Ovechkin of the Washington Capitals, look to have an excellent back-and-forth battle for many years to come. No, neither were rookies, but they've certainly announced their presence (they did that last year, actually). It's only fitting that they finally get some props from me.
And then, there's football. The New England Patriots did what nobody thought was possible, go 16-0 in the regular season. Unfortunately for them, and to the delight of many others, they lost the Super Bowl to the New York Giants. Nobody expected the Giants to win, which is kind of similar to the Patriots first Super Bowl title seven years ago against the St. Louis Rams. The Rams then, and the Patriots last year were complete offensive machines, and nobody could stop them. And just like seven years ago, they were upsets that nobody could see coming.
That, in a nutshell is 2008. Will 2009 be any bigger? Maybe, maybe not. The only thing I am certain of, it should not disappoint.
This one is the documents section to Final Fantasy 6. This was a long time coming, and with a lot of time invested all over the place. However, as is the case with many disassemblies, these are incomplete. Banks C0, C1, and EE stand out in that regard. The area that saw the most attention was C3, and D4 was discovered and added during that time.
If you have comments to add, or you weren't included in the mess of authors (and there are a lot of them), drop a line.
Ok, corny joke. My apologies, but Manny Ramirez just isn't gonna get traded. *attempts to dodge pies thrown in his direction*
Ok, ok, ok. To real business. A couple of weeks or so ago, somebody from "the minibosses forum" sent me an email with a bunch of brand new NSFEs. Who am I to turn down more entries? I tried to get the accents to appear for Deja Vu's title, but they won't show up.
Additionally, Joelsmith380 sent in a brand new FF2 patch, which he's calling Basic Improvement.
I have a feeling I goofed, badly. It was recently brought to my attention that the Megaman 5 NSFE was missing a ton of tracks. I then proceeded to check the one I have, and it has 76 tracks, with the sound effects removed from the playlist. However, SonicAndTails insisted that the one the site has is missing a ton of tracks, so I proceeded to download it. I played it, and he was right. It was missing a ton of tracks.
I searched through my email, and found no trace of this submission. To whoever sent it in, I offer my deepest and sincerest apologies for this royal flub.
blm07 has sent in a new NSFE, Ghostbusters 2. Picto sent in 4 new NSFE's, Fire Emblem, Fire Emblem Gaiden, Adventures of Lolo 2, and Adventures of Lolo 3. He also sent in fixes for both versions of Demon Sword, Zelda II, and Moon Crystal. My thanks for the submissions.
Ok, I've had some things in the queue going as far back as June, and for whatever reason didn't get around to some things. For that, I owe my deepest apologies to UNKNOWNFILE and Kojiro_S, since their submissions were in limbo. However, after going through my inbox I think I've gotten all of the forgotten items taken care of.
If this is not the case, re-send it! I will get it up.
On a related matter, J.B. sent in an FF1 patch, titled "Chaos Ultima." He says to check it out, so don't argue.
Picto sent in 4 new 