A Possible Hack For Phantasy Star 3?

[Klaviaturist]

I am wondering if there is a hack out there that simply makes your characters move faster in PS3? If not, is there any interest in the creation of one? Just wondering as this was always a pet peeve when playing the game.

[hugues]

In the Phantasy Star Collection for Saturn there is a "fast walking" option for Phantasy Star 2 & 3. Since none of the battles or cinemas are affected by choosing this option I suspect it was done as a ROM change instead of simply bumping the frameskip in the emulator. They also added two more saveslots to Phantasy Star 3 so they definitely did some work on the ROM either way. It would be interesting to extract the ROM from the Saturn collection and do a diff with the final Genesis release. That's been something I've wanted to look at for a while but it hasn't made it to the top of my to-do list yet.

[Klaviaturist]

In the Phantasy Star Collection for Saturn there is a "fast walking" option for Phantasy Star 2 & 3. Since none of the battles or cinemas are affected by choosing this option I suspect it was done as a ROM change instead of simply bumping the frameskip in the emulator. They also added two more saveslots to Phantasy Star 3 so they definitely did some work on the ROM either way. It would be interesting to extract the ROM from the Saturn collection and do a diff with the final Genesis release. That's been something I've wanted to look at for a while but it hasn't made it to the top of my to-do list yet.

I've never played the one for the Saturn. Was it released in the states? Also, I was reading on wikipedia about the parallax scrolling that was removed from the US release. Just wondering what that is and if it is something worth hacking as well.

It would be great if the Genesis release could be hacked to have the characters move faster. I have played the game for a number of years, on and off, and one of the biggest turn offs is walking through maze-like dungeons at a snails pace...

[hugues]

I've never played the one for the Saturn. Was it released in the states?

No.

Also, I was reading on wikipedia about the parallax scrolling that was removed from the US release. Just wondering what that is and if it is something worth hacking as well.

I haven't spent time on this one yet because I haven't played the Japanese version for more than a minute. The ROMs are definitely a bit different because none of the data lines up in the same locations. That's the main reason why the Aridia editor doesn't support the Japanese ROM yet. Well, that and my inability to read Japanese to tell if the text editing is working. Minor issues right

I see plenty of parallax scrolling on the US release though. Any more could induce vomiting.

[Tony H]

Found the ROM offset for walking speed when walking right: $004E4E.  This Game Genie code makes him move 4x faster when walking right: ABHA-AJCR

There is a problem though.  The "screen" will not keep up with him.  Been trying to figure out how to fix that, but no luck so far. 

EDIT: Only tested at the very beginning of a new game.

EDIT 2: The other ROM offsets for left, up, down (in no particular order): $004E4C, $004E50, $004E52

EDIT 3: The other 3 Game Genie codes to make your character walk 4x faster in all directions:  9VHA-AACN, AVHA-AACT, ABHA-B34W

These are of course completely adjustable.

[hugues]

There are a ton of bizarre Game Genie codes like those documented over here: http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?act=url&hl=en&ie=UTF8&prev=_t&rurl=translate.google.com&sl=auto&tl=en&twu=1&u=http://gazetadealgol.com.br/blog/%3Fp%3D1140&usg=ALkJrhj7igq1iz_ijg1fNFdVcUPvg-GNBw (even with translation on it's a little tough to follow) - I don't think they've found those yet though.

Anyway to stay on the ROM hacking topic.. if the location where those values are set can be tracked down it wouldn't be hard to edit. The game program likely puts the same value in all four addresses so it would be a one-time global change.

This makes me wonder about the Saturn version a little more now.. I'm leaning toward thinking they didn't change the ROM but instead used a Game Genie type of system to crank up the walking speed at runtime. That would have been the easier route at least, similar to the runtime patch they did for the Virtual Console version.

[Tony H]

Ugh.  Noticed another problem.  When using the modified offsets above, the character walks through walls, buildings, etc.  Back to the drawing board.

hugues, here are the original values used for walking speed (from the ROM), and the values I used to walk 4x faster:

00FF 0100 0001 FF00

00FC 0400 0004 FC00

[KingMike]

Hmm... did you raise the step increment from 1 pixel at a time to 4 pixels at a time, or reduce the time delay between steps?
I'd guess modding the latter would give a less buggy result, but probably be harder to trace.
(it is what I did for my Stargazers hack for NES. I found a variable that counted how many times it would wait for vblank between each pixel the player moved, and reduced it. Originally it was 2, meaning it would wait at least 2 full refresh cycles for each pixel the player moved, and move on the third cycle.)

[engageridleymfkr]

The Phantasy Star collection for PS2 has a bunch of modifiers like this for all the games--increased walk speed, increased EXP/meseta drops, etc. It's all done in emulation, so perhaps it's worth dissecting the ISO to see if the codes can be recovered directly. I know the modifiers made to the games for their VC releases were stores as plaintext, and they're both M2 jobs, so...?

Also, I was reading on wikipedia about the parallax scrolling that was removed from the US release. Just wondering what that is and if it is something worth hacking as well.

The scrolling removed from the international release is really obnoxious and kinda weird. Y'know how the clouds zoom by at a million miles an hour during battle scenes? In the Japanese version the ground is moving, too, which makes even less sense given that no-one is moving and the battle sprites are barely animated.

[hugues]

hugues, here are the original values used for walking speed (from the ROM), and the values I used to walk 4x faster:

00FF 0100 0001 FF00

00FC 0400 0004 FC00

Thanks! I'll play around with those to see what's possible.

The scrolling removed from the international release is really obnoxious and kinda weird. Y'know how the clouds zoom by at a million miles an hour during battle scenes? In the Japanese version the ground is moving, too, which makes even less sense given that no-one is moving and the battle sprites are barely animated.

Right, now I remember it. I think this is a case of addition by subtraction.

[Tony H]

Hmm... did you raise the step increment from 1 pixel at a time to 4 pixels at a time, or reduce the time delay between steps?
I'd guess modding the latter would give a less buggy result, but probably be harder to trace.
(it is what I did for my Stargazers hack for NES. I found a variable that counted how many times it would wait for vblank between each pixel the player moved, and reduced it. Originally it was 2, meaning it would wait at least 2 full refresh cycles for each pixel the player moved, and move on the third cycle.)

I raised the step increment. 

The main problem I'm having is getting the "screen" to follow him at the new/faster speed.  It only takes a couple seconds for the character to walk all the way out of view. 

I traced it back to this instruction:
00:3118  32 38  MOVE.w  ($D242),D1               

D242 appears to be the address that has the values I need for speeding up the "screen", but when I do a memory trace on FFD242, I don't get any results (w/Gens Tracer).  Just have to figure out where D242 is getting its values from.

If I can't figure it out soon, I may try the "time delay between steps" method you mentioned.
July 24, 2012, 09:31:30 PM - (Auto Merged - Double Posts are not allowed before 7 days.)
Finally figured out the problem.  Will take a total of 6 codes to walk any speed you want (1 master code, 1 "screen" speed code, and the 4 codes for the 4 directions).  Gonna do some more testing and will post all the info.  I had some minor problems when walking at 4x, but overall worked pretty good.  Will test 2x and 3x and see how that works (4x did seem a little too fast to me).

EDIT: I'm curious to see how they did it in The Phantasy Star collection for PS2.  Does anyone have that ISO that can compare it to the Genesis ROM?
July 25, 2012, 12:25:46 AM - (Auto Merged - Double Posts are not allowed before 7 days.)
Also wondering... is there more than one choice as far as walking speed on the newer version?  And can you tell how much faster you're walking? (twice as fast, 3x as fast?).

EDIT: Just finished a short test with my 2x walking speed hack... seems to work perfectly.  Will post when done testing.

[Klaviaturist]

Just wanted to say thanks for taking the time to actually figure this one out. Tony H, looking forward to the finished result.

[Tony H]

Just wanted to say thanks for taking the time to actually figure this one out. Tony H, looking forward to the finished result.

No problem.  The 2x walking speed hack seems to work very well.  The 3x and 4x speed hacks had some problems, so won't post those.

Here's how to hack your ROM to walk twice as fast...

Open up your Phantasy Star 3 ROM with a hex editor and make these changes:

At ROM address $0002D0, change the D258 to 6032.   This causes the game to completely skip the whole checksum process (no red screen).  This also makes the game load faster.

At ROM address $002E1D, change the 01 to 02.  This determines how fast the "screen" will move.

At ROM address $004E4D, change the FF to FE.  This is your speed when walking Left.

At ROM address $004E4E, change the 01 to 02.  This is your speed when walking Right.

At ROM address $004E51, change the 01 to 02.  This is your speed when walking up.

At ROM address $004E52, change the FF to FE.  This is your speed when walking Down.


Save those changes and you're all set.  Just remember that any save states/save games made BEFORE you hacked your ROM will need to use one of the PAR codes below.  However, any save states made after the hack should work fine without the extra PAR code.  If you're using an old save state/save game, make sure you turn the PAR code on BEFORE you load your saved game!


Here are the Game Genie codes for walking twice as fast (in case you don't want to hack your ROM).

GJBA-AA8T
Master code (improved).  Only use if you get a blank/red screen.  This code
also makes the game load faster.


93HA-AACN +
ABHA-AECR +
AKHA-AACT +
ABHA-B74W +
AJ1A-AAA6
Makes your character walk twice as fast.



Some notes about these codes...

These codes must be turned on before the game starts.

If you're starting a new game, make sure you have all the codes turned on before
you pick your message scrolling speed. 

If you're using the codes with an emulator save state, you'll need to add one
of these PAR codes as well:

FFD242:0002 (use this code with Gens emulator).

FFD243:0002 (use this code with Kega Fusion emulator).

Make sure you have all the codes turned on BEFORE you load your save state!

[hugues]

Thanks! I'll add these to Aridia (http://www.romhacking.net/utilities/505/) too - let me know how you want to appear in the credits dialog.

[Klaviaturist]

Thanks again. They work beautifully. Now I actually want to go back and play the game again!

[Tony H]

Thanks! I'll add these to Aridia (http://www.romhacking.net/utilities/505/) too - let me know how you want to appear in the credits dialog.

I guess Tony Hedstrom would be fine.

Thanks again. They work beautifully. Now I actually want to go back and play the game again!

Glad to hear that.  I tested the 3x and 4x codes and they seemed too fast.  2x was just right. 

[Klaviaturist]

Playing now and one thing to note, I just got to the part in the beginning where you are going to get married and it seems that in order not to get stuck in the southern part of the castle you need to turn the codes off so the game will progress properly. Hard to explain unless you play the game for the first 2 minutes.

[Tony H]

Thanks for the info.  Are you able to continue on after that (with the codes turned back on?).

[Klaviaturist]

Thanks for the info.  Are you able to continue on after that (with the codes turned back on?).

What I did was turn the codes off right before the wedding. When I end up in the dungeon, I turned the codes back on and I end up moving too fast for the screen and can walk through walls. Similar to what you mentioned earlier.

[Tony H]

When that happens, make sure you use one of the PAR codes mentioned.  That will make the screen move at the same speed as your character. 

I just found the part you were talking about.  When you temporarily can't control your character, the CPU gets confused and sends him into a corner where he gets stuck.  I will see if I can figure out how to fix that.

EDIT: Also, make sure you turn on that PAR code before you move your character around.  If you turn on the PAR code after you move around some, it will confuse the game and you may walk through walls, etc.