[Archived] Hack ideas: for those without the skill but with all the ideas.

[#]

Somewhere deep within Hydelide there's a decent game.

There is. Check out Hydlide 3.

[julayla]

I recently looked at the Japanese release of Kirby's Dream Course and knowing that there's actually an animated title sequence and an intro, I want someone to translate the opening (after somehow trying to insert it into the English version) or something

[Jeville]

Fire Emblem with the story of a power struggle between two Princess Zeldas after Zelda II. The sleeping Zelda we saved in Zelda II is different to the one we saved in the first Zelda game and they coexist.

[Tsukiyomaru0]

I was thinking of a hack for Metal Gear Solid GBC that does the following:

• Restores the Ghost Babel to the title (bye with Solid, in with GB!)
• Replaces the wall colors on minimaps with a darker color, so the yellow blips stands out more.
• Reduces the size of Snake's blip on the radar , or changes it for a 3x3 "+" shape, for more precise movement.
• Try to squish either "Radar Off" or "Offline" under "Jamming" on the radar screen.
• Restore IdeaSpy channel and related content. (US version)
• Rename Fogger to Cigars or Cigarettes.
• If it is not too hard, Gameboy Player border. I managed to cook up one, but is for Virtual Console, but adjusting it shouldn't be hard.

[werewolfslayr925]

I'd like to see a hack of Seiken Densetsu 3/Secret of Mana 2/Trials of Mana that makes the text more legible than what's available on the site. The letters in the current hack are very scrunched together and are difficult to read, especially on a handheld's screen. Not sure how easy such a fix would be, but it'd be nice.

[#]

I was thinking of a hack for Metal Gear Solid GBC that does the following:

• Restores the Ghost Babel to the title (bye with Solid, in with GB!)
• Replaces the wall colors on minimaps with a darker color, so the yellow blips stands out more.
• Reduces the size of Snake's blip on the radar , or changes it for a 3x3 "+" shape, for more precise movement.
• Try to squish either "Radar Off" or "Offline" under "Jamming" on the radar screen.
• Restore IdeaSpy channel and related content. (US version)
• Rename Fogger to Cigars or Cigarettes.
• If it is not too hard, Gameboy Player border. I managed to cook up one, but is for Virtual Console, but adjusting it shouldn't be hard.

Those are some solid ideas. Although 5 is unnecessary as the European version has all that content and is in English, and 7 is not possible as the game is not compatible with the (Super) Game Boy.

[superfantendo]

Modification of Streets of Rage 2 to Batman 66
Playable characters- Batman, Robin, Batgirl, Wonder Woman 77
Leave generic thugs, turn bosses into Batman 66 villains
Change impact effects to POW ZAP BOOM

[star_scream1646]

So I was watching the new Dark Crystal Age of Resistance show a few days ago, and thought that it was always a shame that the original Dark Crystal never got a game on a console. I know Labyrinth got a game in Japan for the Famicom, so I was thinking what game could be hacked to make the world of Thra into an NES game. The only one I could think of was The Legend of Zelda. Link would be Jen ,Zelda would be Kira, the old man could be Aughra and the other NPCs could be Podlings in hiding. Each Dungeon boss would be a representation of one of the Skeksis, with Ganon being changed to the Skeksis Emperor. Just an idea for anyone who may want to hack the original Legend of Zelda into something else.

[TheUnderfaker]

I'd love to see someone finish up the Super Fire Pro Wrestling X Premium translation for Snes,
seems that the line you see when you try to erase your save file never got translated.
would be nice for completion sake.



This is with the original Sydra patch and the later addendum patch applied.

[Spooniest]

I was just wondering, after having visited zombo.com again (which I do from time to time, for a larf), about Street Fighter. Yes, the first one. I was playing it at the time I heard (from BRPXQZME, a former RHDN user) about zombo.com, and the memory got called back through association.

This game's controls are horrible, largely, I'm guessing, due to it being one of the first of its kind. Street Fighter 2 would perfect the forumla, but this game is nigh-unplayable. I was wondering what might be involved in making SF1's controls feel more accurate.

[julayla]

I like someone to finish up the translation of the Sailor Moon gameboy games. Also, it'd be a great bonus if they, like with Nakayoshi & Me (NES) and Sailor Moon SuperS Floating Party Panic (SNES), make it the best of both worlds and have 2 different translations (one for the purists and one for the DIC/Cloverway fans, like what the other Sailor Moon translations should've done at the time).
September 13, 2019, 01:48:22 PM - (Auto Merged - Double Posts are not allowed before 7 days.)
Also, on a more Link's Awakening note, I noticed that a couple of hidden Easter Eggs from the Gameboy version of Link's Awakening aren't on the DX version. Is there any way those can be restored in the DX version? (like the MOYSE and LOLO easter eggs for example)

[redmagejoe]

How difficult would a B Button Dash patch for Final Fantasy II be? There's one for FF3 and one for FF1... I was thinking of just doing a comparison of the FF1 Dash patch side by side with original, but I doubt that would give me the information I need to make a similar change to FF2.

[FAST6191]

Does Final Fantasy II (don't know if we are using Japanese or classic western numbering here) have any kind of speed equip? If so most dash button hacks are things which replicate said effects (either giving the equip early or in better cases finding the flag that the equip triggers and twiddling that). Such things can be done with cheat.
Sometimes there might not be an equip but there could be a cutscene or sequence where characters are moving at pace and that can also be a flag, though could also just be an animation.

If it is time for big boy hacking then we get to look at the general speed increase world (usually seen for the likes of pokemon for people that played with turbo buttons on their emulators and then got hardware but far from unknown outside it, RPGs in general being the big user of such things). Here you would want to change movement animations and possibly positions to happen faster which can be the more annoying ones to do. Start looking at the code though and finding out where map position (possibly screen but more likely an internal map position if it is a scrolling screen in a town/dungeon) is and what changes it. If you are lucky then you can change it to add two instead of one (or making whatever the movement actually ends up as) but do check you don't clip out of bounds, skip event triggers, accidentally run endlessly (if the original says add 2 until you get to 20 and you add 3 then exactly 20 never comes) or something similar. Either way once the position location is found you get to figure out how to boost this within game parameters.

[redmagejoe]

I can't vouch for III, but I know that I certainly doesn't have any equips. I think what it does is simply emulate the boat speed (2x), but there's options to make it Airship speed (4x) and I think 8x? From my understanding, II is the first installment in the series with Chocobos and I believe there's an Airship as well, so I guess it would be the same concept.

[ShadowOne333]

I was just wondering, after having visited zombo.com again (which I do from time to time, for a larf), about Street Fighter. Yes, the first one. I was playing it at the time I heard (from BRPXQZME, a former RHDN user) about zombo.com, and the memory got called back through association.

This game's controls are horrible, largely, I'm guessing, due to it being one of the first of its kind. Street Fighter 2 would perfect the forumla, but this game is nigh-unplayable. I was wondering what might be involved in making SF1's controls feel more accurate.

Why not port everything from SF1 into SF2and rename it accordingly? :p
Sounds better than to try to fix SF1 engine-wise.

[nesrocks]

Someone is remaking/fixing the SF1 game as a version for the Mega Drive: https://twitter.com/ph_rockz/status/1154553602192506880

[Heaven Piercing Man]

Does Final Fantasy II (don't know if we are using Japanese or classic western numbering here)

Who does that nowadays anyway? That numbering is officially obsolete now. FF4 has been FF4 for longer that the time it was "2", so if you're not talking about the NES game, you'd be specifically saying "FF2us SNES"

[redmagejoe]

I can't vouch for III, but I know that I certainly doesn't have any equips. I think what it does is simply emulate the boat speed (2x), but there's options to make it Airship speed (4x) and I think 8x? From my understanding, II is the first installment in the series with Chocobos and I believe there's an Airship as well, so I guess it would be the same concept.

So below, I have the change to FF1 ROM necessary to add the B Button dash. The first block is the excerpt of the disassembly for the unmodified code from 0x3D087 to 0x3D096. The second block is my attempts at interpreting what the changed values translate to. If I can make sense of how all these actors come into play, I can maybe attempt to apply a similar patch to FF2.

Code Select Expand

a9 01 LDA #$01
85 34 STA move_speed       ; set movement speed to move in desired direction
a5 2d LDA mapflags         ; check map flags
4a LSR A                ; put SM flag in C
b0 09 BCS @Exit            ; if in a SM, just exit
a5 42 LDA vehicle          ; otherwise (OW), get current vehicle
c9 02 CMP #$02
90 03 BCC @Exit            ; if vehicle is < 2 (on foot), exit (speed remains 1)
4a LSR A                ; otherwise, replace speed with vehicle/2

4a LSR A
25 2d AND 2d
d0 02 BNE 02
a5 42 LDA vehicle
24 20 BIT 20?
50 02 BVC 02?
a9 04 LDA #$04      ; sets movement speed while B button is held (04 for boat, 08 for airship, 10 for double airship aka crash game)
4a LSR A
69 00 ADC #00

[Guadozoku]

I'm shocked they don't exist yet (or do they?) But casual mode patches for Fire Emblem games that don't have it. I even tried making them with some FE GBA game hacking utility, and put the patch in, but couldn't figure out how to activate it (and you have to, because the games most certainly did not have casual mode activated when I tried them out.)

[FAST6191]

Who does that nowadays anyway? That numbering is officially obsolete now. FF4 has been FF4 for longer that the time it was "2", so if you're not talking about the NES game, you'd be specifically saying "FF2us SNES"

You would be surprised. Most of the time it is North America based peeps as Final Fantasy did not really hit Europe until 7 and then a bunch of the older ones got ported/emulated/tweaked for the PS1 a bit later with Japanese numbers. Others might have even taken until the GBA to learn of them.

I can't vouch for III, but I know that I certainly doesn't have any equips. I think what it does is simply emulate the boat speed (2x), but there's options to make it Airship speed (4x) and I think 8x? From my understanding, II is the first installment in the series with Chocobos and I believe there's an Airship as well, so I guess it would be the same concept.

So below, I have the change to FF1 ROM necessary to add the B Button dash. The first block is the excerpt of the disassembly for the unmodified code from 0x3D087 to 0x3D096. The second block is my attempts at interpreting what the changed values translate to. If I can make sense of how all these actors come into play, I can maybe attempt to apply a similar patch to FF2.

Code Select Expand

a9 01 LDA #$01
85 34 STA move_speed       ; set movement speed to move in desired direction
a5 2d LDA mapflags         ; check map flags
4a LSR A                ; put SM flag in C
b0 09 BCS @Exit            ; if in a SM, just exit
a5 42 LDA vehicle          ; otherwise (OW), get current vehicle
c9 02 CMP #$02
90 03 BCC @Exit            ; if vehicle is < 2 (on foot), exit (speed remains 1)
4a LSR A                ; otherwise, replace speed with vehicle/2

4a LSR A
25 2d AND 2d
d0 02 BNE 02
a5 42 LDA vehicle
24 20 BIT 20?
50 02 BVC 02?
a9 04 LDA #$04      ; sets movement speed while B button is held (04 for boat, 08 for airship, 10 for double airship aka crash game)
4a LSR A
69 00 ADC #00

I would be wary of such things if airships and chocobos disable or alter random combat but I can't say I wouldn't look either -- part of the speed increasing hack stuff I was on about when dealing with text also sees if there is a text speed setting and fiddling with that, or pumping the number way above what the default high speed is, which is more or less the same concept and far easier than properly tweaking speeds).
That said this could be specific to the game in question -- just because speed is actually a variable in I does not mean any of the others do that and instead it could be straight animation loops. Trying to force such an approach could be like looking for the speed flag in a game where is no equip and as such you would not get too far with that one.
That said if you do find the speed value and something is a variable rather than baked into an opcode or something then might be worth getting a savestate with riding chocobos or vehicles and seeing what goes.