So I started a hack.

Looks quite good, but the bosses were very annoying! And don't tell me I'am not a good player, cuz I fought off the three bosses with machine gun, 47 HP, only booster ver. 0.8 and I used no life pot! It was quiet hard, I needed many days to done that!

 

Well there's a reason why that route is called the easy route. But that's pretty good regardless - I often had to use a potion past the second boss (though once I started using the blade, it got much easier.)

Like I said, the bosses are easy to beat once you've figured out their pattern. But if you run into them and start shooting non-stop in hopes you'll beat them before they beat you, you're going to be in for a very unpleasant surprise. Generally it should take a try or two to figure out how to beat them - that's how the NES era was, and back then games really WERE challenging. None of the stuff we have nowadays... anyhow, getting off-topic, sorry.

Are there any bosses in particular that gave you a hard time? I'll look into it if there really is some cheap strategy they can use that I've overlooked.

 

Some of those bosses will automatically get a little easier in the next release; there is supposed to be an extra health potion and some other tweaks that should tone down the difficulty for you.

 

Bump. I can't wait for the release...

BTW, once i get to the Flooded Cave, what i do?

 

You should go back and talk with naomi.

 

Currently on a friend's PC..

I've cracked the script parser and made a few changes to the commands for the hack. One of the things I did was add a "BTN" command (basically a NOD with a sound effect; I've cut out the delays for text display so I needed a way to inform the player to press a key to continue.) I've also created an "FLC" command (FLash Color) which sets the color of a flash when calling FLA. Simple stuff. I'll share the loot when I get my intar-web back.

Two interesting things about the script parser, now that I got into it.

- The FAC command is repeated twice. I'm under the impression Pixel screwed up and was copy-pasting this thing, and forgot about one of them. It can be safely replaced by another command...

- The UNJ command, which isn't in the tsc listing. It basically jumps based on the current state set by UNI (I think that's the command? The fish battle uses it...)

Plenty of interesting stuff already and I've only been gone a day.

 

I'm stuck.

Spoiler

I have Strange parts A and B, and in the Old Factory I have found two switches, which I assume do nothing until the power's back on. How do I fix the live wiring?

 

I'm stuck.

Spoiler

I have Strange parts A and B, and in the Old Factory I have found two switches, which I assume do nothing until the power's back on. How do I fix the live wiring?

Currently, the available version has a bug which causes a trigger not to appear on what appears to be a somewhat random basis. I can't upload my own version because I don't have internet access at home, so that's as far as the demo goes for now.

The switches are

Spoiler

red herrings.

The two parts are

Spoiler

for future use in creating one of two higher-tier weapons - depending on how you use other items, you'll be able to get one of them. This will not take place until much further in the game, but since the two Parts are obtained in the factory and tunnel, they're obtainable.

Of particular interest is the fact I've decided to make Naomi playable at some point in the game. Tests so far reveal it not only works just fine, it might also be possible with a bit of assembly hacking to create multiple playable characters.

If all goes well, I might have some plans for another hack after this one where the teleporter menu will become a character selection menu.

 

Could she have her own inventory, HP, and weapons?

That would be insane.

 

She could and should, but I haven't written the code for it yet. I'll need a few spare bytes to back up Rick's inventory/items/weapons/etc. Not too sure where, but I have a few locations in mind I'll try out.

Once I have access to some memory to back up stuff into, it's just a matter of swapping the characters' data whenever I want to switch between them.

 

Downloaded new version, and i can't play! AUGH! ><

 

Hopefully you realize there isn't a thing anyone can do to help you if you don't give out any details as to what the problem is.

I've done a few tweaks to the scenario data and started modifying the bosses. Devon's jumps are more "aggressive" and his fireballs MUCH faster - but they're fired in a stream that can easily be dodged if you don't jump or stand on a platform when he's shooting. He's relatively easy - being somewhat early on in the game - though. The 4 jellyfishes will be merged into a single one with an entirely different behavior. I'm not sure exactly how it'll behave yet as I haven't begun coding that one yet.

After laying out some plans last night I decided I'd make Naomi play a little different from Rick by giving her different moves. Pressing control will allow her to hop back quickly to dodge projectiles, attacks, whatnot. She'll also move slightly faster, making her more of a speed-based character than Rick. I might toss in other stuff depending on what's feasible. She'll have 25 health, an uzi, and a health potion, but cannot obtain powerups (ie, max health pickups for instance) Technically she could, but there won't be any to pick up so it's a moot point.

 

Well, when i start playing, be it load game or New game, an error writed in japanese appears, no matter what, and most of the time, i can't extract the files >=(

 

The extraction shouldn't be inconsistent. Either it'll work or it won't. You might be downloading it incorrectly (the hosting I'm using is kinda screwy at times..) Using a download manager could lead to problems too. There's also the possibility that the archive is corrupt - if anyone else managed to download it properly though, the problem wouldn't lie there..

I started working on the jellyfish-replacement boss. It's a complete 100% rewrite of the jellyfish's code from the ground up and not just edited code. Kinda exciting. I've had to cut corners to save space (ie, store [ebp+08] in edx throughout the entire script and using only eax and ecx - it's easier than it seems and saves a LOT of space by cutting down on "mov edx,[ebp,08]" instructions.) Essentially it's a very straightforward process - my NPC guide has a bit in it about this stuff at the end. Lots and LOTS of heavy assembly though.

Essentially the new boss will walk up and down the walls trying to get a fix on the player and will shoot at him when it does (so long as the player remains in range.) Occasionally it'll spawn weak but annoying snake-like enemies.

I'm probably going to code everything from the ground up from now on. Enemies, weapons, etc. As opposed to editing existing code.

 

So it will not be a mod anymore rune, its a TC now...

 

So it will not be a mod anymore rune, its a TC now...

It was hardly ever anything short of a TC (unless you consider that some tilesets are from the original and weren't actually changed...) After all, the story, the sprites, the weapons, the enemies, the maps, and the scripts have all been changed.

The only difference now is that I've attained enough understanding of CS's code to manipulate it however which way I want, instead of just inserting small bits and pieces of code here and there in existing functions.

A rose by any other name...

The only regret I have with the hack so far is that I'm stuck using Sue's Workshop. Everything else is done through my own tools, a hex editor, paintshop pro, and past knowhow. I hope to eventually write an editor of my own when I'll be able to put enough time together to get into the map format down to the last detail. All in good time I guess - the girth of the hack so far is graphical and hand-written machine code.

Not to mention my innate dislike of hold-me-by-the-hand editors in the first place... >_> Blech.

 

Not to mention my innate dislike of hold-me-by-the-hand editors in the first place... >_> Blech.

Sue's Workshop isn't exactly a "hold-me-by-the-hand" editor; to really do anything to the game you have to learn how to use TSC script commands, and maybe how to use a hex editor.
And while the program does load and display the maps and scripts for you, that's more of a convenience than anything.

 

FileFactory Link doesn't work for me. Any other download locations?

 

It was hardly ever anything short of a TC (unless you consider that some tilesets are from the original and weren't actually changed...) After all, the story, the sprites, the weapons, the enemies, the maps, and the scripts have all been changed.

The only difference now is that I've attained enough understanding of CS's code to manipulate it however which way I want, instead of just inserting small bits and pieces of code here and there in existing functions.

A rose by any other name...

The only regret I have with the hack so far is that I'm stuck using Sue's Workshop. Everything else is done through my own tools, a hex editor, paintshop pro, and past knowhow. I hope to eventually write an editor of my own when I'll be able to put enough time together to get into the map format down to the last detail. All in good time I guess - the girth of the hack so far is graphical and hand-written machine code.

Not to mention my innate dislike of hold-me-by-the-hand editors in the first place... >_> Blech.

Maybe not a TC but maybe its a PRO-TC now? ^^

 

Unfortunately I don't have internet access at my appartment yet, so I can't upload it elsewhere. If someone has it, it would be appreciated if they could mirror it somewhere, because I think FileFactory kills off downloads that haven't been downloaded in 24 or 48 hours, or something like that...

@Epsilon: Scripts are a joke. Compared to writing raw machine code in hex and debugging by dumping registers every frame, yep, Sue's workshop is a j-o-k-e. ;P But I had more in mind something that goes a little further than Sue's when I posted that - before the discovery of what the tsc commands do, Sue's wasn't exactly a use-friendly editor... except for maps.

@Shining: Like I said, a rose by any other name is just as sweet. Call it a pro-TC if you prefer, I don't mind.

I've spent a few hours this weekend tweaking my first custom boss. Lots of crazy crap that kept throwing me off - but that's what working in machine code is like. Great fun so far, and I've learned TONS about entities. Tons of annoying stuff. For instance, spawning an entity can be acheived with the one-byte push instruction ("push 0A") But the moment the ID is greater than 0x7F, the 4byte push instruction must be used or else it happily crashes. Try and figure THAT one out! And joy and fun - this means 3 extra bytes in your code, so you have to go and edit ALLLLL the relative jumps and calls, tables, and whatnot....

Currently it animates just fine and spawns enemies like I want it to. Yay! Bt it doesn't move - turns out the value in the X and Y positions are rounded off. Joy. Once that's fixed, I have to fix the other entity spawn call because it uses a 1 byte push too... which means MORE pointers to screw with. Goodie!

There is no greater thrill than seeing your custom boss walking around and spawning worms.