User talk:Alley

Paper Mario stuff

It doesn't seem Act Later has anything from what I've seen. It's basically 'Do Nothing' from what I guess by the name so I'm not sure what they would've done.

As for Goompa, the names are listed as:

9B = ~Stupify % unused
9C = ~Stupify % unused
9D = ~Stupify % unused
9E = ~Mumble % unused
9F = ~Preach % unused
A0 = ~Megaphone % unused

I'm not sure where the names come from but these ARE indeed Goompa's moveset values. I confirmed that myself modifying his partner rank to Ultra and even checking the JP version too but no text showed up for it either. I'm not sure where the names come from honestly.

Also just a heads up, Goombaria as we know can't be used in battle at all due to her partner slot being completely blank for battle data. It's possible to mod it back in but the problem comes from the RAM her data would store to. It doesn't look like there's room or maybe there's more data that has to be altered for it to work properly, unfortunately. But she is technically possible if all the issues could be ironed out. — The preceding unsigned comment was added by Justin3009 (talk • contribs)

I see! I'll file it under unused text, then. Those names would be translations of the text I linked earlier. Not entirely accurate ones, either-- I think Clover tried to "localize" them a bit to make them fit with the English names. Odd that they wouldn't show up in-game, since many of the other unused Japanese lines do under the right circumstances. That definitely sheds a light on my hunch though!

I don't think Goombaria was ever intended to be playable. There's prerelease footage of her following Mario around in Goomba Village, but said footage also has Goompa and Goombario in their usual roles, and the fact that there's no battle data for her at all would indicate she was only there for story/tutorial purposes, kind of like Goompa in the final game. --Alley (talk) 20:33, 5 May 2019 (EDT)

TTYD dates

Thanks for adding these to the notes page. Did you also check the European version, and the demo versions? If not, maybe I can send you the files for those, or if you send me the script/method you used, I could extract them. --Hiccup (talk) 13:26, 27 March 2021 (UTC)

I don't have either of those versions on hand unfortunately. You could send over the files if you want (it's just the a and m directories AFAIK), or you could use the Python script I made, which is so short I can just paste it here:

##timestamp stuff for TCRF
format1 = [b"Mon ", b"Tue ", b"Wed ", b"Thu ", b"Fri ", b"Sat ", b"Sun "]
format2 = [b"2003/", b"2004/"] # there don't appear to be any files from 2002 or 2001
path = "path\\to\\extracted disc"
placeholder = {} # not used, meant to check that output is working correctly
wfile = open("path\\to\\output file", "w")

for root, dirs, files in os.walk(path):
    for i in range(len(files)):
        current_file = open(root + "\\" + files[i], mode="rb").read()
        for weekday in format1:
            pos = current_file.find(weekday)
            if pos != -1:
                wfile.write("|-\n")
                #placeholder[root + "/" + files[i]] = current_file[pos:pos + 24]
                buffer = f"| {root + '/' + files[i]} || {current_file[pos:pos + 24]}\n"
                wfile.write(buffer)
        for year in format2:
            pos = current_file.find(year)
            if pos != -1:
                wfile.write("|-\n")  
                #placeholder[root + "/" + files[i]] = current_file[pos:pos + 19]
                buffer = f"| {root + '/' + files[i]} || {current_file[pos:pos + 19]}\n"
                wfile.write(buffer)  

It'll spit out a table body (no header/footer) to a text file for easy pasting. It was meant to be a quick and dirty solution, so the code is kind of half-assed and only checks a single filesystem. If you can, you might want to rewrite it so that it checks multiple discs at once and/or adds columns to the existing table instead of writing a new one. For the US dates I just ran the script separately and copied them over to the Japanese file by hand with WinMerge. From there I did a basic search and replace to clean up the formatting. --Alley (talk) 01:25, 28 March 2021 (UTC)

Thanks. I may not be able to look into this right now, but I will at some point. --Hiccup (talk) 21:36, 31 March 2021 (UTC)

DK Prototype Photos

Hey how are you? I have some photos I want to add to the DK 64 prototype page but I really don't know how to add photos on here and plus I'm scared I might mess something up. Could you help me? - AnonymousJ aka AnonJ

Thanks!

Thanks for pointing out it was a direct copy paste from Grant. I was unsure, so it's good to know for certain now that this instance of "alot" is fine. 👍 TF2CutContent 💬 ✏️ 06:48, 13 April 2022 (UTC)

No prob. It's actually from here, which I did note elsewhere on the page but I dunno if you saw that. I should probably change the formatting a bit to make the source more obvious, in any case. --Alley (talk) 05:39, 15 April 2022 (UTC)

Donkey Kong 64 Prerelease page updates

Why Prerelease page of Donkey Kong 64 never got updated recently? --Chiizo (talk) 09:27, 23 April 2022 (UTC)

If you're asking about the tech section, it's because I got stuck and simply left it for later. Right now I'm a bit busy and don't have proper access to my TCRF things, so I can't exactly pick it back up on a dime. Whatever your "research" entails, the info sources are right there in the todo (and you can find them all in the references section, so no need to google), which should give you something to work with at least. --Alley (talk) 15:03, 26 April 2022 (UTC)

DKP portrait sprite

I have found portrait sprite from data. The offset is 0x24FE40. The sprite order is Candy, Cranky, Diddy, Dixie, Donkey, Ghost, K. Rool and Krunch. Candy's portrait

Change the player's voice to Donkey Kong
02003FA6:05
When changed to him, inaccessible Donkey Kong icon is displayed. (light blue frame). (mGBA only)
 
02003FA6:06
When changed to next number, the placeholder icon as K. Rool is displayed. Same with beyond numbers.

The data of Redneck Kong was removed from the game. While Candy Kong was not implemented in the September 7, 2001 build. Her voice is not implemented, so game causes crash. Therefore I can't check Candy's portrait via cheat. Can you check her portrait color? Windy (talk) 00:10, 12 May 2022 (UTC) (Minor edit in 07:08, 17 November 2022 (UTC))

The palette is at offset 0x1FC650 in the .rodata file (or 0x26C890 in the ELF itself). Here it is in image form. --Alley (talk) 11:21, 13 May 2022 (UTC)

It's difficulty to fit a suitable pattern except for the left and right sides. Can you ripping all of the portraits and upload it? Windy (talk) 16:17, 13 May 2022 (UTC)

Well, I managed to get it to load in-game. Here's the cheat I used:

Player 1 battle portrait sprite
0200B126:??
0000:0000002D Abs   SPR_CANDY_HEAD
0000:0000002E Abs   SPR_CRANKY_HEAD
0000:0000002F Abs   SPR_DIDDY_HEAD
0000:00000030 Abs   SPR_DIXIE_HEAD
0000:00000031 Abs   SPR_KONG_HEAD
0000:00000032 Abs   SPR_GHOST_HEAD
0000:00000033 Abs   SPR_KROOL_HEAD
0000:00000034 Abs   SPR_KRUNCH_HEAD
 
Player 1 battle portrait palette
0200B12A:??
0000:00000053 Abs   PAL_CANDY_HEAD
0000:00000054 Abs   PAL_CRANKY_HEAD
0000:00000055 Abs   PAL_DIDDY_HEAD
0000:00000056 Abs   PAL_DIXIE_HEAD
0000:00000057 Abs   PAL_DONKEY_HEAD
0000:00000058 Abs   PAL_GHOST_HEAD
0000:00000059 Abs   PAL_KROOL_HEAD
0000:0000005A Abs   PAL_KRUNCH_HEAD

FYI, If you aren't doing so already, you should use the symbol file I talked about in the Jul post (you can download it here, it's the .map file). It's basically a cheat sheet for the entire ROM, makes looking for stuff way easier. --Alley (talk) 20:24, 15 May 2022 (UTC)

Can you check the Lv1 item icons? I did see them from Spaceworld 2001 screenshots, a yellow-colored rocket boost with one layer. Also I did see the chained barrel item as well. Windy (talk) 14:15, 29 May 2022 (UTC)

I ripped the whole set and didn't see either of them. There are several icons that are just blanks, so I'm guessing they were either removed or not implemented yet. --Alley (talk) 06:09, 31 May 2022 (UTC)

The multiplayer is not implemented. So I can't check the circled 2/3/4-player cursor. Are these icons exist in data? What colors are them? 1: Yellow circle with red outlining. 2/3/4: ??? Windy (talk) 01:19, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

They don't exist, it's just the P1 cursor. --Alley (talk) 11:13, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

Farm 05 is not accessible via Debug, but its map is exist in the data. How to access to Farm 05?

Level in Debug (00-27)
0200A730:??
Cursor in Select World (00-1F)
0200C8FC:??

There's no code in the Debug list. (17=Farm 04, 18=Haunted 00) Windy (talk) 23:12, 8 July 2022 (UTC)

There you go: 083E3414:00000019

It doesn't add Farm 05 to the menu, rather it forces the game to load Farm 05 instead of Beach 00 (so you need to select Beach 00 in the menu). --Alley (talk) 09:00, 11 July 2022 (UTC)

Checked from the debug menu. It was an actually Farm Attract (R1-2)! So the Farm 03 and 05 were swapped in tcrf page, I did fix it. Cannot check the map tile from Farm 03 (Crashes if accessed from Debug)? Windy (talk) 11:40, 11 July 2022 (UTC)

The crash happens because of a bad instruction in the code that handles the player's starting position. Use 0800D73A:1C00 to simply NOP it out. --Alley (talk) 06:02, 13 July 2022 (UTC)

The data of instruments were mentioned in Jul post. I discovered various music file names.

three_beach_trk0~7
three_snow_trk0~5
three_lava_trk0~6
three_menu_trk0~6
three_bayou_trk0~4
three_haunted_trk0~5
three_castle_trk0~5

Is there music exist in the data other than menu? Windy (talk) 00:24, 26 July 2022 (UTC)

ADD: As it is an unfinished version, no number limit has been set yet.

Have 99 ghosts in Hair Raising Rescue
02004392:63

If number exceeds 99, the game will glitch or crash. Windy (talk) 08:36, 28 July 2022 (UTC)

I got the music, but I'm not sure what you want me to do with the other code... --Alley (talk) 04:39, 29 July 2022 (UTC)

The soundtrack is discovered for the first time in 21 years. Thank you for ripping. Windy (talk) 05:14, 29 July 2022 (UTC)

I saw these sentence, but what does it mean?

Sprites for an animated intro sequence, with Diddy and K. Rool flying around and/or chasing each other.

Are credits implemented in the 2001 build? Windy (talk) 03:36, 5 August 2022 (UTC)

That's talking about the four introanim files, which are a bunch of fairly large graphics that I assume were meant for the opening logos, or some kind of sequence before the title screen. Kind of like how Diddy flies around the Nintendo logo in the 2003 build, except I saw K. Rool in there as well so it obviously isn't the same animation. It's difficult to rip without knowing exactly which tiles go where. However, there do appear to be some function names in the code that relate to starting up a logo screen, so maybe it's possible to load them in-game? I would have to look into that though, and it could take a while (ASM hacks are not really my forte).

As for credits, no, it wasn't far enough along in development. The 2003 build has them because it was practically finished. --Alley (talk) 22:24, 7 August 2022 (UTC)

The plane's color and design were different. Also, the 2003 build has completely different tracks and music. It seems that the previous work has already been finished and another game has started. The game was developed secretly after Microsoft's acquisition, despite Rare no longer had the rights to the Donkey Kong. The development seems that only the basic elements were developed for about 5 months. There are a lot of glitches because debugging is not done. I saw "Terrible Game By" in the credits from Jul post. Windy (talk) 04:13, 8 August 2022 (UTC)

I said practically finished, not actually finished. Yes, they basically started over and there are definitely still bugs, but feature-wise most everything was implemented; it's almost the same game as Banjo-Pilot. It wouldn't make sense to have a credits list unless the game was close to completion, as people can still leave before the end of development (which could affect what names show up in the credits).

Also, your summary of the game's history is a little off. What happened was that the 2001 build was scrapped and/or overhauled into the 2003 version after it changed designers. Most of the work on the 2003 version actually dates back to 2002, when the MS sale was still being finalized. Since Nintendo didn't reject it right away, they kept working on it until around late 2003, when the second designer left. See Jens' comment here for the full explanation. --Alley (talk) 22:28, 8 August 2022 (UTC)

I already read it on July 29th, I think just an adventure mode is removed at time. (Since K. Rool's Gold doesn't work in 2001 build) My guess is that Nintendo refused to release it, so they overhauled it. Voice of 2003 version was recorded in late 2002.Voice info Rareware Central had various builds. We don't know until another prototype leaked or Nintendo officially release it.
There has unused Dark Tower object images.

OBJ_KEEP_K_POWERPOINT
OBJ_KEEP_K_SWITCH
OBJ_KEEP_K_MISSILE
OBJ_KEEP_K_MECHAHEAD

SFX_CMDY_IMPACT (What is this file?)

What's about various unused OBJ and SFX files? Windy (talk) 09:51, 11 September 2022 (UTC)

Your first link doesn't give any sources (and I'm pretty sure Chris Seavor didn't voice everybody, where did he get that idea?). The other one says right there in the thread title that it's a hoax, and it contradicts what Jens (an actual dev) said. I wouldn't trust either of them.

Anyway, I don't want to get too off-topic. Back to the game itself: I did figure out how to swap out an object's behavior, but all the objects I tested either did nothing of note or crashed the game. Here's the code if you want it, but it's not very useful:

Object modifier (gun turret in Beach 02)
020097B6:00??

Note that it won't change the object's sprite, just its actor. List of values starts at OBJ_PLAYER in the .map file.

Looking at the memory, it seems the Dark Tower objects are all present and implemented in the Dark Tower level, though I'm not sure how one would activate them (if they're even "dormant" and not just unfinished). CMDY_IMPACT = "comedy impact", i.e. a cartoonish sound effect for hitting/running into something. I feel like that sound would be used somewhere-- are you sure it isn't? --Alley (talk) 03:55, 15 September 2022 (UTC)

I was doing research through ELF Viewer. Is there secret characters in a sepia background? There are five reserved character slots. Windy (talk) 15:11, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

You mean the character select thing? I don't think so, VBA doesn't show anything unusual there. I can't get it to rip correctly outside of VBA at the moment, but I glanced at the tileset and didn't see anything that would be out of place there either. Where in the ROM did you find these slots? --Alley (talk) 06:15, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

I meant the secret unlockable characters in a sepia background data. Highlighting Dixie Kong when characters that cannot be selected normally.

Character Select (7 to B)
020000DC:0X

Player 0 to 6 can be selected in the menu, but 7 or higher requires a cheat, and only works up to B (hex). Windy (talk) 07:05, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

I don't see anything that suggests they're unused character slots. There are actually way more values that work past 0B (at least on NO$GBA), but it seems to be random which ones those are (eg FC to FF work, but not 40 or 7F). All they do is glitch out the menu and make it really slow, and once you get into a race the game just cycles through the same six characters anyway (FF is Cranky, FE is Dixie, FD is K. Rool, etc.). As for the P1 cursor position(s) on 07-0B, I couldn't find where the coordinates are stored, but even those don't really make sense with the rest of the image. So I'm thinking values > 06 are probably just garbage data and not worth noting. --Alley (talk) 17:29, 27 November 2022 (UTC)

How to load splash screen or disable debug mode? Language option does exist. Windy (talk) 04:40, 27 November 2022 (UTC)

Almost 2 months ago. I posted a message in its talk page. Windy (talk) 03:10, 20 January 2023 (UTC)

I know, sorry for leaving you hanging. I have been a bit busy lately, but it was more to do with a recent update that broke 3D acceleration in VirtualBox (which I use to do the DKP stuff, among other TCRF-type things). I've been waiting on a fix for just as long, but now I doubt that's coming anytime soon so I said "screw it" and downgraded. I'll give the splash/debug stuff a look when I have some time, though I can't guarantee results because it doesn't sound easy to do. --Alley (talk) 02:20, 21 January 2023 (UTC)