Shining Force: SF1 Editor

[projectego]

So glad to have you back, RC! Looks like the break did you a heckuva lot of good. What tipped you off about the battle exit functionality possibly being the culprit?

Have you been able to finish Breath of the Wild yet, by the way? Still waiting for my copy to arrive!

[rubixcuber]

I was looking through every possibly related thing trying to see what could be different or broken and I noticed in the battle editor that Shade Abbey didn't have an exit tied to its tile. And then I checked my documentation and saw that there were 3 different regions tied to that map.

Not yet. It's the kind of game that you can sink a whole lot of time into. I just come back for a brief visit every once and a while.

[projectego]

Ah, I see. Does that mean that Shade Abbey has had this problem present all this time, and it has just been a roll of the dice as to when it would strike? It's interesting that it presented in the very first and second Extended Characters playthrough for me, but seemingly did not occur for Lobo during his first two or more play tests.

If you don't mind my asking, RC, in which programming language is the Editor coded in? I'm very eager to expand my programming knowledge and your Editor has been a great source of inspiration behind this decision.

[rubixcuber]

If that is what's wrong, then it's been like that since I added the battle exits in October. It could just be a coincidence that that was wrong and it wasn't actually breaking it, but we'll see.

C++

[Lobo]

Welcome back home, Rubix!

I don't think I had playtested long enough since October.
Not until the first implementation of extended characters.

Don't know why I got past that point though.
Maybe it was random chance.
Maybe it was because I didn't change anything map related. Just took a fresh rom and edited characters, graphics, text and event stuff.

Last time I edited over Brothers Mod and the bug showed up. I can't remember to have edited either maps or battles, but it's possible I did.

[rubixcuber]

Well, we'll see once I fix it. Either it will fix the problem or it will just mean I've fixed an unrelated bug, ha. That would be a fair coincidence, but I guess we'll find out.

[projectego]

I'm very much looking forward to trying out the next update. Aside from what appear to be a few remaining bugs, the Extended Characters tools feels like its close to completion.

Do you recommend starting afresh with new ROMs with the next version of the Editor, or can we continue working with our pre-modded ROMs?

[Lobo]

Well, this will be a very quick test for us, as we all should have savestates just before going to Shade Abbey.

[rubixcuber]

Yeah, but I probably will have to add something to the debug menu to reset the battle exits or something because fixing the code for it won't restore the lost exits. I'll think of something. Probably just make it reload that one set from the original data.

Edit: Okay, here's my apology for being gone!

Shade Abbey issue is fixed. (There's an option in the debug menu to correct already broken roms)
You'll probably need to go back to a save state before walking out onto the world map. If you're already out there it might not reload the exits. But try it out either way.
Range bug is fixed.
And other things...

Update

v2.11.8 - 4/5/2017
[Characters]
* Copy and paste includes map sprite, portraits, and battle sprites
* Character ID is shown
* Viewing extended characters and then switching to a ROM without extended characters
won't leave it stuck on non-existant characters
* Empty item and spell slots are labeled (None)
* Delete button for item and spell slots
* Equipped items are highlighted green
[Monsters]
* Added link to map sprite
[Spells]
* Removed debug text which showed when selecting AI type
[Battles]
* Equipped items are highlighted green and labeled "Eq"
* Empty item and spell slots are labeled "No Item" and "No Spell" to distinguish
* Delete button for item and spell slots
* Exits can now properly handle maps with 3 sets
[Debug]
* Added an option to replace the missing exits
[Mechanics]
* Added promotion stat percentage modifier
[Ranges]
* Ranges past the first can properly select routines

Hopefully that gets us back into working territory again. Let me know if that does/doesn't work for you and if there are any other outstanding issues after applying that fix or something I missed in the recent discussions.

[Lobo]

Hooray!!!!!

EDIT:
Just tested and it's fixed!
Now, back to the testing job!


EDIT2:

[Mechanics]
* Added promotion stat percentage modifier

I think this one will be most apreciated!

[projectego]

Oh my gosh! Thanks so much for the awesome update, RC! There are so many enhancements my head is spinning! I'm going to download this puppy and check out what's new pronto.

Is it wrong that I... collect Editor versions?

Spoiler

Going to check this all out in full and report back soon.

Just tested and it's fixed!
Now, back to the testing job!

Great job, Lobo! So it worked fine using the savestate you mentioned earlier? I'll try my Rindo savestate, also. And have a good run through on a fresh ROM afterwards to see anything else crops up.

Outstanding work, RC!

Edit: Quick question regarding enemy battle sprite animations when using magic; am I correct in saying that all enemies, when casting magic, have their attack frames reversed? (Example)

By this I mean, is Attack frame #1 (typically x_2.bmp) displayed first and Attack frame #2 (typically x_3.bmp) displayed second? I ask because as the example video above shows, the Mage has his battle sprite attack frames played in reverse order.

[rubixcuber]

Well, the animations are defined per battle sprite.

The mage is sprite 11 which uses animation 18 for attacking and 19 for casting and uses two of the attack frames in their reversed order.

I couldn't say if they all do that without clicking through every animation, but I think that is mostly what they did to save space/graphics.

[projectego]

Just realised that I ballsed up the question. I meant to ask, is attack frame #2 (typically x_3.bmp) displayed first, followed by attack frame #1 (typically x_2.bmp) second. But you understood and answered the question. Thank you.

I'm not able to check in-Editor right this second, but is it possible to give all enemies a separate spellcasting animation? I have a new enemy character designed that is primarily a brawler, but would love to assign him a totally unique (or even reversed) battle sprites when casting magic. Is this currently possible with the Editor?

Also, the Shade Abbey bug appears to have vanished after applying the Debug fix. Awesome work!

[rubixcuber]

Definitely. In the fourth 'tab' of the animation editor you can assign animations to battle sprites.

So just go to the sprite number of the battle sprite from that enemy. Spell casting is set up in the game as weapon type 129. So you need to either add a set if it doesn't have an animation for 129 or change the animation number that's assigned to 129 already.

The third 'tab' is the enemy animation editor. So you can hit Add Anim and make a totally new animation and assign that number to the battle sprite. That make sense?

(And if I finish your 'block animation' request, that will be another hard coded special number. Like 130 = block animation or something)

[projectego]

That makes perfect sense. Thank you for your very clear explanation. Here's the enemy sprite that I was referring to if anybody would care to use it:



Fans of Golden Axe II might remember him as Death Bringer. I thought he'd make for a cool crossover villain.

I'm going to ask my artist friend Dan to design some additional spellcasting battle sprites, also.

(And if I finish your 'block animation' request, that will be another hard coded special number. Like 130 = block animation or something)

I cannot express how excited I was last night when reading this comment. I'm so glad I waited until this morning as I'm pretty sure that any responses that I would have made would have consisted of a cavalcade of fangirl squeals.

Do you feel that this is a feasible feature to add into the Editor? Have any steps been made so far? As mentioned before: I will happily pay my artist to design a 'block' battle frame for all characters (Force and Enemy) and release them for free, if that's of any help.

Just about to start a fresh playthrough using a brand new ROM as a base. I cannot wait to further test the Extended Characters options!

[Lobo]

Great sprites!!!

I feel Golden Axe has a lot more to offer, in terms of potential enemies and allies!



EDIT:
I couldn't get very far in my playtest.
Went to Shade Abbey, then Bustoke.

Finished the quarry battle and went inside the cave to get the Moon Stone.
But when I try to exit the cave, the game freezes.

Maybe it's another broken exit?
I don't know if the game handles it as a battle exit...but it's only the way out of the cave that seems broken.

[rubixcuber]

Hmm. It shows as battle exit 127 in the battle editor.

That may be another case of me missing a set or something. I'll take a closer look at that map.

Edit: Well, it's not a missing set. But I think something to do with that special 127 exit which acts as a teleport rather than leaving the current map. I'll have to dig into it some.

Edit2: Okay, I figured out how the teleport exits work. They need some special treatment as they basically create a temporary submap that loads a different return battle exit.

[projectego]

Good job Lobo and RC!

RC, do you feel that this is a problem present with all teleport exits, or just in the Bustoke Quarry? I haven't yet encountered the issue but I've not quite reached Bustoke yet.

[Lobo]

More important, is it an easy fix?

[rubixcuber]

Well, any teleport that is on a battle map I think. It looks like there might be a bunch in chapter 8 too.

It's basically the same as the last fix. I need to load the sub exits into the editor and save them. And then figure out how many of those are missing and add those into the debug fix.