[smozoma]

Here is how to allow the goalie to move farther under manual goalie control, both with AND without the puck.

Some background info:
- When I start a number with a '$', it's a hex value.
- When I start a number with '@', it's a hex offset.
- In hex, when a number's first digit is an 'F', that means it's a negative number (in this hack, anyway..). FFFF= -1, FFFE = -2...
- The position of the players is relative the centre ice dot (0,0).
- To the right and up is positive; to the left and down is negative.
- See the picture below for the locations of some lines

When the goalie doesn't have the puck, he is constrained to a small box around the crease, measured in pixels (although he actually can move outside this box, but his movement becomes extremely slow, about 1 pixel per second).
- Right side of box: $0024. The value is in the ROM at offset @00B632
- Left side of box: $FFDB @00B650
- Bottom of box for the upper-end goalie: $00E7 @00B66A
- Top of box for the lower-end goalie: $FF19 @00B674

When the goalie has the puck, the whistle is blown if he crosses a line near the top of the faceoff dots.
- The line for the upper-end goalie: $00AA @00D3EA
- The line for the lower-end goalie: $FF56 @00D3F2

Here is an example you might use:

--------------------------------
Make the box twice as wide for both goalies:
--------------------------------

(right side)
OFFSET: @00B632
OLD VALUE: $0024 (+36)
NEW VALUE: $0048 (+72)

(left side)
OFFSET: @00B650
OLD VALUE: $FFDC (-36)
NEW VALUE: $FFB8 (-72)

--------------------------------
Let the goalies roam farther towards centre ice, WITHOUT the puck:
--------------------------------

(upper end goalie)
OFFSET: @00B66A
OLD VALUE: $00E7 (+231)
NEW VALUE: $00E0 (+224, a little bit closer to centre-ice)

(lower end goalie)
OFFSET: @00B674
OLD VALUE: $FF19 (-231)
NEW VALUE: $FF20 (-224, a little bit closer to centre-ice)

--------------------------------
Let the goalies roam farther towards centre ice WITH the puck:
--------------------------------

(upper end goalie)
OFFSET: @00D3EA
OLD VALUE: $00AA
NEW VALUE: $0090 (between the faceoff circles and the blueline)

(lower end goalie)
OFFSET: @00D3F2
OLD VALUE: $FF56
NEW VALUE: $FF70 (between the faceoff circles and the blueline)

 rink_locations.PNG (116.21K)
Number of downloads: 44

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Notes:
Yes, it would be possible to add extra code to the game to get the play whistled down if the goalie violated the trapezoid rule (but without a penalty), but I won't do this. The AI goalie always rushes into the corner to get the puck, so this would cause a huge number of whistles without knowing how to disable that behaviour.

kind of funny: I spent sooo much time tracing backwards through code trying to find how to do this hack, without success ... then I got sick of it and just started looking at the very first trace point that used a certain memory location, and what do you know, that was it. Could have saved hours! I learned some stuff on the way, though, that might be useful some other time.

This post has been edited by smozoma: 10 February 2010 - 01:37 AM

[top shelf]

Another brilliant hack.

When you said you came across a few interesting things was just wondering if the following things are or could be possible?

1. Increasing or possibly reducing the goalie side-to-side movement making it harder to deke the goalie? (far too easy on Genesis but is certainly more difficult in the SNES 93 version)

2. Making the computer pull the goalie after just one goal rather than two

3. Further to this making the computer swap goalies if the starter is having a bad day.


Also any ideas if the scoring areas of the net work in a similar way?

[smozoma]

top shelf, on Feb 8 2010, 07:57 AM, said:

Another brilliant hack.

When you said you came across a few interesting things was just wondering if the following things are or could be possible?

1. Increasing or possibly reducing the goalie side-to-side movement making it harder to deke the goalie? (far too easy on Genesis but is certainly more difficult in the SNES 93 version)

2. Making the computer pull the goalie after just one goal rather than two

3. Further to this making the computer swap goalies if the starter is having a bad day.


Also any ideas if the scoring areas of the net work in a similar way?

Sorry, I haven't seen anything like that.
What I meant was I found things like where the player's current speed is stored, and the location of the puck. I think the location of the puck will allow me to find a way to disable icing.

[top shelf]

smozoma, on Feb 8 2010, 01:46 PM, said:

Sorry, I haven't seen anything like that.
What I meant was I found things like where the player's current speed is stored, and the location of the puck. I think the location of the puck will allow me to find a way to disable icing.

Well was just wondering if some of this could be done as would definitely improve the game. Had a bit of a go at this hacking without any real success (just some strange happenings) so not sure what is and isn't possible.

[smozoma]

top shelf, on Feb 8 2010, 05:31 PM, said:

Well was just wondering if some of this could be done as would definitely improve the game. Had a bit of a go at this hacking without any real success (just some strange happenings) so not sure what is and isn't possible.

Those will be relatively difficult hacks, unfortunately.

1. (make it harder to deke)
No clue if this is possible. AI code is a mystery. Making them move less on dekes would probably have the side effect of making them really slow on onetimers. I'd be more interested in getting rid of the falling over save on the walk-across move. Anyway, it's not that easy to score on dekes in '94, I find.. even the best breakaway percentage in Blitz is just 26%, and only one other person even has 20%

2. Making the computer pull the goalie after just one goal rather than two
Actually, i think this one should be possible, but i'm not quite sure what you mean. the CPU will pull the goalie if they're down by 2 goals near the end, but you only want it to pull him when they're down by 1?

3. Further to this making the computer swap goalies if the starter is having a bad day.
This is maybe possible, but quite hard. It would involve adding entirely new code to the game, since the game never swaps goalies. I did something like this when improving the checking code and fixing the 2nd-assist bug. Someone would need to figure out how the goalie swapping works..

[top shelf]

smozoma, on Feb 8 2010, 05:57 PM, said:

Those will be relatively difficult hacks, unfortunately.

1. (make it harder to deke)
No clue if this is possible. AI code is a mystery. Making them move less on dekes would probably have the side effect of making them really slow on onetimers. I'd be more interested in getting rid of the falling over save on the walk-across move. Anyway, it's not that easy to score on dekes in '94, I find.. even the best breakaway percentage in Blitz is just 26%, and only one other person even has 20%

2. Making the computer pull the goalie after just one goal rather than two
Actually, i think this one should be possible, but i'm not quite sure what you mean. the CPU will pull the goalie if they're down by 2 goals near the end, but you only want it to pull him when they're down by 1?

3. Further to this making the computer swap goalies if the starter is having a bad day.
This is maybe possible, but quite hard. It would involve adding entirely new code to the game, since the game never swaps goalies. I did something like this when improving the checking code and fixing the 2nd-assist bug. Someone would need to figure out how the goalie swapping works..

Regarding no2 - yeh I think it would be better if teams pulled their goalie when down 1 rather than 2 - more realistic. Ideally pulling the goalie when down by 1 or by 2. Weren't you talking about doing a hacking website before? Is that still on the horizon?

[CamKneely]

I think a better way to make the computer harder to play against is to "teach" them how to shoot more one-timers and try more cheese ramming. I'm not sure how we can code the brains of me, Frey, Bo, habs, Icestorm, etc. though...

[smozoma]

top shelf, on Feb 9 2010, 07:27 AM, said:

Regarding no2 - yeh I think it would be better if teams pulled their goalie when down 1 rather than 2 - more realistic. Ideally pulling the goalie when down by 1 or by 2. Weren't you talking about doing a hacking website before? Is that still on the horizon?

I finally have my own linux/apache server going, so I may actually try this now..

[trudatman]

any ideas on similar codes for SNES ROMs?

[shaftman]

This hack would be more do-able in SNES because the goalies don't chase the puck in the corners as much.

[trudatman]

let's do it, then! you start! hehe. seriously, if I thought I could translate this from Genesis to SNES, I would, but I am going to require major assistance. really, though... let's do this.