wboy
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Posts posted by wboy
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Peoples,
While admittedly a little later than first promised
, I am happy to bring you the news that NOSE has finally been publicly released!NOSE, the NHL Old Skool Editor can be downloaded from:
http://www.hexaddicts.com/nose
Please read the documenation contained within the distribution for more detailed information about installing and using NOSE.
Please post any questions, feedback, suggestions or bugs within this forum group.
Enjoy!
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one more day!
quick question, does it support snes?
Maybe two, or three days at absolute worst... I am still doing my best to keep it to one though. It's 1:30am local time for me , and I really should be getting some sleep....
No initial SNES support, and I won't be giving any timelines or promises for its full support just yet. More research too be done....
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If you have something for hard drives that aren't recognized by Windows because they don't spin correctly, that would be awesome. PM me if you have something for that.
Check your mailbox.
Just for the sake of it, what brands of drives that failed on you... my guess.... Seagate?
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I don't know the only good thing they did was add 4 player mode and and exit game
The genesis version also has four player support, you just need to use the team player adapter in controller port 1 (be it on a real console, or by configuring the controller options in the Gens emulator).
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I had a 2nd wave of bad luck this past week. My drive that holds all of my nhl94 data has decided to crap out on me. It has a bad block and won't spin correctly anymore. I haven't given up on it yet, but can't access the data for now.
let me know if you need some hdd recovery tools.
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Nope, don't even have an Xbox, there are certain people here (yours truly) that feel that the Xbox is a load of donkey crap. hehe, I don't mean to start a flamewar, or get off topic. I hope they make the same kinda hardware for the PS3.
Does anyone have this device?
http://www.mod-chip.com/en/actionreplay_max_new.htm
If you do, is it any good?
Well I don't own a XBOX either as I too am not a big fan, but am considering buying one only to make a retro emulation box to easily hooks up to a TV and gives a good picture, without the hassle to messing with PC video cards and the quality limitations I've experienced doing so.
While I do not own action max, the Genesis emulator of it (pgen.gamebase.ca) is pretty impressive, but as we all know has permance issues playing NHL94 at full speed.
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The SNES version does have way better graphics ...
I tend to disagree overall on the graphics side, I mean the SNES player sprites are just to odd/skinny with not as much of a shade depth look to them. The goalies look interesting, but a little out of place. Again, no lighting shading represented on the gloves/pads.
I feel the 16 color dithered player photos would look more life-like in 16 color grayscale like the genesis version, and the SNES title intro screen for 94 is just lame .
As for gameplay, hands down SEGA version for me. Shots in SNES seem to have a little bit more pepper behind them which is one thing I like.
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Just wondering if anyone here has used NeoGenesis (basically the GENS port for the XBOX) to play both the NHL roms or even NHL94 SEGACD ISO on their XBOX?
Interesting, NeoGenesis supports overclocking the emulated Motorola 68000 CPU, elimating excessive sprite slowdowns in Sonic 2. Wondering if this too has the potential to make NHL94 marginally smoother/eliminate any in game slowdowns?
Also, do anyone know if the emulator runs the right resolution in game to utilize the full dimensions of the screen. By this I mean there is no vertical bars on a 4:3 screen, unlike what you currently get when playing NHL games on PGEN for the PS2 because its sticks at the res 320x224, rather than switching to 256x224.
TIA.
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Just tested a little more. The byte (mention above) which controls the length permitted length of a fight seems to act basically as a "call/restart delay" for each rule in-game time seconds.
For example, setting the appropriate Offside call delay byte to 0F (15 in-game seconds) gives you a little more time to crash and bump players in attempt to start a fight when an offside occurs. A real shame again that 93 doesn't react as well as 91/2 to such after-the-whistle roughing turning into fights.
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Well, a bit of good news that could make setting your roms fighting rating to 100 for all players a fun thing to do.
If you search for the text "fighting", you should find the area of the rom that contains the penalty information. It should look something like the screen shot with in Evan's Penalty Editing page.
The byte before the penalty length, Hex 28 (before the lime green highlighted bytes on Evan's pic) seemingly controls the length of time permitted for a fight. Hex 28 = Decimal 40. If I was to take a guess, it gives you around 40 seconds (in game time, not real time seconds) to finish the fight.
If you make the value Hex 01, the fight is over before a punch is even thrown.
If you make the value Hex FF, there is more than enough time for two 100% rated thugs to beat each other till one drop.
I can confirm this find is also true for 91,92, and I gather it will also work for all roms in the series that have fighting enabled as they all basically have the same rule data structure.
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I decided to fool around with 93 tonight by using the editor to ramp up an entire teams ratings in particular attributes.
I took a default 93 rom and changed the values for Boston players so their Handedness/Fighting abilities where set to the highest Righty (Hex E) or Lefty (Hex F) Fighting rating (100). I also raised the aggression and roughness (12 digit) to Hex F for all players.
I then started a 20 minute demo game, boston vs boston, and let the computer slug it out (note, I set the frame skip to 8 frames in Gens to speed up the research). This game had 5 fights in the 1st, 7 in the second and 4 in the third, for a total of 16 fights.
I then cheated a little, and changed the fighting penalty to 1 minute to see if I could squeeze in more fights. All Hex ratings where left as is. Again, a 20 minute demo game was started. This game had 4 fights in the 1st, 8 in the second and 5 in the third, managed to luckily go into OT and get another 3 fights, for a total of 20 fights.
I then went back to editor, reduced all Boston players aggression and roughness rating to Hex 0, and also set their Handedness/Fighting abilities to the lowest Righty (Hex 0) or Lefty (Hex 1) Fighting rating (0). A 20 minute demo game was started. This game had 0 fights in the 1st, 0 in the second and 0 in the third, for a total of 0 fights. No surprise obviously!
I then returned back to the editor, and simply returned the Boston player's Handedness/Fighting back to the highest Righty (Hex E) or Lefty (Hex F) Fighting rating (100), still leaving agression and roughness set to Hex 0. Another 20 minute demo game was started. This game had 4 fights in the 1st, 7 in the second and 4 in the third, for a total of 15 fights. Nice to see the fighting was backing, and interesting, independant of the aggression and roughness(?) attributes.
From these results I think we can assume that the higher the fighting rating, the higher the chance that a fight can happen in game. The only minor problem with that being that all players are ranked as good fighters and can take a heap of punches, though the amount of punches one can take does get less the more fatigued a players is, so there where better endurance may become a advantage.
Also remember that these results where found using demo games, so I gather a few additional fights could be started by a human player roughing up the opposition. Though on that note, EAH91 & NHL92 seem a lot more susceptible to react to such behaviour than NHL93 appears to.
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Well the picture is greayly reduced in size and quality a bit for web sake.
PNG format is perfect for shots from emulators.
Perfect quality, no dithering/quality degrading like jpeg, and a considerable smaller file size in most cases.
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No actually the crowd in 98 is pretty bland. Only 95 I toned down.
really, I actually thought the ice and lines look a lot more bland compared to when I load the rom in gens!
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if i am not mistaken, yet another toned-down rink palette?
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Well as this forum is still without a post, I thought I'd post the info here even though it is completely valid/indentical within 96 & 97.
This post is somewhat of an extention for my findings/ramblings as found in my Player Ratings 101 post.
Most information found in that post also appears valid for 96/7/8 with a few minor exceptions. One being the supposed rating scales, and the other being the aggression attribute which seems to be somewhat incorrect within the original roms values!?!?
Dependant on the hex rating of an attribute within 96/7/8, the following info will give you general indication of what ingame attribute rating you could possibly expect for that player (slightly different to 94/95):
Hex 0, attribute rating will always range from 40 to 44 (maximum difference of 4)
Hex 1, attribute rating will always range from 44 to 53 (maximum difference of 9)
Hex 2, attribute rating will always range from 53 to 62 (maximum difference of 9)
Hex 3, attribute rating will always range from 62 to 71 (maximum difference of 9)
Hex 4, attribute rating will always range from 71 to 80 (maximum difference of 9)
Hex 5, attribute rating will always range from 81 to 98 (maximum difference of 17)
Hex 6, attribute rating will always be 99 (no possible difference)
Regarding the aggression (last) attribute, Hex 0 to 6 will produce a rating within the expected ranges shown above. Interesting, 96/7/8 all appear to use ratings of Hex 0 to F within this column. This is weird, as a Hex 6 rated player will rank 99 for aggression as expected, though a Hex 7 player will rate within the Hex 5 range? I'm not entirely sure what is happening here yet... a bug on the part of EA/THQ Inc?
Will look into more another time as its not that big of a deal. Just stick to Hex 0 - 6 to be safe as its is consistent with the other years.
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wboy is like our very own professor frink from the simpsons.
Well... okay... I guess I'll take that as I compliment!!
Trust me when I say such testing didn't take that long with the aid of the editor.
Like yourself or any other sane person, trying to do arrange data to produce valid results for such tests with only a hex editor would not only burn you out, but probably make your brain physically explode!!!
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Well after some considerable analysis of NHL94 and later rom years (admittedly made a hell of a lot easier using the upcoming editor to test values
), I think I've worked out how ingame displayed ratings work in reference to the Hex 0-6 scaling first used in NHL94, reverting from the original Hex 0-F scales used by NHL93 and earlier roms.I tested this by setting an entire team's players to the same rating... e.g. first all 0's, check the ingame ratings... then change to all 1's... check ingame rating, repeat... etc until Hex 6 reached.
Interesting, while all players where in theory the same, they did all potentially show some mild variances in their attribute ratings. These are not always consistent either! A player's overall and individal attributes rating may be "what you expect" for your first game, the higher for the next, then back to "what you expect"/got first game, then lower the following game?!?!
To prove this, take the original NHL94 rom. Play a regular game with DETROIT. Before the game starts, go to the team roster and check the starting line's player overall ratings. With some luck, they will match the documented overall ratings as found in the roster section (off the main site) of Evan's NHL94 website. Reset the rom, choose the exact same teams/settings again. Check the roster, and now, the overall rating for the players will most likey be different than before. Reset again, and with some luck, yet another new rating for the same players.
It doesn't appear to be completely random. Its as if there is three or four different typical scenarios that you will recieve. Every time you get the same scenario (testing with the same teams), you should also find that it is the same HOT or COLD players. Within the team roster, each player's overall and individual attributes talents will be exact as of the previous time you noticed you've had the same scenario. A predefined random possibly?
So why is this, and how come a whole team of players with the same hex attributes can have what appears to be quite different scalings in the same rating?
I have a theory that *may* be somewhat right, but for now what I can quite accurately tell you is this. Dependant on the hex rating of a attribute, the following info will give you general indication of what ingame attribute rating you could possibly expect for that player.
Hex 0, attribute rating will always range from 25 to 29 (maximum difference of 4)
Hex 1, attribute rating will always range from 29 to 38 (maximum difference of 9)
Hex 2, attribute rating will always range from 38 to 47 (maximum difference of 9)
Hex 3, attribute rating will always range from 47 to 62 (maximum difference of 15)
Hex 4, attribute rating will always range from 63 to 80 (maximum difference of 17)
Hex 5, attribute rating will always range from 81 to 98 (maximum difference of 17)
Hex 6, attribute rating will always be 99 (no possible difference)
From this I had the idea that the game possibly uses the Hex 0-6 rating to dynamically assign Hex 0 -F to the players based on potential ranges of the rating scale shown above. This could be done in attempt to simulate players having good (hot) or bad (cold) days and thus potentially creating a more random game.
Interestingly NHL95 appears to go by these exact ratings except for the Stick Handling, which is different to NHL94, as it supports Hex 0-F.
Checking the ranges of the assigned hex values of the Stick Handling attribute show this:
Hex 0, attribute rating will always range from 25 to 29
Hex 1, 2, attribute rating will always range from 29 to 38
Hex 3, 4, 5, attribute rating will always range from 38 to 47
Hex 6, 7, 8, attribute rating will always range from 47 to 62
Hex 9, A, B, attribute rating will always range from 63 to 80
Hex C, D, E, attribute rating will always range from 81 to 98
Hex F, attribute rating will always be 99
While I originally thought this confirmed my theory, unfortunately the ingame displayed ratings didn't seem to match the finding. By that I mean with the stick handling attribute set to Hex E for all players, I expected all the ratings to be within 92 and 98... the top third values of the range expected for Hex E. Unforunately that was not the case, as values ranged from 81 to 98. Either the displayed value may display wrong (highly unlikey), or doesn't make a difference at all if its Hex C, D or E.
Going back to NHL94, this may mean that a Hex 5 is a Hex 5, irrespective if the players is Hot and rated 98, verus the other who is Cold, and rated 81 for the same attribute. One attribute that could possible test this theory would be SPEED. If both players are the effectively same, are at different ends of the Hex 5 scale (e.g. hot-98, cold-81), but are as fast as each other ingame, then the whole Hot/Cold rating difference is really more of a misleading attempt by EA to make the game appear more complex that it is?
I'll look at hacking a rom soon that could test this theory, and I'll let you know when its done so I few people can test it and give me their thoughts/findings.
Doing similar tests with 96, I vaguely remember a scenario where the same "cold" player rated higher than the same opposings teams equivalent player who was normal. Mind you, I will check that again to confirm. If that is the case, the hot/cold rating may really mean noting ingame. Time will hopefully tell.
The end.
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Well, as a bit of a follow up to my other post which touched on handedness, here is the definitive facts about the handedness between rom years (genesis):
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EAH91 & NHL92
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Even values (Hex 0) for Righty,
Odd values (Hex 1) for Lefty.
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NHL93 & NHL95
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Even values (Hex 0,2,4,6,8,A,C,E) for Righty,
Odd values (Hex 1,3,5,7,9,B,D,E) for Lefty.
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NHL94, NHL96, NHL97 & NHL98
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Odd values (Hex 1,3,5,7,9,B,D,E) for Righty.
Even values (Hex 0,2,4,6,8,A,C,E) for Lefty,
As touched on in the other thread, in 93 and possibly all later years, the higher the odd or even handiness value, the higher fighting rating of the player.
Obviously EA flipped a coin ever year to decide if being left handed made you odd!
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Now before I start, I will admit I've found this out by using 93, not 94, but as the order of ranking attributes between the two versions appear the same, I am certain this info is also valid to 94.
So whats to report.... well I as doing a few edits and comparing the on screen ratings just to confirm the column order of ratings etc.
I was interested to find the way the fighting ranking was different percentages to all others.
Looking into it further has allowed me to find that the Handedness column also stores the supposed fighting rating of a player.
Hex 0 = Righty, 1 = Lefty, Fighting rating = 0
Hex 2 = Righty, 3 = Lefty, Fighting rating = 14
Hex 4 = Righty, 5 = Lefty, Fighting rating = 28
Hex 6 = Righty, 7 = Lefty, Fighting rating = 42
Hex 8 = Righty, 9 = Lefty, Fighting rating = 57
Hex A = Righty, B= Lefty, Fighting rating = 71
Hex C = Righty, D = Lefty, Fighting rating = 85
Hex E = Righty, F = Lefty, Fighting rating = 100
With this, that left the 12th digit not accounted for, being the one item that doesn't show onscreen in 93 (and possibly 94?).
After a bit of fooling around, Its appears to be Toughness... or should I say Crunch factor. WIth a team of 140lbs plebs and F set for the 12 digit (use 6 for 94), I managed to put 3 oppositions puck carriers out of the period in with three minutes of game time (with oncoming clean hits). So I reset to start a new game.. and within the first minute of game time, I again crunched the opposing puck carrier out for the period.
Interestingly, when I increased my players weights, it became harder to line up opposing players up as I lost some of the agility I had with my big hitting jockey sized players.
EDIT: Sorry, just found out that 93 (like 95) uses even numbers for RIght, odd for Left (as shown above), where 94 is switched around... even for left, odd for right.. why.... who really knows other than EA....
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Impatient pricks broke NOSE!.... WTF? sorry, but I had to have an attempt at that considerbly bad humor!
Yes, I know the wait has been long, but trust me it will be a quite feature rich initial beta release with many "no brainer" editing abilities.
For now, and possibly ever, the team numbers in the roms will remain the same, even with the extra free bytes I've been able to create.
In short, the extra free bytes are created by shifting particular data that lives after the original team roster data to the end of the rom, and changing referring offsets to stop the rom from crashing.
Even with all these extra bytes, there are still some limitations. 91 thru 95 don't seem to like more than 26 players (including goalies) per team. Having more stuffs up the stats tracking in game.
96 thru 98 seem to support upto 28 players with the way it stores player's default positions after the team name data. This may support increasing (say to 32?), and the engine may also support more players, but I just need to do a hack to test this which I haven't got around to yet.
So with these current limitations, the extra free bytes basically give you the ability to add more players to give all teams full rosters, and also cater for players with longer names than their predecessors.
While I did find all this out quite a while ago, it wasn't worth posting the find as its too hard to manage all the changes manually to make use of the bytes... and until I got the editor doing it seemlessly, I wasn't going to get everyone excited!
Admitted though, this is probably the one biggest, most practical feature of the editor IMO, as cool as you should find some of the other stuff in it...
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I'm been meaning to post about this enhanced version of Gens (by KanedaFr) for a while, but never got around to it.
Its basically a fully compatible version of Gens, with advanced debugging tools.
I personally do not yet know how to make the most of this tool myself, but if we as a whole are going to learn more about how the NHL roms works, this tool will most definately used to help us get there.
Read about and obtain it from:
PS. Evan, I think this mod deserves to be in the Downloads sections of you site!
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This reverts back to my other thread regarding how to get to the audio within NHL94. We know the tracks on the Sega CD version can be edited (been there, done that), but the actual in-game audio is what we're after.
Title and Organ music is the roms is most likely store in more of a MIDI based format... as somewhat confirmed with Gens' GYM export... of which you can use a utility to convert it to MIDI.
Sound effects on the other hand are probably stored in a PCM WAV format.. within the rom... mind you, thats a guess... I'm sure there are people at the Sega Programming Network site... or even the emu devs that could shed more light on this topic.
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I've just slapped together a few basic pages to preview some of the editing capabilites of the upcoming NOSE (NHL Old Skool Editor).
Initial support will be for Sega Genesis ROMS. Sega CD support to shortly (hopefully) follow, and possibly (and I do only mean possibly) SNES support.
I've stopped developing any more major features for the moment, and will heavily concentrate on doing the few last things I need to do before its initial public beta release!!! e.g. Minor bug fixes, release notes and basic instruction manual etc...
Without fail, the public beta will be released before the start of the new NHL season (Oct 5).
I'll post more details regarding some of the editors features in the next few days or so...
Doing all I can to release it asap.... atleast you now have the Oct 5 deadline to hold me to!
Question from an NHLPA junkie!
in NHLPA '93
Posted
Here's your fix junkie... freshly extracted and cultivated from the official source (the rom)....
nhlpa_nhl___93__u___rev_01________title_music.zip