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[HelpMeHack] Weaken the B-check


smozoma

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Intro / What is this?

In short, someone (or someones) please do the relatively easy Steps 1, 2, 3, and 4 of this hack for me, based on my instructions below.

This begins a series of hack posts where I lay out how to help me with the early parts of discovering how to do a hack.

This series should train up a few guys to be great at investigating the starting stages of hacks to give me the info needed to complete the hack -- or to discover that the hack may not be possible.

Often these steps can be done in 5-30 minutes.

So I hope people will follow the instructions in these HelpMeHack threads in order to find for me the early parts of hacks. And then these people will have gained skills in order to be able to look into other hacks more quickly (or even come up with the basis of their own hacks).

The steps will be rated by difficulty:

Difficulty levels:
1. Total Beginner (anyone can do this)
2. Beginner (still easy, but might take some time to find what you're looking for)
3. Intermediate
4. Mad Skillz
5. You are Mark Lesser

For the Total Beginner level, it might take 30 minutes the first time you ever do one of these steps, but after that, it'll feel trivial and you can often do it in 5 minutes.

You can also try out Part 1 of TonyH's awesome hacking tutorial in order to practice up. It's basically Steps 1-3 from this HelpMeHack, but the 'answers' are already known.

So here is the first hack! I have several in mind, but this is as far as I got tonight.

Purpose of Hack:
The purpose of this hack is to make it so the B-check no longer automatically trips a player.

The B-check allows any player to knock over any other player. Technically, it's supposed to be a tripping penalty, but the refs rarely call it. I think it would be interesting to eliminate the B-check.


Possible Side-Effects:
If coaches can no longer do the B-check, they may resort to holding instead, and holding is super annoying.

Maybe if you manage to get the trip to work on a breakaway, there won't be a penalty shot?

Basic Plan / Why I think the hack may be possible:
When you play with penalties turned off, the B-check no longer works. So it should be possible to find the place where the game decides if the B-check trips the player or not based on if penalties are on or off. Then, hack the game so it thinks penalties are off at the moment a trip is attempted, so the trip doesn't work.

Hack Steps:

Step 0: Get the Gens ReRecording emulator

Expand spoiler to see my guide/tips for doing this.

  • Get the Gens ReRecording emulator (it's Gens, but with some hacking features added on),
  • unzip it,
  • run Gens.exe,
  • and configure your controller in it.

Step 1: [Difficulty Level 1] To find the address in RAM where the game stores the penalty on/off/no-offsides value:

Expand spoiler to see my guide/tips for doing this.

  • Run Gens Rerecorder emulator (Gens.exe). (Do not maximize the window)
  • Load the game ROM
  • Go to the team selection screen of the game
  • In the emulator, show the RAM Search window using Tools -> RAM Search from the menu
  • I think the best way to find the value is to assume the default value is either 0, 1, or 2.
    • Select "equal to" and "specific value" (enter the value "0" beside that) and hit "Search" to find all the current 0s in RAM.
    • then change the penalty setting in the game, and use "not equal to" and click "Search" again
    • then change the penalty setting back to the original value, and use "equal to" and click "Search" again
    • if that doesn't narrow the list down to just a handful of address lines, try it again, but using "1" instead of "0". If it still didn't work, then try "2". If that still didn't work, then my assumption was wrong, please let me know and I'll try to find it myself or think up a new plan.
  • Now you should have the list narrowed down to one address that changes between 0,1,2 when you change the penalty setting in the menu. We will use this address in the next steps. The address looks like 00FF1234 (but 1234 will be different… your goal in Step 1 was to figure out what 1234 is actually supposed to be :) )
  • Please post the address you found, so someone (maybe you) can do the next step.

Step 2. [Difficulty Level 1] To verify that you can "Hook" the address found in Step 1:

  • In the same folder as gens.exe, open hook_log.txt
  • Change the 6th line of the file from "hook_rd2 0 -1 -1" to "hook_rd2 0 ff1234 ff1234", but change 1234 to whatever it was from Step 1 of this hack.
    • "rd" means "read", it tracks when the value in address ff1234 is read and tells you what code in the ROM accessed it.
  • Load the game in the emulator
  • Turn on Hooking using the menu: Tools->Tracing->Hook RAM.
    • You'll see text along the bottom of the screen saying "RAM Hook: ON", or something like that.
  • In the game's main menu, change the penalty setting a few times.
  • Turn off Hooking by using the menu again: Tools->Tracing->Hook RAM.
  • Find "hook.txt" in the folder with gens.exe and open it.
  • Hook.txt should contain some lines that look something like this: [0F:ABCD] R16 = 0000 [FF1234]
    • What these correspond to are times when the game read that address.
  • If it only says MEMORY ACCESS LOGGING STARTED and STOPPED, then something didn't work. Let me know and I'll come up with something new.
  • Please post those lines that were in hook.txt from step h. in the thread so someone (maybe you) can do the next step.

Step 3. [Difficulty Level 1] Hook the address found in Step 1 while doing a B-check.

  • Follow steps 2a-d to enable Hooking.
  • In the game menu, turn ON (no offsides) penalties in the game and start the game
  • Play the game and do a B-check, knocking a player over.
  • Turn off Hooking by using the menu again: Tools->Tracing->Hook RAM.
  • Find "hook.txt" in the folder with gens.exe and open it.
  • Please post the contents of hook.txt and that will give me ideas for the next step in making this hack.

So at this point, I'll see if the contents of hook.txt look promising for the next steps of the hack.

Step 4: [Difficulty Level 1] Run a Trace of doing a B-check

  • Add a hook on writing to the check statistic for the Home team. This will help narrow down our search area. In hook_log.txt, set up the line "hook_wr1 0 ffEB56 ffEB57"
  • Load and run the game in the emulator. Use the home team.
  • Play until you have a B-check lined up (but not thrown yet) and press Esc key to pause the emulator, then F5 to make a quicksave.
  • Turn on Hooking using the menu: Tools->Tracing->Hook RAM.
  • Turn on Trace using the menu: Tools->Tracing->Trace.
  • Press Esc key again to unpause the emulator
  • Do the B check you had lined up, so it connects and knocks the player over.
    • (Note that the emulator will play slower if tracing is on. If you miss the check, keep following these steps)
  • Press Esc again to pause.
  • Turn off Hooking and Trace by repeating steps d-e.
  • If you missed the check, press F8 to load your quicksave, then go back to step c.
  • Please zip both hook.txt and trace.txt and post them as an attachment

I will inspect the trace.txt and the new hook.txt to see if I can figure out the B checking code.

Step 5: [Difficulty Level 3] Inspect the Trace to find how it decides to trip or not based on the penalties setting

Step 6: [Difficulty Level 3 or 4] Hack the code so it thinks penalties are always off when attempting a trip.

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HelpMeHack is an amazing idea. I don't wanna be a Debbie Downer, but

What are you supposed to do when say a 7 weight forward comes at you, and you are a 7 weight defenceman? I think you're trying to make it so poke checks won't affect the player holding the puck, but they'll just knock the puck loose. Thing is, I don't believe that's how it works when penalties are off. I could be wrong, but I think when penalties are off the B check just doesn't plain work.

Can anyone confirm that B checks still work on the puck when penalties are off?

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You can still knock the puck off their stick, but it's more difficult, you have to be really accurate. There was actually a time when some people didn't use the B check :D. I used to just block their path and often the puck would pop off their stick by hitting my skates.

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Let's get this part started, shall we?

Step 1: 00FFD057


Step 2:

MEMORY ACCESS LOGGING STARTED

[0F:79C6] R16 = 0000 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0000 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0000 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0000 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0000 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0000 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0000 [FFD056]
[0F:7BAC] R16 = 0000 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0000 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0001 [FFD056]
[0F:7BAC] R16 = 0001 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0001 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[0F:7BAC] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0000 [FFD056]
[0F:7BAC] R16 = 0000 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0000 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0001 [FFD056]
[0F:7BAC] R16 = 0001 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0001 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[0F:7BAC] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[0F:79C6] R16 = 0000 [FFD056]
[0F:7BAC] R16 = 0000 [FFD056]

MEMORY ACCESS LOGGING STOPPED

For step 3, what address do you want to hook? It looks like there are two places = 79C6 and 7BAC.

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Good stuff! :)

Step 2 was actually just to verify that the RAM hook worked. A practice step, basically. You can see that the value changes between 0, 1, and 2. The values [0F:79C6] and [0F:7BAC] are actually addresses in the ROM, the instructions that are reading the RAM address you hooked. They aren't needed at this point (because we aren't interested in the code that is changing the penalties option)

Step 3 is to use 00FFD057 again, but execute a B-check to see what happens. So you turn on the RAM hook before doing a B-check, do the B-check (knocking the player over), then turn the RAM hook off (in order for it to write the data into the hook.txt file).

Then with that data, I'll know where to look in the code to try to understand how it's deciding to use the easy B-check with penalties on, and the hard B-check with penalties off.

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  • 2 weeks later...
MEMORY ACCESS LOGGING STARTED


[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[01:3FDA] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]
[00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056]



MEMORY ACCESS LOGGING STOPPED


Note there was a lot more [00:EAE2] R16 = 0002 [FFD056] lines before and after, I just truncated around the one different value found.

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threads like this one make me happy. good stuff.

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  • 2 months later...

Thanks Raph

I got discouraged here because I was thinking too far ahead, when actually the next step is no more difficult than step 3. So:

Step 4 has been added. Step 4 will generate a code trace, in pretty much the exact same way step 3 was done. The combination of step 3 and step 4 can be used to inspect the code that executed by the game in order to try to understand how the B check works.

The trace.txt file generated will be quite large, probably 10-20mb. Please zip it and also the new hook.txt file and post them here as an attachment. The files will zip very nicely because they are very repetitive.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Your fourth step contains an error somewhere. This seems to be pretty straightforward to me, however I cannot trace the B-check. The home staistic for the home team's body check is NOT listed in the RAM search, so when I hook and trace nothing shows up.

I was able to get as far as Raph, and my file looks identical to his. After running many tests I can confirm that 01:3FDA is the address to signify a B-check making contact.

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Dang, ok, thanks for checking that (pun not intended).

Can you figure out the home check stat using the technique from Step 1?

What you need to do is just keep searching the list for "greater than" "previous value" after each check (c or b, doesn't matter)

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Nice, good job :D

Can you make a thread for how to do that and I'll add it to the thread guide?

Also, can you post the zipped trace.txt + hook.txt?

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  • 1 year later...

Coach delivers:

I don't think this has been posted.
Posting for future reference:

013FDC Change 66 to 67
013FE6 Change 67 to 66


The above enables the B check with penalties off...

I assume doing the reverse disables them with penalties on? Someone'll have to try

013FDC Change 67 to 66
013FE6 Change 66 to 67

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Doing the reverse would bring it back to normal.

Oh right.. haha of course

Hmm.. So maybe changing just one of the lines that Coach posted will create a no-B-checks ROM, should anyone ever want such a thing.

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