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Post by Dom Jurumela on Nov 18, 2020 12:58:14 GMT
Well, it looked you guys liked the work I did in my sprite hacking, so, for everyone who doesn't know much about sprite changing and rookies in ROM hacking, here is my way of doing it and which tools I use. Also, have in mind, it works for most GBA ROMs, not just Castlevania. So here we go: Tools (all free for use): Visual Boy Advance Emulator: www.emulator-zone.com/doc.php/gba/vboyadvance.htmlSnesGFX: www.smwcentral.net/?p=section&a=details&id=6523Krita image editor (OPTIONAL): krita.org/en/Advanced Palette Editor: www.romhacking.net/utilities/541/Tile Molester: www.romhacking.net/utilities/991/Tile Molester palette fixing file: www.mediafire.com/file/ljn1p9xd57a1zvd/tmspec.xml/fileAnd, of course, an image file with the sprite sheet you want to use Step 1: Adaptating your sprite sheet: - Have something in mind, GBA uses 16 color palettes and nothing more. That's why you may need to use color filters from Krita to do that. There is an option just for color filters in Krita top bar, with many different tools to reduce colors, when I used it, I used the filters mostly on try and error; - ROMs only accept sprite sheets of 128 pixels width. So, when you convert your sheet to a ROM with SnesGFX I HIGHTLY recomend to transform it into an 128 pixel width image, or else SnesGFX can split them oddly. Of course you'll have to move your sprites to fit it, you can use even the most simple image editor, as Microsoft Paint. Tip: It may be a good idea to let some empty space at the end of your image, this space may be useful to port some images you want to edit before inserting them in your hack.
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Post by Dom Jurumela on Nov 18, 2020 13:17:03 GMT
2- Converting your sheet to ROM with SnesGFX: Many Tile editors (like Tile Molester) cannot open or get sprites from images. Luckly we have SnesGFX, a program that changes images to Snes ROMs (don't worry, even being a Snes ROM, you can transfer your sprites to a GBA one with no problems at all. This is SnesGFX main screen, notice the configurations I use, I would recommend you to use the same as me. For starters, just click in the Browse button to look for your sheet image and select it. Now the Window should look like this: You'll have now three new highlighted options at the bottom of the window. The first one will show how will the sheet look like in ROM format, not a big deal. The second one, on another hand, is pretty important, as you must be sure your file won't surpass 16 colors after primary filter, if it did it, You must convert it to 16 colors or less with Krita or your sprites will glitch. If it has 16 colors or less, just click Save and your ROM shall be done, as much as it's palette file.
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Post by Dom Jurumela on Nov 18, 2020 13:50:49 GMT
Step 3: Inserting your sprites with Tile Molester: - We will insert our new sprites, finally. But first we'll need to import your palette. For starters, remember when I said Tile Molester native palette importer sucks. So, in the Tile Molester main folder, you must change tmspec.xml for the file you downloaded in Step 1. Now you'll click File->Open and select the Rom you want to change and do the same for the Rom file created by SnesGFX. Notice Tile Molester doesn't recognize .bin files at first, so you'll have to change the file type in the Open window for "All files". Now you'll have two open windows for the ROMs, which you can move: - They look kinda weird, don't they? At first, select the window representing the file created by SnesGFX, then click View-> Codec-> 4bpp planar, composite (third to the end option). I also recommend you to select View and mark the Tile Grid option. For the original ROM file window, just scroll it down until you find the sprites you want to replace and select View->Tile Grid again. Also, for both windows, select Palette->Import From->Another file and select the palette file created by SnesGFX (it should have the same name as the ROM, but with a .tlp extension). And so we would have this: - But oops, the original ROM sprites still look scrambled. Well, to fix this you must use the buttons marked by the red circle with math symbols in them. And now we have this: Way better. Notice everytime you get to a new group of sprites they'll become scrambled again. So, math symbol buttons and there we go! With that in mind you can replace your sprites copying them from the sheet and pasting them in the corresponding sprites for the original ROM, also, you can use the editing tools at the left menu to edit your sprites, if necessary. Pay attention on the Tile Grids as well (red squares) to don't mess your sprites up.
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Post by Dom Jurumela on Nov 18, 2020 14:25:26 GMT
Step 4: Palette editing. - First of all, open your ROM with Visual Boy Advance Emulator. Get to a scene where you would use the sprites you inserted (if they was the main character sprites, just start to play as him). Notice the sprites would be there, but the colors are scrambled, this is because we didn't change the palettes yet. Firstly, we must find which palette is the one we have to change. To do so, click in Tools->Palette Viewer: - At this new window, we can see every palette used in the scene we're playing now. So we just have to look for the palette corresponding to the sprites we've changed. Select the colors keeping in mind their codes (show by the red circles); - Finally Open Advanced Palette Editor and open your ROM with it. In palette loading options, select "Load by searching" and put the values of the sprite palette. Keep in mind the order of the color code is changed between Visual Boy Advance and Advanced Palette Editor, "12 34" becomes "34 12". In our example, the value "0D67" has to be changed to "670D". Put the values for the first three colors in "Actual Palette". Like this: - Click Search and them select "Load from offset", if the same palette as the emulator is show, great, you did found it (it could be useful to copy the vale in the box Offset(Hex) somewhere so you don't have to search for it again, I highly recommend to do so, even because APE have some crashing issues); - Finally, select the Import Pallete option (the palette with an incoming arrow, marked by the red circle) and select your palette file (you may have to change the type of file to find it). If it doesn't work right, you'll have to select the copy palette option (marked by the lime green circle), and select every bar below the colors in Changed Palette to the colors you want, manually. It sucks, but I didn't find any way to work around that issue :/ - Click on "Replace" and voila! This was just a basic guide, if you want to learn more, I suggest you to look for specific tutorials for each of the tools or to pratice with some trial and error.
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Post by xavierbelmont on Nov 18, 2020 19:18:30 GMT
Step 3: Inserting your sprites with Tile Molester: - We will insert our new sprites, finally. But first we'll need to import your palette. For starters, remember when I said Tile Molester native palette importer sucks. So, in the Tile Molester main folder, you must change tmspec.xml for the file you downloaded in Step 1. Now you'll click File->Open and select the Rom you want to change and do the same for the Rom file created by SnesGFX. Notice Tile Molester doesn't recognize .bin files at first, so you'll have to change the file type in the Open window for "All files". Now you'll have two open windows for the ROMs, which you can move: View Attachment- They look kinda weird, don't they? At first, select the window representing the file created by SnesGFX, then click View-> Codec-> 4bpp planar, composite (third to the end option). I also recommend you to select View and mark the Tile Grid option. For the original ROM file window, just scroll it down until you find the sprites you want to replace and select View->Tile Grid again. Also, for both windows, select Palette->Import From->Another file and select the palette file created by SnesGFX (it should have the same name as the ROM, but with a .tlp extension. And we would have this: View Attachment- But oops, the original ROM sprites still look scrambled. Well, to fix this you must use the buttons marked by the red circle with math symbols in them. And now we have this: View AttachmentWay better. Notice everytime you get to a new group of sprites they'll become scrambled again. So, math symbol buttons and there we go! With that in mind you can replace your sprites copying them from the sheet and pasting them in the corresponding sprites for the original ROM, also, you can use the editing tools at the left menu to edit your sprites, if necessary. Pay attention on the Tile Grids as well (red squares) to don't mess your sprites up. hey you used my Trevor Belmont Sprites to show how this works that's cool
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Post by Dom Jurumela on Nov 18, 2020 20:13:14 GMT
Step 3: Inserting your sprites with Tile Molester: - We will insert our new sprites, finally. But first we'll need to import your palette. For starters, remember when I said Tile Molester native palette importer sucks. So, in the Tile Molester main folder, you must change tmspec.xml for the file you downloaded in Step 1. Now you'll click File->Open and select the Rom you want to change and do the same for the Rom file created by SnesGFX. Notice Tile Molester doesn't recognize .bin files at first, so you'll have to change the file type in the Open window for "All files". Now you'll have two open windows for the ROMs, which you can move: View Attachment- They look kinda weird, don't they? At first, select the window representing the file created by SnesGFX, then click View-> Codec-> 4bpp planar, composite (third to the end option). I also recommend you to select View and mark the Tile Grid option. For the original ROM file window, just scroll it down until you find the sprites you want to replace and select View->Tile Grid again. Also, for both windows, select Palette->Import From->Another file and select the palette file created by SnesGFX (it should have the same name as the ROM, but with a .tlp extension. And we would have this: View Attachment- But oops, the original ROM sprites still look scrambled. Well, to fix this you must use the buttons marked by the red circle with math symbols in them. And now we have this: View AttachmentWay better. Notice everytime you get to a new group of sprites they'll become scrambled again. So, math symbol buttons and there we go! With that in mind you can replace your sprites copying them from the sheet and pasting them in the corresponding sprites for the original ROM, also, you can use the editing tools at the left menu to edit your sprites, if necessary. Pay attention on the Tile Grids as well (red squares) to don't mess your sprites up. hey you used my Trevor Belmont Sprites to show how this works that's cool Oh, yeah, I didn't tell you about it, sorry. Thanks for the sprites, good you didn't mind it
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Post by xavierbelmont on Nov 19, 2020 5:39:19 GMT
hey you used my Trevor Belmont Sprites to show how this works that's cool Oh, yeah, I didn't tell you about it, sorry. Thanks for the sprites, good you didn't mind it no I am pleased that you are using my Sprites to teach everyone else how to put Sprites into these games
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