Author Topic: About the .HRC file type...........  (Read 25396 times)

About the .HRC file type...........
« Reply #25 on: 2001-02-27 07:15:00 »
Awesome! Mind if I add your list to my docs? I'll give you FULL credit.

Reznor007

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About the .HRC file type...........
« Reply #26 on: 2001-02-27 07:29:00 »
Any idea which of those are the high polygon versions of Cloud and Sephiroth used in the final battle scene during the ending?

The SaiNt

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About the .HRC file type...........
« Reply #27 on: 2001-02-27 10:12:00 »
Like I said, the battle characters are in the not in the char.lgp files. So my guess is they're not of the HRC type.

Clone5

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About the .HRC file type...........
« Reply #28 on: 2001-02-27 19:21:00 »
Sure Sethron, but the document isn't quite finished yet.  All of these were determined from the .P files and descriptions.  I'm going to go through the game and see if I find something new.

And Ficedula.  How does each file determine which character it uses.  Does it go by file name (axdc.hrc) or by description its desciption (avawoman)? I remember in one of the field files seeing a section that had the descriptions found in the hrc files.


ficedula

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About the .HRC file type...........
« Reply #29 on: 2001-02-27 21:11:00 »
Not sure. On the one hand, I *think* the list of models used are limited to 8 letters per model name, which would seem to suggest they use filenames. OTOH, they do use names like "cloud", "tifa", which suggests they use skeleton names.

My bet is on skeleton names but I don't know for sure.


About the .HRC file type...........
« Reply #30 on: 2001-02-28 03:00:00 »
Reznor007: A personal guess on my part, but I'd bet that the battle models are in one of the files in the [Main FF7 Directory]databattle directory. Probably inside one of the .BIN files. Hmmm, I suppose The SaiNt might know from his examining of the .EXE.

The SaiNt: Hmmm, I remember saying that a few threads ago...  :wink:

Clone5: Thanks. My doc isn't finished yet, either, and I've still got a ways to go.

Say, that reminds me... Does anyone have any idea what happens if you switched 2 of the .HRCs in char.lgp around?

Ficedula: I'm inclined to go for file names, but I'm not too knowledgable about these things.


Clone5

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About the .HRC file type...........
« Reply #31 on: 2001-02-28 16:17:00 »
You can link two different HRCs together and when it calls one, it gets another.  I once did this so that every HRC was linked to show Cloud.  That was weird, to see Pres. Cloud jump into Helicopter Cloud as the Aircloud surrounded three Clouds.  Some of the characters that have a different number of pieces get a bit mixed up and are all screwy.  Linking them is much easier than renaming them because you can always repair the TOC.

[This message has been edited by Clone5 (edited February 28, 2001).]


The SaiNt

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About the .HRC file type...........
« Reply #32 on: 2001-02-28 05:46:00 »
Clone5. here's how I think it works.
In the exe file the files are referenced to the hrc files so sephiroth is defined as "Sephiroth" in the exe. Let's say the game want the field character Sephiroth to appear. The EXE files have reference of Sephiroth as BKHD.HRC so they call upon BKHD.HRC. Upon loading the HRC file, it reads the header section for the skeleton name. I think the skeleton names are kept in a seperate file (maybe the .a files) Then, it reads how many bones there are and prepares them. The it reads each RSD file that is referenced in the HRC file. The RSD files which reference to the .P files and .TEX files are than loaded in place. My guess is that they are arranged by the hierarchy system in the HRC file (root,hip,etc). This explains why you can easily change or swap the HRC files in the char.lgp or change the references. But when there are a different amount of bones or the bone structure is very much different, the external bone structure files(i suspect) will not have references to them so your characters looks screwed up.

I thought I said it before but I'll say it again. So far the battle.lgp seems to the equivalent of the char.lgp for battle characters. The .bin files like CAMDAT*.bin contain the character info like Str, Vit ,etc
What I further suspect is that the rest of the bin files will contain the prices of items and the attack of def values.


About the .HRC file type...........
« Reply #33 on: 2001-03-04 02:59:00 »
Clone 5: Well, it looks like I may not need your list after all. Still, if I do end up using *any* part of it, I'll make sure to credit you. Hmm, I seem to be missing something. How do you link .HRCs?

The SaiNt: Thanks for the info. You could be right about battle.lgp, however, why are there so many files? Is each battle file only a piece of the full model (like the .P files)? Where are the backgrounds and other location info kept if the battle files only have 3D model data? Also, I checked a couple battle files, and it appears that they are not compressed.
Perhaps, if the backgrounds aren't in the individual battle files, they're stored in one of the .BIN or .DAT files (scene.bin, perhaps?). Same with character info. By character info, I mean AI, abilities and attacks, perhaps a reference or two to its battle 3D model--that type of thing (not the actual 3D models). All the info for the 11 characters (the main characters + Young Cloud and Sephiroth) is in one of the .BIN or .DAT files so it doesn't have to be in each individual battle file.
Info for enemies and bosses could be in the battle files, and, if The SaiNt is right, the 3D data for *all* battle 3D models would be in the battle files. If so, I doubt that any other info besides 3D data (and maybe animations) would be in the battle files.
So where would it be? Well, we know that the game chooses which group of enemies the player will face a few steps before the actual battle. I think this could mean several things:
1. Enemy and Boss data are kept in the battle files, but only one formation per file. To illustrate my thinking, let's take the first scene of FF7. At first you can't encounter enemies there, but once you've fought the two MPs, and left to the next scene, if you go back the random battles will be (IIRC): (1) 2 MPs, (2) Guard Hound, (3) Guard Hound and MP. Now, suppose that the game has one battle file for the 2 MPs, another for the Guard Hound, and another for the Guard Hound and MP. If this is true, the game just randomly chooses from an appropriate group of battle files to decide who you fight next.
2. If #1 isn't true, then all of the enemy info for an area might be kept in a single battle file, all the data for various enemies, formations, and backgrounds. Each battle file would have a list of all the enemies found in it (with all of them starting out labeled as "inactive" via a flag or switch).
This would mean that when the game decides which formation you'll encounter in the next battle, it sets a switch or a flag inside the battle file that "activates" the appropriate enemies (or, it just removes their inactive status). The battle file's list of enemies is then reset after the battle is over.
3. If #s 1 and 2 aren't true, Enemy and Boss data might all be kept in one of the .DAT or .BIN files. That would mean that the battle files just know which enemies (and how many) to load (flags/switches again).
4. Same theory as #3, except it's not the battle files that load the enemies. Instead, the game engine does it.

I don't know much about the .DAT format, but audio.dat is like an archive that contains all of the sounds, so it wouldn't surprise me if they did something similar for enemy data.
We have 5 .DAT files to choose from:
enemy012.dat
enemy331.dat
kage.dat
mark.dat
Stage57.dat

Most of these files are pretty small. The two smallest (mark and kage) are LZS compressed, but still itsy-bitsy when decompressed.

My first thought about enemy012 and enemy331 was that they were the Emerald and Ruby WEAPONS. I thought this because I knew they'd been added to American and European versions of the game, so the programmers probably just tacked on the data for the two enemies without bothering to put them with the rest of the enemy data. There are a couple problems with this, though. First, one is more than 20 times bigger than the other--I'd expect their size to be similar. Secondly, it would probably have been just as easy for the programmers to put the data of Emerald and Ruby with the rest of the monster/boss info. After thinking it over, I've discarded this idea in favor of another.

I think enemy012 has all (or most) of the info for the bosses, and enemy331 has all the normal enemy info. Why? Well, first, the numbers (012 and 331) got me thinking. I know there's more than 12 boss fights, but for some (i.e. the Turks, Jenova) you fight them multiple times throughout FF7. The only things that change are their stats/abilities/AI. As far as 331, that sounds about right for the number of enemies in FF7. Doing some quick math, the Official Strategy Guide lists 264 enemies (including bosses) in it's bestiary, and it is missing a number of enemies, including ones found only in the battle arena, various other enemies that it forgot, and Ruby and Emerald WEAPONS (and possibly Ultima, too) who might not be considered Bosses by the game (normal battle music plays when you fight them).
If this hunch of mine is correct, it means that enemy012 holds data for 12 enemies (probably bosses) and enemy331 holds data for 331 enemies (the rest). Another possibility is that the two files hold the formations, not individual data. There are probably 331+ different formations throughout the game.

What about mark and kage? Perhaps my original way of thinking about Emerald and Ruby *could* be right, and it's actually these two files instead. They *are* both small and roughly the same size.

Stage57.dat could be the backgrounds. Like all the rest, just a guess.

What do you guys think? Perhaps The SaiNt knows something more about this from his .EXE research? I really am not sure about this, but I thought I'd share where my analysis has taken me. Hey, hopefully it's enough to at least get you guys thinking.  :wink:

[This message has been edited by Srethron Askvelhtnod (edited March 03, 2001).]


ficedula

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About the .HRC file type...........
« Reply #34 on: 2001-03-04 03:45:00 »
Whoa. Pretty comprehensive  :) I can't really contribute more to this, except that I *think* Kage means either "dark" or "shadow" in Japanese. Not sure, I'll check it when I get back to my room. Might or might not be significant.

The Skillster

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About the .HRC file type...........
« Reply #35 on: 2001-03-05 02:53:00 »
let me elaborate on stage57.dat:
stage 57 IS stage 57 , confused? u will be!
the game (at design level) is split into stages, my proof? open ff7 PSX disc 3, now look for the supernova (!) folder, if i remember theres a file called stage57.dat.
stage57 is the last fight scenes (maybe the boss fight with safer/bizzaro sephiroth, or the final, Final fight with sephiroth?).
thats solid stuff, not 100% confirmed but if you open the exe in a hex viewer and search for stage57.dat youll find it along with supernova data too.
see you all later in the week  :D

About the .HRC file type...........
« Reply #36 on: 2001-03-05 07:55:00 »
Ficedula: Thanks for the info. Perhaps that means kage.dat is the shadow data. IIRC, for most of the 3D models it's just a circle. That would probably make for a pretty small file. Good luck with checking it out.

The Skillster: Are you saying that the entire game is split up into 57 different stages, or just the battles, or what?


The Skillster

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« Reply #37 on: 2001-03-06 21:41:00 »
i havent a clue  :D
but it looks like that it ant be fights (as u pointed there r only 15 or so boss fights).
so im assuming that when you reach a major plot (flash) point, where certain flags/switches r changed in the game engine and u come to a point where u cant return to the previous state b4 the event occured (ie , the first visit to the north cave),
i would call that a new stage.

About the .HRC file type...........
« Reply #38 on: 2001-03-07 05:07:00 »
Clone5: I did end up needing your list. Came in quite handy too.

The Skillster: I suppose it's possible. Something like that would likely have a great deal to do with the .exe.


The Skillster

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About the .HRC file type...........
« Reply #39 on: 2001-03-07 14:14:00 »
i have a serious feeling that the stage57.dat is the data for the last fight the one with the vocals, dont u think so?
why? coz they had to add the loading for the extra soundfont! this would make sense to just tag on a file. if someone could interperate it OR compare it to the data files inthe battle.lgp to see if my theory is true? then we could find out some more about the battle format?