what do you know about FF8 (internal structure)

[G3nius]

Hi all!
I often read this forum, but post smth very seldom. There is a lot of information about FF7 and a few about FF8. I would like to know, what can you do with FF8 now (read, disassemble and edit models & locations, animation, scripts etc)?

Please post here links about these subjects, because it's too hard to find its.

Thanks.

PS Sorry for my poor English, my native alphabet stands far from latin

[stormmedia]

Well, I'd say that for someone whose alphabet stands far from latin you write english pretty well  .

Anyway,  there is indeed very few about FF8.  Personally the only thing I know about it is how to edit the midi tracks.  Unfortunately, I don't think anybody managed(or even tried) to decode the 3d models information or anything like that.

[G3nius]

stormmedia, thanks.

First, I'm interested in internal scripting. There is a lot of weird data in packages. For example, I have file named harata in main.fs, containing some interesting text info (scripting on english with japanese comments). I have a point, that this file isn't used in the game (maybe it used for compiling init.out or something else and was added to package by mistake). Then, some of mag*.0? (this is a mask ) files contain text info looks like scripts. But there are only two file with script-like data.

I can continue...

[stormmedia]

Hey, if you manage to somehow decode the data informations, that could be the beginning of FF8 modding.   I think this game would be interesting to mod since, if I recall correctly, the 3d engine supports some kind of skinning.  So we won't have to cut all parts like in FF7, so it would look a lot better.  Also the background are better I think and background filtering already have been added(by Ficedula I think).

Well I'm looking forward to see if you manage to decode it hehe.

[G3nius]

I'll resume my FF8 research after passing last exam. I should finish my graduation at university 15th of June. 

[halkun]

What would be cool is a dump of of the FF8 PSX bin file showing the directory layout.

The filenames have been deleted, but I'm pretty sure we can ID some of the files by content. Most files from the Psy-Q libs had a unique header. I'm guessing that the walkmesh hasn't changed much. Most likely is somewhat in the smae file structure as FF7, with battle in one directory and the field files in another.

Worth taking a look at.

[Jari]

Oh yeah, I forgot this topic.

halkun, would you prefer to have this in Tech-related? I can move it...

[G3nius]

halkun, is there only way you talk about?
I hope I never have to learn PS opcodes, x86 is much than enough.

*edited some grammar*