Author Topic: [FF7PC-98/Steam] gjoerulv's "Hardcore" mod (v1.0.7.2) (Read 1091602 times)

royalmurder · « **Reply #1175 on:** 2011-11-30 13:22:58 »

So I know you guys are bemoaning the difficulty of later-game fights, and this is gonna sound pathetic...
but I'm stuck at the 3 soldier guys (Theo, Venus and Locke) at the box for keycard 66 the first time you go through the Shin-Ra building. I've been gathering notes on how they attack, and how to attack them, but they just do too much damage. anyone got any tips?

Vgr · « **Reply #1176 on:** 2011-11-30 17:10:47 »

Quote from: royalmurder on 2011-11-30 13:22:58

So I know you guys are bemoaning the difficulty of later-game fights, and this is gonna sound pathetic...
but I'm stuck at the 3 soldier guys (Theo, Venus and Locke) at the box for keycard 66 the first time you go through the Shin-Ra building. I've been gathering notes on how they attack, and how to attack them, but they just do too much damage. anyone got any tips?

^ This is the reason I stopped playing that mod. I'm stuck there too.

Livesey · « **Reply #1177 on:** 2011-11-30 18:40:51 »

Quote from: royalmurder on 2011-11-30 13:22:58

So I know you guys are bemoaning the difficulty of later-game fights, and this is gonna sound pathetic...
but I'm stuck at the 3 soldier guys (Theo, Venus and Locke) at the box for keycard 66 the first time you go through the Shin-Ra building. I've been gathering notes on how they attack, and how to attack them, but they just do too much damage. anyone got any tips?

Gather Loco weeds and have Barret mindblow the one that revives. I'm sure you've noticed that they counter attack everything. having everyones limit when the match starts is a good idea, have Cloud cross slash Locke or Venus hopefully it'l paralyze. this fight took me a long time to do too. The mod gets better later and better as in the fights seem like a challenge rather than just flat out impossible, this fights intimidationg because it feels like they get 10 turns to your one but this isn't the case later.

EDIT: Sorry I neglected to mention where you get Loco weeds. IIRC you steal them from the things that look like saws I beleive you can fight then on floor 66 or 65. Can't remember which one.

Hope this helps because the mod really picks up during Junon.

gjoerulv · « **Reply #1178 on:** 2011-12-01 00:56:07 »

Quote from: Livesey on 2011-11-29 01:47:01

...
EDIT: Okay so I just beat the plant with the help of quadra magic I was on my way out of the cave when BAM "IMA DRAGON" cometeo = Dead
...

lol I just realized I forgot to update those dragons in the caves. >< In mt. Nibel they are a bit different.

Livesey · « **Reply #1179 on:** 2011-12-01 12:41:57 »

I'm sure the dragons will be a fun fight when I'm ready for them.
And at least my failure brought light to this.
Oh also in one of the caves (might have been mime) there were alterations of the beach plugs a fight with them for me = instant death not sure if they are supposed to be there but I believe it would be worth looking into.

I.. Hate.. Aita... That damn Abode of the Dead I can't see any way past it, does it have an element? I can make cloud and Barret survive it but yuffie dies in one hit of it and Cloud and Barret are always in critical he also seems to use this move very frequently.
I thought the protect ring might help but it removes barrier.
also it seems you HAVE to dispel his Regen which means carrying 2 dispels with you or stocking up on holy torches because he always seems to remove the guy who dispels him (or I'm just unlucky)

My current strategy is having Barret white wind after yuffie dual casts demega full cure on him and cloud 4x attack and Phoenix when he needs too (which is usually after the second Abode of the Dead

Anyway any tips guys?

royalmurder · « **Reply #1180 on:** 2011-12-01 16:48:45 »

Quote from: Livesey on 2011-11-30 18:40:51

Gather Loco weeds and have Barret mindblow the one that revives. I'm sure you've noticed that they counter attack everything. having everyones limit when the match starts is a good idea, have Cloud cross slash Locke or Venus hopefully it'l paralyze. this fight took me a long time to do too.

The one that revives? You mean... one of them casts life? 'sob' why?! X)
also, I've noticed that Tifa's limits always hit the red one (Venus, I think it is) and he counters physical attacks with a physical attack and fira, so he does a sh*t-ton of damage.... so I'm just not using her limits XD
I'll try out the loco weeds though, should be rather useful

cheers!

EDIT:
Ace! That worked perfectly, cheers!

Livesey · « **Reply #1181 on:** 2011-12-01 18:36:48 »

Quote from: royalmurder on 2011-12-01 16:48:45

The one that revives? You mean... one of them casts life? 'sob' why?! X)
also, I've noticed that Tifa's limits always hit the red one (Venus, I think it is) and he counters physical attacks with a physical attack and fira, so he does a sh*t-ton of damage.... so I'm just not using her limits XD
I'll try out the loco weeds though, should be rather useful cheers!

EDIT:
Ace! That worked perfectly, cheers!

Glad to hear it, the game gets a little easier after that fight, though personally I struggled on the fights after escaping your cell.

I hope you have the minigames patch applied or else escaping Midgar will be hard, First time I tried it I didn't have the minigames patch , got to the end of the highway in about 20 seconds with no health and instantly died from the back attack.

Also for the love of all that is holy get the elemental in the building, it is invaluable in this mod.

Slade · « **Reply #1182 on:** 2011-12-01 21:24:36 »

Aita is pretty rough. Abode of the Dead has no element that I could discover. It does less damage the more members of your party are standing, so...there's that.

I'm assuming you're using the break 9999 patch in one form or another- if so, get everyone hasted at the start of the battle (I don't think that gets dispelled by Styx or anything else) and just blast him with Laser/Demaga as fast as you can, swapping over to Shadow Flare (or Cometeo) once he's down low enough. You've got to keep his regen dispelled, also, like you mentioned, and also keep everyone at full health (I had everyone at around 15k hp in order to survive a couple of hits). I didn't have W-Magic when I fought him, but using that with Quadra Magic/Demaga would be very effective. If he ejects a party member early, just reset, haha.

I ended that fight with a Shadow Flare from Cloud, with one party member ejected and the other dead. It was pretty tense.

Livesey · « **Reply #1183 on:** 2011-12-01 22:36:21 »

Quote from: Slade on 2011-12-01 21:24:36

Aita is pretty rough. Abode of the Dead has no element that I could discover. It does less damage the more members of your party are standing, so...there's that.

I'm assuming you're using the break 9999 patch in one form or another- if so, get everyone hasted at the start of the battle (I don't think that gets dispelled by Styx or anything else) and just blast him with Laser/Demaga as fast as you can, swapping over to Shadow Flare (or Cometeo) once he's down low enough. You've got to keep his regen dispelled, also, like you mentioned, and also keep everyone at full health (I had everyone at around 15k hp in order to survive a couple of hits). I didn't have W-Magic when I fought him, but using that with Quadra Magic/Demaga would be very effective. If he ejects a party member early, just reset, haha.

I ended that fight with a Shadow Flare from Cloud, with one party member ejected and the other dead. It was pretty tense.

I have W-Magic and quadra magic I think I need to get more hp or possibly dragonforce x 2 everyone, I'm trying it with one person ribboned maybe I could give a go at using other means of Status effect negation as to allow haste + regen and to an extent wall, I guess I'll try it after the midgar raid. Thank you for the tips.

Slade · « **Reply #1184 on:** 2011-12-03 08:49:57 »

Beat Theo, Locke, and Venus for the 3rd time.

It took awhile to figure this one out. The strategy that finally succeeded: Cloud with maximum HP, a Protect Ring, defending, with a mastered Cover on. Vincent & Red 13 (my mages) hit them with Quad/W-Ultima and
W-Summon Neo and ZERO Bahamut. That pretty much ended the fight.

They aren't affected by status effects anymore (except for Stop, but that seems to be pretty rare), and they counter counter attacks, so take your counters off. The purple one (can never keep that straight in my head, haha) will counter with Tornado, but Elemental-Wind in the armor of my mages took care of that.

Oh, and the purple one has a Ribbon, the red one has a Hero Drink, and the blue one has an Elixir (I think).

Stuck on Hojo for now. His 3rd form hits everyone with Stop and I didn't have anything to prevent it.

Livesey · « **Reply #1185 on:** 2011-12-03 14:24:54 »

Quote from: Slade on 2011-12-03 08:49:57

Beat Theo, Locke, and Venus for the 3rd time. It took awhile to figure this one out. The strategy that finally succeeded: Cloud with maximum HP, a Protect Ring, defending, with a mastered Cover on. Vincent & Red 13 (my mages) hit them with Quad/W-Ultima and
W-Summon Neo and ZERO Bahamut. That pretty much ended the fight.

They aren't affected by status effects anymore (except for Stop, but that seems to be pretty rare), and they counter counter attacks, so take your counters off. The purple one (can never keep that straight in my head, haha) will counter with Tornado, but Elemental-Wind in the armor of my mages took care of that.

Oh, and the purple one has a Ribbon, the red one has a Hero Drink, and the blue one has an Elixir (I think).

Stuck on Hojo for now. His 3rd form hits everyone with Stop and I didn't have anything to prevent it.

Doesn't added effect + time prevent stop? also I'm not sure if esuna removes it. if it does esuna-all added effect +time and thats kind of a work around it.

This is why I haven't sold any accesories.

Vgr · « **Reply #1186 on:** 2011-12-03 14:47:50 »

Hi all of you,
so far I see you all enjoy this mod a lot.
I would too, but I don't like playing on the PC much.
That's why I ask for permission to perfectly convert this mod to the PSX version.
This isn't a one-man job, so if anybody is willing to help me, let me know.
Here is what is needed to do :

1. Convert the animations of scene.bin to a plain PSX file.
2. Merge both kernel together and convert animations.
3. Modify the limits and their animations with LiBrE to a working LIMTMENU.MNU for the PSX version.
4. Include the scripts thanks to Makou Reactor.

That's it for the easy part. Now, there are the 3D models.

The PSX FF7 uses LZS compression for the 3D models. Some programmer (~~sorry to not being able to tell who, I can't remember exactly~~ Edit: NFITC1) made a program to convert the LZS files. While this might seem easy, it is clearly not. This needs to be in a specific file type before converting and I don't know how. So, unless some people can help me with this, the only issue is to use already-existing models from the game.

This really is the only problem so far. Putting the scripts in the PSX version require precise manipulation but is doable. The models though...

So, anybody willing to help me, let me know!

Livesey · « **Reply #1187 on:** 2011-12-03 15:14:17 »

Quote from: Vgr on 2011-12-03 14:47:50

Hi all of you,
so far I see you all enjoy this mod a lot.
I would too, but I don't like playing on the PC much.
That's why I ask for permission to perfectly convert this mod to the PSX version.
This isn't a one-man job, so if anybody is willing to help me, let me know.
Here is what is needed to do :

1. Convert the animations of scene.bin to a plain PSX file.
2. Merge both kernel together and convert animations.
3. Modify the limits and their animations with LiBrE to a working LIMTMENU.MNU for the PSX version.
4. Include the scripts thanks to Makou Reactor.

That's it for the easy part. Now, there are the 3D models.

The PSX FF7 uses LZS compression for the 3D models. Some programmer (~~sorry to not being able to tell who, I can't remember exactly~~ Edit: NFITC1) made a program to convert the LZS files. While this might seem easy, it is clearly not. This needs to be in a specific file type before converting and I don't know how. So, unless some people can help me with this, the only issue is to use already-existing models from the game.

This really is the only problem so far. Putting the scripts in the PSX version require precise manipulation but is doable. The models though...

So, anybody willing to help me, let me know!

I heard soewhere that the PSX version of te game is not as easy to modify due to the limited space ( I think) Wouldn't the new battles interfere with the conversion?

Vgr · « **Reply #1188 on:** 2011-12-03 15:17:23 »

That's a good point, of which I didn't think. However I'm not talking about space issue, as this is for my PS3, for instance, and space isn't really an issue. I'm not sure if the battles would interfere, but the major problem is really the models, although sometimes only a few stuff added in the scene.bin can result in an unplayable game. I hope NFITC1 could get around and help us.

Livesey · « **Reply #1189 on:** 2011-12-03 15:28:35 »

Hmm, I would love to help although I know nothing about modding / converting, is there any guides on this place to helppeople get started?

sl1982 · « **Reply #1190 on:** 2011-12-03 15:30:15 »

Space is an issue on the ps3. It emulates the psx, so if it will not work on the original psx it will not work on the ps3 either.

Vgr · « **Reply #1191 on:** 2011-12-03 15:36:30 »

You need Wall Market and Proud Clod to edit kernel.bin and scene.bin respectively.

Thanks SL, I didn't know that. So maybe we'd have to forget about new models. Already, new scripts and enemies take too much space for the PS1. This mod is fun BECAUSE of the new enemies, so we're not going to delete 'em, but their models could be a workaround. I remember Bosola making a patch for this.

Livesey · « **Reply #1192 on:** 2011-12-03 15:43:23 »

Quote from: Vgr on 2011-12-03 15:36:30

You need Wall Market and Proud Clod to edit kernel.bin and scene.bin respectively.

Thanks SL, I didn't know that. So maybe we'd have to forget about new models. Already, new scripts and enemies take too much space for the PS1. This mod is fun BECAUSE of the new enemies, so we're not going to delete 'em, but their models could be a workaround. I remember Bosola making a patch for this.

Maybe if the new enemies take up too much space is there a way to remove some of the more tedious random encounters to save up a few bytes? Also the new models of enemies are mosly resizing and recolours do they really take up more space than the model they are based upon?

Vgr · « **Reply #1193 on:** 2011-12-03 15:48:01 »

The models, yes they take as much if not more space than the previous ones.

Bosola made a patch where more space is allowed for modding and thus more scripts or enemies. Although I don't know if it'll work for everything.

Livesey · « **Reply #1194 on:** 2011-12-03 15:53:59 »

Hmm, I guess it's worth a try also another idea that may work is replacing some models for previously used ones, it won't be the same experience seeing as a lot of enemies would look like duplicates of another but I'm pretty sure it might work if there is too much space being used up.

Also I have been using Proud Clod as a reference to the enemies in this mod so I am slightly familiar with it well except for the AI script I took one look at it and well I was confused,
Wall I Market Will download and have a little play around with it.

gjoerulv · « **Reply #1195 on:** 2011-12-03 16:56:45 »

All new enemy models are based on pre-existing models. In every case it's obvious which model they're based on. The easiest, and most obvious workaround would be to change these enemies' models to the original ones (not all have new models).

What you can do in the scene is to reduce the more complex AIs and delete enemies that are never used. If I'm not mistaken the original scene size is 264kb.

Livesey · « **Reply #1196 on:** 2011-12-03 17:26:38 »

What's the size of your scene Gjoeruvl?

Also I just beat the 3 soldiers for the 2rd ime with the tactic listed above and wow it was a pretty tense battle I survived with only Cloud left on 2000 Hp.

Great fight.

Okay so I just tried Hojo cruised up to the 3rd form then he does combo and well I don't really know how to protect I know someone has to have cover so the MP attack doesn't drain a magic users MP but the damage and status ailmments are what are getting me, I'm going to try it with cloud holding ribbon Tifa with headband and esuna all and barret added effect time and maybe ribbon.

EDIT: It worked I just had cloud cover and counter everything healing him with full cure and reviving with angel whisper when needed.

gjoerulv · « **Reply #1197 on:** 2011-12-04 20:01:12 »

@Livesey it's 296kb.
It will not work on psx even if you change the new enemy model pointers and correct the animation IDs. I believe it needs to be exactly the original size. It's not as hard as it sounds as it's size will always be divided in blocks of 8kb.

Livesey · « **Reply #1198 on:** 2011-12-05 11:41:54 »

So in order for it to work we would have to cut out 32kb. Hm thank you for the info.

xLostWingx · « **Reply #1199 on:** 2011-12-05 21:40:30 »

Quote from: Livesey on 2011-12-05 11:41:54

So in order for it to work we would have to cut out 32kb. Hm thank you for the info.

If you end up attempting this, you should make a thread for it. A lot of people would be interested if they could play gjoerulv's Hardcore Redux for psx.