Author Topic: Final Fantasy IX: David Bowie Edition Version 2.0, now with Moguri support (Read 27774 times)

Caledor · « **Reply #25 on:** 2020-03-18 03:22:07 »

Clem thank you for talking about the Mene issue. To fix it, try dumping all the field scripts, with comments for readability. Then look for the dialogue that Mene says when there are no chocographs to be found. You'll see a few boolean vars like Chocobo_NoFindChocograph and Chocobo_NoMoreChocograph around there, used to trigger the dialogue.
Those must be coherent with the changes we made.

EDIT: The link below is the modified script for Chocobo Forest that should work with your mod (and mine: i applied the same changes to chocograph avaliability as you did). Since this comes from an italian script, compare it to yours and apply the changes i made. Also, remember to apply the very same changes to Chocobo Lagoon and Air Garden's scripts. That entire portion of code is repeated among all three. If you happen to make some tests, please let me know how it goes.

https://pastebin.com/6z1f4KZM

FFIXFAN · « **Reply #26 on:** 2020-03-18 18:20:04 »

Last Question hopefully? Do u have to advance the storyline to a certain point to be able to find the last 2 chocograph pieces?

Clem Fandango · « **Reply #27 on:** 2020-03-18 21:46:28 »

Finishing up Ipsen's castle should allow you to acquire the last two pieces. After you do that you can complete all of the Chocograph activities outright, outside of the shimmering island treasure of course.

Quote from: Caledor on 2020-03-18 03:22:07

Clem thank you for talking about the Mene issue. To fix it, try dumping all the field scripts, with comments for readability. Then look for the dialogue that Mene says when there are no chocographs to be found. You'll see a few boolean vars like Chocobo_NoFindChocograph and Chocobo_NoMoreChocograph around there, used to trigger the dialogue.
Those must be coherent with the changes we made.

EDIT: The link below is the modified script for Chocobo Forest that should work with your mod (and mine: i applied the same changes to chocograph avaliability as you did). Since this comes from an italian script, compare it to yours and apply the changes i made. Also, remember to apply the very same changes to Chocobo Lagoon and Air Garden's scripts. That entire portion of code is repeated among all three. If you happen to make some tests, please let me know how it goes.

https://pastebin.com/6z1f4KZM

Thanks Caledor, I'll give this a whirl and let you know how it goes.

Caledor · « **Reply #28 on:** 2020-03-22 17:03:45 »

Tested it myself after reaching that part of the game:
I have a Mountain Chocobo, 4 Chocograph Pieces, 16 Chocograph, missing Green Plains, and Mene tells i can't find anymore.

EDIT: But it keeps telling me i can't find more after getting HG3, even though i actually can (and just did), so gotta fix it.

Paste updated to fix bugs.
https://pastebin.com/mYThL3tF

Also this time i wrote only Main_Loop since it's the only function updated, and wrote comments in the changed parts

Clem Fandango · « **Reply #29 on:** 2020-03-25 21:46:33 »

Good stuff, thanks. Sorry it's taken me so long to respond, work is a circus right now and I haven't had much time to think about the mod. My hope is that I'll have some time to look at it this weekend.

Clem Fandango · « **Reply #30 on:** 2020-04-13 21:28:13 »

After a hiatus I've gone back to working on the mod a little bit, I've thrown together a new update (also updated the link in the OP):

https://mega.nz/file/1toxGDLB#C-zK5PwMoB0QwzcbRX0cNYhLnY00WeORZTB3T7uS_6E

(Note that there was download up for a few hours pointing at a 1.02 version, if you got that and haven't installed the mod before, grab this and install it instead.)

This is a fairly small update, I've fixed the scripts for Chocobo Hot and Cold so that Mene should now properly prompt the player when there aren't currently any available Chocographs to dig up. Thanks to Caledor for the info on how to do that, worked like a charm.

Additionally I've completely redone the scripting for the Quale fight. If I'm being honest, he was totally an afterthought in the first release and I didn't really spend a whole lot of time on him (IE, I literally didn't touch his script at all and just kind of shrugged). He should be a lot tougher now, far more than vanilla, but not impossible or anything. Hades is probably still the hardest optional fight at present barring Ozma.

Going forward my plan is to change up some of the encounters, specifically in Memoria. One thing I've never liked about the area is that almost every fight is against one big tough enemy, which is fine but causes certain attacks and techniques to wind up far more useful than others, so I'd like to add encounters that feature a more diverse array of enemies. Not entirely sure what it's going to wind up looking like, but I've got some ideas that might wind up being fun.

Clem Fandango · « **Reply #31 on:** 2020-07-21 00:47:57 »

I will also be adding smaller updates to the OP, so I'd recommend checking there to see what the latest version is.

After a long hiatus, I've just finished version 1.1 of FF9 David Bowie Edition! The download link is as follows:

https://mega.nz/file/59oAGShb#m6yORsBwFxBATzq4cEhycHburS2NykaoEc0tRv4l1pE

Little heads up if you downloaded this version before July 22nd, after I uploaded the mod I almost instantly realized an oversight and corrected it, reuploading the mod once I was able to. So if you got 1.1 before that time, maybe grab it again. It's a pretty embarrassing oversight but won't break anything and might not be obvious.

You'll also be able to find a link in the OP.

It should be possible to continue playing from a previous save, but a few things will wind up looking kind of funny. I'd recommend starting from scratch if possible, but no big deal if you can't. You can also start the mod part way through a vanilla playthrough but it will be weird and probably unbalanced, I don't really recommend it.

NEW FEATURES

- Memoria has been completely revamped, with new monster formations. The encounter rate has also been raised slightly, closer to what it was in the PS1 version. This is partially due to self-indulgence since I made a bunch of new fights, but also because I found it was kind of weird to be able to pretty well just sprint through the final dungeon with like two random fights total. Every area with random battles will have at least one new monster formation. I won't lie, some of it is a wee bit janky, but it's all playable and I think the new fights are fun to figure out.

- Skills have been changed for some characters, with a few new skills and some others shuffled around. For instance, some Thief Swords have a variety of buffs for their status effects and you can use Soul Blade to buff party members.

- There are a variety of equipment and item changes, some minor, some major, some more for flavor.

- A bunch of bugs and oversights in previous versions have been fixed, for example it's now possible to actually target dispel tonics on enemies, something that has been bothering me for weeks now! Hopefully I have not produced too many more issues.

So have fun, let me know if there are any bugs.

Spoiler: show

Clem Fandango · « **Reply #32 on:** 2020-08-29 21:35:42 »

Quick update in case someone reads this before the OP: version 1.12 is out and it fixes the issues that the mod was having with the update for FF9 that came out in early August. I'm still in the process of testing it, but so far I'm confident that it should be working properly, aside from of course the standard jank that comes from this mod of course. The new version can be found at the following link:

https://mega.nz/file/JowEFYhb#7XJLbrKokzqth5c2usSb_5esBY3HO12Ba4n0Qzy39pQ

There's not any real changes aside from the mod working with the new version of FF9. Shouldn't be anyway.

If anyone was waiting on this, apologies for the delay on it. The update came out immediately after I had finished a marathon of work on the mod and the whole situation of figuring out why it was broken wound up feeling more than a little discouraging. As far as I can tell it was some minor tweaks in the World Map settings (not the scripting, thnak god) that I had made ages ago that were screwing everything up. I've omitted those changes and it shouldn't really make any serious differences to the full product.

If anything isn't working as advertised or otherwise falls apart entirely (like with producible crashes) please let me know!

setafd · « **Reply #33 on:** 2020-09-01 13:30:55 »

This mod looks pretty interesting and I'm glad it's been updated to work with the new Steam release. Does it by any chance work with Moguri? I saw half a year ago someone had problems that he thought might be related to it, but I don't know if that was made certain

Clem Fandango · « **Reply #34 on:** 2020-09-01 23:10:14 »

I'm not actually too sure, haven't yet tested it with Moguri. If all Moguri is doing is replacing graphical elements, my initial thought is that it should be fine, but I'm not 100% clear as to how Moguri functions and what files need to be replaced when it gets installed. It's something I need to read more about and experiment with.

setafd · « **Reply #35 on:** 2020-09-01 23:18:16 »

Quote from: Clem Fandango on 2020-09-01 23:10:14

I'm not actually too sure, haven't yet tested it with Moguri. If all Moguri is doing is replacing graphical elements, my initial thought is that it should be fine, but I'm not 100% clear as to how Moguri functions and what files need to be replaced when it gets installed. It's something I need to read more about and experiment with.

My suspicion is that it's more complicated than that, because it uses Memoria to do whatever magic it's doing, but I have no idea

Tirlititi · « **Reply #36 on:** 2020-09-02 08:53:22 »

The latest version of HW tries to make it a bit more clear about Memoria's current requirements (in "Additional informations" when you save a Steam mod).
Basically, you must generate spreadsheets and raw assets, put the folder containing them in the directory of the game and then register that mod folder in Memoria.ini.

Moguri requires the modification of Assembly-CSharp.dll through Memoria and it would require it even if it didn't rely on Memoria, so it couldn't be easily compatible with any gameplay mod if there wasn't this system of registering mods in Memoria.ini.

Clem Fandango · « **Reply #37 on:** 2020-09-02 21:54:04 »

That's interesting. I've been mulling over looking into what exactly I need to do to make the mod compatible with Memoria since I started working on this, but it's not really ever been a big priority. I've got a few balance and testing passes I want to do on the mod to get everything right where I want it, but I think that'll probably be the next big step afterward.

Clem Fandango · « **Reply #38 on:** 2020-10-12 19:40:53 »

1.13 has been released. It's not a massive update, but includes some minor fixes and changes to monsters, mostly miscellaneous stuff in the early game. Most notable is that Lani can actually hit with Gravira now, somehow I managed to do what Square had done with Steiner's Thunder Slash, which is kind of funny. Some text that I hadn't properly restored when fixing the mod for FF9's August update has also been brought back.

1.13 can be downloaded here:

https://mega.nz/file/Mxh3RAQR#w1Y5hwBcOCbR8edikZki5v1dk9w9_9u4sUHi_U-p8Uc

Clem Fandango · « **Reply #39 on:** 2021-03-07 21:20:51 »

1.14 is now out, after a very long hiatus:

https://mega.nz/file/h8R1BC5R#v37UtBn3ktRqOtqVxxH5h98d93vqi1r9wIO2j8IMaPo

Other updates will follow, I'm in the process of going through the game and cleaning up bugs and such that I missed, as well as making alterations to battles that either don't feel all that good or fun. No doubt that like 15 minutes after making this post I will realize something that should have probably been included in 1.14.

Notably I'm going to start making strides towards getting the mod compatible with Moguri, since that really seems to be the way of the future and I think it's a mistake for me to neglect it up to now. I won't be releasing anything Moguri-compatible until I think I've got it working properly, so it'll probably be a while.

Zentrius · « **Reply #40 on:** 2021-05-23 01:34:30 »

are there any plans for support for memoria? been loving the hack, but the ridiculously slow battle start up makes this insanely frustrating to play.

Clem Fandango · « **Reply #41 on:** 2021-05-24 15:56:38 »

Quote from: Zentrius on 2021-05-23 01:34:30

are there any plans for support for memoria? been loving the hack, but the ridiculously slow battle start up makes this insanely frustrating to play.

That's what I'm hoping to do following the next update, specifically I'm really hoping to get it working with Moguri. It's a little slow going unfortunately, my work process with the mod seems to be brief bursts of ideas and productivity followed by weeks of distractions.

Also make sure you've got the Skip Battle Camera set to ON in the in game menu, it'll get rid of the lengthy camera sweeping at the start of most random battles.

Next update is made of up various tweaks with a few huge things (I've just up and got rid of Virus since it's not all that compelling), hoping to get some work done on it today. It's mostly just testing at this point.

edit: I wound up working on it for a while today, largely just fixing stuff that's been broken for a while. New download link is here, non-comprehensive changelog is inside:

https://mega.nz/file/osJCDTKJ#r58TKMOgv7_JZX6T12yuUD-fCQvtDFFXXiDiCshnVA4

There's still a couple small things I want to add from here, but I need to look into the feasibility of what I want to do.

FakerMaker · « **Reply #42 on:** 2021-07-05 22:02:07 »

Hey! Little late to this. Was wondering if there was a way to apply this patch to the original PS1 isos. I'm unsure how difficult it would be to do so. Thanks!

Clem Fandango · « **Reply #43 on:** 2021-07-07 02:29:09 »

It might well be possible, to be perfectly honest I never really intended a PSX version and haven't really played around with the Hades tool's features to know exactly how it works, though I imagine it's a question of exporting the mod as a PPF. My guess is that it's probably possible, but it might be broken in new and unique ways. If I can get a good chunk of time to screw around with it I might give it a shot at some point, unfortunately I haven't really had the time to work on the mod much in general lately.

Having said all that, I do recommend checking out the Steam version if you've got a chance, it had a fairly nice UI update last year which makes it look dramatically better than it did before. I wasn't completely sold on it when I initially played it, but it feels pretty decent these days and it's not dramatically different than the PS1 version. It DOES feature a speed up toggle and a config option to remove the slow camera rotation the opens most random battles. It's pretty nice.

Clem Fandango · « **Reply #44 on:** 2022-04-26 02:50:58 »

1.16 is now available: https://mega.nz/file/MppgzaiL#SGGMgoCDJgUx54PMVh9pZcjiUv6zL-3LArwGyiRndn0

It's not a massive change up, I wanted to come back and touch things up after not having really looked into the mod for a while. The download should have a list of changes, identical to the one in the updated OP. I want to keep working on some of the rougher edges as I see them, as I'm back to doing a playthrough after a long time away from it.

Couple things I should mention: using Memoria with this mod does appear to work as far as I can tell, though I should note I never did play through the entire game with it. It's been months since I've last messed around with it, I hesitate to say it's fully supported and you may run into trouble if you run it, though it seemed fine for me. Ozma definitely won't work with turn-based battles. I really enjoyed how turn-based battles feels with the mod, at least from the bits of it I played.

Regarding Moguri support, I don't think that it's particularly likely to happen at this point. From what I can gather, getting it working isn't a particularly simple process and involves the Moguri devs implementing support for DBE within their own project, so it's not just a question of installing Moguri and plugging DBE in. Quite frankly I don't think that there's anywhere near enough demand for this project to really justify that time and effort, especially considering the lack of sophistication in what I've done compared to a number of other mods. At the end of the day this was really just a thing I worked on for a couple years on and off for fun and I wasn't ever entirely sure I was ever going to release it to the public.

There's been some rumors lately about another FF9 release for PC based on an Nvidia leak, I'm not sure if it's a real thing that going to happen or what it's even going to look like, but if it happens and it is possible and not a major pain in the ass to work with, I might try to get compatibility for it. We'll have to wait and see at any rate.

Tirlititi · « **Reply #45 on:** 2022-04-26 13:42:37 »

I'll check what is the problem with compatibility with the Moguri mod but I would find it very strange if it were compatible with Memoria and not Moguri. I don't know what this DBE is about. (EDIT: Ow... DBE is the mod's name ^^')

By the way, the opening post has a huge "Final Fantasy XI: David Bowie Edition" typo :p

Clem Fandango · « **Reply #46 on:** 2022-04-26 21:35:36 »

Quote from: Tirlititi on 2022-04-26 13:42:37

I'll check what is the problem with compatibility with the Moguri mod but I would find it very strange if it were compatible with Memoria and not Moguri. I don't know what this DBE is about. (EDIT: Ow... DBE is the mod's name ^^')

I can't recall exactly what I had to do to get it working with Memoria and I'm not 100% sure I didn't break Memoria functionality in the process, as I didn't wind up playing through the entire game with it, just a few small chunks just to see how it was. It's been a long time since I was messing around with it but I think it was a question installing the mod as I normally would after installing Memoria, but I'll need to fiddle with it again to see. Whatever it was I did, I do recall trying to do largely the same thing with Moguri and didn't have a whole lot of luck.

I'm going to try to get back into it, it would be entirely on-brand for me to have made a mistake at some point during the process. I'd love to have Moguri support in particular, pretty much any time I read a post on other sites about people playing the Steam port it's usually about how fantastic Moguri looks.

Quote

By the way, the opening post has a huge "Final Fantasy XI: David Bowie Edition" typo :p

Gah. Oh god, I don't know how long that's been like that, it's giant and bold and I didn't even realize it. Dyslexia again strikes.

Robgatti · « **Reply #47 on:** 2022-05-09 23:13:50 »

Gonna be jumping in tonight, is there anyway to confirm everything is working correctly?

Really excited been searching for a reason to go back to IX.

Clem Fandango · « **Reply #48 on:** 2022-05-10 00:16:51 »

A really quick thing to check is whether Zidane has a Mage Masher already equipped, that's an early way to know how things are going. Generally speaking starting a brand new save file is probably a good bet, otherwise your inventory might have some things in it that it really ought not to.

However since my last post there's actually been a number of big changes and it's actually pretty easy to set up the mod with Moguri now, if you want to give that a shot. Just have to do the following:

1. Install the latest version of Moguri, the download link is as follows: https://www.moddb.com/downloads/mirror/216757/127/bfacb6ef7e75fa89cd9b57b3d09a2a23

2. Download and run the latest version of the Memoria patcher from this page: https://github.com/Albeoris/Memoria/releases. Note that when you run the patcher, Windows may pop up a dialog saying the file is unsafe; this appears to be a false positive and is probably not unexpected given how the patcher works.

3. Launch FF9. You should now see a different looking screen from what you would normally get with Moguri, what you'll want to click is the "Install Mods" button in the upper right-hand corner. From there, click the Browse Catalog tab and you should see the mod listed. Not everything listed is current available for direct download through the manager, but from what I can tell that will change soon.

4. Install David Bowie Edition and go back to the Installed Mods tab. From here you may need to alter the load order; so long as David Bowie Edition is listed above the Moguri files it should work just fine.

MASSIVE thanks to Tirlititi for getting this all figured out, none of this would be possible otherwise.

Even if you don't want to run Moguri for whatever reason, I'd still recommend doing everything here after the first step. Memoria is generally superior to the original engine at this point and it makes installing supported mods like this one way, waaaay easier.

I should note that there might be bugs, I've been testing it myself and had some other folks do the same and there have been some oddities here and there, most prominent one at the moment is that the area around Dali seems to occasionally lock up during random battles, but it's fairly easy to get to Dali with minimal battles and it's not guaranteed to happen to you. Once I've had an opportunity to test the fix for that I'll update this thread and the file within Memoria; from there it'll just be a simple matter of uninstalling and reinstalling the mod.

Last thing I'll say is that there will probably be a number of balance tweaks forthcoming (I'm not super into how the start of the game plays in retrospect), but otherwise everything should be playable and stable.

Robgatti · « **Reply #49 on:** 2022-05-10 03:38:13 »

Im not particularly worried about the Backgrounds, but is this compatible with the HQ Backgrounds?

Thanks again! (Have no issue setting up Mogiri / DBE with the steps listed!)

EDIT: Is this mod designed to be played in "Turn Based Mode" or can I leave the ATB as it is.