I build on the sholders of gaints. I originally came here because I wanted some help ripping the battle fields in FF8. There is a long story to that.
You see, when FF8 came out, I loved the story beyond words. Sadly, the magic system was *SO BAD* I almost didn't finish the game. (They gave up Materia for *THIS*!) I always wanted to re-tell the FF8 story end-to-end but mainking the magic system a side-thing. The plan was to make a 3d real time movie created from of the FF8 data. I helped Qhimm decrypt the FF8 models and tought how to do data visualazation with a few tools I created. Sadly, I have long lost my copy of FF8 PC and the PSX version has a horrably hidden filesystem.
The only thing I really do is read Japanese blogs and sometimes hear a whisper or two from some Squaresoft developers. I also had some contacts from Square-USA in Hawaii that poked me with a clue stick sometimes.
If anything, the only thing I do is come up with wild theroies or play the PSX version of FF7 VERY SLOWLY with the VRAM showing and watch how the system handles data. (I run in software mode at 1280x1024 from a save state). It's enough to get a frame-by frame play.
Another sad thing is my tools have to be re-created. I magrated to Linux a while ago and don't have my hacker's toolbox anymore. Not only that, the PSX disk will not mount proper under linux because it's written in mode 2, I also can't seem to rip the data correctly as Mode 2 data has larger sectors than Mode 1 (ISO-9660) causing the last 256 bytes of each sector to get eaten.
Also the only real contobutions I've ever done is made the baby steps into decoding the .a files waaaay back then. (Mirex then filled in my neophyte work I was doing and did all the heavy lifting) and decoded the FF8 models, but that was because I realized that the models were using quads, not triangles. It was Qhimm that told me that it was using PSX GPU Packet headers to orginaze the data. Something *I* should of reconized as I wrote the PSX doc... (Which makes sense, you can "preload" the data packets and and stream them to the GPU via DMA quickly as opposed to creating every packet on the fly and placeing them into an Ordering Table.)
Another dream is to re-create the FF7 engine and have it run on modern platforms. In a perfect world I would adore the ability to use data from either the PSX or the PC version. However, I bearly know C and use a graphics lib called "allegro" which can't do accelerated graphics. I can bearly open a file and read it into a struct. I can't do OO programming at all because I have difficulty with relational data. I'm also an innumerate and can't add numbers above 15. (I'm not joking!)
The only thing I'm really good is taking programs, blowing them apart, and looking at the fagments left behind. I have a slight (SLIGHT!) intuitive edge, however my therories are often quite wrong. Most of the time people think I know what I'm talking about and try my theroy, only to find I'm full of crap ^_^ and then work out on thier own how things really work...
For example ^_^
I once spoke with the Japanese fella who wrote the FF7 model viewer, he got the data from a friend who worked for square. When I asked him what the file format was, he told me, but it was in such convoluted Japanese I could bearly understand him. He said it was set up in "Data Pools" when one pool refered to another. I saved the explanation so I could translate it later, and never found it again.
I posted here that the models are made from "Data Pools" and for some reason, someone knew what I was talking about and was able to make headway into the .p format.
Where was I?
Oh, yea.
Anyway, if you want me to accumulate everything I have discovered or read or have blown up into one huge doc for refrence, I'll do it. "Everything you ever wanted to know about the FInal Fantasy 7 Engine, but were afraid to ask" ^_^ It wll be an inresting place to put my wild theroys and so you guys can can prove me wrong and tell me I'm full of it.
I'll accumulate what I can into an outline. I would like permission from the various hackers to be able to put thier data into my doc. I'll give proper credit.
If anything, we will have a base to which someone else can port the silly thing to modern platforms.
you're doing great work.