Darunia's Text Loading Wrong

[giadrosich]

I'm sorry if I'm always asking questions and annoying people....

 

I'm having a problem with Darunia, it's loading the last bit of his phrasing, skipping everything before it. I've looked into the hex editor at a clean copy vs. my edited copy and I don't see a difference. I've deleted the file on the rom and started it fresh, but it still does the same thing.

 

I have to open the door with Zelda's Lullaby to talk to him, but when I do, he just loads up his "after talk" text.

 

Example:

 

Clean Rom:

"Destroy the monsters in Dodongo's Cavern and become a real man! Then we can talk about the Spiritual Stone!"

 

My Text Edit Rom:

"Go to the Temple of Time and pull the Master Sword from its pedestal!"

 

Picture of side by side coding:

NOTE: Left is Clean Copy. Right is Edited Copy.

Start of dialogue. This is what should load.

 

Ending dialogue that always loads first without anything else.

 

I don't see any sort of difference with the coding. The only thing I can think of is maybe the bigger space in the edited rom? Would that affect it anyway?

 

I don't usually have a problem spotting differences with the hex editing, but this one I'm at a loss.

 

[Three_Pendants]

Are you using File 1 to test this? I just tested it and on File 1 he will always give his "after speaking to" text.

 

But I loaded up a clean File 2 and free movement'ed my way to Goron City and Darunia had his ordinary text. If it's File 1 it likely has something to do with the event flags already triggered by default of File 1 (wish I could find Event Flags, but I don't even know where to start...)

[giadrosich]

Oh, thank you so much, I agonized over that hex coding seeing what I could have possibly done. You seem to know all the best answers! I'm always terrified I'm going to mess up the rom somehow to a state where I can't recover, I swear I keep like 5 backup copies.

[Three_Pendants]

I am glad to hear that was the answer then. Hmm, perhaps I should explore the default File 1 in greater detail, see if maybe I can't come across some event flags.

[Three_Pendants]

Bah, it would figure... there's nothing special going on here (well actually it does illuminate one thing for me.) The game will Always give you the "after speaking" message if you already have the Goron's Bracelet, which makes sense. That means in this particular case there is no event flag at work, but what is at work is the game checking for the Goron's Bracelet which means that this is a viable lead in some respects. 

 

I should be able to set a breakpoint on this especially and move forward. But what other NPC's also react like this...

 

I know the Kokiri Emerald doesn't Appear to do all that much (it may make Saria's actor spawn in her home) Ah well. One step at a time would be best.

[giadrosich]

I suppose that makes sense, because we have all the items anyway. Hmm. But then if we enter the Temple of Time, should it have the "zelda captured" scene show up because we have the spirit/shadow medallions?

[Three_Pendants]

And there's the rub. The game isn't so exact with things like this and leads me to believe that there must be some sort of "event flag" system somewhere in the game's programming. Things like the text of the Kokiri changing, Various NPC's appearing, all of that is clearly not based on what quest items you have.

 

However some things that I've learned where the Quest Items are taken into account is songs. If you talk to someone in File 1 you will see they will say their "You already completed this part" lines and that's because the game is looking to know if you know their songs. Malon, Saria, Sun's Song altar all work like this. It may also be for this reason that Impa doesn't show up (as far as memory recalls) in File 1 after talking with Zelda. 

 

There's a lot of moving parts to this all it seems.

 

 

EDIT: Alright! Managed to find the location of the Sun Song's Altar learning. Now you can choose to learn any song (or obtain any quest item) you'd like from it. Downside is that everytime you speak to it the cutscene will repeat because there's some check it does to see if you have 8000 in your Quest item portion and if you don't it will think you won't have its primary purpose. Unfortunately I'm not sure where to look for that. The clues I came across all ended up in dead ends.

 

This is located in RAM at...

 

84E4E AND 84E8E as FEB0 (FEB0 is taking its cue from a curious address that adds FEB0 which just so happens to match the location of the Sun's Song quest item) Use the list from... http://www.the-gcn.com/topic/1867-zelda-oot-how-to-choose-which-items-quest-equipment-or-otherwise-you-wish-to-obtain-from-most-npcs/?p=28317

 

To find what you're looking for. The ROM locations will be given upon request.

 

EDIT 2: Bah! Nevermind. Apparently this is used for all quest items and is used in a manner to get to a specific value. Changing this changes the receiving of All Quest items.

[giadrosich]

Guh, now I'm getting a freeze at the guard to death mountain for some reason. Either he's loading up Impa's text or he's just freezing outright, I don't understand it.

 

I am using file 2 for testing all this.

 

After his part of reading Zelda's Letter, the whole game just freezes, and I'm not sure why. The text box ends with the usual 04 1A.

[Three_Pendants]

That is bizarre. I wouldn't have a clue as to what would cause that. Is the freeze similar to your freezes as what happened with Zelda? Or is it a literal game crash?

 

That it would load another character's text is odd enough though.

[giadrosich]

No it was a literal picture freeze. The sound would continue, but it would just freeze up. I think I might have found the problem, but I've ended his speech prematurely. I did get a softlock where stuff was still moving but he wouldn't continue speaking one time either. Not sure what caused that, but I must have fixed it.

 

I closed out the speech with 0B 02 after he reads the letter and he opens the gate just fine. But I'd like him to say a bit more. I'll have to keep messing with it.

 

As for him speaking Impa's text, I think that was the matter of the box not being closed properly. I think I'm going to have to ditch scroll of time because it continues to cause problems for me like this. He would say half of his line, then it would load Impa's text saying she taught the lullaby to the princess since she was a baby.

 

Just doing some quick editing, I've tried ending it with the 04 1A which leads to a freeze, I've tried just 02, and he ends the speech, but does not open the gate. The only thing that seems to get him to open the gate is the 0b 02, but there's still a box or two left in that speech tree. He still says everything after opening the gate though.

[DeathBasket]

I'm not familiar with how Scroll of Time actually works but it sounds as if messages either aren't ending correctly or are not being written with the correct lengths. It could also be another issue since afaik Scroll of Time does not handle certain characters in the text that may end up leading to problems if they are ignored. If you're working with the debug ROM then you could try out this which is what I use and so far has not given me any problems I recall, though it does not have a nice interface like Scroll of Time. 

[giadrosich]

I'm not familiar with how Scroll of Time actually works but it sounds as if messages either aren't ending correctly or are not being written with the correct lengths. It could also be another issue since afaik Scroll of Time does not handle certain characters in the text that may end up leading to problems if they are ignored. If you're working with the debug ROM then you could try out this which is what I use and so far has not given me any problems I recall, though it does not have a nice interface like Scroll of Time. 

Thanks, I'll be sure to shift through this and see if I can find the problem. I don't care about pretty interface, I want something that works. XD

 

OH thank you so much! Turns out there was a coding for <wait> where it wasn't supposed to be. I'll be using this from now on. Everything is fixed and perfect.

[giadrosich]

And there's the rub. The game isn't so exact with things like this and leads me to believe that there must be some sort of "event flag" system somewhere in the game's programming. Things like the text of the Kokiri changing, Various NPC's appearing, all of that is clearly not based on what quest items you have.

 

However some things that I've learned where the Quest Items are taken into account is songs. If you talk to someone in File 1 you will see they will say their "You already completed this part" lines and that's because the game is looking to know if you know their songs. Malon, Saria, Sun's Song altar all work like this. It may also be for this reason that Impa doesn't show up (as far as memory recalls) in File 1 after talking with Zelda. 

 

There's a lot of moving parts to this all it seems.

 

 

EDIT: Alright! Managed to find the location of the Sun Song's Altar learning. Now you can choose to learn any song (or obtain any quest item) you'd like from it. Downside is that everytime you speak to it the cutscene will repeat because there's some check it does to see if you have 8000 in your Quest item portion and if you don't it will think you won't have its primary purpose. Unfortunately I'm not sure where to look for that. The clues I came across all ended up in dead ends.

 

This is located in RAM at...

 

84E4E AND 84E8E as FEB0 (FEB0 is taking its cue from a curious address that adds FEB0 which just so happens to match the location of the Sun's Song quest item) Use the list from... http://www.the-gcn.com/topic/1867-zelda-oot-how-to-choose-which-items-quest-equipment-or-otherwise-you-wish-to-obtain-from-most-npcs/?p=28317

 

To find what you're looking for. The ROM locations will be given upon request.

 

EDIT 2: Bah! Nevermind. Apparently this is used for all quest items and is used in a manner to get to a specific value. Changing this changes the receiving of All Quest items.

I don't know if you watch speedruns at all or keep up with glitching, but http://www.zeldaspeedruns.com/oot/ has some interesting documentation on their findings. They usually complete the game with only spirit/shadow, so it might be a combination of both looking for the items as well as flags. RBA allows them to write whatever value they want to the C button, so there is a run where they write light arrows and such. I can't say I understand any of it, but you might find it interesting. Apologies if you already know.

[Three_Pendants]

A lot of interesting information. Some is plausibly usable. Some of it just confuses me to no end.

[giadrosich]

A lot of interesting information. Some is plausibly usable. Some of it just confuses me to no end.

Welcome to me (a glitcher) looking in on the modding community. Interesting. But confusing.