Let's Make a Hoax!

[Jason777]

Similar to what RustySporks did with his god-awful attempt at claiming that the Running Man could be beat (and how to access the "Sky Temple"), I have had this wonderful idea in my head to create a small modification and show it off to the world as some secret that has always existed in OoT (or MM if you wanna go that route).

 

Here are my ideas:

[*]"I obtained the Triforce!"

[*]"I found the REAL Sky Temple!"

[*]"I found the Light Temple!"

Out of those, the ones concerning the Light Temple and the Triforce would be the easiest to make-- I already have a map that resembles the Light Temple and the other would just take a small ASM hack that makes the user extremely overpowered.

 

I would prefer doing one on finding the "real" Sky Temple just to shove something up RustySpork's a** but there's no telling how long that'll take... I take my sweet time making maps.

 

The reason why I am giving this idea out to the community is... to help pass it off as the truth. I would post a youtube video and people from the site would just go to post "omg that is so awesome, I found teh light temple too".

 

It would be fun to watch what happens, yes?

 

EDIT: Also, guess what? The video won't have comment moderation on it!

[Conker]

Looooooove it.

[Librarian]

Genius 

 

 

Few minutes later...

 

 

 

 

Breaking News! Triforce obtainable in OoT 3d!

[xdaniel]

Hehe, the fact that you actually want to do these things in a ROM, as opposed to the Rusty moron and his video editing tools, is what I really like about the idea. Nice one

[HeavyZ]

This sounds awesome.

I can contribute with the comments and if you don't feel like making the puzzles and placing actors then I could do that too. I gotta say I've gotten much better at making dungeons since the Deku Tree in my project, I was pretty limited before.

 

Edit: Oh yeah or I could do the music

[Netsrac]

Not only should we comment on the video, but also make multiple videos showing that off so that people don't have any doubts.

[Mallos31]

And suddenly, we go from hoax, to full project  

[Jason777]

EDIT: Oops, I seem to have made an extra post. Please delete this.

[Secant]

>sees topic thread
>oh god what is this
>reads first post
>YES.

 

Jason, you have my modeling skills (for what they're worth) at your disposal; I'd be happy to try to throw together something for you to work with, just tell me what you need and I'll try to make it happen.

[Jason777]

I could release a patch for the modification and make up some fake complex description of what it does...

 

"While searching for remnants of beta magic spells in the ROM some time ago, I found the start of a scene file that is not referenced through any of the scene or file tables. Thinking that it was a grotto of some sort, I looked for references to the file via assembly lui/addiu or lui/ori pairs. I found only one result that made a reference to those offsets. Upon looking at the routine that contained these instructions, I discovered it to be an seemingly unused scene loading routine. The reason why I say it was unused is because the only time that the routine is ever called is when an specific event flag is set. Documentation from various Z64 modding sites inidicates that this event flag is believed to be unused. Thinking that I was smart, I simply made a small modification in order to have the event flag always be set. Not knowing what was going to happen, I played through a little bit of Ocarina of Time before I cam across a blue portal that had appeared in the Temple of Time as if from nowhere. I was 99% sure that this was the result of setting the unknown event flag. Upon entering the warp, the game... crashed. Discouraged, I decided to try to load up the hidden scene by replacing a scene in-game. The game crashed again. I came to the conclusion that perhaps the scene or map files were made up of an archaic format. Wrong. The map files were compressed. I simply uncompressed the map files, entered the blue warp, and... What? The place I entered was far from a grotto. Watch the video and see for yourselves.

 

You can download a patch that enables the event flag and decompresses the map files by clicking this link: ...."

 

That was only an example. Of course, if somebody else can think up a more convincing story than that would be appreciated.

 

Oh, and does anybody else have an ideas on what would be a really good hoax? I'm all for the Sky Temple idea but, like I said, there's no telling how long that'll take

[HeavyZ]

I like your idea but since you're asking.. what about different sword in a hidden temple? Like a sword modeled from the box art of either ALTTP, or Zelda 2? maybe even some other sword from one of the games earlier in the franchise.

[Spire]

This is fantastic. Of course, we'll need to delete this thread really soon for obvious reasons.

 

However, I think the very best hoax would be the Temple of Light & Triforce obtainment. Jason777, your mockup description of the blue light flag is very well thought-out. However, having an extreme lack of knowledge in that field, I suspect there may be some glaring loopholes to more seasoned hackers. As such, we must compile our knowledge in hopes of exposing the very perfect explanation for how this could be. You are on the right track.

 

You see, anything beyond the Temple of Light and Triforce could easily be written off as fan-made. The Ice Temple became the Ice Cavern, but the Wind Temple became the Forest Temple albeit not wind-themed at all. We could make a convincing beta Wind Temple, but even that is riding a fine line. I implore we go the Temple of Light route. Remember this hoax?

 

 

Even that lone image drove the internet nuts back in '99. That was back when photoshop and the internet itself were fairly new things (granted, they both emerged around 1990, but it took a while to really pick up).

 

Lastly, I would love to extend my hand as a map builder and texture maker. I feel I am very proficient in both fields and I know I could contribute well to this effort.

[HeavyZ]

You have a point Spire, but as I recall didn't most experienced hackers know off hand that the whole Ben thing was a hoax? I mean I wasn't a hacker then and me not being superstitious just took it as fake anyways. Regardless it gained popularity like wildfire.

[Spire]

Regardless it gained popularity like wildfire.

 

This. No matter what we do, some people will know it's a hoax. They won't be able to stop the masses from clamoring to the possible. People want to believe in such matters, so no amount of dissenting opinions will turn everyone away. Plus, BEN was a fabricated supernatural phenomenon, which both helped and hurt it depending on the beliefs of the viewer about such ghostly matters. This hoax is rooted in uncovering a previously unknown piece of Ocarina of Time. Jason's multiple failure attempts make it all the more believable. The blue light is instantly believable because such light appears when drawing the Master Sword.

 

If we can build a convincing Temple of Light that honors the aesthetic standards and choices made by Nintendo for OoT, we can convince most people of its authenticity. The question remains: do we make it a full or half dungeon? Furthermore, do we deliberately include 'outdated' text that clashes with the narrative of OoT, since the final product purported that the Triforce was split between Link, Zelda and Ganon? As such, there would be no need to visit the Temple of Light and no means of obtaining the full Triforce. This could all be explained by being compressed within this one file that Jason "unpacked and restored".

[HeavyZ]

Yeah I have no idea if we should make it a half or full dungeon haha.. I say half would be more believable, but then there's that side of me that wants to play a new epic dungeon. As for including out dated text I don't know.. depends when would the dungeon have been taken out of the game in the stages of development? Did they decide to take it out because there wasn't enough room to do the final animation scenes and all of that jazz in the game perhaps?

[Jason777]

With the mockup description I gave, I am completely relying on a gamble that someone with knowledge in MIPS assembly, yaz0 compression, and the various file formats Z64 who isn't already a part of the whole scheme doesn't come by the video and blow the whole thing up in our face. The chances of somebody with that specific skillset (and who isn't already a part of this site) appearing as if from nowhere are very slim. Also, N64 ASM hackers are a dying breed.

 

Without that skillset, exploiting the hoax would be quite difficult. That way, if anybody came by and asked where exactly in the ROM these "unused" things were, I could just give them some bogus (but tactical and intuitive) offsets for them to check out. Chances are that they wouldn't even have the ability to confirm if the discovery was a hoax or not.

 

Everything I have given within the description has no loopholes and is actually how the OoT engine works. The only thing fake about it is that specific event flag and the compressed map and scene files do not exist. That being said, it would still be a good idea to come togther and forge an explanation that is fool-proof.

 

I have one last thing to say: I don't want this project to turn into anything huge and beyond our capabilities.

 

What I'll be asking for is...

[*]A custom dungeon map

[*]A dungeon plan to go with it

[*]Possibly some new music (I don't know how I'll work this into the story)

After that, I'll do the rest of the work such as actor placements, assembly hacks, linking everything up together.

 

Spire, Naxy, and anybody else who is willing, you guys are free to collaborate and come up with a dungeon structure. Of course, don't work on anything until I have definitive idea on what all needs to be done and I have some concepts lined up. You may come up with concepts on your own to throw at me though.

[HeavyZ]

I think you're a cool guy and all Jason so don't think anything wrong when I say I Lol'd at the thought of someone actually busting you out over some youtube comments or something, and what you might think at that moment hahaha. Like all of those unlikely things happened.

[Jason777]

I think you're a cool guy and all Jason so don't think anything wrong when I say I Lol'd at the thought of someone actually busting you out over some youtube comments or something, and what you might think at that moment hahaha. Like all of those unlikely things happened.

I would probably be a sarcastic ass if that happens. I try not to lie, but if somebody calls me out on it then I just admit that I was lying in the most confusing matter possible so that people don't know whether or not to believe it.There will be no comment moderation on the video (makes the whole thing seem more believable) so I'll have to be prepared for that

[Secant]

Nice mockup for the description Jason, it looks pretty believable to me. I'm going with Spire's reasoning for the Light Temple, that would be the map most people would expect to be left over in the ROM. Just one particular thought for justifying this scene never being found before, would it make sense for it to be compressed in a format other than yaz0? I know spinout and ZZT have both written tools for decompressing the ROM and most people work with pre-decompressed versions of the game anyway, so some people might wonder why this was never found before.

[xdaniel]

...make the compressed files header-less or something, with no or no obvious attribute that'll identify it as compressed data? Would also kinda fall in line with 120's missing room header.

[Spire]

One thing to note: whoever posts this to youtube should not be a known affiliate of a Zelda modding forum. If your presence [Jason] on youtube is often, or even slightly associated with the GCN this could bust.

 

However, the GCN is also known for being a hub for Zelda hacking and ROM research, not just modding. I guess this point is moot.

[Agnostic Priest]

I can do it, im little known in the modding community

[Spire]

You just want to take credit. Whoever posts it needs to have formidable knowledge of Zelda hacking. I currently nominate Jason if he is not known on youtube for modding Zelda.

[Kargaroc]

I suggest that we aim for a more Zelda 64 kind of style seen in old screens, since it would fit in line with the thing about the archaic compression format, the fact that it's not referenced at all (amazingly the code for the scene player is still there!), and in general the fans expectation.  I mean, there are screens of the area with the Triforce.  I'd guess that's what most people think when they think "OoT beta".  So that's what they'd be expecting.

 

Also, if we go the Zelda 64 route, we shold limit ourselves to what could be done with the old Fast3D microcode, or at least give it the look of the old Fast3D rooms.

Unfortunately that would require redoing any pre-built maps, either from scratch or simplifying the geometry of an existing one.

But I really like this idea of creating a Zelda 64 esque hoax

[xdaniel]

I don't think there's any way to discern Fast3D and F3DEX2 just from the visuals, it's mainly technical differences (ex. vertex cache, triangle instructions)... although, granted, I'm not sure about possible polygon counts per frame. Those should probably be considered, yeah. Besides that, one of the most impressive things the N64 has - the combiner with its multitexturing and colorization and all that stuff - is actually even Ucode-independent. Hell, I had multitexturing going in Super Mario 64 once, just to prove it works

 

But regardless of that, there is something about the look of old Zelda 64 screenshots, tho, for sure. That's certainly something to emulate if we go in that direction.