Yet another animation insertion question

[The Iron Rose]

Hey, so I've been trying to import some custom animations for my FE7 game, and unfortunately, while I managed to import the animation with FEditor, have a working script, have all the images, et cetera et cetera, I'm having a little bit of trouble with actually getting it to be in the game itself. What I did was I increased the Max Index for animations, but unfortunately, I uh, can't figure out how to tell the Nightmare to USE the animations past the max index or 0xA2. Essentially, under the animation played category, which is the one I gather I need to edit, there's nothing past 0xA1. While I could just overwrite another animation, I'd rather not in case it ended up being critical in game. So in that case, how then would I set it so that Nightmare can select indexes past, in FE7's case, 0xA1? I tried just editing the animation.txt list, which didn't do anything, though I didn't exactly expect it to, given it's a txt file. I honestly I know basically nothing about increasing data to work with or doing any kind of beyond basic hacking or modding, so any help would be appreciated.

Also question on animation etiquette. Is it okay to use others' work without their permission for personal use only? I'm not planning on uploading anything, and I'd never do that without contacting someone first, but if I'm just planning on using animations/sprites/whatever for my own personal stuff, can I just download animations without gaining permission first? I'd assume yes, seeing as most animations are publicly available, but I thought it prudent to check first.

Thanks for any assistance!

E: So it's entirely possible I'm also screwing up actually importing the custom animation as well, which is entirely possible. I have all the frames, as well as the script in a .txt file in one folder. I hit the "Load From Script" button in FEditor Adv, load the script, and then save the file in a new folder. It tells me "Animation Saved!"

Then I go over to Class Animation Manager, bump the Max Index up by one, go to the new opened index, and import the animation. I enter a name for it, save, close the editor.

The new animation shows up in the animation pointer table with nothing in the header, mode divider, Frame Data, Left and Right X/Y Positions, and Pointer.

I haven't a clue what any of those things mean.

Assuming I want to tie the new animation to a class, I know I use the custom battle animation module to set up the new animation, with the problem being that nothing past 0xA2 shows up.

What else should I/do I need to do?

Thank you again!

Edited August 20, 2012 by The Iron Rose

[shadowofchaos]

If you want to use the Animation Module for it to use anything higher than 0xA2, you will have to edit the nightmare module and the associated text files with it.

Or you could manually edit it with a Hex editor by going to where you pointed at and entering the hex value.

I'm sleepy, so maybe I'll take screenshots tomorrow.

As for using animations, you're free to download it to your computer and load it onto a ROM to see it. No one will stop you. It's just when you use it for a hack or public work of your own that people take issues with it.

[The Iron Rose]

Figured out how to get it past 0xA2. Unfortunately, expanding the Animation List, which I tried before I posted (including the number of entries at the top of the file) didn't seem to do much of anything, so I just changed the relevant box to be an editbox, rather than a drop down menu. Still, it seemed to fix my problem, though of course the pallet is an issue. Regardless, thanks for your help!

E: And duh, fixed the animation list. All fine now!

E2: Okay, second problem.

So for several of the animations I want to insert, there are more than the 4 slots available in the nightmare module. What I did was edit the nightmare module to display 8 different available animation slots (effectively combining 2 different tables into one). This was in an attempt to gain more than 4 slots per pointer, which I now realize was fairly stupid, in that I could have just edited the next available pointer.

Problem is actually selecting that. How then, do I set it so that one class can use pointer data from beyond the first list. That is to say, if I edit offset 0x8FFF810 and extend into 0x8FFF820, what do I put in for the pointer under the battle animation pointer selection in the class manager?

Edited August 20, 2012 by The Iron Rose

[shadowofchaos]

Nope. If you want to expand it to use more than 4, you'll have to edit the nightmare module to do so, OR do it manually in a hex editor. 0x00 is the separator and three in a row act as a terminator for the entire animation set (letting the game know that the class that points to that location that the class(es) use data only up to that point).

I think I have a post that explains the manual editing part better somewhere. Lemme quote it.

but there's no real point to it since FE8 doesn't have the ability to let dancers use them.

...

Source: Link

The Earth Seal works normally (probably has the same effect as the Master Seal), as do the dancer Rings and the Mine.

Using the Custom Battle Animation Module as your guide...

As you can see, the values are:

09 01 91 00 05 01 91 00 06 01 91 00 07 01 91 00 00 00 00 00

Let's break it down.

09 = Disarmed (required)/Rapier

01 = Makes it the generic type, which is the Disarmed

91 = Dancer Animation

00 = Separator

********************

05 = All Anima

01 = Generic weapons

91 = Dancer

00 = Separator

********************

06 = All Light

01 = Generic weapons

91 = Dancer

00 = Separator

********************

07 = All Dark

01 = Generic weapons

91 = Dancer

00 = Separator

00 00 00 = Terminator

To get it working, just repoint it somewhere and do each ring as a unique instance... like:

7E = Nini's Grace

00 = Specific Item

91 = Dancer

00 = Separator

So it would be:

09 01 91 00 05 01 91 00 06 01 91 00 07 01 91 00 7E 00 91 00 7D 00 91 00 7F 00 91 00 80 00 91 00 00 00 00 00

Just point it in free space and change it in the Nightmare module.

And you have:

Nini's Grace:

Fila's Might:

Thor's Ire:

Set's Litany:

You just need to text edit them.

It was for FE8, but same idea.

Edited August 20, 2012 by shadowofchaos

[The Iron Rose]

Uh-huh. I've read that, actually!

I think I solved the problem, though I'm not actually sure how. I've actually read that same tutorial before I asked for help, and tried editing in the animations via hex. Unfortunately, the edits I was making kept disappearing, for reasons beyond my comprehension, but it seems to be working now, so I'm happy.

Thanks for all the assistance, I'll edit again if when I make another stupid mistake.

[shadowofchaos]

Unfortunately, the edits I was making kept disappearing, for reasons beyond my comprehension, but it seems to be working now, so I'm happy.

Probably if you had nightmare open at the same time as your hex editor and then edited with the hex editor, and THEN saved with nightmare, your changes in the hex editor will revert, because Nightmare saves over the last ROM version you opened with nightmare.