What are the absolute limits to ROM hacking?

[Flamma]

So, I was messing around with FE7 earlier, and I got a pretty overambitious idea for a project. I opened up my stuff to start working on it, but then I thought:

"I'm pretty sure the game has limits to what you can and cannot do."

So now I'm wondering how far you can go with ROM Hacking, because I want to do as much as possible.

Thanks.

[Naglfar94]

Well I am not all that experienced with ROM hacking but I guess there is one limit I have found as I have had bad experiences everytime in nearly every game except FE7. Uhh hacking and changing portraits of your units either strange things happen or just outright crashes I guess it is more than just going through a few nightmare menus to handle portraits. Like say change Wolt to Guinevere the game won`t like that.

[Lamia]

games are just programming, but the problem is finding just the right stuff to reprogram if not programming yourself

you can do anything, like even cause the game to write an entirely NEW game and load it (although this was done as an active thing and not part of ROM modification through a program, pretty sure it still ought to apply)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OPcV9uIY5i4

if you want a proper case of super mario world hacking there's tons of examples... even stuff like boss fights from other games and special moves put in for mario

really there's no limit if you know what you're doing, you just have to learn (somehow)

in the meantime there's simple tools, notes, and guides you can use to get you started off others' research

Edited September 17, 2015 by Lamia

[Maritisa]

If you want a truly unrestricted engine, use FEXP, or wait for FEXNA's public release. They're not actual romhacks, they're engines designed to simulate FEGBA games, so they have no true limits at all. Romhacking can do some crazy stuff with proper application, but it will always have finite, hard-coded limits that are a result of the fact that it's a rom of a GBA game.

[Shadowflare]

Um... I know a couple things regarding size, but not much experience with using it. So take what I'm saying with a grain of salt.

So, I know that the max an FE8 rom can go is 32 MB I believe. There's a patch somewhere out there that chucks in a bunch of extra space. However, there is a limit in the hardware, not the size itself. For instance, don't go putting a 14 part orchestra arrangement into your hack, cause the physical hardware of the game's engine can't handle it. There is a patch that allows up to 12 tracks, but only 12 sounds at a time. As for chapters and stuff... there isn't exactly a hard hard limit that I know of, but I would say a game should be no longer than vanilla FE7 if you don't want issues. Or as the above said: FEXNA/FEXP if you really just want to go full ham.

[Brendor]

Most of the limitations are on the size of the data eg the ROM data can't be more than 0x2000000 bytes in length and the screen resolution (240x160p) etc

[CT075]

the limit that will be most relevant to you is your technical skill

[MisakaMikoto]

1) The hardware restriction on GBA.
2) If you use a tool made by someone to complete sth, the tool itself may have some restrictions.

3) Your ability as a hacker :)

[Czar_Yoshi]

Technically with enough asm you could make anything you want happen. But after a point you'll be changing so much and need to know so much to change it that you might as well be making a new game entirely from scratch.

[Flamma]

I'll be checking out FEXP, thanks.