I've been an Xbox modder for some time now - over a year, now I think about it - and know the ins-and-outs of the console pretty well. My friends and I play ridiculous amounts of Halo (2), and we're planning a celebratory post-exam LAN party. I've played most of the maps to death, and though they're still fun, I thought it would be cool to shake things up and play some custom stuff.
Now, the most Halo modding I've ever done is messing with simple Halo 1 weapon values with an on-Xbox cache editor. I know how annoying people who ignore tutorials are and so I've spent most of this evening looking through guides etc. on this site and others. However, I still have some questions on the "fundamentals" of Halo 2 map editing - these principles aren't really explained anywhere, it's just a case of "do this because you're told to". They shouldn't take long to answer.
1. Basically, the process of adding a user-created to Halo 2 is patching the hell out of another map? As opposed to simply adding a new map file?
2. PPFs, SPPFs, and .serenity's - just different formats of patch? Any advantages/disadvantages to particular methods?
3. Does it matter which map you patch when adding a user-created one, or is it an arbitrary choice?
4. Maps can be added in addition to the originals as opposed to overwriting them? (I'm pretty sure about this, just want to be certain)
5. What's this about some maps not working with System Link? Is it an old problem now solved, or does it affect newer maps too?
6. What problems does the AU cause? Can they be overcome?
7. Can the main menu fifty-map limit actually be overcome by hex-editing the default.xbe, or is that just speculation?
As I say, I have looked for answers to these questions but none have been forthcoming.
Thanks very much!
