Halo Map Chooser: Customize, Infinite Maps, No Compressing

Flying Poo · Post by **Flying Poo** » Wed Jun 30, 2004 10:37 am

Well its good ideas!!! but from junit has in mind it looks like he wants to go straight into gameplay from that menu... that would require either hacking the UI or the xbe its self to find out what the executing command would be to start a MP game... and theres also all the specs. of teh game...CTF..slayer...FFA...Team...... but it would be nice to see an xbe that was built for just multiplayer gamming

start off getting a decompiler for the xbe mostlikley.. and trying to get your hands on XDK... un less i'm wrong and it can all be done in the UI!!!!

junit0524 · Post by **junit0524** » Wed Jun 30, 2004 11:20 am

If you had something with loads map files then you wouldn't be able to pick gametypes, correct? Because it wouldn't be using ui.map.

no it would copy the cache003.map file to you X,Y,pr Z when you press A. And then maybe press X to start Halo. Then you would just play that level on the ui. It would still have the same pic, description, and name in the UI but that doesnt really matter as long as we can organize all maps into one directory and app with no cache003 clearing needed.

(GT)Juggler · Post by **(GT)Juggler** » Wed Jun 30, 2004 8:54 pm

well what i have on my xbox isnt far from what this program does. Xcommander RC2 is the easiest way to play halo mods without a computer. on the rt side, go to x or y or z and delete cacheoo3. then I put a folder in my F partition called halo mods. in there theres BC BC SW HH RR and the others. . . then u open the folder on the left half of the screen and see a mod u like, open the folder select it, and click copy. then when its done, do the IGR and pick halo, which is right at the base directory of ava or evox or unleashx (i got all 3)

so this program is basically gonna copy the pre-patched cache files which are organized on the hd, to the x or y or z and then u can go to halo from there. ok, sounds good i guess. just make sure somewhere it says what level ur supposed to pick when u get to halo, since theres no ui changes, and its not needed. instead of making the program tell u what level to pick, on the left when u pick ur mod, organize it by the level u have to pick to play it.

THE END.

dabeast77 · Post by **dabeast77** » Wed Jun 30, 2004 10:01 pm

so this program is basically gonna copy the pre-patched cache files which are organized on the hd, to the x or y or z and then u can go to halo from there. ok, sounds good i guess. just make sure somewhere it says what level ur supposed to pick when u get to halo, since theres no ui changes, and its not needed. instead of making the program tell u what level to pick, on the left when u pick ur mod, organize it by the level u have to pick to play it. THE END.

I thought he was talking about a program that had unpatched cache files for every level, and it patched the corret file based on what .ppf you select.

jkjk · Post by **jkjk** » Thu Jul 01, 2004 3:14 am

hey gt, were you able to increase the fan speed (to reduce lag) with unleash as your non-default dash?

Lightning · Post by **Lightning** » Thu Jul 01, 2004 4:40 am

All you need to do is use XBtool to modify your bios and change the fan speed %

goatninja · Post by **goatninja** » Thu Jul 01, 2004 5:39 am

I know i posted this before but i changed it up a lot ... if your attention span can handle it check out this way to implement the idea:

goatninja wrote:I think i have an idea how we can effectively do this with existing methods almost overnight!!!

Start with HCE, first have a command to 'downlod ppfs' from a server to a unified folder and naming structure to your HCE ppf directory... you could udate your list every time you open hce if you like. Each ppf file could have a tag to the correct cache (jumping ahead here but hce will have a cache save/load feature, so hce's saved cache directory will have a clean cache for each map) and automatically load/patch it, or even easier to implement: the name of the corresponding map cache could be on on each ppf, in this case you would go to a mapcache select screen and load and patch the correct cache. The final step would be to have every ppf available in this database to also have a ppf patch for a pic and description of the map in the ui... again automatically patched by hce or included as a ui ppf in the map's ppf folder. You then start halo, pic and decription appeaar in the ui and your off!!

Now for the overnight part...dash integration. I use ava right now, and they have this wicked autoupdate feature, plus all sorts of download features (xbmc and a couple of other apps can be downloaded and installed easily). AVA has already expressed interest in halo modding, and would probably love to integrate this into an update. Overnight we would have a user base of a few extra thousand!!!!!!!

If kai got in on this, then the app would have kai in there (as every syslink game has access to already through ava). Kai would love this too and set up an arena for this, where xblive headsets could be used to communicate ppfs, or, for non headset users, a simple send chat message option tha allows you to select and send the ppf's name, or if the network code in HCE is ready, there could be an option to patch all the other boxes' caches in a private room or something.

The advantages of this:
1-dummy proof: select ppf, the rest is done automatically.
2-feasability: ppfs are small files, they are alreadty posted online and every other mechanism (except some of hce's stuff) is ready to go
3-Instant user base: when included in an ava autoupdate.
4-An eager set of developers: teamxlink and hce guys friends are always open to new ideas and they both speak very highly of the ava guys too!!

What do you think?

Flying Poo · Post by **Flying Poo** » Thu Jul 01, 2004 6:06 am

what about thoes of us who are still kinda living in the dial-up era... how about a PC "auto-update" for ppfs as well... cause we all know x-box and dial-up dont mix!!! and then the prog on the xbox just connects to the PC and "mirrors" a specified Dir on the PC to "update" the mods, or MACs (MACs sucks!)

also an idea is a way to decompress the maps as Halo does so there isnt so much room taken up on the Hard Drive, (for thoes still w/ stock!) and then be patched.... it wouldnt even have to be stored on a HDD... DVD... Der!!!! Nvm!

ohh Better yet!!! DVD storage of modified maps and a prog that just transfers them over to the Cache... use of ini file to coresponding maps and possible graphics for neat selection

sorry i ramble

goatninja · Post by **goatninja** » Thu Jul 01, 2004 6:18 am

decompression is coming!!! but not until hce 0.9 i think

blink182house · Post by **blink182house** » Thu Jul 01, 2004 10:29 am

Sounds good (goatninja), I would definately change from EvoX to Avalaunch if they had some integration to Halo Mods.

Flying Poo · Post by **Flying Poo** » Sat Jul 03, 2004 1:19 pm

wow... this is diein' quick...... there wasent a single post on the 2nd!

rafe · Post by **rafe** » Sat Jul 03, 2004 10:15 pm

is there an estimated time frame of when the release of this will be? sounds awsome. this will take care of alot of problems and end having to make new ways to store, play, etc.. new maps. and without dealing with the cache

thanks guys, this is great!

(GT)Juggler · Post by **(GT)Juggler** » Sat Jul 03, 2004 10:37 pm

jkjk wrote:hey gt, were you able to increase the fan speed (to reduce lag) with unleash as your non-default dash?

well unleash is my main dash, so i dunnno if itll stay if evox or ava is the main dash.

the fan speed is an awesome feature of unleash - i like that dash the best

NikeJustDoItOk · Post by **NikeJustDoItOk** » Sun Jul 04, 2004 8:32 am

Look guys, there is no need for 200 programs on the xbox that do the same thing; especially because if you wait a few weeks, HCE will have that all. This post has motivated me to get map decompression in by 0.8 beta 3 and ill move the release candidate to beta 4.

This will start a number of different features. With map decompression, you could load the original map file into cache very easily and then edit it. Another option would be that HCE would automatically create a PPF patch compared to the original cache file. When you select that PPF patch, it automatically loads the correct cache file for you, patches it, and you press start to run halo. Also, the xlink kai implementation that GoatNinja suggested would be possible then. PPF patch creation, auto cache creation... so I hope you can see how much would be possible with this.

All that wouldn't be until 0.9 or later but the map decompression could definantly be here by 0.8 beta 3.

BTW, war3z did a great job on the hex editor, it could be used by people who cant FTP over to their box and still do advanced editing. Keyboard support in 0.8.

-NikeJustDoItOk

zulux · Post by **zulux** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 5:33 am

Besides, all your ideas are cool, but I think the best idea would be to have backups of every cache file, just 1 copy of each, and have the program transfer that fresh cache over, and apply a ppf to it. There would also be a spot that you could scroll through the ppfs.

goatninja · Post by **goatninja** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 2:51 pm

zulux wrote:Besides, all your ideas are cool, but I think the best idea would be to have backups of every cache file, just 1 copy of each, and have the program transfer that fresh cache over, and apply a ppf to it. There would also be a spot that you could scroll through the ppfs.

Already there in beta 2 exectly as u say except u have to load the cache first...it would be good to have the ppf menu linked to the load function.. that way u can choose the ppf first.

The next step would be to create a standardized ppf menu... with standardized names for the ppfs that have the name (and version if applicable), map and creator, something like:

Inmate.Prisoner.byfezzman

and have the ppfs organized in folders named after the maps they r for.

this would make finding ppfs easier when playing online.

thescottishguy · Post by **thescottishguy** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 3:52 pm

goatninja wrote:
something like:

Inmate.Prisoner.byfezzman

not to nitpick but if your naming order was

(original)-(mod, new map, proj, etc..)-(new map name)-(creator) it would work without the folders
example:

prisoner-mod-Inmate-Fezzman
bloodgulch-nmp-Vengeance-Ultramagnus
bloodgulch-nmp-The_Hangar-TheScottishGuy

no need for extra folders, simplifies things a bit. come to think of it it wouldn't be a bad idea to have a naming conventions theory on here, it would make mods easier to keep organized

goatninja · Post by **goatninja** » Thu Jul 08, 2004 6:32 pm

that's great scottish... but i think it would still be better with folders to reduce scroll time. Even if pressing side on the d-pad skipped by letter (i think it skips a fixed number with each press), it would still look neater... and if we placed rar'd packs on bittorrent, newsgroups, and other web hosts... people would definitely download them. This pack could be updated weekly and mirrors can be posted in the forum... that would be sooo sweet... and with HCE's new fatures... the timing is perfect!!!!

adamscybot · Post by **adamscybot** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 11:33 am

Im afraid that nearly all these ideas would require hacking the xbe.

Now. To do this you need a decompiler to decompile the xbe. But that is EXTREMELY hard and involves memory adresses, hex, c++ and pretty much everything.

It can also be impossible. this is why that you cant just dowload the source of the decompiled xbe off xbins now. Because no one can do it!

So. Thats looking quite impossible.

I also make myself some little apps or whatever you wantt o call them. Mostly trainers for games and also have the xdk (sshhh. lol) which requires Microsoft Visual Studio .NET.

It is possible though. To make a simple application that patches a cache file locally via ppf in the cache directory.

Good luck.

XBOX War3z · Post by **XBOX War3z** » Fri Jul 09, 2004 12:32 pm

Well you can already replace Xdemos thing in Halo with HCE
Then use HCE to decompress/load the cache files you want
Patch all the files (in the future download ppf files)
ok to work more like junit's idea i could add more stuff in the cache header (description, pic location) (which could later be used to update the ui

)
You can already save/load your cache files with the latest HCE
But the compress/decompress part needs some more work
We are also gonna add an cache header editor so you can easily swap between map build (PAL<>NTSC), map name (so you have to select longest instead of bloodgulch) and the custom stuff supported by HCE

this all would bring us very close to what junit had in mind

place all your extra backups (like The Library) in HCE\NTSC\Backup
it lists it in the menu (edited mine to show custom name)

HaloMods "Classic" Read-only Archive

Halo Map Chooser: Customize, Infinite Maps, No Compressing

Would you rather have this than NMP?

Wholy Shit!