How to Play Super Mario 64 Hacks on the ED64!

[Vertrex]

One thing that you all should know is that this technique only works on soft mods of Super Mario 64. If there isn't too many drastic changes or if it isn't 64MB and higher, you are in luck and the hack will most likely work.

All you need is:
HxD (It has to be this Hex editor), chksum64, and of course.. my notes (which you can download here): http://www.filedropper.com/m642ed64compability

When VL-Tone invented the ROM-Extender, he had to locate the MIO0 data onto offsets ending in: 1, 3, 5, 7, B, F. The reason of this is so that emulators like Project 64 would load everything perfectly.. if you had downloaded the .z64 file I provided in the other thread and tried running it on PJ64, you'll notice that the background will be corrupted. This is because PJ64 is somehow different from real N64 hardware for some odd reason. Since there wasn't anything that loaded ROMs from SD cards onto the real N64 back then, VL-Tone made it specifically for emulation because that's all there was. The notes I provided need the bytes shifted back to that they can all end on: 2, 4, 6, 8, A, C, E

I must warn you: Doing this is a very tedious and long process. It takes nearly an hour to convert one ROM so that it has compatibility.
Thank you for taking the time to read this and be sure to give credit.

Regards, ALP/Vertrex
(Founder of the SM642ED64 compatibility modification)

[Paulweeze]

Thanks for the notes! By the way, would it be practical for someone with programming skills to make a app to automatically convert those bytes?

[BolinCaker]

That's awesome man so if I did this for Star Road would it work? I have a copy that's 48 MB

[cheaterdragon1]

Alrighty so here's what I understand and what I'm doing:

I've downloaded your notes, HxD, and a popular Super Mario 64 hack. It looks like in your notes there are 55 blocks of code that need to be moved up by a single byte. At the top of HxD I click Search then pick Goto, and in the box I type the first one, 00B1F8B5. This takes me to straight to the first point which is convenient. I then highlight it, scroll all the way down to 00B2D715 highlighting everything the whole way. I then copy it all, and go up to 00B1F8B4, and then click Paste Write. (not Paste Insert) We've now moved one of the many blocks of code up by one byte.

The only problem I have is this method takes 5 or 6 minutes to make one change, and there's 55 changes to make! Most of the time is lost due to the large amount of scrolling you have to do. If you could just type into the program 00C3AFD5 to 00C4F915 and have it automatically highlight those two and everything inbetween then yeah I could do this in under an hour like you mentioned. I don't see a way of doing this and the program did not come with instructions nor can they be found online. Surely I'm missing something?

I'd also like to say thank you very much for releasing this and I hope the people in the other thread are apologizing.

[Vertrex]

Yes, it is a long process indeed.
For the pointers, you need to search for that and replace all bytes with the new bytes.

[Kyle]

At the top of HxD I click Search then pick Goto, and in the box I type the first one, 00B1F8B5.
I then highlight it, scroll all the way down to 00B2D715 highlighting everything the whole way.
I then copy it all, and go up to 00B1F8B4, and then click Paste Write.

Is this accurate for what should be done? I can try writing a quick utility for this. I just need it very spelled out.

[cheaterdragon1]

Yes, it is a long process indeed.
For the pointers, you need to search for that and replace all bytes with the new bytes.

Was I doing it correctly then, but I just need to do that as well? Can you elaborate on your second sentence? So far I've been using the MIO0 Data, I haven't even touched the pointers.

[Kyle]

This should do the process as cheaterdragon1 explained it. I took your hex values into LibreOffice Calc, rearranged them and got them in a format I could work with. Feel free to try this out. I don't own an ED64. 

http://srktt.com/files/ED64.exe

Source: http://srktt.com/files/ED64.txt

I also need the second part explained if there's more to this.

[Paulweeze]

 

[SimpleFlips]

This is absolutely amazing. I'll get settled in on a hack pretty soon. Should we create an archive of already hex-edited hacks so once someone does it it will save other people the time?

[cheaterdragon1]

Kyle, nice program. I've opened up your program and it immediately asks for a ROM. I gave it a Super Mario 64 hack and it made a copy of it. I assume you just modified all 55 of the blocks of code in the ROM? If so then this is incredibly helpful! I'm still working on the same ROM and only just crossed the halfway point.

Paul, we all read that line, but I have no idea what it means. It might as well be written in Klingon.

[Paulweeze]

OMG I just ran Super Mario Magic Plant Adventure 64 rom thru Kyle's program and am playing it as we speak! Thank you Vertrex and Kyle!
Lol cheaterdragon, my bad. Didn't know if Kyle read the original text or not but he definatly did.

[Doom]

Kyle, big thanks for helping out and creating this tool even though you don't own an ED64!

[SimpleFlips]

Kyles program works like a charm.
Does anyone know how to get romhacks to save?

[SimpleFlips]

That's awesome man so if I did this for Star Road would it work? I have a copy that's 48 MB

I was unable to get it to run using Kyles software - have you had any luck doing it manually?