+Philsan Posted October 11, 2021 Share Posted October 11, 2021 Can someone please tell me which hex values should I edit to change blue and purple colors? Soccer (1982)(Thorn Emi).xex Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
glurk Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 I didn't dig in far enough to find where those color values are set, but "THORN EMI VIDEO" is in there 3 times consecutively, so I set the high bits and made all three black. Is this what you are after? Soccer (1982)(Thorn Emi).xex If you specifically want to CHANGE the blue/purple to some other colors, it would take a bit deeper digging... 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
glurk Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 (edited) I looked a bit harder, but only found 1 color and the background. Search for: a9 84 8d 17 d0 a9 09 8d 0a d0 The "84" is the blue text far left, the "09" is the grey background. Where the purple's set, I didn't find it. EDIT: What, specifically, are you wanting to do? More info makes it easier to figure out what needs to be done. Edited October 12, 2021 by glurk 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Philsan Posted October 12, 2021 Author Share Posted October 12, 2021 Thank you very much @glurk I would like to replace left and right THORN EMI VIDEO text with two real teams names and matching colors. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
glurk Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 Well, changing the text is easy. To remove the "THORN EMI VIDEO" in the center, just make it all zeros. But the colors (2 of them) are set in a DLI, and they are not all clearly set in one place. I didn't find the purple, it's in there "somewhere" but tricky to find... It could take some time, as there is PAL detection (for speed I think) and it could be set based on that, sigh... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Philsan Posted October 12, 2021 Author Share Posted October 12, 2021 Thanks. Where do you find the three THORN EMI VIDEO text? In the file I uploaded I found left one only. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
glurk Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 74 68 6f 72 6e 00 65 6d 69 00 76 69 64 65 6f 00 00 00 b4 a8 af b2 ae 00 a5 ad a9 00 b6 a9 a4 a5 af 00 00 00 f4 e8 ef f2 ee 00 e5 ed e9 00 f6 e9 e4 e5 ef All three are CONSECUTIVE. With different high bit settings for colors. The middle one is the b4,a8...a5,af part of it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Philsan Posted October 12, 2021 Author Share Posted October 12, 2021 Here I see only one THORN EMI VIDEO. Ah, yes, now I understand, graphics mode 1 characters, thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
glurk Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 It's a zillion times easier if you use Omnivore. It shows the ATASCII characters, and disassembles the 6502 code, and can show PM graphics, and whole heck of a lot more. https://playermissile.com/omnivore/ 3 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+MrFish Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 39 minutes ago, glurk said: It's a zillion times easier if you use Omnivore. It shows the ATASCII characters... You can display ATASCII in HxD. You just need an Atari font on the system you're using. Then you select it in the "Options" dialogue. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
glurk Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 Well, people can use whatever they want, but if I want to rev. engineer some Atari stuff, Omnivore disassembles 6502 and display lists, works as a hex editor, works with ATASCII, Apple fonts, etc... It show XEX segments, CAR headers, ATR image format, etc... It does more stuff than I even remember to use. To say I recommend it highly is an understatement. It lets me do 10 times more things in one tenth the time. I'm not at all affiliated with the program, it's just the tool I mostly use. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+MrFish Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 I know all about Omnivore, and use it myself. I was posting the information for those who might think HxD can't display ATASCII. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Irgendwer Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 1 hour ago, glurk said: To say I recommend it highly is an understatement. Contrary to many other Windows Atari tools, this one unfortunately doesn't run under Linux/wine: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kenjennings Posted October 12, 2021 Share Posted October 12, 2021 8 minutes ago, Irgendwer said: Contrary to many other Windows Atari tools, this one unfortunately doesn't run under Linux/wine: There are directions on the github page for building/installing to run directly on linux. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
glurk Posted October 13, 2021 Share Posted October 13, 2021 (edited) I never did find the purple in the game code, so I just patched the darn thing to set it myself. It works. Here's one with the middle text blanked out, and both left and right "THORN EMI VIDEO" set to green: Soccer (1982)(Thorn Emi).xex The location offsets to the bytes to change are - BACKGROUND:$30D0 - LEFT_TEXT:$30CB - RIGHT_TEXT:$1FF7 I've already pointed out the text area to change. It would be possible to make a little "patcher" utility to change the team names and colors and patch the XEX accordingly, but I'll leave that for someone else. I'm not a sports guy at all, never played this game... EDIT: Played with it some more, just for fun. Here's one with UNITED STATES on the left, in red, white and blue and with COLUMBIA on the right, in yellow, blue, and red: Soccer (1982)(Thorn Emi).xex Edited October 13, 2021 by glurk 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Philsan Posted October 13, 2021 Author Share Posted October 13, 2021 17 hours ago, glurk said: I never did find the purple in the game code, so I just patched the darn thing to set it myself. It works. Here's one with the middle text blanked out, and both left and right "THORN EMI VIDEO" set to green: Soccer (1982)(Thorn Emi).xex 16.02 kB · 2 downloads The location offsets to the bytes to change are - BACKGROUND:$30D0 - LEFT_TEXT:$30CB - RIGHT_TEXT:$1FF7 I've already pointed out the text area to change. It would be possible to make a little "patcher" utility to change the team names and colors and patch the XEX accordingly, but I'll leave that for someone else. I'm not a sports guy at all, never played this game... EDIT: Played with it some more, just for fun. Here's one with UNITED STATES on the left, in red, white and blue and with COLUMBIA on the right, in yellow, blue, and red: Soccer (1982)(Thorn Emi).xex Your multicolor version is very nice! Regarding "normal" version, I am sorry but I am not able to find BACKGROUND:$30D0 - LEFT_TEXT:$30CB - RIGHT_TEXT:$1FF7 with Omnivore. Is it possible to change center text color too? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
glurk Posted October 14, 2021 Share Posted October 14, 2021 (edited) Those aren't things to search for, they are the actual hexadecimal offsets of the bytes that need to be changed in the patched XEX version I posted. For example, the "BACKGROUND" color byte at offset $30D0 is $09. Change that $09 to another color value to change it. Same for the other two. Changing the black center text is trickier, as it will change EVERY black in the whole game, unless I do another custom patched version. Which I "can" do, if you want to tell me how you'd like it to be. But I figured you'd want to do your own mods (?)... EDIT: Let's just go back to the original XEX you posted in the first post. Search for A9 44 (it's only in there once) and that's the PURPLE $44. Search for A9 84 8D and that's the BLUE $84. I know where the black is set, but you don't want to change that one, as it will affect every black in the whole game. Edited October 14, 2021 by glurk 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
glurk Posted October 14, 2021 Share Posted October 14, 2021 I just want to add - please don't take it as an insult - I usually assume that I'm talking to a knowledgeable programmer. Which isn't always the case. It's hard to know over the internet what someone else's experience level is. I've been doing this silly game-hacking stuff for like 40 years, so maybe I don't explain things well enough... Just trying to be helpful. I figure "teach a man to fish" is better than just giving him a fish, LOL. But my teaching skills may be lacking. 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Philsan Posted October 14, 2021 Author Share Posted October 14, 2021 No problems, I am an humble Basic programmer (see signature) but I've no experience with hex editors. I knew how to change left text, I didn't find center and right text because I didn't use Omnivore, hex editors don't show ATASCII and I didn't think about graphics 1 peculiar functioning. BTW, I used that mode in my latest game, Vic Zombies ah ah. I know how to search and replace a value but I wasn't able to find exactly $30D0, $30CB, $1FF7 locations with Omnivore. It seems easy but yesterday I must have missed something obvious. Tonight I will search the values you mentioned above and then check the locations. Unfortunately it's not possible to change pitch's part color, even with DLI. It would have been nice to change shirts colors... I didn't think "black" banner register is used with the pitch too. I will write the center text with the other two colors then. And yes, I prefer that someone teaches me, I am grateful for you help! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
glurk Posted October 14, 2021 Share Posted October 14, 2021 Yeah, programmers of original games don't necessarily make their stuff "hacker-friendly." They have the source code, of course , and we don't. So it requires reverse-engineering to go in and find stuff in the binary. And if that middle black text color is set, it's used for all the blacks below on the main game screen as well. So it would change the little player men, and the ball, and every other black. Changing the left and right text colors is about all one can do. The multicolor one I did (just as a fun experiment) required re-writing (adding to) the DLI interrupt for that text line, and would need to be different for every team colors. I just picked USA and Columbia because they both have nice Tri-Color flags. It was just a test hack. I could potentially re-write the DLI in order to allow changing the middle black, but I didn't want to get into a major thing... The numbers I gave were the HEX OFFSETS into the file. Like, $0000 is the offset to the first byte, $0400 is the 1024th byte, etc. The actual locations. Hope this all helps. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Philsan Posted October 14, 2021 Author Share Posted October 14, 2021 Ah ah, yesterday I wasn't focused. Found offsets with Omnivore. Thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manterola Posted October 14, 2021 Share Posted October 14, 2021 On 10/12/2021 at 3:45 PM, glurk said: It's a zillion times easier if you use Omnivore. It shows the ATASCII characters, and disassembles the 6502 code, and can show PM graphics, and whole heck of a lot more. https://playermissile.com/omnivore/ I tried to install omnivore but I gave up.... I will start another topic showing the problems I had (in Win10) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Philsan Posted October 15, 2021 Author Share Posted October 15, 2021 7 hours ago, manterola said: I tried to install omnivore but I gave up.... I will start another topic showing the problems I had (in Win10) I didn't install it. I simply run "Omnivore-1.0rc4-win.exe" found here https://github.com/robmcmullen/omnivore/releases/tag/1.0rc4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
glurk Posted October 15, 2021 Share Posted October 15, 2021 Yes, I should have mentioned that. Omnivore-1.0rc4-win.exe linked above is the one I use as well. It still is not "perfect" as that you may possibly run into a small bug or weirdness here or there, but I don't think there are going to be any further versions. Who knows? That said, once you get accustomed to it and get a workflow going, it's really quite reliable and useful!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manterola Posted October 15, 2021 Share Posted October 15, 2021 (edited) Okay, thanks I tried pip to install it.. But anyway.... Another option to tweak programs is the debugger of Altirra... For example, setting a breakpoint for a change in any of the color registers and then see what is going on when that happens. You can then identify in the xex the same section of the program and modify accordingly. Edited October 15, 2021 by manterola 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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