DKC Atlas Forum

[Cody]

Which animation frame would you prefer for the above two?

[Qyzbud]

Cody, that's another good point. Many of DKC2's (and a few of the other two games') levels feature animated graphics as part of the terrain. I'm happy to manage this myself, so don't worry about the animated parts, just ignore them for now. It doesn't even matter if they match up, as this is an easy 'finishing touch' that I can address at the end. I will need to do lots of finishing touches anyhow, what with adding text info, additional background/foreground effects, etc... so I'll pick the animated graphic frame(s) at that stage. It should be pretty easy to work out the 'initial' frame here. I've already discovered a code which freezes the animation, so I have something to work with.

I'll share all of these useful codes soon.

In the meantime, check out this interactive layered map demo - Jungle Hijinxs: Bonus Area 1. This is the 'something special' I promised a few posts ago.

[cfh]

Wow, that's great, works perfectly!

Just a bit worried about the load times for a full map...

[Qyzbud]

Interestingly, I think this will be less of an issue than it would at first appear...

Having the graphical components on separate layers allows me to 'tile' elements such as foreground/background graphics, and PNG's lossless compression (which shares my middle name, incidentally) seems to compress repeated graphics, such as the tilesets of DKC, really well. Having each element separate also allows for smaller colour palettes, which in turn reduces file size.

There is also the possibility of using CSS to do even more... Such as positioning each sprite as a separate image, rather than a 'sprite sheet'. This could reduce file size again... but there's quite a temptation to animate the sprites, if I take this approach. Actually, to me that sounds great... but it's a lot more work, and would be very hard to perfect (and even harder to edit, should things need to be altered!). Of course the file sizes would go up, and so would system requirements...

I think I'll create an animated map as soon as I get a chance, just to see how it goes.


Thanks for the feedback, cfh. Glad it worked nicely at your end!

[BlueTronic]

Having the graphical components on separate layers allows me to 'tile' elements such as foreground/background graphics, and PNG's lossless compression (which shares my middle name, incidentally)

Your middle name's PNG?...


Qyz says: *sigh*

[Qyzbud]

Interactive Layered Map Demo - Jungle Hijinxs: Bonus Area 1
Here is the 'something special' I promised a few days ago. I know the bonus areas are currently Cyclone's project, but for the sake of this demo, I wanted a moderately sized terrain to work with. Take a look, and let me know what you think, keeping in mind that the actual page layout/design is highly temporary. I'm going to aim to have it look a fair bit like the main site, but there will be a few significant, necessary changes. I look forward to working on this more... Your thoughts and suggestions are appreciated.

[Cyclone]

Awesome stuff Qyzbud! Having a guide like this surpasses any printed strategy guide.

- The functionality in your demo seems good to me. Maybe a toggle indicator for each of the layers would be nice so you know if a particular layer is on/off.
- I think you need a way of enlarging the map. Like a DK style magnifying glass so you can zoom in on certain areas for a clearer view.
- Animated sprites/terrain I think would be a nice touch and would make the maps even better. If its an option you can turn off/on then I wouldn't worry about download times. You could always add note anyways.
- What about foreground layers like fog, mist ect? Do PNGs support transparencies like that?

[Qyzbud]

Cheers mate, your suggestions are good ones.

-Toggle indicator (graphical one) is the next thing on my to do list. I reckon that's essential.
-A zooming in/out feature would be great, but possibly very complicated. I'll look into it.
-Animations are fun, we'll see how this goes.
-PNGs do support a very nice 'rich' transparency mode, which works beautifully in Firefox and IE7, but not in previous IEs. In IE6, for example, the user would be greeted by solid grey instead of transparency. This problem can be avoided by having that layer toggled off by default, and having a little note beside its toggle button to let IE6 etc. users know what to expect. That way they don't get the initial impression of 'this thing's broken'.

I actually spent a lot of effort designing a map viewing interface with Flash. That could have been a good approach, but now that I've discovered the power and grace of CSS web design, it's hard to want to use expensive, proprietary software for a project as 'modular' as this.

[Qyzbud]

I have updated the interactive layered map demo with a nifty set of toggle buttons - same link.

I'm hoping to look into zooming/resizing options tomorrow.

[BlueTronic]

Hehe. The buttons follow me when I use the Wii's browser.

[Stone]

I've taken the pics about 4 days ago, but I was too lazy to make the map. But now, Mudhole Marsh is finished.

Mhh, imageshack doesn't like previews of maps with a long horizontal axis

Thanks to the plants in the background assembling the pieces was very easy, I probably needed just an hour.
Now it gets tricky, my next map features massive palette swapping, the name is Gangplank Galley.
Any ideas?

[Qyzbud]

Cool, I'll update the list. Don't worry about the thumbnail... it's entirely clickable.

I see what you mean about the palette swapping... It's relatively subtle, compared to what I encountered in DKC's cave levels, but we want things to be perfect, don't we! One option would be to go to the end of the level, then map it in reverse, as that way the palette remains fixed. The problem with that is that it fixes the palette at its final setting, which isn't its 'native' palette. Obviously, we want it to be in as pure a form as possible...

My usual modus operandum for situations like this is to rip the graphics from savestates using vSNES (this worked perfectly for DKC's cave levels, and even unrippled the underwater scenery). Often the lighting and other effects in SNES games are done in in a way that vSNES can 'ignore', but I gave it a go, and it doesn't work here. We could save a copy of the level's initial palette as a palette file, then load that palette file each time we open a state in vSNES... That should work, but it would be terribly tedious.

What I'll try next is to develop a PAR code to freeze the palette. That's probably our easiest option here... Watch this space!

[Stone]

One idea I have is using your "go to the end"-method to map it and then manually swap the palette in Photoshop.
Mhh, very painfull method, I think. And at some point you don't know what you have already swapped and what not

Edit: And of course there wouldn't be any darkness at all. If the swapping occurs in certain distances, for example, every 512 pixels, then it would be possible to take the swapped part at those points.

[Qyzbud]

Swapping palettes in Photoshop is against DKC Atlas policy, no matter how close it looks to 'correct'. Unfortunately, colour information is sometimes lost when palettes change in-game. Maybe something that wasn't black before will turn black, and then 'mix' with other black pixels, for example. We would only consider this if we've exhausted all other options.

It may sound funny, but the best way to develop this code would probably be to make up a rough terrain with more screenshot overlap than usual... then we could turn each layer/screenshot on and off to see if it changes, or we could use the 'difference' layer blending effect so that any differences are visible, and anything which is unchanged would just appear black. When we can tell exactly where the game triggers the terrain palette swaps, we can tell the code search that it needs to look for a changed value when we get past that point.

I've managed to tweak some palette addresses, but nothing useful yet:

paletteshift-par-code.png (28.68 KiB) Viewed 243472 times

I'm going to bed now, but maybe I can chip in a bit more effort tomorrow.

[Simion32]

I've managed to tweak some palette addresses

To actually search for a color (in RAM anyway) will be difficult, because you would need to know the exact color. I'm certain that I could develop a pallet modifier code...

While I'm hacking that, here's some less-than obvious information:

Each color in the pallet is 2 bytes. Each red/green/blue entry is 5 bits, which leaves the MSB (Most Significant Bit) left over.
It looks like this in binary (each letter represents a binary digit):

Code: Select all

M-BBBBB-GGGGG-RRRRR

Notice that it's BGR, not RGB! To get the real RGB value you multiply the value of red, green, and blue by 8 (to convert binary to decimal or HEX, you can use Windows Calculator). Notice that this means there is no "perfect white", since the maximum value of 31 multiplied by 8 is 248. So each color value can be any multiple of 8 up to 248.

[Myuu]

Wow, this pwns.

[Qyzbud]

Simion, I should change your rank here to 'Code Explorer' or 'Binary Adventurer'... Seriously though, the amount you know, about such obscure stuff...

Well anyway, cheers. There's no pure white? That's handy to know. I can safely use white as a transparency/alpha mask colour without risking a loss of pixel data, in that case. Would be easier on the eyes (but perhaps less conspicuous) than my current choice of MAGIC PINK!!1!

It seems to me that with this mission, telling the palette just not to change would be better than setting the palette to a specific value. Maybe not, though. It would certainly be more interesting if we were able to tweak palettes just to give the levels new looks. Like the 'seasonal variations' you get in Swamp/Bramble levels.

[Cosmicman]

this is truly amazing, reminds me of the dk2 official guide that had all these maps completelly layed out like this, keep it going !

[Cody]

Wow...

If anyone has the official guide, could you take a picture of Bramble Scramble? I want to see how Rare covered up the funny brambles (if the whole level is laid out).

[Qyzbud]

I have those official guides, and I took a peek... looks like there's no cover-up at all; the brambles are represented in their disjointed glory for all to see! It's not all that obvious, though, as it's a reduced-size map.

[Cody]

Would you mind snapping a photo of it?

[Qyzbud]

Okay, this is the best photo I managed to take, given my lighting conditions:

Spoiler!

dkc2npg-4-3-map-photo.jpg (249.76 KiB) Viewed 243288 times

Sometimes I look at Nintendo's maps and wonder; why bother making our own?

Answer: because ours will be so much sexier.

[Simion32]

Here's a sample rip of some of Loopy Light's bonuses, automated using a currently unreleased version of my Resource Extraction Tool. Remember that the PNG is 32 bit with translucency - if you want to see the true tile background colors, open it in paint. The original colors are preserved even though they are displayed as transparent.

Edit by Qyzbud: Broken image link advert spoilered

Spoiler!

[Cyclone]

Cool. So all the bonus rooms for a particular level are joined together like that? Or did you tell your extractor to join them? I think I see a seem joining the second bonus with the first?

[Simion32]

They were not joined together, that's how they are stored in the ROM. Apparently Rare organized it that way - I just discovered that those two other bonus levels are stored right after that one, so I let the extractor include them. Here's a PNG of some Factory type bonuses:
Broken image link (ad) spoilered by Qyzbud

Spoiler!

EDIT: Qyz, does the project need any of DKC's bonus rooms mapped? I can help with that. I've posted these here as examples, but I don't necessarily know if you have every bonus room mapped...

[Stone]

Now that is great! And I'm sure that Qyzbud has use for them
I'm just unsure how to include them, level and bonuses separated or together?

[Cyclone]

well I did offer to map the bonus rooms for DK1 but I don't think there is any point in me doing it Simion since you have a much more accurate way of doing it.

[Qyzbud]

Ah, that's brilliant stuff, Simion. Another giant leap for map kind.

I'm always fascinated to learn of Rare's design techniques. They seem to do some very unusual stuff in order to pack so much game into such a limited cartridge format... Sandwiching bonus areas together, cleverly sharing graphics, sounds, animations... With such talented artists, ingenious designers and resourceful programmers, no wonder Rare were so able to push 16-bit gaming seemingly beyond its limits.

I haven't actually begun any of the bonus room mapping. Simion and Cyclone; since you guys have an interest, and plenty of technical expertise between the two of you... maybe you could work as a team to do this? Of course it doesn't have to be just you fellows doing all of the bonuses; I myself would be glad to lend a hand when time permits, and I'm sure others would chip in, too. The bonus areas are every bit as important to the mapping project as the main level areas, I just haven't had my focus on them so far.

As for how to display levels/bonuses in relation to each other; since I'm presenting these level maps as an interactive web page, it will be quite easy to simply have the bonuses displayed beneath the level, at the appropriate places. I could either have them be always visible, or give them a 'toggle', so you can view them by clicking the graphic which indicates their entrance points. Sounds like a nice way to do it, but it may be more logical/convenient to just have them out in the open for all to see. I'll put up a demo as soon as I get it ready, and you guys can provide feedback (if you'd be so kind!).

[Simion32]

I'd be willing to work as a 'team' with Cyclone, but since I have the power of data extraction, it may end up being more of a one-sided competition.
Currently I'm working on getting all of the room offsets programed into the extractor, hopefully that part of giangurgulo's documents is accurate.

Regarding the other two games: It will be rather interesting when I have to hack DKC2/DKC3, as I'll be starting from scratch on both. At least I now have some more in-depth hacking experience - I should at least be able to locate their graphics using the same trick I used to located DKC's. Then I suppose their tile sets could be hacked by way of looking for code which assembles 32x32 tiles. I've got no guaranteed hacking method yet, but I'll have a way of going about this soon.

[Qyzbud]

...I was thinking that maybe you could share your data-extraction power with Cyclone. OMG, I know. Cyclone has been looking for the most 'efficient' method for creating maps, and since you have found it (but are generally busy with other hacking/extracting projects), I thought that some teamwork would make the dream work!

Totally up to you guys, obviously.

I'm going to plunge into some more Zero-Speed assisted sprite mapping, and further XHTMLisation of map layers now.

(If I'm not back in 5 minutes... Just wait longer!)

[Cyclone]

It's all right. Simion can do it. I kind of lost interest in it once I saw the progress Simion was making with the extractor. That's the way I wanted to do it in the first place (extracting from the ROM instead of screenshots). Simion if there is something I could do to help speed up your progress I may consider it but I do have a few large DK projects on my own.

Edit – that sounds like a very intriguing idea Qyzbud. I might be interested in that but I don’t have a lot if any program knowledge

[Simion32]

Ok, for the maps, I'll refrain from uploading everything to imageshack; instead, everyone will be able to extract the maps once an update for the Extraction Tool occurs. I was really surprised just how bad Slipslide Ride looks when you are looking at the whole level... in-game, you can't tell how "scrambled" it is, so I guess that's the only thing Rare cared about apart from its level design.

I do have a few large DK projects on my own.

Hmm, I wonder what those may be?

[Qyzbud]

Without giving anything away, I'll just say he's cooking up some good stuff.

[Cody]

Assuming that your comparison is accurate, this means ZSNES screenshots, vSNES rips and Snes9x Prt Scrn captures are all true to the original palette's colours, but there is a distortion (brightness increase) when using Snes9x's own snapshot saving function. Does that sound right?

Exactly.

Broken image link (ad) spoilered by Qyzbud

Spoiler!

In the above picture, the left three are ZSNES screenshot, vSNES rip, and Snes9x Prt Scrn, and the one on the right is from your Jungle Hijinx map. I picked a random pixel, copied that color into the main 'Paint' color and drew three lines to the identical pixels on the screenshots: They're completely accurate. I didn't bother comparing the Snes9x snapshot saving function because I know for a fact that it's brighter.

The reason why some pixels are stretched is because I enlarged the picture to further accuratize (not a word ) the pixel-picking. All of them but your Jungle Hijinx map were affected.

[Qyzbud]

Alright, well it looks like Simion's DKC Resource Extractor is going to make mapping more efficient than ever, so to those who have been helping with this thread's project; unless you really enjoy mapping out the terrain by hand, I'd suggest that you save yourself the hassle. Check out his DKC Resource Extraction Tool thread for all the details.

Interactive Map Viewer - Demo 2: Winky's Walkway
I've personally been working hard on this online map-viewing interface, and planning possible ways of integrating it with the main site (and more specifically, the Level Info pages). The current demo is of Winky's Walkway, which is the smallest level in DKC. I decided to try working with a full level this time, but I figured it would be sensible to pick a level of manageable size during these development stages.

This demo is optimised for Firefox. Users of IE etc. will be greeted with some layout peculiarities, but functionality should be fine. I'll be working to improve compatibility as I get further through the design and coding of this interface. Long way to go... just wanted to share some progress.

Let me know what you think.

[Stone]

Hehe, now all us mappers feel so useless with this extraction tool

Your Demos are great, that really makes our (your, of course ) maps better than those in Nintendo's official player's guides.
I imagine integrating this in the main site is tricky if it should fit the DK style somehow. It would be nice clicking on so monkey's head on the world map to get into the level map, similar to the game.

Maybe you could add both map-types on your site, the normal png's and the interactive one.

And I also wonder how to hide bananas in those thin boards. Those Kremlings may have some secret Banana compression techniques.

[Simion32]

This is looking great! The only thing that seems wrong is that the grid button says 32x32 yet the actual displayed grid is 64x64... unless you meant something entirely different by a 32x32 grid, but I doubt it.

I never knew there were hidden banana bunches in walkways!

Keep up the good work!

[Tompa]

Looking really good with your map projects! I hope I will be able to help out in the future.

Right now I have a request however... If someone could map Croctopus Chase for me. No sprites or such are needed, only the walls/floor/ceiling. I need it for my Time Attack.

Another thing which would be useful is some kind of code or such that makes me see what's solid and what that isn't. As when I'm running around in the water level, I can sometimes jump through walls, but I have no idea how to find out where there are openings and where there aren't any. So if someone had something like that to assist me, I would be most grateful!

[Stone]

If someone could map Croctopus Chase for me. No sprites or such are needed, only the walls/floor/ceiling.

Hihi, just take a look at Simions DKC Resource Extraction Tool

[Qyzbud]

...the grid button says 32x32 yet the actual displayed grid is 64x64...

Heh... WHOOPS!

What a funny mistake to make. *FIXES IT* I guess I just like the number 32... Do I get points from you for that, at least?

Thanks for all the comments, guys. I'll update again soon... Tompa, PM me if you still need the Croctopus Chase terrain.

[Cody]

Qyz, if you don't mind me asking, how on Earth did you find every hidden cache in every single level? Being a huge DK fan, you didn't....search every tile in the game, did you?

Just curious, is all.

[Qyzbud]

I actually did. I was very efficient though; I did it using one life, and it took less than an hour!

Hehe, in truth it took much longer than an hour... How did you know that I'd found them all? Ah, perhaps the Level Info pages are a give-away, and the recent map demo was a visual reminder... Yeah, well I searched all through each level, hand slapping every step of the way. I don't know of any hidden bananas in bonus areas... Are there any? I haven't searched many bonuses, just all main level areas. I even checked 'inaccessible' areas, just to be thorough. I'd have loved to find one in an area that can't be reached during regular play, but no such luck...

The revealing of hidden bananas is one of my very favourite aspects of the DKC mapping project. I hope it doesn't spoil anyone's fun; they are cool to find on your own! I'll make sure to keep that layer hidden by default, just in case.

[Raccoon Sam]

Didn't read the whole thread, but if it helps, Maxim from VGMaps.com did a level extractor that upon specifying a tileset file to creates a PNG of the level. We already extracted Jungle Hijinxs successfully with the tileset banks I ripped. It works on all levels just as long as the tileset files are present.

[cfh]

Simion's extractor (viewtopic.php?f=26&t=226) can extract every level to a PNG directly from the ROM.

[Raccoon Sam]

That's awesome..!
I'll check it in a bit, thanks for the link

[Qyzbud]

The DKC Mapping Project is now officially linked to the Atlas!

Check it out: Interactive Map Viewer

So far there are two 95% complete maps available (Jungle Hijinxs and Winky's Walkway), but I hope to have all of Kongo Jungle's levels up really soon.

I'm sure that I will be making a million and one changes to the formatting and functionality of the map viewing interface, but it has been developed to a point where I can make these changes without having to go through and edit each page. Each individual map page reads from a template file, so all I have to do is edit that one file, and all map pages will reflect the changes I make. Better yet, the PHP file for each map is extremely simple to create, so as soon as I get each graphical layer saved, all I have to do is make a copy of the code below and edit the variables:

Code: Select all

<?php
$level_name         = 'Jungle Hijinxs';
$level_code         = '1-1';
$level_archetype    = 'jungle';
$level_width        = '5376px';
$level_height       = '512px';
$bg_tile            = 'repeat-x';
?>

<?php include ($_SERVER["DOCUMENT_ROOT"]."/dkc/php/map_template.php") ?>

Amazingly simple, but it took a WHOLE lot of work to get to this stage.

Anyhow, the tough work is done, so now progress should be impressive and speedy. Let me know what you think!

[Cody]

For Jungle Hijinxs, Is that top of a tree under the second banana cache supposed to be there?

[Qyzbud]

Well noticed!

...and yeah; I'm not sure if Rare knew they left it there, but it's there alright (I triple-checked, cross-referencing with extractions from Simion and Raccoon Sam).

[Stone]

And what is with the barrel near the G-letter in Jungle Hijinxs? Or isn't it a barrel?

[Simion32]

I do believe that's the barrel that returns you from the second bonus level.