SNS update: I think I know which 4 of the 6 eggs we are supposed to get (part 2)

[hatrickpatrick]

Part 1: http://forums.rarewitchproject.com/s...ead.php?t=1287

Well, it was the beginning of Februrary last year when I first noticed the possible connection between 4 of BK's eggs. And now, a year and a half, and 3,073 posts later, we're still here, about to go into part 2 of what was, quite possibly, the biggest thread I've ever seen on a Vbulliten forum. I remember the early days of that thread, trawling through BK's memory and looking for clues, beginning a search through all possible egg combinations, and giving that up just as quickly as I started when I realised just how long it would take.

I never thought that the thread would reach the age and size it did. I even remember my astonishment when, a few weeks after posting the first message, the thread's "views" count surpassed that of the "Post the best fakey" competition. And I certainly never thought we'd come so far in finding SnS.

Back then, I was a really, really crappy hacker. I didn't know the difference between 80 and 81 codes, I had no clue how an activator would work, I didn't even know that there were codes which could control things based on which button you were pressing. That was all new territory to me. I never would have expected that a year later we would have the beginnings of the fabled cutscene modifier, we'd have found hidden scenes, backround models, text, rooms, and all the other pieces of information we got along the way. So first off, I'd like to thank everyone who's brought us to where we are today, all the theories, codes, hidden things people have found,the sheer length of time we kept looking.

It was unfortunate that the thread got closed when it did; conversation in it was becoming more and more random and bizarre, nothing new had been discovered in ages, and we were stalling. I was, in fact, JUST about to post a message suggesting we have another look at the cutscene mod. I still think that it's been our best lead so far. We need to map it out and find the rest of the activator, and also to revisit all the unsolved mysteries we discovered along the way (particularly the hidden silos in BT).The reason I DIDNT post that message was because I was waiting to see if Ice had managed to figure out the M code for BT. I haven't seen him post anything about it since he announced that he thought he could make one, so you never know, he might have managed it. We'll have to wait and see. Until then, there are a few things I really think we should look at:
1: The cutscene mod. If anyone has hacking experience, we need people to help map it, and also to try and find the 2nd activator for it (The one we have, bizarrely, doesn't control all the cutscenes, only some of them ???) which I really think would be a huge help.
2: We need to revisit some things we found and then forgot about. I'll try and find the links to them later today (although it might be tomorrow before I have them all, going through that topic looking for forgotten posts is NOT going to be an easy job >_>)

So, just to kick us off, I'm going to repost all the cutscene mod info we have so far. Credit goes to Slaphappy for finding these codes which had eluded just about everyone for so long.

Originally Posted by Slaphappy

Sorry I didn't get a chance to post sooner today. Here's what I've run across with the Cutscene Modifiers. They are going to be a collection of sorts though, because they don't all act as one type.

Some examples of what I mean by types:

In-Level Cutscene
MMM - The Church Door Timer
Jump on it and a cutscene appears showing the door open

Out-Of-Level Cutscene
TTC - The Grunty Jiggy Switch
Jump on it and the cutscene shows a different level momentarily and then comes back to where you started.

Here is a NTSC memory address I can't quite pin down, but it is clearly an activator/state value.

With a new game state, warp over to TTC and put in this code for Cap'n Blubber's cutscene:
80367003 0002

Warp to MMM and put in this code for the church door cutscene:
80367003 0001

Other level cutscenes (but clearly not all) are activated by this as well, but I haven't put in enough time to get a handle on it. There are many more pieces to the puzzle.

As for Out-Of-Level Cutscenes, here are the addresses for the source and destination levels of the scenes shown:

Go to Cutscene Level:
80367687 00XX

Return To Original Level:
80367697 00XX
8036769B 00YY

XX = Scene Digit
YY = Level Placement

I do not have an activator location for the out-of-scene yet, so I usually just use a grunty switch for it.

It looks like all cutscenes occur at Level Placement 00, but with varying camera positions. For the cutscene camera position, it looks as though 8036768B may be the value, but messing with it usually just gives a black screen and usually disables/screws up the send back function. Weird. It maybe be some combination with 8036768F which gets populated with a unique value as well.

If I get a chance tomorrow, using Ice's suggestion, I'll see if I can convert these to PAL. Yeah, I know, it's not NTFS.

He went on to post the same information in PAL, plus some more codes involving placement of banjo and sprites in the level during cutscenes:

Originally Posted by Slaphappy

Partial Activator:
80367483

Go to Cutscene Level:
80367B07 00XX

Return To Original Level:
80367B17 00XX
80367B1B 00YY

I wasn't messing around to much with the cutscene, because when you use the activator, you get strange results. Put in a value and Banjo and the objects in the level disappear. Put the value back to zero or it's original value and the objects come back but not Banjo. So I'd have to reload the level to get him back. Tedious at best.

Well, I found the location to get Banjo back and it has couple other behaviors. So if your going to investigate the activator, this will be beneficial.

NTSC
8037BFB8 00XX
00 - Banjo's Gone
01 - Banjo's Back

8037BFB9 00YY
00 - Banjo's Frozen
01 - Banjo's Movable

8037BFBA 00ZZ
00 - Banjo's Shadow's Gone
01 - Banjo's Shadow's Back

Here are the PAL counterparts:
8037C988 00XX
8037C989 00YY
8037C98A 00ZZ

And finally, he posted this:

BK Activator
0037E8F4 (NTSC)
8037F2C4 (PAL)

00 - no effect
01 - Load Level: Action State set to 3
02 - Halt State (processor still executing): Action State set to 2
03 - Bad Address: Action State set to 2
04 - no effect
05 - no effect
06 - Load Level in Demo Mode: Action State set to 7
07 - Load Level: Action State set to 8
08 - Load Level in Demo Mode: Action State set to 9
09 - Load Level: Resets Game Totals to Zero: Action State set to 3
0A - Load Level: Loads Totals: Action State set to 3
0B - Load Level: Does not alter action state
0C - Load Level: Action State set to A
0D - no effect
0E - no effect
0F - no effect


BK Action States
0037E8E4 (NTSC)
0037F2B4 (PAL)

00 - Banjo Playable, Start disabled
01 - Banjo Playable, Start disabled
02 - Banjo Playable, Character Message Actions Halted
03 - Banjo Fully Playable
04 - Items Menu Overlay
05 - Banjo Playable, Takes No Damage, No Collection Action, Start disabled
06 - Banjo controlled by AI, New Level Timer Disabled
07 - Banjo controlled by AI, Demo Timer Active
08 - Bottle's Game Overlay, Banjo controlled by AI
09 - Banjo controlled by AI, takes no damage, Exiting Level Disabled, start disabled
0A - Mumbo's Hand Overlay, Banjo controlled by AI, start disabled
0B - no effect
0C - no effect
0D - no effect
0E - no effect
0F - no effect

Some of these I find very interesting and figuring out why the developers needed them is quite a task. For example, Activator 0B seems useless, but is absolutly necessary for the way the secrets are shown at the end. The activator 0C is fired when Mumbo's hand appears. BK gets action state 0A which is puts the CPU in control of him. He swims up to SI and goes in. The level is changed using 0B which leaves the action state unchanged allowing the CPU script to continue uninterrupted. That is the only place I can find that the CPU controlled Banjo actually changes level.

So, here's the kicker, and is very speculative. Repeat, unproven and very speculative. I find activator 02 and 03 quite strange. 02 has the appearance of being a freeze, but it's not. Certain disabling addresses are set and the processor continues to run, not frozen, in a looping state. To me it could possibly be the activator for the Write Data section of SNS. Which would lead me to believe activator 03 could be the Read Data counterpart. I may be completely off base about the both of these but it is not outside the realm of possibility. They are there for some reason. I'm looking into these to see what I can find.

This is as much as we currently know about the cutscene mod. And I think our first port of call in this thread should be to find out more, and map it out. Like I said, if anyone can help with that it'd be much appreciated. I'll start a thread on the Hacking board especially for that cause.

I've found a copy of my original sum up of forgotten discoveries in the other thread so I'll post that below (I want to devide this post seeing how it's getting so big >_>)

[hatrickpatrick]

Posted early on Christmas eve last year >_>

Originally Posted by hatrickpatrick

I've split this into two categories. And the topics I want people to pay particular attention to are the Beta Spiral Mountain one (which I still think could be a massive, massive discovery) and the Fungus Forest one, which has some very interesting evidence in it for a connection with FP.

***IMPORTANT DISCOVERIES***

Here I list the threads which seemed, to me, to have extremely relevant information in them, but were abandoned and forgotten about. These are listed in order of how big the discoveries were, and personally I think we should keep looking into some of these...

The Gobi's Walley Topic - This one has two discoveries, one being the unexplained appearance of question marks on GV's walls, the other being about the Ice Key wall. Apparently it's meant to slide open rather than smash.

BETA spiral mountain level discovered, hidden in BK's instant warp as a crash digit - This one, I think, is probably a lot more important than we realised at the time, as it's one of the few unexplained locations in BK which doesnt seem to bear relation to any part of the game and *could* be the setting for some hidden cutscene or event. We never actually found out what it was for, and it could still have things we don't know about. Looks very promising indeed.

The topic which started off all the excitement about FP possibly having the link to Fungus forest. There is still a great deal of controversy over the existance of fungus forest. I myself find it fairly unlikely that an entire level could be hidden in memory, but there is a lot of evidence in here to support just that. well worth the read.

*Worth a look, but probably insignificant*
The discovery of the beta JRL pipe - I think it's fairly safe to say that it was just a duplicate of the existing JRL pipe left in for some unknown reason.

Banjooie believes he has discovered an extra piece of land in spiral mountain which is unused by the game - Still not quite sure what that was, but I think the general consensus was that it was a glitch

Also, I feel I owe everyone an apology over the demo control codes. Again, I sort of forgot about them after my digits list became seriously innacurate and complicated... I might just post the addresses, with a vague description of what each digit CAN do. pinning them down is just too difficult.

So merry christmas everyone, have a great one!

So, on we go, into part 2!

I'll post a link to the hacking board topic as soon as I get a chance to make it. Until then, good luck everyone.

--hatrick

[TzTok-Jad]

i hope that this topic goes from.. well what it is now to finding somthing REALy useful

[Dricenticore]

What? You thinkn different coloured things in the world are usefull but a cutscene mod isn't? Ok let me clear this up.

THE REASON SO MANY THINGS ARE SNS COLOURED IS BECAUSE VIDEO GAME MAKERS LIKE PUTTING COLOURS IN GAMES, AND THOSE COLOURS ARE PARTICULARLY BRIGHT AND NICE!

[TzTok-Jad]

the eggs are bright and nice... maby the programers liked those 6 paticular colors!

hey with a cutscene mod, does that let you play in areas where the cutscenes take place?

did anyone try going DOWN the stairs in the openind scene where grunty is in the tower talking to dingpot?

[supuhchris]

the reason the egg colors are in alot of video games is because there aren't very many colors that they would use, most other colors would just be shades of those colors and the only other colors that there could realy be would be colors like brown, black, grey, or white. atleast thats what i think (i don't see a reason to spell color with a u)

[hatrickpatrick]

hey with a cutscene mod, does that let you play in areas where the cutscenes take place?

No, it lets you watch cutscenes without triggering them, IE, watch the "blubber's gold" cutscene without actually giving him the gold. We've been hoping that might let us watch the SnS cutscenes without activating them but work needs to be done still to get it working properly...

did anyone try going DOWN the stairs in the openind scene where grunty is in the tower talking to dingpot?

I'm not sure, but I think we're all fairly sure that room is the room with the yellow warp cauldron in it after the quiz, but with different sprites?

[collecter]

I don't want to start a wild goose chase or anything but I remember reading a thread somewhere on this site about playing during cut scenes. One group of hackers should find and explore for cutscene oddities (like the jinjo it mentions) and a second group should work on expanding and refining the cutscene codes. I'm sorry that I'm not that helpfull.

[TzTok-Jad]

i think if someone gives a screenie if grunty turning away frin dingpot where she says "WEll.. we'll see" that part where it shows the wall, a pic of here when she first talks (where she digs her nose) and the saem pics of the tower room with banjo, we can make a lickely comparision and see if it infact the room ith the last "needed" note door

[Isaac]

I visited the begining cutscene (Grunty with her cauldron, picking her nose) and it's the room with the yellow warp cauldron.

[slaphappy]

Originally Posted by collecter

I don't want to start a wild goose chase or anything but I remember reading a thread somewhere on this site about playing during cut scenes.

It lets you play during the level cutscenes, or more specifically, the levels with Animation Scripts running.

BK Maptacular Fun

You can explore past the open Transformation Room door, and in some places there are floors to walk on that aren't visible. So an activator may be needed, or maybe we were never intended to be there and there is no activator. It seems everything we find leads to more things to find. Hacking is such sweet sorrow.

[pinkbull]

Okay I wrote somthing awhile back. It's a summery of that entire page. Here's the link. I'm also working on another article that should also help to keep repeat discoverys down and more new discoveries. It should be VERY useful.

[breagullbomber]

ok you guys...i really wanna become a hacker and help out but i've got a problem...when i start to begin my hhacking it doesent let me...the problem is i try to go into beta or w/e on my shark by preessing the button on the front but it doesent do anything...any suggestions??(BTW i dont have the 4MB expansion pack if thats the problem someone plaese tell me) My memories not great but i think the manual said something like turn on the code generator then turn on the game and press the button on the front, anyways, any helps appriciated and i really hope this thread goes somewhere BIG twords finding SNS. The faster you help me the faster you get more help hacking!!

[Platinum Jinjo]

you need the 4mb expansion pack to use the code generator.

[hatrickpatrick]

Wow, thanks Pinkbull great job!

Do closed threads here purge? If so, I'm going to have a go at archiving most of the thread, although with so many pages it'll take hours >_>