Super Metroid/SMILE Help Thread

2008-07-14 10:01:06 pm

Having a big problem with the lower 2 tiles of a 2x2 shot block being non-solid (samus can roll through them) and they're set to verticals. I followed the instructions in the SMILE FAQ about how to make them, but no matter what I do I can't seem to keep the lower 2 tiles solid. Any advice would be very much appreciated.

Acheron

2008-07-14 10:13:11 pm

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Quote from Shijin:

Having a big problem with the lower 2 tiles of a 2x2 shot block being non-solid (samus can roll through them) and they're set to verticals. I followed the instructions in the SMILE FAQ about how to make them, but no matter what I do I can't seem to keep the lower 2 tiles solid. Any advice would be very much appreciated.

Give them a BTS of FF, then change them to vertical.

Shijin

2008-07-14 10:28:02 pm

Cool, got it, thanks tons.

playerman1230

2008-07-16 08:26:58 pm

Hated by all

Aren't the Ceres errored tilesets the way they are because they are Mode 7? The way I see it, the conventional tiles are 16-bit, and I heard that Kraid's room is 8-bit.

On the other hand, what are the latter four tilesets on regarding door colors (I'm reading repalletation notes for the moment.)?

P.JMan

2008-07-17 03:50:33 am

I like Big Butts and I can not lie

Quote from playerman1230:

Aren't the Ceres errored tilesets the way they are because they are Mode 7? The way I see it, the conventional tiles are 16-bit, and I heard that Kraid's room is 8-bit.

[2008-06-17 18:19:44] <Jathys> ceres shaft and ridley's room are mode 7 (8bpp)
[2008-06-17 18:19:51] <Jathys> kraid's room is 2bpp (NES)
[2008-06-17 18:20:06] <Jathys> I don't fully understand kraid's room though

Black Telomeres

2008-07-17 05:37:00 am

SMProgrammer1: Hay guys let's use the NES graphics format for one room in the whole game just so we can say we did!
SMProgrammer2: Whoa... dude... you like, blew my mind, man.

They did it to save space to make up for wasting huge amounts of space elsewhere laugh new

[2008-06-17 18:20:06] <Jathys> I don't fully understand kraid's room though

Even great haxing lord Jathys cannot fully comprehend the glory of KRAID'S ROOM! ALL HAIL!

playerman1230

2008-07-17 03:19:58 pm

Hated by all

Unless you try to make an 8-bit viewing format in SMILE. It wouldn't be as practically simple as getting Kraid's Room GFX, then viewing it as NES Mode in Tile Layer Pro. The Mode 7 part I understand for Ceres-Ridley's room, and maybe it's the tilting in the shaft?

P.JMan

2008-07-17 03:59:40 pm

I like Big Butts and I can not lie

Those graphics loaded in SMILE are for Kraid, the actual graphics for the room are somewhere earlier in the ROM

Bolognab

Edit history:

Bolognab: 2008-07-18 07:21:54 pm

2008-07-18 04:37:04 pm

Okay, my speedbooster room is f'ed up after I editted it and expanded it's room size using Acheron's directions.

Things I did:
1. Editted a bunch of tiles, ran out of room
2. Followed Acheron's instructions to expand the rom and room size
3. Came to test and it was a mess of glitch blocks.

The only different circumstance I can think of is that I get speedbooster before I even ever touch this room. Perhaps if I change the fx1 pointer so that the rising lava disappears?

Edit: I forgot to say that I also changed the heat bit and perhaps a moving spike fx1.

Edit2: I'm pretty damn sure the room expansion had something to do with this shit. aiwebs_018

attachment:

Super_Metroid_00000.JPG

Acheron

Edit history:

Acheron: 2008-07-19 09:49:34 am

2008-07-18 11:50:10 pm

Acclaimed Threshold

Constant Sorrows

If it looks normal in SMILE and is only goofy in-game, it's likely something to do with improper enemy data. Expanding room stuff, if done properly, won't ever corrupt stuff you've already drawn in.

Now, changing horizontal room size will mean you have to re-draw the room, that's an inevitable part of the engine. But if all you did was increase the room size limit and saved it, there's no way you'd get any bugs, unless you did something wrong in the process. It's a lot more likely you'll screw something up along the way if you have headers so you should remove your header if you have one. Other than that, retrace your steps--it really is a simple process once you've done it a couple times.

I'm 99% sure that's an enemy-related bug though.

Bolognab

2008-07-19 12:09:50 am

You come through for me again and again acheron.

Acheron

2008-07-19 09:50:14 am

Acclaimed Threshold

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Quote from Bolognab:

You come through for me again and again acheron.

I'm a helper!

Some day I'll just compile a big fat Troubleshooting Guide for SMILE, once I've got the time.

Bolognab

Edit history:

Bolognab: 2008-07-19 02:02:16 pm

2008-07-19 12:17:10 pm

I fixed the enemies and only the bts blocks healed. The other tiles are still ugly. :|

Edit: would the unkown PLM at the top of the room have some role?

Edit 2: it seems the problem was that I had a ninja pirate in the room. I removed it and the glitch is gone, however the heat bit is still active even though I unchecked it.

Edit 3: well it seems I solved all the problems myself. I changed the rooms fx1 pointer to share a different room's.

So is there some special requirement for the ninjas to work? I used them in a few scattered rooms and it would be a hassle to change them all.

attachment:

Super_Metroid_00001.JPG

Acheron

2008-07-19 02:43:14 pm

Acclaimed Threshold

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Quote from Bolognab:

I fixed the enemies and only the bts blocks healed. The other tiles are still ugly. :|

Edit: would the unkown PLM at the top of the room have some role?

Edit 2: it seems the problem was that I had a ninja pirate in the room. I removed it and the glitch is gone, however the heat bit is still active even though I unchecked it.

Edit 3: well it seems I solved all the problems myself. I changed the rooms fx1 pointer to share a different room's.

So is there some special requirement for the ninjas to work? I used them in a few scattered rooms and it would be a hassle to change them all.

Space pirates sometimes don't like being in the same room as certain enemies. If you follow SMILE's enemy help and the room is still buggy, it's probably because of incompatible enemy types in the same room.

playerman1230

2008-07-19 05:16:27 pm

Hated by all

Quote from Bolognab:

Edit: would the unkown PLM at the top of the room have some role?

Lava-rise when you get Speed Booster.

Quote from Acheron86:

So is there some special requirement for the ninjas to work? I used them in a few scattered rooms and it would be a hassle to change them all.

Space pirates sometimes don't like being in the same room as certain enemies. If you follow SMILE's enemy help and the room is still buggy, it's probably because of incompatible enemy types in the same room.
[/quote]

Eh. . . Check the Enemies Allowed list. Although Pirates tend to be alone and not disturbed.

Acheron

2008-07-19 11:01:53 pm

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I like those quote tags, it's like I said something I never said at all!

Quote from playerman1230:

I'm a pretty pony princess!

Anyway I've tested enough to know that some enemies simply won't share rooms with pirates. I'm guessing it's due to pirates using some different FX stuff or something, I'm no expert. Most bosses won't share space with certain enemies either.

As for that lavarise PLM... well, in general I've never seen a PLM cause tiling errors. Improper PLM settings might make a room freeze on load but it shouldn't cause normal play with crazy graphics. Feel free to prove me wrong of course.

playerman1230

2008-07-19 11:17:57 pm

Hated by all

Quote from Acheron86:

Quote from playerman1230:

I'm a pretty pony princess!

This is a frickin joke post, isn't it?

Back on-topic:

Quote from Acheron86:

As for that lavarise PLM...

What I would've meant in specific is a FX-triggered PLM (mostly why the certain FX1 boxes are yellow).

And while I was playing with the graphic editor's palette system, trying to make a ground color in Crateria whitish-gray, but I "overshot the limit" by two bytes, and please don't tell me "damn you, expand the rom and repoint more". What kind of damage would I expect to the ROM if I overshot the color by even a byte?

Acheron

2008-07-19 11:30:10 pm

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Constant Sorrows

Quote from playerman1230:

Quote from Acheron86:

Quote from playerman1230:

I'm a pretty pony princess!

I would just like to let everyone know that I'm a girl, and I like ribbons in my hair, and I want to kiss all the boys.

Back on-topic:

Quote from Acheron86:

As for that lavarise PLM...

What I would've meant in specific is a FX-triggered PLM (mostly why the certain FX1 boxes are yellow).

And while I was playing with the graphic editor's palette system, trying to make a ground color in Crateria whitish-gray, but I "overshot the limit" by two bytes, and please don't tell me "damn you, expand the rom and repoint more". What kind of damage would I expect to the ROM if I overshot the color by even a byte?

Hrm. You saved over your palette data? If you hadn't moved the data yet you can expect a variety of things. The easiest fix of course is to go to the address the palette is at with a hex comparison editor (compares two hex files) and compare that location to a pre-overwritten backup, then fix those bytes. Otherwise you might have entire corrupt tilesets, among a lot of other potentially messy things. I'd fix it via the aforementioned method before you find out the hard way much later on.

If you've already moved the data to free space you can ignore any message SMILE sends, it doesn't handle that stuff properly yet so it can be sort of whiny when it doesn't need to be. You should only have trouble if you didn't move it to somewhere with ~$300 bytes of free space.

[quote="playerman1230"]
[quote="Acheron86"]
[quote="playerman1230"]
I'm a pretty pony princess!
[/quote]
[/quote]

I would just like to let everyone know that I'm a girl, and I like ribbons in my hair, and I want to kiss all the boys.

Back on-topic:

[quote="Acheron86"]
As for that lavarise PLM... 
[/quote]

What I would've meant in specific is a FX-triggered PLM (mostly why the certain FX1 boxes are yellow).

And while I was playing with the graphic editor's palette system, trying to make a ground color in Crateria whitish-gray, but I "overshot the limit" by two bytes, and please don't tell me "damn you, expand the rom and repoint more". What kind of damage would I expect to the ROM if I overshot the color by even a byte?
[/quote]

Hrm. You saved over your palette data? If you hadn't moved the data yet you can expect a variety of things. The easiest fix of course is to go to the address the palette is at with a hex comparison editor (compares two hex files) and compare that location to a pre-overwritten backup, then fix those bytes. Otherwise you might have entire corrupt tilesets, among a lot of other potentially messy things. I'd fix it via the aforementioned method before you find out the hard way much later on.

If you've already moved the data to free space you can ignore any message SMILE sends, it doesn't handle that stuff properly yet so it can be sort of whiny when it doesn't need to be. You should only have trouble if you didn't move it to somewhere with ~$300 bytes of free space.

playerman1230

Edit history:

playerman1230: 2008-07-20 12:40:50 am

2008-07-19 11:42:04 pm

Hated by all

Quote from Acheron86:

Hrm. You saved over your palette data? If you hadn't moved the data yet you can expect a variety of things. The easiest fix of course is to go to the address the palette is at with a hex comparison editor (compares two hex files) and compare that location to a pre-overwritten backup, then fix those bytes. Otherwise you might have entire corrupt tilesets, among a lot of other potentially messy things. I'd fix it via the aforementioned method before you find out the hard way much later on.

If you've already moved the data to free space you can ignore any message SMILE sends, it doesn't handle that stuff properly yet so it can be sort of whiny when it doesn't need to be. You should only have trouble if you didn't move it to somewhere with ~$300 bytes of free space.

Actually no, I did save the palette data on those that can be fitted without error (doors for example), but SMILE acts like a bitch when I only wanted to edit ONE DAMN COLOR in Crateria. I didn't feel like screwing with others then.

Edit: Color in question is originally grayish-blue. Wanted to make it somewhat grayish-white. I think it's Set 1, Row 5.

[quote="Acheron86"]
Hrm. You saved over your palette data? If you hadn't moved the data yet you can expect a variety of things. The easiest fix of course is to go to the address the palette is at with a hex comparison editor (compares two hex files) and compare that location to a pre-overwritten backup, then fix those bytes. Otherwise you might have entire corrupt tilesets, among a lot of other potentially messy things. I'd fix it via the aforementioned method before you find out the hard way much later on.

If you've already moved the data to free space you can ignore any message SMILE sends, it doesn't handle that stuff properly yet so it can be sort of whiny when it doesn't need to be. You should only have trouble if you didn't move it to somewhere with ~$300 bytes of free space.
[/quote]

Actually no, I did save the palette data on those that can be fitted without error (doors for example), but SMILE acts like a bitch when I only wanted to edit ONE DAMN COLOR in Crateria. I didn't feel like screwing with others then.

Edit: Color in question is originally grayish-blue. Wanted to make it somewhat grayish-white. I think it's Set 1, Row 5.

Acheron

2008-07-19 11:50:09 pm

Acclaimed Threshold

Constant Sorrows

Quote from playerman1230:

Actually no, I did save the palette data on those that can be fitted without error (doors for example), but SMILE acts like a bitch when I only wanted to edit ONE DAMN COLOR in Crateria. I didn't feel like screwing with others then.

Uhm. Palettes are stored as whole sets. Each tileset has one palette; that pointer is the whole set of 8 individual 16-color palettes. If you changed Crateria's (tileset 1) palette pointer, you're fine. As for why some colors, when changed, cause that error, it's got something to do with the palette data (palettes are, I think, 255 bytes long but have to be compressed into 216 or so bytes for no apparent reason). Anyway you can ignore the message if you've moved the palette for that tileset, otherwise you need to fix it or revert to a backup.

Xaggoth

Edit history:

Xaggoth: 2008-07-22 06:51:06 pm

2008-07-20 08:34:34 pm

Does anyone know the room size of the firefly room in lower norfair? I don't see any problems right now with my 3014, but it would be nice to be sure.

Edit: Second question: Can I make respawnable enemy destructible blocks in SMILE? Having respawning checked and placing doesn't seem to work.

Edit Again: I'm using some slopes as "elevator tiles" and I get scrolling issues when riding them on occasion. Anyone have a solution? It doesn't always happen and it doesn't seem like a major bug anyways.

Cardweaver

2008-07-22 06:53:35 pm

you could try manaully applying all the different BTS values to an enemy destructible block

As of right now, there isn't a known fix for the slopelevator scroll glitch

Deep_Space_Observer

2008-07-23 02:31:04 am

Did a quick read through this thread so I may have skipped it if it was already answered, but how do you change enemy vulnerabilities? I'm toying with the idea of making certain bosses vulnerable only to morph ball bombs.

Cardweaver

2008-07-23 02:42:26 am

right click on the enemy, then, on the right side there should be a bunch of data. At the bottom of this is a scroll bar. Scroll over one screen, then click on the edit button next to vulnerable. Here, you can change the vulnerabilities by changing the numbers (00-7F for damage that will freeze if ice effect is on, 80-FE for damage that will not freeze, and FF for only freeze, no damage).

Quote from Acheron86:

well, in general I've never seen a PLM cause tiling errors.

Gate PLM's overwrite anything they touch. Same with doors, items not in a shot block, and a few others I can't remember. This ordinarily isn't a problem, but it can mess with aesthetics if the gate needs to pass through something in the background that is drawn in the layer 1 tiles because after activating the gate, there will be a gap in the something.

Edit: A question of my own: Is there a way (in SMILE) for a Brinstarian grey door to start flashing because Ridley has been defeated other than moving the room or the boss into a different area?

right click on the enemy, then, on the right side there should be a bunch of data. At the bottom of this is a scroll bar. Scroll over one screen, then click on the edit button next to vulnerable. Here, you can change the vulnerabilities by changing the numbers (00-7F for damage that will freeze if ice effect is on, 80-FE for damage that will not freeze, and FF for only freeze, no damage).

[quote="Acheron86"]
well, in general I've never seen a PLM cause tiling errors. [/quote]

Gate PLM's overwrite anything they touch. Same with doors, items not in a shot block, and a few others I can't remember. This ordinarily isn't a problem, but it can mess with aesthetics if the gate needs to pass through something in the background that is drawn in the layer 1 tiles because after activating the gate, there will be a gap in the something.

Edit: A question of my own: Is there a way (in SMILE) for a Brinstarian grey door to start flashing because Ridley has been defeated other than moving the room or the boss into a different area?

Acheron

2008-07-23 02:55:33 am

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Quote from Cardweaver:

Edit: A question of my own: Is there a way (in SMILE) for a Brinstarian grey door to start flashing because Ridley has been defeated other than moving the room or the boss into a different area?

I don't think there's a direct way, but depending on the situation some workarounds might be possible using room states. Basically you'd set up a room you'll have to enter after Ridley to trigger one of the "events" (for example, breaking noob tube required to leave post-Ridley area). Then you'd use a room with two roomstates to set up the door; default state, with PLM set to "never open" and the other state could be noob tube broken and the door would flash after appropriate conditions (say, miniboss of the area defeated, which has probably happened if Ridley's dead).

That's the only workaround I can think of now. I know it's not very convenient.