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[sb iq]

I'm a complete newbie to the game hacking scene and am trying to edit the textures in the Playstation Tomb Raider games.

I was wondering if there was a comprehensive beginners guide to the program Tile Molester.

Before someone yells "Read the f***ing manual n00b!" I already did and still did not understand it.

I was able to find what looks like a texture when I open up the first level in Tomb Raider 2, but it was extremely blurry and the colors were off.

I want to know how I can make it more visible by adjusting the settings, etc. but I do not know how. Some help or a link to a good document aimed at beginners would be appreciated.

Thanks.

[BRP]

This website looks helpful:
http://www.tnlc.com/eep/tr/editor.html

For the most part, PSX games don't have the texture data in something a tile editor like Tile Molester can see. You'll have much better luck with the utilities.

I didn't check to see if they have anything on TR, but perhaps romhacking.net is a better place to ask these kind of questions.

[sb iq]

Thanks for the link, but I already checked out that website a long time ago. :)

But I ripped textures from the PC version of TR2 with a program called "Jack!". When I used Tile Molester on the PSX version, I noticed some blurry patterns that kind of resembled the same images I ripped from the PC version.

[bcrew1375]

Sounds like some form of compression.

[sb iq]

I mean, I do see some textures, they are just the wrong color and it kind of looks like static.

Could it be that I do not have the correct codec for viewing this in Tile Molester? If a codec for viewing PSX textures in Tile Molester exists, where can I download it?

[Garstyciuks]

Try swapping the channels of the extracted textures (you can do this with programs like photoshop). When I was making my bitmap loader, I accidentally loaded color data in wrong order, which made the images look like "static".

[sb iq]

How do I do that in Tile Molester?

Also, I don't have Photoshop. :(

[sb iq]

Okay, I am going to post some pictures. Unfortunately it is from my geocities account so you will need to copy and paste the URL into your browser. The original images were in .bmp, but I needed to convert them to .GIF since geocities has terrible bandwith.

Here is the texture I ripped from the PC version using a program called "Jack!":

http://www.geocities.com/sbiq2/WALL16.GIF

Here is a snap shot of me viewing a certain portion of that huge texture file:

http://www.geocities.com/sbiq2/PCxample.GIF

Now, I load the level WALL.PSX from the PSX version into Tile Molester. I go to View-->Mode-->2-Dimensional withand then View-->Codec-->24bpp RGB (888) and I get this:

http://www.geocities.com/sbiq2/psxample.GIF

Notice the similarity I was talking about?

This is the closest I have gotten to viewing textures in this game with a program. I have tried .TIM rippers and they did not work at all.

If you are going to explain things, please keep it simple since I am a newbie. The most l33t thing I have ever done in my entire life is pass a C++ course at a university a B-, and a digital logic course at that same university with a B+. And that was a long while ago and I forgot a lot of stuff. :(

[Garstyciuks]

Sorry, it doesn't look like the static that I had. My guess would be that it uses the wrong palette to display the images in tile molester. This is only my guess, I haven't hacked any games for consoles.

[sb iq]

It looks like there are "duplicate" textures for some reason. Those images in PCxample.GIF seem "duplicated" more than once in psxample.GIF. Also, the textures are in a different order and have been rotated.

Is this a bug in Tile Molester or are the "duplicate" textures really there?

[Garstyciuks]

I don't think that it's a bug. You probably have to play with the settings. And you have to import/create your own pallete, so the colors look like the ones you got from pc version of the game.

[sb iq]

Oh.

How would I create and import my own pallete?

[Garstyciuks]

Sorry, I haven't ever used Tile Molester. If you are lucky you may try to look for some tutorials about it.

[sb iq]

I tried, I couldn't find any. >_<

This might sound a n00bish, but how do I change the dimensions in Tile Molester? The PC rip is 256 x 2816

Also, right now I loaded the PC file, WALL.TR2 and saw the textures in Tile Molester. It looked like static again and the colors were off, but they were there. However, there were no "duplicicate" textures.

[Garstyciuks]

I believe that static is caused by the wrong palette. The texture dimmensions in playstation and pc version may differ.

[sb iq]

How do I figure out the proper dimensions for the PSX version? Moreover, how do I change the dimensions in Tile Molester? I've been clicking around and I am beginning to think Tile Molester is incapable of changing dimensions.

[sb iq]

Okay, right now I saved the palletes from the TR1 PC version from a snapshot made in DOSBox using Paintshop Pro 9. I loaded up Tile Molester and went to Palette-->Import From-->Another File... and went to the directory where my palettes were saved. Under "Files of Type" I have "All Supported Formats" selected.

My palletes do not appear. I cannot load them. I have 2 copies of the pallete, one is .PspPalette format and the other in .pal format.

What gives? How do I load the pallete?