Removing Echelon Intro

[dr.dino]

I'm already aware that there have been posts about this issue in the past, but I'm posting another one anyways because there never seems to be an absolute or conclusive solution or explnation on how to remove the echelon intro from various dc games. I found a small little guide about how to do it on the net. But it goes into hex editing and using some self-boot reimaging thing from echelon. It's all very confusing. So perhaps if someone can really break down and simplify each step of the process, and make it a compatible set of instructions for ANY echelon intro game, that would be great. Because I and apparently many others simply hate those damn intros. They screw up everything and are annoying as hell. Here are the games I have which are infected with the intro:

Confidential Mission
Sonic Adventure 1 & 2
Ecco The Dolphin Defender of the Future
Death Crimson OX (actually I don't know about this one; Chankast just plain crashes and quits when it attempts to play this one, if anyone can verify the same game or knows anything about it, let me know)

So if anyone can post some simple step-by-step instructions on how to remove the intros, for these games on my list at the very least, that would be awesome.

 

[aika-san]

Unfortunately, i don't have any of the games you mention. I'm interested in the document you found though. would you be kind enough to post the location of this guide. i'm sure everyone else would be interested as there are a large number of games which aren't working due to the echelon intro

thx.

 

[dr.dino]

Removing the Echelon intro
Credits to jc of dcwarez.

Some people may wish to remove the Echelon intro for one reason or another, a major one being that the intro sometimes screws up the sound/music initialization in their rip of Unreal Tournament (making it emit a nasty screeching sound until a game is started). (Following example applies to DOA2LE. You can use a similar method for the other games, but the file size will be different.)

1. Extract the 1ST_READ.BIN file from the CDI or your CD.
2. Fire up your hex-editor (I like HEdit or Hex Workshop) and open 1ST_READ.BIN, go to offset 0xF0000 and copy the Hex all the way to 983040 (the end).
3. Make a new file 1929928 bytes large, and paste the contents of the clipboard into it.
4. Save the file, and place it into a directory (ie, C:\SELFBOOTDOA2LE), and extract the data from the CD or the CDI file into that directory as well. Now just follow ECHELON's self-boot tutorial and re-image the CD.

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I found this doing a Google search. But as you can see, this guide really only applies to DOA2LE because of the file size specified. I have noticed that the file 1ST_READ.BIN appears in every DC game, however they are all of varying file sizes. Their a lot of intermidine steps between the steps in this guide which need to be explained. And an explanation as to why the file size of the 1ST_READ.BIN file varies from game to game, or if there is some exact formula to determine the appropriate size of the 1ST_READ.BIN file for any given DC game.

 

[Pavlik]

Removing the Echelon intro
Credits to jc of dcwarez.

Some people may wish to remove the Echelon intro for one reason or another, a major one being that the intro sometimes screws up the sound/music initialization in their rip of Unreal Tournament (making it emit a nasty screeching sound until a game is started). (Following example applies to DOA2LE. You can use a similar method for the other games, but the file size will be different.)

1. Extract the 1ST_READ.BIN file from the CDI or your CD.
2. Fire up your hex-editor (I like HEdit or Hex Workshop) and open 1ST_READ.BIN, go to offset 0xF0000 and copy the Hex all the way to 983040 (the end).
3. Make a new file 1929928 bytes large, and paste the contents of the clipboard into it.
4. Save the file, and place it into a directory (ie, C:\SELFBOOTDOA2LE), and extract the data from the CD or the CDI file into that directory as well. Now just follow ECHELON's self-boot tutorial and re-image the CD.

-----

I found this doing a Google search. But as you can see, this guide really only applies to DOA2LE because of the file size specified. I have noticed that the file 1ST_READ.BIN appears in every DC game, however they are all of varying file sizes. Their a lot of intermidine steps between the steps in this guide which need to be explained. And an explanation as to why the file size of the 1ST_READ.BIN file varies from game to game, or if there is some exact formula to determine the appropriate size of the 1ST_READ.BIN file for any given DC game.

Yes it working but not for latest echelon relases (eg. Tennis 2k2, bomberman online) :]