Hacking Ray's Mario Kart 8 Course Modding Tutorials

[ChaofanJ]

I gotta say, this looks like it took a lot of work to complete, well done.

And now... some possible noob questions:
Is it possible to edit paths in the blender plugin yet or is that only possible via text? I think it would be hilarious to add the Giant Yoshi Egg into another track (in this case, I'm trying to add it into Dry Dry Desert).

Also... when I attempt to add Fire Bars or Fire Rings into Dry Dry Desert, the model appears to be invisible. Am I doing something wrong or does the game not search for (try to load) the files. (note that the collision's for the Fire Bars (or Rings) still works)

 

[Ray Koopa]

as stated in the project wiki, the Python api of blender is insufficient to support path editing. you can however use the egg on other paths. In a 'Halloween edition' i made for a friend which will be streamed today (metasmiths on twitch, at 20 gmt+1) we added several boo's everywhere plus a shitload of other things on all courses including stupid new music.

when creating the tracks for it i also noticed that many models just go invisible on other tracks. even the dk banana disappears on ice park for example. I'm not sure why. probably just didn't load the resources for it for some reason. this can be nicely abused because some ramps also stay invisible and you can use them to add 'collisions' to otherwise unsolid objects.
On another note, some objects are missing animations on specific tracks where they were not originally used. E.g., placing DrumInside or CrashBox on Yoshi's Valley produces completely usable objects, but when kicking the drums away or crashing into the crates, they just disappear without any effects.

 

[Harmonia]

we added several boo's everywhere plus a shitload of other things on all courses

How did you add Boos to different courses? Whenever I tried it the game crashed. I only tried through pure byaml editing though, I'm guessing you did it through Blender?

 

[Ray Koopa]

Boo's (Teresa) require a Path or ObjPath. If they don't get a path, the game crashes. Other than that they can be used really flexible and I don't know why Nintendo disabled them online (they're fully synced).
They behave pretty differently from other objects when moving along paths.
They always start at path point 0 (no matter which starting point you specify) and move around in ping pong, back and forth. The path speed is only applied while they move along them, and then they always turn around very slowly at a path end (if it is non-circular).

General rule of thumb is to compare how the object was used originally: Does it require parameters? Was it always attached to a path or other object? Failing to copy the original behavior always makes the game crash. Ensure both objects in object relationships are enabled in the same game modes (e.g. having one object disabled in WiFi games but the other one which references it enabled in WiFi will make it crash online since the object relationships cannot be resolved).

However, some objects will _always_ crash on specific tracks. E.g. Thwomps (Dossun) crash on Ribbon Road (and others) no matter how correctly you set them up. Some tracks are really touchy (Wii U Rainbow Road, Ribbon Road, Neo Bowser City, just to name a few) and you should stick to use only the objects which already appear there.

To make this simple I always have two Blender instances open: One of the track I edit and one in which I load the tracks in which Objs I want to use were originally used; I can quickly look up how they were used then.

 

[Louis Miles]

Man, that's a really awesome work you made, Ray Koopa Stay tuned!
Actually, there is a way for creating these BFRES model files. I actually made one, but don't know, how to insert it into the game, because the model from a track is stored in a szs file, and when trying to open or convert it with some programms, it gives me just error messages.

How can i convert a BFRES file to szs file?
Thanks in advantage

 

[NexoCube]

Man, that's a really awesome work you made, Ray Koopa Stay tuned!
Actually, there is a way for creating these BFRES model files. I actually made one, but don't know, how to insert it into the game, because the model from a track is stored in a szs file, and when trying to open or convert it with some programms, it gives me just error messages.

How can i convert a BFRES file to szs file?
Thanks in advantage

How have you made that ? (3D Model to .bfres ?) Can you send it to me, i'll try to encrypt it

 

[Ray Koopa]

SZS is just a Yaz0 compressed file. You can compress any file into Yaz0. EveryFileExplorer ships with a plugin to decompress and compress to SZS as far as I know.

 

[Louis Miles]

How have you made that ? (3D Model to .bfres ?) Can you send it to me, i'll try to encrypt it

Hmm, I'm not sure, that the modell works correctly. When i try to import it to blender, i just got error messages :/
I'm using "NW4F tools". Someone could take a look at this, because it can create these BFRES files

SZS is just a Yaz0 compressed file. You can compress any file into Yaz0. EveryFileExplorer ships with a plugin to decompress and compress to SZS as far as I know.

When i try to open it with EFE, it just happens nothing! How do you exported the models from the szs ?

 

[NexoCube]

Hmm, I'm not sure, that the modell works correctly. When i try to import it to blender, i just got error messages :/
I'm using "NW4F tools". Someone could take a look at this, because it can create these BFRES files

When i try to open it with EFE, it just happens nothing! How do you exported the models from the szs ?

yaz0enc, yaz0dec

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

By the way, thanks @Louiskovskie , didn't know about these file mastering tools, downloading it, since i have a ninty dev account (every1 can have one)

 

[Ray Koopa]

The Blender add-on can automatically decompress SZS (though the speed is limited to Python 3 which is not really fast with the required bitwise operations - with the help of some experts we squeezed out all possible performance though). If you get "errors", you need to provide the exact error messages or nobody can help you.

You require the MK8 shader definitions to export to BFRES with the official Nintendo tools or the models won't appear in game (if the engine can handle loading it correctly at all).
Please note that if you downloaded the NintendoWare tools legally you have signed an NDA contract and are not allowed to share information about them. If you have not downloaded them legally, you have pretty much the same problems.

 

[ChaofanJ]

as stated in the project wiki, the Python api of blender is insufficient to support path editing. you can however use the egg on other paths.

I figured that was the case, so... how would one go about adding or modifying paths? would you have to do it through text based editing? Or is there a faster method? (if this kind of thing even exists right now)

 

[Ray Koopa]

there was another 3D editor addon but it was not very advanced. I didn't have time working on a custom one.

 

[NexoCube]

Man, that's a really awesome work you made, Ray Koopa Stay tuned!
Actually, there is a way for creating these BFRES model files. I actually made one, but don't know, how to insert it into the game, because the model from a track is stored in a szs file, and when trying to open or convert it with some programms, it gives me just error messages.

How can i convert a BFRES file to szs file?
Thanks in advantage

Okay, i have the ninty 3D editor and yeah you can export a "binairy" (.bfres), how have you managed to create a course model ?

 

[Louis Miles]

Does someone have a list about the whole filesystem? I've dumped the whole game with ddd, and when starting the game with Loadiine, the console just crashes! The only reason for this can be missing files! I already looked at http://mk8.tockdom.com/wiki/Filesystem/content , but it doesn't list ALL files.
I unfortunately can't use Caffiine, my FW is 5.5.1 :/

Okay, i have the ninty 3D editor and yeah you can export a "binairy" (.bfres), how have you managed to create a course model ?

I just made a flat model with SketchUp. First i imported the model from the first course, to see, how big the karts roughly are.

 

[Ray Koopa]

It's better you get a copy of the game from elsewhere.

Beyond that you can totally use Cafiine with 5.5.1.

 

[Louis Miles]

It's better you get a copy of the game from elsewhere.

Beyond that you can totally use Cafiine with 5.5.1.

Oh ok. Please can you tell me, where i can find the Caffiine version?

 

[ChaofanJ]

Oh ok. Please can you tell me, where i can find the Caffiine version?

There are a few different versions of the Cafiine server, but this one is my personal favorite: https://github.com/Syroot/CafiineServer

Although the original works just fine, Ray's version is better than the original due to better logging support along with a few other improvements.

 

[Ray Koopa]

Oh ok. Please can you tell me, where i can find the Caffiine version?

Yeah, try my https://github.com/Syroot/CafiineServer along with the loadiine.ovh exploit, that's the simplest way to use it.

 

[Louis Miles]

Alright
But, how exactly can i start Caffiine on the Wii U? There is no app for the Homebrew Channel.

 

[NexoCube]

Alright
But, how exactly can i start Caffiine on the Wii U? There is no app for the Homebrew Channel.

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