ROM Hack Fire Emblem Conversation Editor (Awakening/Fates)

[SecretiveCactus]

Fire Emblem Conversation Editor

​

I have no idea if I'll finish this post before midnight (probably not), but hey! Finished when I said I would, despite weekend laziness.

Anyway, this is a conversation editor for messages in the 3DS Fire Emblem games, Awakening and Fates. It allows you to edit game text with a simplified script format or the normal game text format, providing syntax highlighting for the former.

It also includes such fancy extras as an integrated conversation simulator based on FEITS as well as an audio palette to help you pick sound effects and a My Unit editor that lets you save a bevy of beautiful My Units for use in your conversations.

The User Documentation is here, and I highly recommend reading it, since it includes details about script commands and such: https://secretivecactus.gitlab.io/fe-conversation-editor/

You can grab the release here: https://gitlab.com/secretivecactus/fe-conversation-editor/tags/v1.2.1

The code is on GitLab: https://gitlab.com/secretivecactus/fe-conversation-editor

 

[thane98]

Glad to see this release! I'm looking forward to using it for future projects.

 

[KunoichiZ]

> GitLab instead of GitHub

WHY

In all seriousness, this is a pretty amazing tool. And the fact that there's documentation on all of this? +1 man, +1.

 

[SecretiveCactus]

Glad to see this release! I'm looking forward to using it for future projects.

I certainly hope you find it as useful as I find your tools!

> GitLab instead of GitHub

WHY

A couple of reasons, actually! I like the smaller nature of GitLab, I like the fact that I can develop in private repos for free before going public... And also I forgot my GitHub password and lost the e-mail I used for it, so I didn't feel like starting a new account with a different name. So, you know, reasons. (But seriously, I do like GitLab a lot.)

In all seriousness, this is a pretty amazing tool. And the fact that there's documentation on all of this? +1 man, +1.

The documentation is what killed me! The actual program was more-or-less finished as of a few days ago, barring final testing and cleaning. Finishing up the Javadoc took a little longer, but I was still well ahead of schedule. The user documentation...?

...Yeah, that took me a while.

 

[Maou666]

Nice editor! Maybe this will make fire emblem fun for me again.

 

[SecretiveCactus]

Fixed a fairly significant bug with the saving and loading of support conversations -- it must have snuck in during the last-minute cleanup stages, since the problem didn't exist two days ago! I've uploaded both a full new release for first-timers and a .jar file to replace the original for people who already downloaded it. Just stick the .jar in the bin/ directory (overwriting the existing one) and you're good to go!

Nice editor! Maybe this will make fire emblem fun for me again.

If it succeeds at that, I probably deserve a medal or something.

 

[Dylos]

Any chance the my unit editor can be modified to load a character file from FEFTwiddler? Or to export into FEFTwiddler?

Just an idea since the hex of the my unit isn't terribly complex. This would of course have an added benefit of being able to have more freedom over the my unit in your game without the end user having to hex edit.

 

[SecretiveCactus]

Any chance the my unit editor can be modified to load a character file from FEFTwiddler? Or to export into FEFTwiddler?

Just an idea since the hex of the my unit isn't terribly complex. This would of course have an added benefit of being able to have more freedom over the my unit in your game without the end user having to hex edit.

That seems entirely possible. I'd need to take a look at how FEFTwiddler saves character files, but I can't imagine it being that hard to work with -- I'll put it on the list of things to look into for future releases!

 

[ValiantChan]

Dang, this is gonna make my life so much easier, bless you.

Quick question though, is the audio palette for voices only, or does it include sound effects like a dish breaking or someone falling over?

 

[SecretiveCactus]

Unfortunately it just contains voices for now -- I couldn't really find any good tools to extract the audio, so even just that much took me a while. Other audio definitely something that I want to add in the future, though!

 

[ValiantChan]

I can't seem to find where BGMs can be sampled. I assumed it was in the audio palette, but I don't see them there.

 

[SecretiveCactus]

I can't seem to find where BGMs can be sampled. I assumed it was in the audio palette, but I don't see them there.

I... must have forgotten to add BGM to the palette, then. I'll have to push a small update for that later, but for now you can listen to it from its place in the resources/`game-mode`/sound/BGM folder. I'm really sorry about that! I could have sworn... I wonder if it's in one of my subprojects...

 

[DeathChaos]

NICE.

Also tagging @UnassumingVenusaur , get yer butt over here, you'll love this.

 

[king_frost93]

For some reason, the audio clips don't seem to want to play when I use them. Even running them in Windows Media Player doesn't work because it thinks they're invalid.

This is pretty cool though. I downloaded it last night and it's very useful. The only real complaint I have has to do with the documentation, which is that it doesn't tell you how to things like background fades. I figured it out myself by simply checking an existing support file in the program but still, something you might want to put down.

 

[SecretiveCactus]

NICE.

Also tagging @UnassumingVenusaur , get yer butt over here, you'll love this.

Glad you like it! And I certainly hope she does... I still feel really guilty that I showed this to her when it was in early dev and then ended up taking a little over half a year to actually get a release out.

For some reason, the audio clips don't seem to want to play when I use them. Even running them in Windows Media Player doesn't work because it thinks they're invalid.

This is pretty cool though. I downloaded it last night and it's very useful. The only real complaint I have has to do with the documentation, which is that it doesn't tell you how to things like background fades. I figured it out myself by simply checking an existing support file in the program but still, something you might want to put down.

Did you install the audio pack for the game you're using? Per the release notes, the core packs come with "audio files that will not play any sound but will allow the script editor to recognize them as valid for syntax highlighting". They're just empty dummy files with the right names!

And the reason I didn't include a wider variety of notes on those kinds of things is that, frankly, I'm not entirely sure how to do them myself. My focus thus far was just on getting this out there, not extensively testing unknown text control codes -- I've got an Issue opened here with a list of control codes that I know exist but haven't investigated yet, and I certainly welcome any input from people who have the answers! I'll add more script commands as I learn what things do. I intend to do a fair amount of research about it myself at some point, but I'm not sure when I'll have the time to really sit down and test!

 

[ValiantChan]

I can't say I know what the codes in the unknown codes issue do, but I know a few bits of commonly used codes - namely, the fade to black (from Fates - it may or may not work in Awakening, I can't remember) and a handful of sound effects. I could post them here, if you want them.

 

[SecretiveCactus]

I can't say I know what the codes in the unknown codes issue do, but I know a few bits of commonly used codes - namely, the fade to black (from Fates - it may or may not work in Awakening, I can't remember) and a handful of sound effects. I could post them here, if you want them.

That would be great, thank you! It would be a great starting point. I can handle quick testing to make sure they work the same way in both games if I know what to be testing for, haha.

 

[DeathChaos]

About the control codes, $Wa is listed in the issue, while this is the most commonly used one!

$Wa basically means "This character is now the active talker.", which is why it will always be seen at the start of a speaker change.
$Svp is what the game uses to call voice clips, so for example, $SvpVOICE_CHARLOTTE_CUT_IN_00 would call Charlotte's first cutin quote.

These apply to both Fates and Awakening.

$VNMPID is something I've only seen used in Fates, but it's quite simple and effective.

Every portrait in the game is tied to an MPID, it's what displays the name, however, sometimes portraits need to be reused with different displayed names, enter $VNMPID, an example of this is Conquest Chapter 8, the game uses $VNMPID to assign Odin's portrait the MPID_? ? ?, making his displayed name "???" instead of "Odin".

 

[SecretiveCactus]

About the control codes, $Wa is listed in the issue, while this is the most commonly used one!

$Wa basically means "This character is now the active talker.", which is why it will always be seen at the start of a speaker change.
$Svp is what the game uses to call voice clips, so for example, $SvpVOICE_CHARLOTTE_CUT_IN_00 would call Charlotte's first cutin quote.

These apply to both Fates and Awakening.

$VNMPID is something I've only seen used in Fates, but it's quite simple and effective.

Every portrait in the game is tied to an MPID, it's what displays the name, however, sometimes portraits need to be reused with different displayed names, enter $VNMPID, an example of this is Conquest Chapter 8, the game uses $VNMPID to assign Odin's portrait the MPID_? ? ?, making his displayed name "???" instead of "Odin".

$Wa is in there because, while it often serves the purpose you describe, there are also cases where it's used after a character has been determined as the speaker and without changing the active speaker! As such, I consider it either "partially understood" or "hamhandedly applied by the devs". The odds of it being the latter are... Pretty high, really.

$Svp should not have been on that list! I need to proofread that thing more carefully. I definitely get that one, hahaha.

And that's a really neat detail about $VNMPID -- thanks for that! I'll see about whipping something up for it.

 

[robotortoise]

That's it.

That's fucking it. You've done it. You've killed FEITS, and with it, you've killed me with happiness and sheer glee. Are you happy now, you *bastard?!!*


This is the best goddamn thing I have ever seen in my life. Holy fuck this is one comprehensive, well-thought out program. Sound, a nice GUI, Fates and Awakening support, easy editing, great documentation....

Are you TRYING to make me need a new pair of pants?!!!


Seriously, as the guy who localized FEITS, this is the best fucking thing I have ever seen in my life.

The only qualms I have about it are:
A. It uses not-Github. Github is kinda the defacto standard for a reason.
B. It uses mp3s, instead of grabbing the sounds and streams from the BSCARs and .bcstm files respectively. (i.e. no looping and lower quality.)
C. It's difficult and unclear to set-up. All the files should be downloaded at once. None of this a la carte business. (Or, at the least, if you do a la carte, have the download packs more obviously linked, in with the "how-to" guide.


But complaining about those is like complaining that the beautiful, gold-plated horse you just found has a small fly hovering around his nose. Seriously this program is amazing. Holy shit. I love this program and I love YOU. And if you ever need the Awakening or Fates PNGs from the DLC, I've uploaded them here.