ROM Hack Will Someone make a Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive edition Save Editor?

[hanseo]

what's the chance of this happening?

 

[mystiko111]

I'm waiting for it too.
XC DE is a big game title and normally there should be one.
There was also one for the Wii edition and for XC2.
But I search everywhere but I haven't found any clues for an SE for XC DE.
I don't know why...

 

[damysteryman]

Now why do I get the feeling everyone who wants an XC DE save editor is staring at me right now?

The idea has been in the back of my head recently, and I do have interest in making one...

BUT!

There are 4 major issues stopping me from doing so.
They are:

1. The save file data format for XC DE has not been reverse engineered yet, and is simply not understood. @zestiva has done some work and identified a few sections of the save file, and posted the results in this thread, but that is only a start, as the file obviously contains heaps more data that is still unidentified. I think we need a community effort to figure out the data format and what each and every bit of it is for. We can only safely edit what we know after all. Anything else is just random guessing.
2. A lot has changed over the last 2 years since I made the XC2 save editor. It was written in C# and using the "WinForms" UI toolkit to build the UI, which is very easy to make GUI applications with, but Windows -only. But now my computers don't use Windows as their main OS (instead using Linux). Therefore, any app I make would need to be cross-platform, which means using WinForms is ruled out (either that or force all non windows users, myself included, to run them using "wine" compatibility layer). I can still program in C# in my current setup, but I would need to take time to find a C# UI toolkit that is cross platform, and learn and practise how to program with it, which is doable, but would take time.
3. I have other personal projects that I am in the middle of, they need to be finished first before I jump to a new one.
4. When I am not working on the aforementioned projects, I am spending all my free time by... actually playing XC DE

So, to answer your question, short answer is "MAYYYYYYYYYYYYYBE". Points No. 2,3, and 4 are ones that I can obviously handle alone, but the main showstopper is Point No. 1. To get a save editor off the ground, we need to know how to actually edit the bloody thing. But file format reverse engineering is something I do not know how to do.

Only way I can do it is:

1. Load up game
2. Make single in-game chance of 1 thing (and ONLY 1 thing)
3. Save game in different slot and exit game
   
4. Extract both save files from console and compare the differences
5. Manually edit 1 of those differences (and ONLY 1 of them) on PC
6. Inject altered save back into console
7. Load up game
8. See if your manual change has had the desired effect in-game.
9. Rinse and repeat... FOR.EVERY.SINGLE.PLAYER.RELATED.THING.IN.THE.GAME.

This would obviously be extremely tedious and horrifically slow, especially for only 1 person. And I am only 1 person last I checked.

A much faster way would be to reverse engineer the game executable itself, and learn how the game itself handles the save file.but I do not know how to do such reverse engineering, so if someone were to try this, it would not be me unfortunately. I would have to do it by the super slow manual method described earlier.

...

So to sum things up, the main big thing that people need to do is actually figure out the save file itself before any decent save editor could be made. If people the community can come together and figure out the save data format and publicly document it, then awesome. Otherwise... not so awesome. The more that is figured out about the save file, the closer we get to having an XC DE save editor. Also, it will take a while.

Now, if you will please excuse me, I have a certain glowy clairvoyant sword-swinging, killer robot smashing, mass sidequest-grinding, epic world-saving, home-portable hybrid entertainment console-exclusive game of the video kind to go waste the rest of my current free time playing.

 

[Crashdummyy]

What about ASP.net Core (blazor?) ?
You can build your Editor AS a Website and Host it in WebWindow or electron.

Using blazor allows you to get rid of Javascripts.
I don't know how much of an effort IT is, but switching from WPF to blazor wasn't difficult at all

 

[mystiko111]

Now why do I get the feeling everyone who wants an XC DE save editor is staring at me right now?

The idea has been in the back of my head recently, and I do have interest in making one...

BUT!

There are 4 major issues stopping me from doing so.
They are:

1. The save file data format for XC DE has not been reverse engineered yet, and is simply not understood. @zestiva has done some work and identified a few sections of the save file, and posted the results in this thread, but that is only a start, as the file obviously contains heaps more data that is still unidentified. I think we need a community effort to figure out the data format and what each and every bit of it is for. We can only safely edit what we know after all. Anything else is just random guessing.
2. A lot has changed over the last 2 years since I made the XC2 save editor. It was written in C# and using the "WinForms" UI toolkit to build the UI, which is very easy to make GUI applications with, but Windows -only. But now my computers don't use Windows as their main OS (instead using Linux). Therefore, any app I make would need to be cross-platform, which means using WinForms is ruled out (either that or force all non windows users, myself included, to run them using "wine" compatibility layer). I can still program in C# in my current setup, but I would need to take time to find a C# UI toolkit that is cross platform, and learn and practise how to program with it, which is doable, but would take time.
3. I have other personal projects that I am in the middle of, they need to be finished first before I jump to a new one.
4. When I am not working on the aforementioned projects, I am spending all my free time by... actually playing XC DE

So, to answer your question, short answer is "MAYYYYYYYYYYYYYBE". Points No. 2,3, and 4 are ones that I can obviously handle alone, but the main showstopper is Point No. 1. To get a save editor off the ground, we need to know how to actually edit the bloody thing. But file format reverse engineering is something I do not know how to do.

Only way I can do it is:

1. Load up game
2. Make single in-game chance of 1 thing (and ONLY 1 thing)
3. Save game in different slot and exit game
   
4. Extract both save files from console and compare the differences
5. Manually edit 1 of those differences (and ONLY 1 of them) on PC
6. Inject altered save back into console
7. Load up game
8. See if your manual change has had the desired effect in-game.
9. Rinse and repeat... FOR.EVERY.SINGLE.PLAYER.RELATED.THING.IN.THE.GAME.

This would obviously be extremely tedious and horrifically slow, especially for only 1 person. And I am only 1 person last I checked.

A much faster way would be to reverse engineer the game executable itself, and learn how the game itself handles the save file.but I do not know how to do such reverse engineering, so if someone were to try this, it would not be me unfortunately. I would have to do it by the super slow manual method described earlier.

...

So to sum things up, the main big thing that people need to do is actually figure out the save file itself before any decent save editor could be made. If people the community can come together and figure out the save data format and publicly document it, then awesome. Otherwise... not so awesome. The more that is figured out about the save file, the closer we get to having an XC DE save editor. Also, it will take a while.

Now, if you will please excuse me, I have a certain glowy clairvoyant sword-swinging, killer robot smashing, mass sidequest-grinding, epic world-saving, home-portable hybrid entertainment console-exclusive game of the video kind to go waste the rest of my current free time playing.

Haha... OK. The XC2 SE was really great.
A XCDE SE would be awesome too, but it would save me soooo much time, if there would be a cheat for "unlocking all achievements and trials". Some of them are so annoying... for example deal 666 and 777 or do a chain attack 1000 times.
Are U also into creating codes?
It tried Zestivas savegame, but it was really buggy. X D Tried to make a run through the game to start with all unlocked achievements, but it stucked in chapter 14.
So would it be possible just to unlock these things?

 

[damysteryman]

What about ASP.net Core (blazor?) ?
You can build your Editor AS a Website and Host it in WebWindow or electron.

Using blazor allows you to get rid of Javascripts.
I don't know how much of an effort IT is, but switching from WPF to blazor wasn't difficult at all

Hmm, interesting. I was looking at Avalonia UI framework earlier, but Blazor looks interesting too, I will have to look into it sometime. Thanks for the recommendation.

Haha... OK. The XC2 SE was really great.
A XCDE SE would be awesome too, but it would save me soooo much time, if there would be a cheat for "unlocking all achievements and trials". Some of them are so annoying... for example deal 666 and 777 or do a chain attack 1000 times.
Are U also into creating codes?
It tried Zestivas savegame, but it was really buggy. X D Tried to make a run through the game to start with all unlocked achievements, but it stucked in chapter 14.
So would it be possible just to unlock these things?

Thanks, I am glad you liked it
Well, something like that is theoretically possible, but we obviously need to find out where that specific data lives within the save file first.
And well not really, at least not at this time, I am mainly interested in the idea of a save editor for now.
Ah ok, yeah I saw the thread, and all its replies. I wonder what was edited in the save to make it do that? This is example of why we need to figure out and understand the save file format first before we can really do anything useful with it.

 

[zestiva]

I think you can use yuzu emulator run xbde, use memory editor manural control data value, fast analyze data format, because the save data arrangement and memory data arrangement are exactly the same
you can use hex editor open save file, use memory editor search and accept exactly the same hex code in memory（except play time, it‘s real-time changes）, this address can easy convert to save address offset, and copy same size memory block write as a save file

 

[mystiko111]

I think you can use yuzu emulator run xbde, use memory editor manural control data value, fast analyze data format, because the save data arrangement and memory data arrangement are exactly the same
you can use hex editor open save file, use memory editor search and accept exactly the same hex code in memory（except play time, it‘s real-time changes）, this address can easy convert to save address offset, and copy same size memory block write as a save file

I managed to play a nearly 100% save file.
Future Connected is done 100% and I also completed the main story with nearly 100%. Have all 50 trials done, but some battle achievements and cosmetic stuff are missing.
Would it help you if I send you my save game?

 

[zestiva]

yes

 

[ken28]

why not use edizons to make a save editor?`
Doesnt have edizon the option for it?

 

[mystiko111]

yes

May I send you a pm or send me a pm.

 

[damysteryman]

I think you can use yuzu emulator run xbde, use memory editor manural control data value, fast analyze data format, because the save data arrangement and memory data arrangement are exactly the same
you can use hex editor open save file, use memory editor search and accept exactly the same hex code in memory（except play time, it‘s real-time changes）, this address can easy convert to save address offset, and copy same size memory block write as a save file

That's actually a good idea. Why didn't I think of that?
I tried to do this with yuzu, but yuzu had a lot of glitches when I tried to load XC DE into it. (I managed to get ryujinx working fine though)

But instead of using an emulator, I learned how to do this with my actual Switch + Noexs Debugger, I got that all setup and working today, Noexs is not perfect and seems to have some disconnection glicthes, but it gets the job done. Well, it is either that or my wifi is bad



Anyways, for a while today I was messing with XC DE Inventory Item data in Noexs, and I think I understand most of the Inventory and Item format, not all of it, but at least enough of it to be able to make some meaningful sense of it, so that is progress at least.

 

[zestiva]

May I send you a pm or send me a pm.

I think you can direct upload accessory

 

[mystiko111]

I think you can direct upload accessory

Here it is!
Hope it will help you.
If you just unlock the missing records it will be a 100% without glitches or bugs. ; )

 

[ComputerServer]

Here it is!
Hope it will help you.
If you just unlock the missing records it will be a 100% without glitches or bugs. ; )

Made an account for this site to say pleaseeee upload it here so i can use it. Been waiting for a 100% or near save to go up

 

[zestiva]

Here it is!
Hope it will help you.
If you just unlock the missing records it will be a 100% without glitches or bugs. ; )

cos stuff you can copy my save’s bfssystem.sav replace same file

 

[mystiko111]

cos stuff you can copy my save’s bfssystem.sav replace same file

Yes, seems to work perfectly! ^^
Only one minor bug... under options the tutorials are always shown as unreaded with that red dot on it, don't know why. X D

 

[zestiva]

compare your and this bfssystem.sav，restore ff to 00

 

[mystiko111]

compare your and this bfssystem.sav，restore ff to 00

Zestiva, I beat the last Nopon sage trials with a S rank, but it reseted all cosmetical parts and I can get it to unlock again.
May you take a look and unlock the parts again? THEN we will have the first 100% savegame with everything done and unlocked.

 

[zestiva]

perfect