A Thing That Would Be Very Nice!

[Natrius]

I saw the talk about being able to play MMF or Gamemaker games on the GP2X, and I found it very interesting. The whole talk about it made me wonder another thing. Would it be possible to make a program that let's you play RPGmaker 2000 games one the GP32/GP2X? That would truly be fantastic as there's a lot of nice games made for it, and it would be cool to be able to play your own RPG's portable.

So, forgive me if this idea is impossibe I have no coding skills at all, would this work?

Thanks.

 

[no_skill]

this depends on how mmf/gammaker games work internally.

afaik mmf/gm creates a .exe for your game (port = no way), but if the exe rather only contains mmf bootup + mmf runtime + game in script form one could

a) write a game-script-and-resources extractor
B) write a mmf/gm gp2x runtime.

however, this requires heavy ammounts of reverse engineering and/or cooperation of the mmf/gm/etc creators.
maybe we could convince them that there's a financial benefit if they support more platforms

 

[Natrius]

Hmm.. Well RPGmaker 2000 uses an EXE file and takes resources such as music, characters, backgrounds, tiles etc from folders.. The games use 320 x 240 resolution so it would be perfect for the gp2x..

However I don't think that ASCII (The company behind the program) would support a GP2X program that runs the games.. There's a new version of RPGmaker out called RPGmaker XP which I think is the only of the versions they're interested in now.. And XP is the only one available in English.. (Sure RPGmaker 2000 that I'm talking about is available... But illegal translated..)

Anyway.. This idea would be so cool if it worked. As I already said, there's a lot of good games released for it!

 

[Alpha2]

The question is what format are the games in? Assuming the games arnt .EXEs, if they're in a format like .RMK or something prepriatary you'd first have to figure out how to read the file. then you;d need to create an engine from scratch to enterpret the RPGmaker instructions on how to display those files which would likely be more difficult than it sounds.

It's be easier to create our own RPG making program than to co-opt theirs for our own uses.

 

[EvilDragon]

The games of RPGMaker aren't exes - they just have an EXE-Launcher (similar to Fenix Games).

The game itself uses an own format, and could well be ported even to the GP32 - though nobody wanted to do this, as nobody even knows how the files are setup.

 

[Natrius]

The games of RPGMaker aren't exes - they just have an EXE-Launcher (similar to Fenix Games).

The game itself uses an own format, and could well be ported even to the GP32 - though nobody wanted to do this, as nobody even knows how the files are setup.

​

I see... Yeah that's probably how RPGmaker does it.. There's a file for every map you create for the game also..

Yeah sure you could create your own program, but the RPGmaker 2000 is really cool.. And then there's all those games. The graphics/resolution thing that it uses really gives the games a 16-bit SNES look which is really cool.

 

[Alpha2]

So then, who feels like digging through RPGmaker to find a way to interpret these games on a GP2X? It'd be nice but it'll take a while even if someone starts now I think.

 

[Natrius]

Yeah it must be really hard..
But I really love the idea!

Damn, I wish I was good at coding.. (the only "coding" I know, is the scripts in MMF... :rolleyes: )

 

[Digital Awakening]

There's always the option to ask them directly if they want to port or help someone to port RPGmaker to GP2X. Let's face it, games made in 320x240 would be extremly easy to get to run (maybe without any changes at all) on a GP2X so if the system sells enough they should be interested.

 

[Alpha2]

If the English version of RPGmaker is concidered bootleg/illegal they probably arnt going to bother porting their closed code for the GP2X. The games themselves are made by people who technically have no coding ability or else they wouldnt be using RPGmaker in the first place.

We could get their graphics and sounds and stuff sure but someone would still need to build it all together into a game from scratch if we dont have anything to duplicate the exe's environment.

 

[Natrius]

Hmm.. Yeah, maybe I should e-mail the company just tosee what they'll say!..

 

[Digital Awakening]

Well, GP2X is not just an english product.

 

[Digital Awakening]

I've downloaded the english version of RPG Maker XP and it's quite cool. It's made for 640x480 this time around and you can even get down and dirty with the included script engine to make games that are more unique. The best part about buying it is all the included media. Anyway, this would probably be great if it worked on GP2X.

 

[Minkoff]

RMXP would be much easier to port to Linux, since the scripting interface is very open and we (the RMXP community, which I happen to be a part of - scripting, that is) know a whole lot about it. Porting it would be as simple as rewriting some of the built in functions that aren't in the project file and recreating the graphic and audio wrappers. It is Ruby, so it will run on Linux - just badly.

 

[Digital Awakening]

I would probably buy it if it worked on GP2X.

 

[Natrius]

Yeah, it would be cool if RMXP worked on the GP2X.. But I hate XP for a reason..

The resolution!

It's too big.. I love the old 16-bit resolution on RM2000 which gives the games a 16-bit SNES RPG look..

The XP games just look... Too new and amateurish in some way..

 

[Digital Awakening]

Minkoff:
Do you know if the media is free to be used in commercial projects that is not made with RMXP once you have bought it?