Program For Save State Hacking.

[rsuryase]

What is a good hex editor for save state hacking?
I would like one that can keep a record of the addresses of the value I'm searching for, so I can compare several different savestates to find out which addresses correspond to say HP, MP, Money, etc.
I'm trying to hack a translated Dragon Quest VI SNES.

 

[rsuryase]

This is the guide I'm following. http://www.fantasyanime.com/garden/savestatehacking.htm
Problem is when I search for a value, I get 30-50 results, so it's hard to pin down the right address.
I also know savestates have to be unzipped first.

 

[rsuryase]

Now i only search for values that gives me 10 results and write them down. Do this for 3 different save states. I manage to find the offset but when i change them nothing happens. I'm trying to hack PocketSNES Wiz save state, is it hackable at all?

 

[Slade]

This is a japanese only game ?

Hhhmm, looks like I might have a hacked rom or two. These aren't my sorts of games (I'm not an RPG fan), however hacking games is usually pretty easy for me.

I've found a copy of snex9x for windows, so I'll use this to hack. It's going to be easier for me. I'll try the save state hacking. Personally I'd rather do ram hacks, but the save state should help you.

No promises, I've never done a save state hack before, and I've never done a snes hack either... but I have hacked literally hundreds of games over the years.

Edit:

Well, it didn't take too long to find one simple hack.

Rom: Dragon Quest VI - Maboroshi no Daichi (J) [T+Eng.90-2_NoPrgress].smc
This will give you 99 health.
Change 14c54 to 63 and 14c56 to 63

Use 7zip to compress with Gzip compression to a save state name.

I have not tested this with pocketsnes on the Wiz, just snes9x on Windows.

 

[rsuryase]

i'll pm u a link.

 

[Slade]

Well sucky, it seems as though the snes9x and pocketsnes snapshots aren't the same. How depressing.

Edit:

The offsets aren't too different, thankfully:

14ce8 63
14cea 63 (should be the second byte after the first 63).

If you search for the string "MBEF." in the third (or there abouts) occurance you should change above the "E" and the "."

The offsets are correct. I have tested this in pocketsnes and things show up fine.

 

[rsuryase]

So the hex values are not reversed. Thanks for finding the character stats offset. Can you find money offset?

 

[Slade]

I had a quick look for money and wasn't able to find anything solid. It was close to midnight, and my brain doesn't function very well that late at night.

I'll have another look today and see what I can find. With the character stat's high I should be able to survive fairly easily in game which will allow me to get some good snapshots with higher amounts of gold. This way I can do a decent comparison.

It would be really good if the snes9x and pocketsnes snapshots were compatible (well, they are in a way). You can take a pocketsnes snapshot and put it in a gzip archive of the correct name and snes9x will load it fine.

Edit:

HHmmm, 14534 & 1555A seem to hold the correct values, but don't actually do anything when changed. :-/

Edit2:

I'm going to guess that gold is using a pointer, so the location keeps shifting. This is why editing the file/save state doesn't work. Even ram hacking isn't working, the address keeps changing. I would just hack your stats and grind to get your gold up. Keep hacking your stats each time and keep grinding to get gold.

It's for this reason I don't like these games, they're boring.

 

[rsuryase]

I see, no wonder I've been failing. I always look to increase money first so I can buy all the goodies. Thanks for your help.

 

[Slade]

You're welcome. If you get stuck on something else, let me know.

Please, no more RPG's

 

[rsuryase]

I'm getting the hang of savestate hacking now. I hacked Dragon Quest, Star Ocean, Tales of Phantasia already. Easy considering I'm not a programmer.