Warping onto the Swoop Tracks? (KOTOR & TSL)

[DarthVarkor 384]

Is it possible to warp onto the swoop tracks themselves without spawning in the swoop bike? Specifically for Taris and Nar Shaddaa. I know the warp code for Nar Shaddaa is 371NAR but that spawns me in the bike. Is it possible to get there without the bike? Asking for a machinima related reason...

[Sith Holocron 2,473]

Might I suggest using GLIntercept, pausing the swoop race you want, going into first person mods, and capturing your footage that way?  (You might have to go into first person, then pause - I forget the order that I did it in to get screen capturess for my loading screens.)

[Kexikus 994]

It should also be possible to get there if you replace the OnEnter script for the area with an empty script. That is unless swoop areas work different from normal levels and stunt modules. 

[DarthVarkor 384]

3 minutes ago, Sith Holocron said:

Might I suggest using GLIntercept, pausing the swoop race you want, going into first person mods, and capturing your footage that way?  (You might have to go into first person, then pause - I forget the order that I did it in to get screen capturess for my loading screens.)

Issue with that is GLIntercept only shows what the player is 'facing', and as the swoop bikes are locked onto a straight facing route it doesn't render anything behind the bike, making what I can shoot fairly limited. It's something I plan to incorporate, sure, but having a full 360 view of the track would be ideal. 

[DarthVarkor 384]

Just now, Kexikus said:

It should also be possible to get there if you replace the OnEnter script for the area with an empty script. That is unless swoop areas work different from normal levels and stunt modules. 

Interesting. How would I go about doing that exactly? 

[Sith Holocron 2,473]

2 minutes ago, DarthVarkor said:

Issue with that is GLIntercept only shows what the player is 'facing', and as the swoop bikes are locked onto a straight facing route it doesn't render anything behind the bike, making what I can shoot fairly limited. It's something I plan to incorporate, sure, but having a full 360 view of the track would be ideal. 

Other than the beginning or the end of the race, what difference does that actually make though?  Think about it this way.  How would anyone know if you're "walking the camera backwards" if you then reverse the footage?

[DarthVarkor 384]

Just now, Sith Holocron said:

Other than the beginning or the end of the race, what difference does that actually make though?  Think about it this way.  How would anyone know if you're "walking the camera backwards" if you then reverse the footage?

That's true, actually. 

[Sith Holocron 2,473]

That's how I got these three shots anyway . . . 

However, I hope Kexikus will be able to explain his method to you.  Best to have multiple options to work with.

[DarthVarkor 384]

Interesting, how did you get the bikes in the shot in such high quality? They look like they're in motion, too. What about the HUD/clock that displays in game during the races? From experimenting with GL the HUD follows behind the bike at a distance. 

[Sith Holocron 2,473]

Tell you about in PMs.

[Kexikus 994]

On 10/4/2018 at 10:58 AM, DarthVarkor said:

Interesting. How would I go about doing that exactly? 

Sorry for the late reply.

The first thing you'll need to do is to find the name of the OnEnter script. This is either stored in the area's .are file or in some cases in the .ifo. So open those with some kind of gff editor. In the .are it's listed as "OnEnter" and in the .ifo as "Mod_OnModLoad".

Once you have that open a script editor, either in KotOR Tool or a dedicated one. Create an empty script, save it with the correct name and compile it. Then put that compiled script into your Override folder and you're good to go.

This might break some things if the OnEnter script is used for specific setup things in Swoop tracks. I don't know if that happens but just be warned.

[DarthVarkor 384]

This is where my lack of modding experience becomes a bit of an issue. I understand how to open the script and save a blank one in its place but I'm very confused on the first part. Where/what is an .are/,ifo file, and what is a GFF editor? I've found "Open GFF Files" in the KOTOR Tool menu but I'm not sure if that's it. 

[Kexikus 994]

Okay, so GFF files are a format that's used for many of KotORs files, e.g. .utc, .are, .git, .ifo etc are all gff-files with a different file extension. To open these you need a GFF editor. I know that KotOR Tool allows you to directly open gff files with an editor. That's the "Open GFF Files" button you've found or you could just double-click the file in question. But I'm not sure if KotOR Tool actually comes with a GFF editor or if you have to manually add one. You can try and open them with KotOR Tool or if that doesn't work, export them and use K-GFF.

Now, a module in KotOR contains three main files, a .git, a .are and a .mod. Then it also contains models, scripts, triggers and much more but we don't care about those right now.

The .git contains "dynamic information" about the area, that is coordinates for placeables, spawn points for creatures, cameras and stuff like that.

The .are contains "static information", e.g. lighting, music and what scripts to fire in certain conditions like when the area is loaded.

I don't really know what the .ifo file does but there are some cases where the OnEnter script is specified in there instead of in the .are file. I have just accepted that fact^^

You will find these three files in the modules .rim file WITHOUT the "_s" before the extension. When you open for example the .are file in a gff editor you'll get a tree view of the file's contents. It's listed alphabetically so just search for the "OnEnter" value and you have the name of the script you're looking for.

[DarthVarkor 384]

Thanks for getting back to me on this. I think I understand it a little better now, but I'm still confused as to what I actually *do* first. By finding the three files in modules. rim files I'm assuming you mean RIM - Modules in KOTOR Tool? I'm unsure where to go from there. I know tar_m03af is the swoop platform (where Bastila is held captive) but I don't know where I'm looking for the actual swoop track itself. 

[Kexikus 994]

Yeah, those are the rim files.

And I don't know which module you're looking for. It's the one you want to warp to. You mentioned 371NAR in your first post. The other ones can probably be found in one of the many warp code lists floating around the internet.

Once you know which module you're looking for, you find it's .are file in the corresponding .rim section of KotOR Tool, open that with a gff-editor, find the OnEnter script name in there and put an empty script with that name into your Override.

[DarthVarkor 384]

1 hour ago, Kexikus said:

Yeah, those are the rim files.

And I don't know which module you're looking for. It's the one you want to warp to. You mentioned 371NAR in your first post. The other ones can probably be found in one of the many warp code lists floating around the internet.

Once you know which module you're looking for, you find it's .are file in the corresponding .rim section of KotOR Tool, open that with a gff-editor, find the OnEnter script name in there and put an empty script with that name into your Override.

Ah okay, for some reason I can't find the name of the Taris swoop track anywhere so I'll give it a whirl with Nar Shaddaa & post back - thanks!

[DarthParametric 3,777]

TAR_M03MG should be the Taris swoop track module. You can see it listed in KTool directly after the swoop platform, TAR_M03AF.

[DarthVarkor 384]

Thanks for that find, DP.

So, I've exported TAR_M03MG's .are file and found the "OnEnter" value, this is what I see, how do I find the name of the script? I opened another random module and in its "Label" box it had (what I'm assuming is) an actual script name in it, but as you can see from the screenshot this doesn't have one it just says "OnEnter".

[DarthParametric 3,777]

The swoop track modules don't appear to use OnEnter scripts (in K1 at any rate). I would guess the OnHeartbeat script is pulling more or less the same duty, but DeNCS fails to decompile them.

[Kexikus 994]

I can't check right now but you might also want to check the modules module.ifo file to see if maybe the OnEnter script is specified in there. That would be the Mod_OnLoad field in this case.

Or maybe DarthParametric checked that already and it's not the case^^

[DarthParametric 3,777]

Nothing in the IFO either. Could well be hardcoded, as there are no triggers or anything else obvious.

[DarthVarkor 384]

Yeah, looks like this might be a lost cause, then. I opened up both the .are and IFO files for 371NAR to see if K2 did it differently but it looks exactly the same as the Taris swoop track files. Either way, this has taught me a bit about extracting module information and how to view it. Thanks for your help, guys!  

[Kexikus 994]

Something else you could try is to replace another module with the swoop track. That shouldn't be too hard to do either.

But maybe using GLIntercept is just the best way to go here.

[DarthVarkor 384]

14 minutes ago, Kexikus said:

But maybe using GLIntercept is just the best way to go here.

Yeah, that's what I'm thinking would be for the best. This whole endeavor was to get shots for my machinima, but I have plans to expand the swoop race beyond the in-game tracks anyway. Thanks for your help with this! 

[BK2-Modder 16]

Not sure if this would help any, but I found this zip in my archive called "371NAR Non-Swoop.zip"

Link: http://www.mediafire.com/file/l1wyi33dqis8d54/KotOR_II_371NAR+Non-Swoop.zip

Let me know if that's of any use at all.