Artmoney Sprite Ripping

[Orochi_X]

PART ONE: The Basics.

I've mentioned Artmoney many times and a few members have PMed me for details about it so here is a quick tutorial!

Artmoney , for those who do not know , is actually intended as a cheat program. It is an hex editor that allows you to alter certain values whilst the game , emulator or whatever is running.

We can also use it for sprite ripping by removing layers , locking the sprites x and y coords and even cycling through the animations!

Get Artmoney and the emulator settings HERE

Run your emulator then start Artmoney. Select the emulator from the drop down box.



In most cases , we won't actually know the exact values to change but there are several values that are easy to find and will help us to pinpoint the values we need. These are things like:

The timer
HP/MP
Lives/credits
X/Y pos

We will start with the timer. Pause the emulator and hit the search button in Artmoney.



Search can be set to "exact value".
Value will be the current remaining time.
Type should be set to "custom". Hit the option box next to it and copy the settings in the image below.



Press OK then continue setting up the options from the previous window...

For address range , if you grabbed the emulator settings , choose emulator , then select the game system and emulator from the last two drop down boxes.

If you are not using the emulator settings (why not?!?!) then set address range to all.

Hit OK and Artmoney will find all the values. If there aren't too many to display , they will be shown in the left window.



In 99.9% of cases , there will be more results than we need. To work out which one we need , we will have to do some work.

Unpause the emulator and let the timer tick down. Pause it again and return to Artmoney.

Hit the filter button and a little window pops up.



In the case of the timer , we will search for an exact value , the value is the currently displayed time and type should remain as custom.
Hit ok and you should see the list of values in the left window decrease. Repeat the process until you only have a handful of results.


Move the results over to the right window with the arrow buttons so that we can edit the values.



In the case of the timer , you should have two values. One is the actual timer whilst the other is the time displayed onscreen. To find the actual timer , freeze one of the results by checking the "f" box and unpause your emulator. If you have the correct value , the timer will be paused!

That's pretty much the end of the tutorial. I will post some tips in a short while but , for now , look at the lovely pic of Quan Chi from MK:Mythologies , ready to be ripped from EPSXE!




PART TWO: Getting The Sprites.

O.K. I've shown you the basics. Now it's time to put what you've learned to good use! The table for LB2 is probably a little complicated so I whipped up a table for SFA3. It's very easy to use. Grab it from the attachments.

The first thing we need to do is make this table work on your P.C. It will be pretty rare for any downloaded table to work straight away as different P.C's will store the informationin different addresses. Artmoney can offset the differences to make these tables work , though.

Load up Artmoney and SFA3 in Kawaks. Search for the timer value as I described above. Note that the timer value in SFA3 is actually a 1 byte integer.

Once you've found it , right click it then select "more" , "auto apply the offset" and "auto apply the offset to all"



Or use the shortcut keys!  


Once that is done , the table should now work for you so resave it somewhere.

Now we can start looking at the sprites. We need to figure out how they work. Pause kawaks and take note of the value in the address labelled as "P1 frame". Then use the frame stepping feature in kawaks (shift + spacebar) until the characters sprite changes. Note down the new value and repeat the process a few times.

Luckily , SFA3 is very simple. You will notice that each frame increases the value by 20. (for the purpose of this tutorial atleast. Some sets of animations are sorted differently by changing the last digit by a multiple of 2. We don't need to worry about that for now)

Now , how do we scroll through the animations? With hotkeys!!

Click on the last box in the row (circled in the image below) and a window will pop up. Select the "special hotkeys" tab.



I've already edited my hotkeys. To do the same , click on the buttons labelled as "disabled" and fill in the relevent info. You set the hotkeys by actually pressing them.

Thats it! You do not need to mess around with Artmoney from now on. Just use the hotkeys whilst Artmoney is minimized and the frames will change.

[Orochi_X]

Some tips/methods.

For hp/mp , search for unkown value then get hit or use mp.
Filter for unknown value , was decreased.
Reapeat until you have the value.

For x pos.
Search unknown value then move right.
Filter unknown value , was increased.
keep the entity still for a while then filter unknown value , was not changed.
Move left then filter unknown value , was decreased.
Repeat any or all of the above.

Background images etc are usually set as 1 when being displayed. You will return literally thousands of results for that so look for things that can be manipulated , such as round win icons , they are in the same range as background images (in most cases) so the method will be something like this...

Search for exact value , 0.
Win a round then filter for exact value , 1.
You should find the address of the win icon which will give you a clue as to which addresses you need to modify to remove the background.

Other useful things to look for would be animated elements in the background such as a flock of birds flying past or the moving train in the the various FF themed stages.

When locking an entity's position , you will also need to lock their velocity to prevent them from "skipping" around the screen.


There are certain exceptions to the rules. MK , for instance , saves the timer in two addresses , one for units and one for tens. They are also hexidecimal values , so searching for 99 , 50 , etc will not return the proper results.

Some timers are stored as 1 byte integers , so keep that in mind if you are having trouble finding the timer.

Savestate often! Messing around with this tool will most likely cause the emulator to crash. If it crashes halfway through a sprite ripping session and you havent used a savestate , you will not be happy!

[Fightn Words]

It looks like it works pretty much the same as most cheating applications although it seems like it has more specialized options- I'd imagine these would come in handy. I can see the advantage in doing it this way when you have a metric boat-load of sprites to grab from several characters in one game. Forgot to add this one to the list...

[maxman]

After I installed the Artmoney program, I have the options I want to choose, but I don't know which one. I don't know either I pick "OK" or "Get Artmoney Free". I know it has three options, but I have two choices and I need to pick one of them. Which one should I go as a free user?

[maxman]

I just click on this "..." button, I find this.:

"Spyware Process Detector" is not found on your computer. You can download and install it from our own company site: www.systemsoftlab.com. The program can work with Artmoney together as a process protector. Using "Spyware Process Detector", you can open any hidden process and a process that blocks opening. The program shows detailed information, about processes running on your PC and it detects new spyware, trojans and viruses (undetectable by your anti-virus scanner.

Do I have to download the SPD? I was impatient in waiting for answers regarding the starting of Artmoney. I'm new to Artmoney.

[Orochi_X]

No , you do not need SPD.

After I installed the Artmoney program, I have the options I want to choose, but I don't know which one. I don't know either I pick "OK" or "Get Artmoney Free". I know it has three options, but I have two choices and I need to pick one of them. Which one should I go as a free user?

I have the pro version of Artmoney so there are no such options. I can't really help you. What does the whole message say?  

[nedflandeurse]

Interesting

Is there a way to use it for dos games?
I would like to make some rips from old games without the possibility of disabling BG.

Is it hard to rip from a game without using an existing table?

[Orochi_X]

I've made some progress with Last Blade 2 tonight.

I can lock P1's X pos and velocity AND scroll through P1's animations. Needs a little more work but here is the table for anyone who wants to mess around.

Spoiler

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clTG1uSw0q8

You need to set kawaks to console mode and use the training mode in LB2.

[Plombo]

The flashing character shadow in that video was introduced by CamStudio, right?  I know it does that whenever I try to use it to record a game.

[DJGameFreakTheIguana]

I never heard of this but it seems very useful. I'm busy downloading some Rap music at the moment, but I'll try it out after I get a few more tracks.
I play this stuff while I mod you know?

EDIT:
Hey, I just wanna know if this works for mame? I'm in dire need of ripping some sprites from a few of the games. I'm also using the Gens/GSr7_pre2 for sega ripping, if you get the chance. I did install but I really don't have much time to mess with it right now. I'll be back tomorrow if you post how we can remove the background from said emulators, if you didn't already.

X)

[Orochi_X]

The flashing character shadow in that video was introduced by CamStudio, right?  I know it does that whenever I try to use it to record a game.

Nope. The emulation is slightly broken. The shadows flash and the debug switches dont stay on. There are a few other titles like this. Garou MOTW is one that comes to mind.


Yeah , DJ , it will work with those emulators. There is a tutorial in the op but feel free to bug me if you need any more advice.

[maxman]

No , you do not need SPD.

After I installed the Artmoney program, I have the options I want to choose, but I don't know which one. I don't know either I pick "OK" or "Get Artmoney Free". I know it has three options, but I have two choices and I need to pick one of them. Which one should I go as a free user?

I have the pro version of Artmoney so there are no such options. I can't really help you. What does the whole message say? 

Well... Sorry for being late, but here is the window but it's in attachment below.

[Orochi_X]

That looks like adware to me....... Never seen it before but , like I said , I use the pro version.

Also , I'm updating the LB2 table in the attachment a few posts up. I've got Y pos , frame pausing/stepping and character swapping working now.

Once I've worked everything out properly , I'll use it to expand on my tutorial to explain how to actually get the sprites you want.

[maxman]

That looks like adware to me

What's an adware?

[Orochi_X]

Advertising software.