Harp Weapon Tutorial

EDIT: (Thanks to Everything, and everybody who have participated in this discussion.  I am very satisfied with the work done here.  So rather than make an extra thread, I decided to show my work here. I tried to make it as simple as possible for everyone new to coding.)

I am not a coder, and while I have been trying to understand how things work, I admit I am far from competent. That being said, how difficult would it be to make a competent harp?  While I cannot replicate Edward's Harp from FF4, I have made a harp that functions very competently.



If you want to be able to make your own harp, you will have to learn how to use these programs at base level:

1. Super Nintendo Emulator (To save state)
   
2. yy-char (edits the weapon graphic)
   
3. ff3usme (basic interface for weapon detail)
   
4. hXd (edits hex code for the weapon)
   

You will also have to SACRIFICE these things in your game:

1. Metal knuckle graphic (2 8X8 tile blocks)
   
2. another graphic containing 2 8X8 tile blocks (for this example, the throwing card)
   
3. GP Rain Coin Graphic
   
4. GP Rain Animation Code
   
5. Unarmed Weapon position (Technically this CAN be fixed though additional editing, but I didn't deem it necessary to fix)
   

FF3USME
Let's start with the easy part.  You'll want to choose the weapon you want to edit. (In this example, the Metal Knuckle, located at #84)


Here the weapon is already set to the knuckle (5E)  You want to set the Attack Animation to 39 (That's GP Rain) and also check box the Atma wpn. gfx. As far as I know it keeps the projectile from being transparent.  Finally set your desired SFX (I found Shiller to be appropriate, the hex is 6D and the Decimal is 109)

Other than adding things such as "both hands" "damage from the back row" and "randomly cast X" in the Reg Item (Adv.) tab, You might want to edit the icon from the Card to a Note to use when renaming your soon to be new harp:

ALSO DON'T FORGET TO EQUIP THE CHARACTER YOU WANT TO TEST WITH TO THE NEW WEAPON! 

ZSNES or other Super Nintendo Emulator
Get to a part of the game where your character can use a weapon.  The earliest part is after Terra loses her Magitek Armor.  When you enter the battle mode, make a Save state of the Attack.  (It also helps to keep a save state of the battle just so you can test out the weapon)

HXD
Now for the toughest part, the CODING.  We have to get the metal graphic sprite expanded and luckily there are unoccupied graphic spaces available.

Code:

D2/0B74: 03 94 03 95 (the 2nd and 4th byte changed to 94 and 95, the card graphic)

So now the sprite has 4 8X8 Tile blocks to make a harp with, but the alignment is off so now we have to adjust the position

Code:

D0/7F01: A4 83 2B 8F (changed first byte to A4 to adjust position)

The harp is now in the correct position, but the weapon duration should be extended. I changed the duration from 8 to 15 loops so the weapon lingers a bit longer.  

Code:

D0/7F0B: 89 15                    loop start (15 times)

So the harp part is finished, but what about the Weapon animation?  What we will do now is "merge" the offset of the Music Note Hit (D0/0635) with the GP Rain offset (D0/65D4) by editing a few codes.

Code:

; [ New Animation Script $0039: Music Note Hit (Sprite)]

D0/65D4: 00 20                    speed 1, align to center of character/monster
D0/65D6: 85                       move to attacker position                
D0/65D7: 83 77                    move forward 24 (This allows the note animation to load where the character is)
D0/65D9: 89 07                    loop start (7 times)
D0/65DB: 0F                       [---]
D0/65DC: 8A                       loop end

D0/65DD: 95                       calculate vector from attacker to target
D0/65DE: C9 00                    play default sound effect
D0/65E0: 80 5D                    command $80/$5D
D0/65E2: 98 04 01                 increment frame offset every 4 loops (0..1) (This prevents flickering)
D0/65E5: 00                       [$00]
D0/65E6: 92 02 08                 move along vector at speed 2, branch to $063D
D0/65E9: 80 4E                    clear frame offset
D0/65EB: 80 5D                    command $80/$5D
D0/65ED: BF 2F 07                 jump to subroutine $072F
D0/65F0: FF FF FF FF FF FF        end of script

With this you should now have a working Harp.....but it still doesn't LOOK like a harp.

YY-CHR
Now it's time the graphical editing.  Once you load your rom, also load the save state you made earlier, and set the Graphic Format to 3BPP SNES and scroll down to around the offset $1343B0 and use the "+" and "-" to focus the image until you see the "Dice" put together, from here, you'll want to choose a palette that looks like the one you want and you'll have to edit the pixels in each section.  I have them labeled here with the already edited graphics:


I'll admit it's hard to figure out precise areas when it's scatted all over the place. By changing the zoom to (X16) you can work on the harp and note piece by piece. You can always test it out in game if you're unsure if it looks right.

If you follow these instructions exactly you should have a working harp.  It's not perfect by any means, but it's a good substitute if you want to try a new kind of ranged weapon.

 Edward can't contain his excitement~