DCFFVII Research Thread

[Shademp]

グレングラント​

速射性能、攻撃力を兼ね備えた試作ライフルフレーム。​

非常に重い。​

Glen Grant​

A prototype rifle frame that combines rapid fire performance and attack power.​

Very heavy.​

This online mode rifle is yet another example of an item that only appears in the JP KelStr of the NA retail game. It is absent in all other documentation. In real life Glen Grant Inc. is a distillery that produces Scottish whiskey.

The online mode handguns, machine guns and rifles have very unexpected names and I wish we had word from the developers as to how they ended up with these names.

A rough picture emerges (emphasis on "rough" due to incomplete documentation) of how the available gun frames changed between Beta (2005 era) and the Retail/Public 2006 era.

Handguns in Beta

One Eighty.......[ワンエイティ]​

Five Forty.......[ファイブフォーティ]​

Seven Twenty.....[セブントゥエンティ]​

Caballerial......[キャバレリアル]​

Stalefish........[スティールフィッシュ] Officially localized as "Steelfish".​

Alley-Oop........[アーリーウープ]​

Elguerial........[エルガリオ] Officially localized as "Elgarial".​

Miller Flip......[ミラーフィリップ]​

Broken Handgun...[壊れたハンドガン]​

Scarlet Custom...[スカーレットカスタム]​

All of the above, sans Broken Handgun and Scarlet Custom, are references to skateboarding moves.

Handguns in 2006

Auto Lock Handgun......[オートロックハンドガン]​

Auto Lock Handgun Ex...[オートロックハンドガンEx]​

One Eighty.............[ワンエイティ]​

Three Sixty............[スリーシックスティ]​

Caballerial............[キャバレリアル]​

Stalefish..............[スティールフィッシュ] Officially localized as "Steelfish".​

Alley-Oop..............[アーリーウープ]​

Broken Handgun.........[壊れたハンドガン]​

Scarlet Custom.........[スカーレットカスタム]​

Machine guns in Beta

Nelson......[ネルソン]​

Stenberg....[ステンバーグ]​

Ullman......[ウルマン]​

Foresythe...[フォーサイス]​

Grogono.....[グロゴノ]​

Terashima...[テラシマ]​

Smith.......[スミス]​

Revis.......[レヴィス]​

Hopcroft....[ホップクロフト]​

I can't quite pin down these references. There seems to be an intended theme of famous military officers, like Horatio Nelson and possibly William Sydney Smith. But the only Stenberg I find is 20th century Swedish Air Force officer Dick Stenberg, which seems like a strangely random choice. No good leads on the other names and given that the katakana might be "wrong", it's possible that "Revis" might even be intended as "Lewis". No choice but to use the official localizations here.

Machine guns in 2006

Auto Lock Machine Gun......[オートロックマシンガン]​

Auto Lock Machine Gun Ex...[オートロックマシンガンEx]​

Nelson.....................[ネルソン]​

Foresythe..................[フォーサイス]​

Grogono....................[グロゴノ]​

Terashima..................[テラシマ]​

Smith......................[スミス]​

Broken Machine Gun.........[壊れたマシンガン]​

Maxima.....................[マキシマ]​

Rifles in Beta

Tomintoul.......[トミントール] Officially localized as "Tomintol".​

Balmenach.......[パルメナック] Officially localized as "Balmen". The first katakan does say "Pa", but "Ba" [バ] was more likely intended.​

Brora...........[ブローラ] Officially localized as "Bror".​

Clynelish.......[クライネリッシュ] Officially localized as "Clynel".​

Caol............[カリラ]​

Littlemill......[リトルミル] Officially localized as "Tlemill".​

Springbank......[スプリングバンク] Officially localized as "Ringbank".​

Knockdhu........[ノックデュー] Officially localized as Ockdhu.​

Isle of Arran...[アイルオブアラン] Officially localized as "Farran".​

References to places- and distilleries in Scotland. Clearly somebody on the development team had familiarity with Scottish whiskey.

Rifles in 2006

Tomintoul......[トミントール] Officially localized as "Tomintol".​

Glen Grant....[グレングラント] Absent in guides and blogs. Adding to the list of whiskey distilleries.​

Clynelish........[クライネリッシュ] Officially localized as "Clynel".​

Caol..........[カリラ]​

Littlemill...[リトルミル] Officially localized as "Tlemill".​

Springbank....[スプリングバンク] Officially localized as "Ringbank".​

In conclusion: Deepground cares about mako, skateboarding, military history and Scottish whiskey.

 

[Torrie]

Alley-Oop........[アーリーウープ]

Deepground also cares about enviromentalism and drag, hence and I oop--

Just in case: meme origins explained on Dictionary.com

 

[Makoeyes987]

It was a true war crime that S-E denied us this multiplayer mode outside of Japan. They should have just gone all in with it. Full support, online infrastructure investment like in Japan, real promotion to generate hype, the whole shebang.

Like, DC is a very weak barebones third person shooter, but if they had refined the multiplayer elements and got players hooked on the online competitive play? It'd have been a huge return on investment and they could have left a mark on the beginning of online gaming.

... Then again the PS3 was around 3 to 4 years away... They probably knew that and didn't want to spend the money investing on a sunsetting console. Oh well.

Still would have been cool.

 

[Shademp]

The online mode machine gun names also pop up if you search for computer scientists with said names. I get more results than if I search for military officers/generals/admirals etc, but we're getting into increasingly obscure territory here. Is it possible the developers had textbooks by computer scientists like Peter Grogono, Jeffrey Ullman, George Forsythe etc and used that for the machine gun names? Maybe.

 

[Odysseus]

It was a true war crime that S-E denied us this multiplayer mode outside of Japan. They should have just gone all in with it. Full support, online infrastructure investment like in Japan, real promotion to generate hype, the whole shebang.

Like, DC is a very weak barebones third person shooter, but if they had refined the multiplayer elements and got players hooked on the online competitive play? It'd have been a huge return on investment and they could have left a mark on the beginning of online gaming.

... Then again the PS3 was around 3 to 4 years away... They probably knew that and didn't want to spend the money investing on a sunsetting console. Oh well.

Still would have been cool.

they SHOULD have just made it an offline multiplayer mode in international versions imo. Yeah it would probably have been scaled back a ton, but at least it would still be there.

 

[Shademp]

NT's progression through the new Any% has been amazing.

October 17: 1h24m35s
October 22: 1h23m49s
October 31: 1h21m14s

This newest WR of 1h21m14s is extremely impressive. Highly recommend anyone to watch this run even if they've never watched a Dirge speedrun before. NT's achievement also proves that with current tricks and knowledge, a near perfect run could yield a sub-1:20.

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1191897430

During the run NT was in audio chat with two other people: Veteran Dirge runner DynamiteDanTNT and the new DoC runner DECosmic (who is a prolific Devil May Cry speedrunner). The end result is that NT's stream is filled both with interesting DMC- and DoC commentary.

 

[Strangelove]

I mean, I'm not sure what other context can be inferred from "dishes."

料理 can be 'dishes' but also 'cooking/cuisine' and refer to the origin or method of cooking. 魚料理 and 肉料理 would be describing what the main ingredient is (fish dishes or meat dishes), but 中華料理 or フランス料理 are dishes from china or france and not about what's in it. レンジ料理 is microwave cuisine but you're probably not eating the microwave.

that said, it is a little vague now the idea has been put in my head, my first reading would have been 'cooking with mako' as the heat source but now i'm not so sure.. the 'recipes for saving mako dishes' is economical recipes for mako cooking ('saving' here being resources, money, energy, etc.) but is that saving mako you're using to cook through the food. or saving mako to make it last so you can eat more.

i can't seem to find any commentary online about it that might shed any more light on it.

 

[Makoeyes987]

Well we got items now called "mako candy" so I think the context of Deepground's relationship with the substance is clear.

 

[Strangelove]

i had a feeling i'd seen something about food and mako somewhere before, has there been other references else where? mako candy rings a bell but maybe i just saw some dc online stuff before

 

[Makoeyes987]

i had a feeling i'd seen something about food and mako somewhere before, has there been other references else where? mako candy rings a bell but maybe i just saw some dc online stuff before

Other than the dishes and candy items, I'm not aware of any other food references. However, the FFVII 10th Anniversary Ultimania does say that DG SOLDIERs need constant infusion of mako to preserve their bodies and their suits provide that infusion as well. And there's the whole item description of the mako capsule from the DC Online beta that describes it as, "A must-have for those who die if they are not exposed to mako."

So yeah, I feel pretty confident characterizing DG SOLDIERs as mako junkies who will literally eat mako.

 

[Tetsujin]

Fun fact, rectal bleeding was a common problem in Deepground because of all the mako crystals they were shitting

 

[Makoeyes987]

Fun fact, rectal bleeding was a common problem in Deepground because of all the mako crystals they were shitting

ROTFLMAO

Perhaps we've discovered a perk of being a DG SOLDIER....

Refining your own materia.

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

Fun fact, rectal bleeding was a common problem in Deepground because of all the mako crystals they were shitting

Oh, God, the kidney stones ...

 

[Tetsujin]

Oh, God, the kidney stones ...

 

[Shademp]

Most bosses grant EXP based on how much damage you inflict on them.

​

Damage * Coefficient + p = EXP​

Damage: The actual, final damage inflicted on the enemy. Limited by the damage cap of 9999.
Coefficient: The conversion rate for transforming damage to EXP.
p: Quasi-random value between 0 and 1. Increments and resets as you deal damage on enemies that employ the Damage-to-EXP mechanic.

The Shrikes in Midgar Assault (Ch8-1) have the highest damage-to-EXP conversion rate of all, with a coefficient of 0.20. If we deal maximum damage...
9999 * 0.20 + p = 1999.8 + p

...we max out the EXP gain at 2000, though if the quasi-random value p is lower than 0.20 then the final EXP will be 1999.

Shelke has the second-highest conversion rate in the game, landing at 0.14. The maximum amount of EXP a single attack can yield from Shelke, when she is still undefeated, is thus 1400. Notably, Thunder magic and melee attacks can be used to gain EXP from enemies even when they are defeated or in an otherwise "invincible" state such as a phase shift or a defensive position. Use a powerful high-chain Thunder attack on Shelke when she has her shield up and you can gain 1400 EXP, even though no damage is inflicted. The EXP cap changes to 420 when Shelke is defeated (I have not looked up the assembly code for this yet). The same conversion rate of 0.14 is still employed even when Shelke is KO'd.

Back to the Shrikes. As the video demonstrates, a 12-chain is high enough for us to reach the damage cap of 9999 on the Shrikes. With a very specific setup it is then possible to one-shot four Shrikes at the same time, using the Thunder magic. Even with a 0-chain the Shrikes would be defeated with a single Thunder Lv3, but our maxed out damage outputs help with maxing out EXP farming. We get 2000 EXP per defeated Shrikes, so 8000 EXP in total. Roughly 350-400 EXP is then gained from defeating the final two Shrikes by using the gun.

This is quite the contrast with a battle that will usually net a player 1000-1100 EXP when they spam 0-chain bullets on the jet-pack foes. EXP can be converted to gil, with 1 EXP = 10 gil. In other words we get over 70000 extra gil with the EXP farming method.

The most difficult part of the strategy is building a high killchain, as the chain can easily be cancelled or you don't build a high enough chain.

Shooting the four Shrikes simultaneously is done with the following setup:
- Jump into the boss trigger by the lamppost, facing forward.
- Tilt the camera STRAIGHT UP so you are looking at the sky at the highest possible inclination. Vincent's head should line up with the metal beam.
- Tilt the camera slightly to the right, matching Vincent's head roughly with the spot where two segments of the metal beam are welded together.
- Just as the horizontally moving Shrike passes above the metal beam, perform a double-jump. Use Thunder Lv3 at the peak of the double-jump.

The remaining two Shrikes will always be on Vincent's left and behind him, relative to his position and direction when the magic shot was fired.

 

[Shademp]

When getting ready for a team battle, players in the online mode would be divided up into Red Team vs Blue Team. During both the beta- and public period these were called "Team Ifrit" and "Team Shiva" respectively.

Image from brief beta recording:



Pre-beta however, these groupings were named "Team Rosso" and "Team Azul".

Spoiler: Beta Manual screenshots

Back in December 2018 I realized the KelStr files held menu text for a non-standard font table as well. The table behind text that looks like this:

​

I'm taking the time now to study the KelStr files more in-depth and making sure I don't miss any content, such as text employing the unique font. Reading the KelStr file from the Beta Version disc unveiled the following text in said font:

Team Rosso gains 1 point!​

Team Azul gains 1 point!​

Team Nero gains 1 point!​

Team Vice gains 1 point!​

That's the first reference I've found to "Team Nero" and "Team Vice". Perhaps rather than being limited to Red vs Blue, maybe the idea was to battle in any combination of Red, Blue, Black and White? Or maybe "Team <Tsviet Name>" had a different gameplay context in this extra early pre-beta stage. The timestamp for the Beta KelStr file is July 11, 2005. That's over two months before the Beta phase began on September 22, 2005.

 

[Shademp]

Change of pace. This one is just for fun.

Imaginary Trophy list for Dirge of Cerberus that I whipped up in just below one hour. Please feel free to add your own trophy ideas and/or suggestions for alternate names to existing trophy ideas.

Dirge of Cerberus: Imaginary Trophy List

Spoiler

- The God of Dirge​

Platinum trophy for having gained all other trophies.​

​

- The Nightmare is Only Beginning​

Clearing Normal mode.​

​

- The Beast's Triumphant Roar​

Clearing Hard mode.​

​

- Sins Exorcised​

Clearing Ex Hard mode.​

​

- Glass Cannon​

Clear the story with Vincent at Level 1.​

​

- Heavy Tank​

Clear the story with Vincent at Level 50.​

​

- Too Long Did Not Cutscene​

Clear the story in under 2 hours 20 minutes.​

​

- Pride of a Gunslinger​

Clear any difficulty mode with Sight Support always set to Manual.​

​

​

- The Theatre of Dirge​

All Memory Capsules destroyed.​

​

- Gallery Completed​

All Extra Mission capsules destroyed.​

​

- Extra-Curricular Exams​

All 46 Extra Missions cleared.​

​

- Vincent Valentine The Legend​

Extra Missions cleared with a total clear time below 3 hours.​

​

- Swipe Your Worries Away​

Clear the Extra Mission Missilebreaker Melee without using bullets. Magic and melee allowed.​

​

- Creative Endurance​

Clear the Extra Mission "Gatling Shower" without using any gun turret.​

​

​

- Superb​

All S Ranks in 'Stage Results' in at least one chapter.​

​

- Savage​

All S Ranks in 'Stage Results' in at least five chapters.​

​

- Smokin' Gun Style​

All S Ranks in 'Stage Results' in at least ten chapters.​

​

- Sick Skills​

All S Ranks in all Stage Missions.​

- Chain Master​

Achieve a 50-chain.​

​

- Chain Savant​

Achieve a 99-chain.​

​

​

- Those Who Don't Understand​

Defeat Shelke the Transparent with a single shot.​

​

- Those Who Are Impressed​

Defeat Neo Azul in the Shinra elevator with a single shot.​

​

- Postponing the Inevitable​

Survive for at least 60 seconds against Weiss the Immaculate.​

​

​

​

- The Heart of a Magician​

Manaheart picked up in Ex Hard.​

​

- The One Handgun Above All​

Upgrade to Ultima Weapon completed.​

​

- The Three Heads of the Hound​

Perform all Cerberus upgrades.​

​

- The Claws of a Griffin​

Perform all Griffon upgrades.​

​

- The Three Heads of the Hydra​

Perform all Hydra upgrades.​

​

- Going Through All the Lengths​

Perform all barrel upgrades.​

​

- The Proof of a Guardian​

Find the Guard N Barrel in Ch6.​

​

​

- The Planet's Pulse​

Acquire all 8 Omega Reports.​

​

- A Mystery Barren of Detail​

Acquire all 3 G Reports.​

​

- 30000 Needles​

Find and defeat all three Cactuars in the main story.​

​

- The Proof of One Hundred Kills, Kupo!​

Pick up the Gold Moogle Doll in Ch10.​

​

- Collector's Impulse​

Acquire all 7 Silver Moogle Dolls in Ex Hard mode.​

​

​

- The Forgotten Janitor's Closet​

Open the door to the mop and bucket in the Kalm office.​

 

[Makoeyes987]

Platinum trophy should be named "The Alpha and Omega"

Missile Breaker Melee's trophy should be called, "Missile Maestro" for lulz.

"Chaos Controlled" would be the perfect title for clearing EX hard mode too.

"Impeding the Immaculate" would be a great title for surviving Weiss's first boss fight for a minute.

"Cerulean Slayer" would be great for beating Arch Azul in one shot.

"Transparent Tranquilizer" would work for beating Shelke in one shot too.

There should be trophies for other Tsviets as well.

"Bloodbath or Bust"- defeat Bloodburst Rosso without taking any damage.

"Nighty night, Nero"- defeat Arachnero in 4 minutes or less.

Also, there should be a trophy for preventing the kid in Silent Edge from getting grabbed once. It could be called, "Bestest Babysitter."

And finally, crafting the Ultima Weapon's trophy should be called "One Gun to Rule Them All" just because.

 

[Clement Rage]

"Okay, so you're good" All S ranks.

"The Quick and the Dead" Defeat a Tsviet in one shot.

"Shinra's Finest" Complete the tutorial.

"Team Player" Save all WRO members.

"I Work Alone" Save 0 WRO members.

"Heroes Wear Capes" Save all civilians in Kalm.

"Are Sins Ever Forgiven?" Save 0 civilians.

"Pest Control" Defeat 50 beetles.

"Cat person" Defeat 100 Guard Hounds

"Scenic Route" Take 10 mins or more to get to Reeve in the command centre.

"Nostalgia" View all flashbacks.

"I'm gonna try." Save all allies.

 

[ForceStealer]

"The Quick and the Dead" Defeat a Tsviet in one shot.

I love this one.

(Cat Person and I'm Gonna Try are also good)

 

[Clement Rage]

Thanks. There's also room for an 'Immaculate Conception' joke in there somewhere, but I couldn't decide which of Weiss' rebirths to apply it to.

 

[Shademp]

Dirge of Cerberus research made me forget my laundry in the washhouse. Pretty sure that's a real-life trophy I just earned. Thankfully I should be able to retrieve my washed clothes tomorrow morning.

It's been over half a decade since last I forgot laundry that I already placed in the washing machine. What makes today extra unusual is that it took me 2-3 hours to realize my mistake because I was so caught up on the Dirge task.

What was the task? Finding the algorithm for the creation of the KelStr encryption/decryption bitmask. This bitmask/key is created by taking the following literals from instruction space...

0x000039BA​

0x0000C261​

0x00002EEF​

0x00000008​

0x000083D1​

...and performing a series of shifts and XOR operations.

Algorithm recreated in C++.

   uint8_t bitmask[16];
   int a,b,c,d;
   int i=0;

    while (i<8)
   {
    a = 0x000039BA << (0x00000008 - i);
    b = 0x0000C261 << i;
    b = (b ^ a) >> 8;
    bitmask[i+8] = b;

    c = 0x000083D1 << i;
    d = 0x00002EEF << (0x00000008 - i);
    d = (d ^ c) >> 8;
    bitmask[i] = d;
    i++;
   }

The bitmask always ends up being this series of bytes no matter what version of the game you are dealing with:

6C 70 B4 C3 D3 0D 4F B5 78 59 67 24 BD 81 7E 43​

Meaning that if you are writing a program to decrypt a KelStr file and thus unveil the menu text therein, it's easier to just skip the algorithm for key-creation and instead copy-paste these bytes.

 

[Shademp]

"Demo Version" State

There is a memory region with values that indicates the current difficulty mode, the number of seconds since boot-up (Global Timer), the current locale (Japan, US, UK, Italy etc) and many other game states. Typically these are 4-byte integers. One such variable/flag is an address that checks whether or not the game is in its "Demo Version" state. If its value is 0, you are not in the Demo Version (DV) state. If its value is anything other than 0, you are in the DV state.

The address of the "Demo Version" variable...

204CAE48: JP Original​

204687D8: NTSC-US, Localization Prototype​

2046A3E8: NTSC-US, Retail​

2046B1F8: PAL​

2046B3F8: JP International​

I have not found a Beta Version equivalent, nor any address for unlocking a "Beta Version" state in the retail games. I had hoped to manipulate the aforementioned memory region to make gameplay available on the beta disc but so far no luck.

What the Demo Version state does
- Lists the text "Demo Version" in the lower right corner of the start menu screen. If the DV flag is activated at odd times, the game may choose to display text showing the version date of the game instead.

Spoiler: Ver. 20060622_0

- Tutorial Menu, Extra Features and PlayOnline options become locked.

Spoiler: This feature is currently unavailable.

- If you are playing on a savefile with lots of progression, the number of checkpoints available to you is reduced. Checkpoints no longer display the time when they were last cleared. I have not done deep digging on how public demo versions were set up, ergo I do not know if the player was ever supposed to have free reigns selecting any checkpoint. The available checkpoints differ depending on if you play the JP Original, the NA prototype or the NA/PAL/International versions.
- If you are playing on a savefile with zero progression, you can only select to start a new game on Normal or Hard.
- When selecting a new game the intro cinematics are skipped. You are instantly greeted to the chapter title "Sea of Flames" and move on to real-time cutscenes and gameplay.
- Apart from retrieving whatever equipment, gil etc you had in your current savefile, the memory card is not accessed during actual gameplay. As a consequence, shooting a memory capsule means the game won't try to save this progress. Changes in the Config settings are not saved onto your memory card either. Thankfully, being in the DV State does not corrupt your save data.
- Options "Restart" and "Tempsave" are locked away.
- The "Config" only consists of one page, just like in the tutorial where you play as Turk Vincent. You have no means of changing your button mappings.
- When clearing the final checkpoint available in a given chapter you are forced to watch the ending cutscene, as the cutscene skip function is not available. When the cutscene ends you are treated to the text "To Be Continued...", followed by the flashy CG art image of Vincent descending upon the Deepground army. You are thanked for playing Dirge of Cerberus: Final Fantasy VII and assured that the game is coming soon. You are returned to the start menu.

The original JP version counts the demo to end when you reach the Dragonfly GL at the very end of Ch1. This results in a cool freeze-frame for when the "To Be Continued..." text shows up. I am reminded of the JoJo "To Be Continued" meme.

Spoiler

If you "clear the demo" in the PAL or JP International versions then the concluding text will be in German regardless of your locale/language settings.

Spoiler: Fortsetzung folgt.

I do not know if this text was ever localized to anything other than English and German.

Confirmation of this CG art, albeit in its PS2 compressed form, existing on the game disc gives me hope. Maybe there exists an easy switch somewhere to unlock this "wallpaper" for the start menu. In page 24 of the DCFFVII Official Complete Guide we see this picture used for the background.

Spoiler: Page 24 crop

I had no idea before last night that the game held this hidden Demo Version state/status. The only reason I found it was because I was looking for a debug menu flag and I decided to randomly change values in the memory region that seemed like a logical spot for a potential debug menu flag.

No debug menu has yet been unlocked but I'll remain on the lookout. Comparing the files between game versions revealed that the NTSC-US (prototype & retail) and the PAL versions have a ton of debug files not present on the other discs. Not even the Beta Version has these files. Ergo, the NA and PAL games are where to look for debug menus and the corresponding flag(s).

 

[Shademp]

On the Status screen you can read Vincent Valentine's name. The Status screen would also hold the name of your online player character.

Spoiler: Vincent Valentine

Spoiler: Status: Online Player

Sometimes I imagine creating a player character and using my own alias there. Or for that matter, seeing the names of familiar Internet fellows on a revived DoC online multiplayer. For lack of a true revival of character creation, I decided to just type in some name tags. Let me know if you have requests about exclusion, inclusion or other edit of your name.

​

 

[ForceStealer]

Man could you imagine if somehow someone got those MP servers up and running for us?