Cut Scenes and Unused Text from FFVII

[GlitterBerri]

Hello, the following may have been linked here before, but in case you haven't seen it I'd like to draw attention to all the unused text and scenes that remain hidden within the game.

http://www.glitterberri.com/final-fantasy-vii/unseen-text

As well as the history of Summon Materia which was mentioned here recently, this section contains a greatly extended Honey Bee Inn sequence, a letter from Yuffie after she steals your belongings, holiday plans for AVALANCHE, and greater character development planned for Jessie, among much else.

 

[X-SOLDIER]

Looks like I've got my reading material cut out for me today!


X

 

[Tennyo]

Wow, this is some interesting stuff. Thanks for sharing!

I must say, the Honeybee Inn stuff seems particularity interesting. I wonder why so much was cut out?

 

[Dashell]

I love how Yuffie ends the letter with "your friend" XD

She's so hilarious! Thanks for the link, I gotta check this out.

{Tifa}{EOL} Tifa:
「{Cloud}、助けてくれるのね?」{EOL} Cloud, you’ll help us, won’t you?
☞ 約束だからな{EOL} ☞I did promise.
☞ でも、{Barret}がきらい{END} ☞But, I hate Barret.

AHAHHAAHA

"Tifa I'd love to protect you but... I just hate Barret so much..." *leaves*
Tifa: o_o

 

[Roger]

I like how Red XIII goes "Humans are mysterious creatures" when Cloud tries to use the same angle with Aeris and Tifa. It's actually very simple, Nanaki.

 

[Username]

I must say, the Honeybee Inn stuff seems particularity interesting. I wonder why so much was cut out?

Prob mainly due to the fact Cloud was flirting with a guy and constantly asking for his panties.

 

[GlitterBerri]

More stuff, thanks to Shademp!

http://www.glitterberri.com/final-fantasy-vii/unseen-text/in-the-truck

Hooray for extra characterization of Sephiroth.

 

[Shademp]

There is room for much speculation around this scene.
First of all, the driver dies. Is this driver the same Shinra grunt that we see driving the truck in the final game? Is that driver the same grunt that gets lost in the Nibel mountains after the bridge falls? If so, then this unused scenario has the Shinra grunt die at an earlier point in the game.

I am also not sure whether the exchange between Cloud and Sephiroth at the end, when the driver has died, takes place after or before the battle with the monster.
On one hand, I imagine that they would have taken care of the monster before thinking about who is to drive the truck. On the other hand, the placeholder line saying
“Battle: Sephiroth VS Monster” is placed at the very end and so if the text is in order with the events then the battle takes place after all that dialogue.

It may also be interpreted that Sephiroth at one point was meant to fight the monster alone, as the placeholder does not say "Battle: Sephiroth & Cloud VS Monster". If the order of events are as such, Cloud may not have been in the battle because he was driving the truck.

One thing is more clear though that this unused scenario has Cloud revealing his Nibelheim origins to Sephiroth after the monster shows up rather than before it.

But for most part this piece of unused text confuses me because there is no way of knowing for sure when the battle with the monster was meant to take place.

 

[Dana Scully]

The most intriguing part of that to me is this:

Sephiroth: Haven't you ever thought about wanting to quit SOLDIER...now, quit Shin-Ra?

IIRC it's the only time in the OG that pre-crazy Seph shows any hint of wanting to quit SOLDIER/Shinra. Considering the events of CC, would make a fair amount of sense, though.

 

[GlitterBerri]

I haven't played CC! x_x Spoiler tags if you're going to mention anything, please, sorry for the inconvenience.

 

[X-SOLDIER]

I haven't played CC! x_x Spoiler tags if you're going to mention anything, please, sorry for the inconvenience.

D:

You really should.


X

 

[Strifegirl]

lol xD I've seen a couple of vids on youtube about this ^__^ here take a look ;3

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HbnhZd2ctmo&feature=channel_video_title

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d9JczLfYq68&feature=channel_video_title

 

[koolaidman]

Hey all.

Even though it wont be covered for a while, I'm interested in some unused text from one of the debug rooms (BLACKBG7) that was found some time a go.

On Glitterberri's website, you can check out the unused debug room text on the "Debug text" link on the Unseen text page. I'd link to it, but I don't have 5 posts as of writing so I can't.

I'm very interested in the part with the music selection. There are some intriguing entries on there that don't seem familiar at all. I remember that someone said that the actual music sequencing data that each map uses is held within the map file itself (rather than the sound file where the instrument banks are). I also remember that one of the BLACKBG maps had a version of Aeris' theme that may/may not be different from the final version (you can tell that the incorrect instruments are playing, indicating that the song must've been around when the instrument bank was different).

Look for "Final Fantasy VII - extra debug room" by VanishedOne on YouTube. Again, I'd love to post a link but I can't for reasons mentioned above.

You could use the early demo's instrument bank file to see if it sounds a bit better, but I don't know how this person managed to get this to load.

This is all very interesting to me so I hope you guys continue to find interesting things. I look forward to reading Part 4!

 

[Shademp]

Hey all.

Hiya. Welcome to TLS!

I'm very interested in the part with the music selection. There are some intriguing entries on there that don't seem familiar at all. I remember that someone said that the actual music sequencing data that each map uses is held within the map file itself (rather than the sound file where the instrument banks are).

This is true, the music is held within each field file. You can get the instrumental sounds elsewhere, but to rip the music you would need to know R3000 Assembly and understand the PSF format. I am yet to find anyone with the programming skill to do a music rip of all the field files in the original Japanese release. Only by doing this could we be sure that we've completely scoured the game for unused music tracks (not counting the minigames, of which I am not sure how their music could be ripped).

The BLACKBG7 text (Kazuhiko Yoshioka's debug room), especially the unflagged music selection track, is fascinating. GlitterBerri's Debug Text entry
The final field only contains four music tracks, which are labelled as follows in Makou Reactor:
Music #0: Turk's Theme. This one is never triggered naturally in this field, as far as I know, but modding the field to ignore Music #1 will cause #0 to play instead.
Music #1: The Oppressed.
Music #2: Let The Battles Begin
Music #3: Mako Cannon - The Destruction of Shinra (portion played in FMV with Rufus).

EDIT: There *might* be more music tracks in this field. I tried out #4 and #7, but all I got was silence. I am not in the mood to try all the numbers though.

Either the field was once riddled with music, or the options were to transport you to the correct fields that would play those themes. We honestly do not know. In the tobal demo, there is no separate folder for music tracks (except, again, for the instrument sounds), so there probably was never a separate folder that the game was to refer to.

I also remember that one of the BLACKBG maps had a version of Aeris' theme that may/may not be different from the final version (you can tell that the incorrect instruments are playing, indicating that the song must've been around when the instrument bank was different).

Here is the music piece you mentioned, which I like to call "Aeris' Corrupt Theme".

So yes, the instrument bank must have been different.

This room is called BLACKBGA, and the author is Motomu Toriyama. You can tell that it is a beta version BLACKBG2, Motomu Toriyama's final debug room. Just why he switched from BGA to BG2, we can only guess.

You could use the early demo's instrument bank file to see if it sounds a bit better, but I don't know how this person managed to get this to load.

This is a f*cking excellent idea! Hopefully someone with the know-how can try this out.

 

[koolaidman]

Hey Shademp thanks for the response!

I checked out the earliest PSX demo that we have and I noticed that all the field map files aren't compressed with LZS like in the final version. I packaged all these files into one file and searched for the AKAO header and found 5 sound files based on how many instances of AKAO I could find. To top it all off, I searched the entire ISO and found a total of 7 AKAO headers (the added 2 are the LOOPTEST and OA SND files). I think the PSF rip of the demo version that we have only contains 4 songs, so there's 3 more songs that still need to be ripped from the demo. There might be more hard coded in other files that might be compressed with LZS, but I'm not sure.

As far as the corrupt Aeris theme goes, it should be relatively easy to replace the INSTR.ALL/DAT in the final version with the one from the demo version. I'm not sure if there are any other differences in the format besides the samples themselves, but I remember combing through the INSTR.ALL file from the demo version and all the instrument samples that all the music in the game can use is in here (they didn't purge the file for instruments for just the songs used in this demo). A lot of the samples themselves are different from what we're used to, so it'd be interesting to try this out. I just don't know how VanishedOne got the map to load.

 

[Shademp]

One can visit BLACKBGA by activating this code before you load a new game or an old save:
800987F40066

It will only work for the first Japanese release, because much of the .DAT file has been deleted in the later versions. I have not found a direct entrance to BLACKBGA from, for example, the debug room lobby.

The PCSX emulator may sometimes crash when trying to load BLACKBGA, but PCSX has some compatibility issues in general. The ePSXe has no trouble loading the map, or accepting that you jump to any other map from BLACKBGA.

I think the PSF rip of the demo version that we have only contains 4 songs, so there's 3 more songs that still need to be ripped from the demo. There might be more hard coded in other files that might be compressed with LZS, but I'm not sure.

Who has a PSF rip of the demo? How do you detect an AKAO header? Do you know anyone with the programming knowledge to make PSF rips?

Unfortunately I do not know of a tool with which to replace the INSTR.ALL/DAT files. The program I use for modding the game, Mass Field Update, can only update changes made to field .DAT files. To me, so far, changes to any other part of the PlayStation version of the game is restricted.
It is impossible to take the .ISO file of the final game and simply add or delete files from it. You need to develop the correct software to do this.

I should tell you that I have no programming skills whatsoever. All I can do is hope that other people develop the software necessary to research more aspects of the PlayStation version of the game.
If you are using any special tools to research the demo, or if you have any general hacking skills, please inform me.

 

[koolaidman]

Hi Shademp thanks for the response.

Actually, I did manage to replace the INSTR files using CDMage. Replacing the .ALL file results in silence for everything (even sound effects), but just replacing the .DAT file seems to work. It sounds messed up, but maybe we're on the right track?

I also took a look at the early demo and found out some stuff. LOOPTEST.SND is the track that plays in the main menu for the demo, and the OA.SND file is the Opening BGM. The weird thing though is that OA.SND is unused, I replaced this file with dummy data to see if it would affect the music during the opening movie but the music still plays. I attempted to swap LOOPTEST.SND with OA.SND, but since OA.SND is larger than LOOPTEST.SND it will only copy about half of the data from OA.SND. It still plays though, but only the first 2 or 3 channels. From listening to it though, it sounds like it might actually be different from the one presently used even in the demo. It's difficult to tell though, but I did notice a few things even from what I heard.

I investigated the AKAO files that the game actually uses, and it's a bit weird. You can find the AKAO sound files just by taking a group of files and put them into one file that doesn't compress or encrypt them (for example, I just took files from a specific folder and create a .bin, then searched through the bin with Hex Workshop for the 'AKAO' string). The AKAO header is intact, but the rest seems compressed in something. The AKAO files are coming from some of the .ATE files in the NARITA folder.

I got the PSF for the demo from hellandheavennet. It only contains the remix of the Prelude, the Battle BGM, Opening BGM, and Fighting BGM.

From what I've gathered so far, INSTR.DAT contains the pointers for the music and sound data. INSTR.ALL contains the actual samples. You can listen to INSTR.ALL by importing it into PSound and scanning for sound files it can play. You'll notice a lot of differences in the samples between the demo and final versions. The samples for the LOOPTEST.SND seem to have been added later, but were taken out from the final version's INSTR.ALL file.

Unfortunately, I lack programming knowledge. But I often look into the internals of games to make sense of how they work based on what I know on their structure. From looking at FF7, it's all over the place. Looking at the final version of the copy I have at least, there are SND files in the FIELD folder. But by judging from what I've seen from the demo, I don't think these are used either. I don't know anyone who knows the internals of FF7 personally, but Qhimm is your best bet for help.

And finally, thanks for the code. I'll check out the room later and see how well it plays with the changes I made.

 

[GlitterBerri]

Hey, koolaidman! Welcome to TLS! Thanks for your enthusiasm, I wanted to help you out, so here's a proper translation of all the debug room menus. You'll have to wait for the commentated version, though. ^^ Hope it's of use!

http://www.glitterberri.com/final-fantasy-vii/debug-rooms

 

[koolaidman]

Cool, thanks for the translations! I was wondering what room were which based on the file names, so this will help a bit.

I decided to take a look at the final version a little bit more. In the Japanese version, there are two SND files that are just left hanging around in the directory. One is the song that plays in the Battle Arena and I don't remember what the other was is (it might be a fanfare because it's small). In the US version, these files are gone. The AKAO files are stored in the .DAT files for every map. I checked out BLACKBG7 (the one with the music selection strings) and unfortunately, I only see 4 AKAO headers, so there must be only 4 songs located on the map. I did check out BLACKBG2 since that file is one of the more bigger DATs in the game and it has 13 AKAO headers. If I remember correctly, this was the map where the music changed depending on who you talked to. But I don't think there was ever 13 pieces of music that could be played on the map. And finally, BLACKBGA only has the Aeris theme and nothing else. If there are any other completely unused map files like BLACKGBA (and by judging from the FIELD folder more, there are maybe tons more), there's a huge possibility that those maps contain more unused/alternate versions of BGM.

But anyway, I checked out the corrupt Aeris theme. I took the AKAO data present in the DAT and copied it to a new file, and then replaced LOOPTEST.SND with it. Unfortunately, it only loads the first 2 or 3 channels because of the file size limits (the song is about 12KB, LOOPTEST is 3KB) but I could still hear more than I need to hear.

http://kiwi6.com/file/7rxo2t6wxr

There's still something wrong with it even when it's using the demo version's instrument data. Note that the begining is cut off, that's my doing because nothing is being played (it's on a later channel that isn't loaded due to the data being truncated) I guess the song itself isn't as early as this demo, but probably a little closer to release. Here's the song as heard in the final version:

http://kiwi6.com/file/n28i1rqtau

Surprisingly, the demo can work with the sound files from the final version. I was expecting a drastic change in the format, but it seems to at least play the notes with the correct tempo and panning.

I wish there was a player that could play these files raw. It'd make life a bit easier.

 

[Shademp]

Thank you immensely for your contribution koolaidman. When I'm in the mood for it, I will use your methods and try CdMage (last time I tried to use it to mod FFVII it failed) to mod FFVII and use a hex editor to see if I too can search for AKAO headers. This would make it possible to scour all the 700 field files and see if there are any other unused tracks in there.

Since you are interested in unused content, you may want to pay attention to not only the stuff posted in this thread, but also in this easter egg themed thread where I occassionally post my updates.
Simply keeping a track of my youtube account may be of interest to you. =)

Again, thank you for giving us this alternate version of Aeris' BLACKBGA theme.

 

[X-SOLDIER]

I am incapable of contributing to this, but I just want to say that you guys are AWESOME. The work that goes into figuring this stuff out blows my mind.


X

 

[koolaidman]

Unsure of where to post this again, but it's pretty neat.

In prerelease videos, it was known that at one time they went with chibi versions of the characters instead of portraits. In the demo version, they used portraits (a bit different from the final too), but also in the demo are a few leftover things from older versions.

In WINDOW.BIN:

(sorry for the wrong colors, blame tile molestor)

They left them in. But it looks like they cleaned up some stuff for the demo, since there's a lot of empty space. Other parts of WINDOW.BIN just contain more Japanese characters, so this is all there is. I don't think this is the final version's WINDOW.BIN file.

In fact, most of the demo has been cleaned up of just the importing stuff. There might be more stuff to see in the other GZIP'd files, but I don't know what you might find.

 

[Shademp]

Looks like I was wrong not to use tile molestor/molester. It is not officially compatible with PlayStation games, as seen by the wrong colors, but great idea for you to try it anyway!

I can't help but notice that "shield", which is the same type as used for FFVI's equipment menu.
*quickly edited pic*

The same "sword" icon, too. The other weapon icons to the far right in your image look just like ones from earlier Final Fantasies as well.

No menu can be accessed in the demo. I wonder if some hacking into the game could unlock a menu, even if only a partial one...

That sphere might represent Materia or Magic, but I can't make sense out of all the icons.

 

[koolaidman]

Looks like I was wrong not to use tile molestor/molester. It is not officially compatible with PlayStation games, as seen by the wrong colors, but great idea for you to try it anyway!

I can't help but notice that "shield", which is the same type as used for FFVI's equipment menu.
*quickly edited pic*

The same "sword" icon, too. The other weapon icons to the far right in your image look just like ones from earlier Final Fantasies as well.

No menu can be accessed in the demo. I wonder if some hacking into the game could unlock a menu, even if only a partial one...

That sphere might represent Materia or Magic, but I can't make sense out of all the icons.

Nah, I checked. The demo lacks the MENU folder which contains the files for the shop, main menu, etc. But speaking of the menus though, I wonder where the FIELD models are kept? I wonder if they purged the demo from any unused common field objects like the save points. Because if they didn't, maybe we can find the model for the old save point in the demo as well. I don't know where it could be though, I can't find documentation as to where the game keeps it's model data for NPCs and objects for the field maps. I don't even know where they're keeping the portraits for the characters that are being used in the demo either. It doesn't seem like it's in WINDOW.BIN. I only found the eye graphics field characters use in TDB.LZS, but I can't find the models themselves (maybe in FIELD.BIN? It's GZIP'd compressed but nothing seems to decompress it).

But anyway, back to the graphics I did manage to find. You're right, they are graphics from older FF games. I noticed a Mage Staff of some kind near the right of my picture, I think. Another thing I noticed is that right above the graphics for 2D Cloud and Barrett are some Japanese characters. If I remember correctly, these are the same exact characters (same font at least) that are featured in battle in this prerelease video (at 0:54):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GW1e5OauZ44&feature=player_embedded#at=54

I don't know what it says, though. But you can also see that those face graphics were originally in here by judging the empty spaces, but were removed for some reason.

Besides the demo, I also took a look at the original Japanese version again and looked at all the unused field files in search of AKAO files. It's been about a week or two since I did it so I can't remember the specifics right now, but not a lot of the maps that aren't normally accessable in the normal debug map actually have AKAO files. I did find one or two though. One that sticks out of my head is one debug room file that has the song "Listen to the Cries of the Planet". I got the song to play quite nicely in the demo version, but it's not a perfect match. Nothing seems too out of the ordinary with it, so I'm not sure. I can't remember which debug room it was though, but it's OB and above I believe. There were some other AKAO files in some other debug rooms, but they were either sound effects or they just didn't play at all when I put them in the demo. So who knows.

Speaking of the final version, I actually remembered something I've been meaning to point out a while a go. I remember looking at this picture:

And I remember being able to control Red XIII through some selection from one of the debug rooms. I can't remember any specifics though. But I was wondering if you checked out Kalm's script file for anything odd? There's also another picture where everyone's in the central square of the town, which seems to me that Cloud was originally supposed to tell his story outside rather than at the Inn. I could be wrong though, but they set up of the scene seems to hint at that:

But anyway, I hope the next part is coming a long nicely. I can't wait to read it!

 

[Shademp]

I have made a decision. Because of the technical difficulties that have kept the Honey Bee Inn article from becoming completely finished, I have decided to make my Honey Bee Inn videos public. I uploaded them over a month ago and kept them private because I wanted to introduce them at the same time as the actual article.

I don't want to keep the material from TLS any longer though, so here they are.

This will greatly diminish the impact of the upcoming article, but I say f*ck it. It's not right to let the people wait for so long.