XeNTaX

yeah sorry my former webserver was a target of a hackers and now everything is deleted, i'm working on getting a new link working again

for now you can pm me to get my msn, and i can send u the prog to extract the archives

Hi its been a very long time, but I'm still intersted in getting full support for this game in xentax, I'm reading the guide to file explorations but it is very hard for me to just pick up this up... however, i'm trying

some things that may help you complete it:
1. watto with gamextractor made a special plugin, but it has some bugs and is not very useful (its not complete)
2. silver made a def file of some sort, see earlier post

for #1 I can supply this plugin which is not avail on watto's site, (he made this almost a year ago special for me)
DOWNLOAD:
http://tzfiles.com/users/hello123/fc_plugins.zip

for #2 I have never seen this def file, I would like too, I PMed Silver, but it seemed has dissapeared since it was about a year ago since he made this post, if anyone has this or knows how to contact Silver or get this def file I'd love to see and try to work from there

Mr. Mouse I have never tried your MexCom script, u mark this game as complete
I can't try your mexcom script b/c I have to pay for the full version of multiex in order to use mexcom scripts, I would only pay for it if u have full support for this game, yet I cannot test what you've done to see if it is supported or simply a beta whatever... You see the predicament I am in

-please reply to these concerns, and thank you for your interest and hard work, may I remind you I have been patient and this topic has existed for over a year while other games have been fully supported and completed in less than that time

*EDIT: I can supply sample .dat files to experiment with as well, just let me know.

I don't know what happened to my def list it has been forever! I looked around for a bit and found my small def file. This is not complete! I do not know what happened to my other work.


This file is worthless really without something that uses it. The filenames were chopped in this def list. See my previous post about long directory filenames. I used only the file + ext as a name and rid of the path in this definition file. It is a binary file so you need to read it like this:

[CRC] [String Length] [String]
4 Bytes for the CRC
1 Byte for the String Length
String

I do not remember if these were filtered (dupes, matches) etc. I just saw the file. Again the CRC's will not line up to the string because the paths were eliminated to save space. I do not know where the source files are. If the hash ID's matched any in this file the goal was to display the string associated with it. Good Luck

AWESOME SILVER! glad to see you are still around

I know a lot more than I used to before, but I still don't know everything.
Could you explain these things to me?
1. the CRC (wiki) says its a way to sign files with a code.. bal bla bla, what is it really pertaining to the crc's found in the .DAT file ? Do you have to decrypt the CRC like a md5 hash? (which is not decryptable) What is the relevance of the crc in the .dat file period? How will it help me unpack the archive?
2. I looked at the file in notepad, and i looked at some other files as well, the state that it is currently in is binary right? I know php, so i can convert the strings to hex, ascii or whatever.. What kind of string manipulation/searching would I need to do to? bin 2 hex? and then look for what?

3. you say its a binary file so read it like this... you mean with some kind of program/script?? or just with the naked eye? I can write something in php to "look" in the file, but explain a little mroe what you mean by
[CRC] [String Length] [String]
4 Bytes for the CRC
1 Byte for the String Length
String


Another thing I don't understand is, yes I've looked through the files myself, I see ascii strings of the locations of files like "/weapon/flamthrower.xbt".. but why is this important at all in extracting the actual files from the archive? for all we know it is simply a line of code in a particular file, sure we can tell that there are definetely refernces to files in the archive, but how the hell to unpack them? how do these strings/locations help in any way?


4. Did you try Mr. Mouse's mexcom script? I never could because I didn't pay for multiex, what does it do anyways... ? can anyone who has the registered version of multiex try it and tell me?

5. Did you try watto's plugins for the .DAT files in gameExtractor, (i linked to the package in my earlier post which inclues the exe executable for gamextractor as well as the plugins and other useful text files) Does this help you in any way?



-thank you

Extracting from these files is god-awful easy.

Notice this is in the completed section because it is done. The archive specs are complete. I'm saying that to use the data you need to know what it is. That is the next step you can either seperate it into 4 categories by looking at header data and guessing what the file is. Or you can go all out and go for the names and extensions.

1. CRC is how they named their files. You need to follow past instructions to get the rest of them.

2. Notepad is not for editing these files. Get a hex editor.

3. My file is setup the way I said it was. A simple loop will read it.

What good are files without names? This is important to know. flamethrower.xbt is a lot better than "file 1". You know it is a DDS texture (xbt) and it pertains flamethrower. The path is crucial because they CRC'd the string with the path included.

4. No I have not. I write demo tools and keep them to myself.

5. See 4:

If you know PHP you can simply write something in php to extract.

I haven't even looked at the files but this should still hold true or close to it.

Open .Fat to read .dat file

.Fat Archive:
[4] - ID (DAT2)
[4] - Int32 - Number of Files

Number of Files Loop (12 bytes a entry)
[4] - Offset: In .Dat
[4] - File Size
[4] - ID/Hash?

The ID/Hash? is the CRC that is discussed in later posts.

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obsolete...

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