CPCookieMan
Member
Alright hello again everyone! I know I'm new to the site, but I'm no newbie to game modding. I (being one of them young modders) used to play SpongeBob Battle for Bikini Bottom (henceforth SB:BFBB) on my GameCube all the time, and it still remains on my top 3 list today. You guys mainly do hardware mods, but I figured you might enjoy a good software mod anyway. I was poking around inside the ISO here, and found some amazing stuff, so let's get started!
Step 1: Obtain a SB:BFBB ISO file.
Step 2: Grab GCReEx from here and extract it into it's own folder.
Step 3: In a command prompt, navigate to that folder and run 'GCReEx.exe -x game.iso' replacing game.iso with the full path to your ISO.
Step 4: Open up the folder it created and then the root folder inside of that one.
Now there's a lot of stuff in there, which includes all the maps. If anyone can figure out how to decode / edit those (I've thrown everything possible at them) I'll give you a cookie. What we really want is the sb.ini file. Here is my clean copy.
Tons of cool stuff in here, I'm going to highlight some of the best lines. I think the coolest thing about this is that they're almost all well commented by the original developers!
BOOT=HB00
This line sets where the game boots to when a new game is started. This goes into root > hb > hb00. So if we wanted it to boot to Jellyfish Fields, you'd look in root > jf > jf01 and therefore the code you'd put in here would be BOOT=JF01. Coupled with ShowMenuOnBoot = 0, this is very good for debugging, as the game will start up directly into your chosen map.
G.TakeDamage = 1
Setting this to 0 gives you godmode.
G.CheatFlyToggle = 0
Now this one I haven't played around with much, I assume as with the other cheats in there you use the D-PAD to toggle fly.
G.InitialShinyCount = 0
G.InitialSpatulaCount = 0
These two set up your inventory when the game is initially booted.
G.Gravity = 30
While one is tempted to change this value, it's not what you think it is. This merely effects trampolines and stuff. Jump height is controlled on a character basis and is farther down in the file.
SB.MoveSpeed = 0.6,4,5, 0.1,0.8,1.0
You have one of this line for each character, it changes the walk speed. As the comments say, "First to second is the walking range, second to third is running range. The last 3 numbers are the corresponding stick deflections for those speeds." These have animation speeds underneath them, you should change those proportionally with how you've changed the move speed so the animation plays at the correct speed.
SB.Jump = 1.4, 0.1, 0.1
SB.Double = 1.4, 0.1, 0.1
You only need the first number here, the double adds onto the single so a maximum jump with default parameters is 2.8.
Now time to remake the ISO so it's playable in emulators or modded consoles.
Step 1: Go back to the Command Prompt with GCReEx.
Step 2: Run 'GCReEx.exe -c GQPE78'
Step 3: You're left with out.iso. Happy modding!
Extra: I've created a bat file that compiles and starts the game. Just replace the dolphin exe path and the iso path with yours and you're good to go! Double click to commit your changes to the game and start it up.
I think I am the first person to mod this game, I haven't seen anything on it elsewhere on the internet. My email is paul (at) cpcookieman.com if you'd like to email me. Any questions, comments, or absolutely additional information found is welcome below. I've only shown some of what I've found poking around in this game and specifically this file, so if you want to see other things feel free to ask.
--CPCookieMan (Copyright 2012) (I do not claim to own this game, SpongeBob, or anything else but the post content and tutorial)
Step 1: Obtain a SB:BFBB ISO file.
Step 2: Grab GCReEx from here and extract it into it's own folder.
Step 3: In a command prompt, navigate to that folder and run 'GCReEx.exe -x game.iso' replacing game.iso with the full path to your ISO.
Step 4: Open up the folder it created and then the root folder inside of that one.
Now there's a lot of stuff in there, which includes all the maps. If anyone can figure out how to decode / edit those (I've thrown everything possible at them) I'll give you a cookie. What we really want is the sb.ini file. Here is my clean copy.
Tons of cool stuff in here, I'm going to highlight some of the best lines. I think the coolest thing about this is that they're almost all well commented by the original developers!
BOOT=HB00
This line sets where the game boots to when a new game is started. This goes into root > hb > hb00. So if we wanted it to boot to Jellyfish Fields, you'd look in root > jf > jf01 and therefore the code you'd put in here would be BOOT=JF01. Coupled with ShowMenuOnBoot = 0, this is very good for debugging, as the game will start up directly into your chosen map.
G.TakeDamage = 1
Setting this to 0 gives you godmode.
G.CheatFlyToggle = 0
Now this one I haven't played around with much, I assume as with the other cheats in there you use the D-PAD to toggle fly.
G.InitialShinyCount = 0
G.InitialSpatulaCount = 0
These two set up your inventory when the game is initially booted.
G.Gravity = 30
While one is tempted to change this value, it's not what you think it is. This merely effects trampolines and stuff. Jump height is controlled on a character basis and is farther down in the file.
SB.MoveSpeed = 0.6,4,5, 0.1,0.8,1.0
You have one of this line for each character, it changes the walk speed. As the comments say, "First to second is the walking range, second to third is running range. The last 3 numbers are the corresponding stick deflections for those speeds." These have animation speeds underneath them, you should change those proportionally with how you've changed the move speed so the animation plays at the correct speed.
SB.Jump = 1.4, 0.1, 0.1
SB.Double = 1.4, 0.1, 0.1
You only need the first number here, the double adds onto the single so a maximum jump with default parameters is 2.8.
Now time to remake the ISO so it's playable in emulators or modded consoles.
Step 1: Go back to the Command Prompt with GCReEx.
Step 2: Run 'GCReEx.exe -c GQPE78'
Step 3: You're left with out.iso. Happy modding!
Extra: I've created a bat file that compiles and starts the game. Just replace the dolphin exe path and the iso path with yours and you're good to go! Double click to commit your changes to the game and start it up.
Code:
@echo off
color 0a
title Compiling...
GCReEx.exe -c GQPE78
echo .
echo .
echo .
echo Done compiling! Have fun!
echo .
echo .
echo .
Pause
title Debugging...
echo Starting emulator...
E:\Games\Gamecube\Dolphin\Dolphin.exe --exec D:\SpongeBobBFBB-Editable\out.iso
--CPCookieMan (Copyright 2012) (I do not claim to own this game, SpongeBob, or anything else but the post content and tutorial)