Manually editing save

[aciko11]

Hi, i'm trying to manually edit my save file of pokemon liquid crystal. Does anyone have a guide or something to do that? Cause i'm trying to understand how the save file is structured but i'm failing :/ Like for example how do i find a pokemon of my party or box in the save file?

 

Btw I already tried to use other software to edit it since it's an hack of fire red, but it doesn't work. 

[theSLAYER]

@aciko11 A good place to start would be to look at Gen II's save structure:
https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Save_data_structure_in_Generation_II

I say first learn how to calculate the checksum.
If the Checksum is invalid, the game treats the save as invalid too.
Maybe write up a checksum calculator, to validate your save.
If you don't get this first step right, then nothing else really matters...

 

A good way to find whether some points are at the same places, is to use your Pokemon Names.
Convert the name to hex using the encoding table.
https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Character_encoding_in_Generation_II

[aciko11]

On 8/23/2018 at 2:41 AM, theSLAYER said:

@aciko11 A good place to start would be to look at Gen II's save structure:
https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Save_data_structure_in_Generation_II

I say first learn how to calculate the checksum.
If the Checksum is invalid, the game treats the save as invalid too.
Maybe write up a checksum calculator, to validate your save.
If you don't get this first step right, then nothing else really matters...

 

A good way to find whether some points are at the same places, is to use your Pokemon Names.
Convert the name to hex using the encoding table.
https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Character_encoding_in_Generation_II

Thanks, i've already read that (for the gen 3), but i can't seem to find anything, like if i try to search for my trainer id (using the encoding table) it doesn't seem to be there. I managed to find what i wanted with some trial and error, but i can't understand why i can't find for example my trainer id (28935 that in hex would be A3 A8 AA A4 A6 right?). Anyway now im stuck at the checksum part, it appears that liquid crystal has its own way of doing that  i think my only chance is try to ask the developers 

[theSLAYER]

8 minutes ago, aciko11 said:

Thanks, i've already read that (for the gen 3)

I didn't realize it's a Fire Red Hack, my bad.

8 minutes ago, aciko11 said:

(28935 that in hex would be A3 A8 AA A4 A6 right?)

Your trainer ID would not be stored like that. That's for individual characters.
 

As a matter of fact, the page I linked you already told you the location (offset) of your trainer ID.

In the case of Trainer ID, you can do this. Then, flip "7107" to "0771", and it should be near the start of your save.
(mine was around location 0x1008):

In any case, what are you trying to accomplish by manual editing?
Why wouldn't PKHeX work for you? It'll probably be too tedious for you to try to fix the save's checksums..

[aciko11]

21 hours ago, theSLAYER said:

In the case of Trainer ID, you can do this. Then, flip "7107" to "0771", and it should be near the start of your save.

Ohhh so that was the problem, i also tried to look for 7101, didn't know i had to flip it like that, can you explain why? 

21 hours ago, theSLAYER said:

In any case, what are you trying to accomplish by manual editing?
Why wouldn't PKHeX work for you? It'll probably be too tedious for you to try to fix the save's checksums..

Since the cheat for shiny pokemon always gets me a female with the same nature, i wanted to be able to like put in the box a desired pokemon shiny and with the nature i wanted.

If i try to edit the save with PKHeX when i open the game it will say that is corrupted even if PKHeX says that everything is correct. I think that is for the checksum

 

P.s. sorry if i take a lot to answer but i'm also studying for exams xD

Edited August 25, 2018 by aciko11

[theSLAYER]

32 minutes ago, aciko11 said:

Ohhh so that was the problem, i also tried to look for 7101, didn't know i had to flip it like that, can you explain why?  

something called endianness. For gen 3 games onwards, lots of numerical datastructures are endian flipped, tho I am not sure of why it's done.

33 minutes ago, aciko11 said:

Since the cheat for shiny pokemon always gets me a female with the same nature, i wanted to be able to like put in the box a desired pokemon shiny and with the nature i wanted.

If i try to edit the save with PKHeX when i open the game it will say that is corrupted even if PKHeX says that everything is correct. I think that is for the checksum

are you playing on an emulator or something. that could be happening because of save files settings etc etc.

PKHeX actually fixes the checksum, so that wouldn't be a problem.

Tho maybe Liquid Crystal changed how the save is handled, hence why you get these issues.

How about this?
Try to use an emulator that supports trade, and trade the Pokemon you want to edit to a non-hacked rom.
This way, PKHeX would be able to handle that save file correctly.

All you have to afterwards, is to trade back from non-romhacked to your hacked rom.

[aciko11]

On 8/25/2018 at 5:27 PM, theSLAYER said:

How about this?
Try to use an emulator that supports trade, and trade the Pokemon you want to edit to a non-hacked rom.
This way, PKHeX would be able to handle that save file correctly.

Trading doesn't work unfortunately xD they say they will fix it, hopefully they will do it soon 

[theSLAYER]

13 minutes ago, aciko11 said:

Trading doesn't work unfortunately xD they say they will fix it, hopefully they will do it soon 

Based on a reddit thread, an older version of PKHeX seems to work on Liquid Crystal.

Back up and make a copy of your save before trying this.
Here we go:
PKHeX (08-07-16).zip

(I had to dig through internet archives to find this, so I hope it works.)

[aciko11]

On 8/29/2018 at 9:32 AM, theSLAYER said:

Based on a reddit thread, an older version of PKHeX seems to work on Liquid Crystal.

Back up and make a copy of your save before trying this.
Here we go:
PKHeX (08-07-16).zip

(I had to dig through internet archives to find this, so I hope it works.)

I think he's referring to pokemon liquid crystal 3.2(that is not avaiable for download) not PKHeX 3.2. Anyway, i tried but it didn't work  My only option is to try and wait for the trading to be avaiable  

[theSLAYER]

1 hour ago, aciko11 said:

I think he's referring to pokemon liquid crystal 3.2(that is not avaiable for download) not PKHeX 3.2. Anyway, i tried but it didn't work  My only option is to try and wait for the trading to be avaiable  

That makes sense. In any case, this will be tough because you've got a few hurdles ahead of you:

1. You're going to have to manually decrypt and encrypt back the data of the PKM in the save.
(Need to decrypt in order to be able to edit, and re-encrypt it 'coz that's how it's stored in the save)

2. The next step would be to manually fix the checksums of the save.

If you can't manage simpler edits, then these 2 will be a huge roadblock for you.

Have you tried using Action Replay/Game Shark codes?
Assuming the RAM map of the game hasn't changed much, that's probably a better option for you.

[aciko11]

On 9/2/2018 at 12:22 PM, theSLAYER said:

Have you tried using Action Replay/Game Shark codes?
Assuming the RAM map of the game hasn't changed much, that's probably a better option for you.

Yeah tried, unfortunately nature and shiny cheats do not work together. The shiny cheat will always produce the same pokemon: same nature, same stats.

 

On 9/2/2018 at 12:22 PM, theSLAYER said:

If you can't manage simpler edits, then these 2 will be a huge roadblock for you.

I'll see when i'm done with my exams and i will have more time   (and if i still desire to waste my time xD) 

Thanks for everything!