TMX File Issue

[Skyla Doragono]

Hey guys, getting ready to do a massive Persona 4 Golden dump on TSR, but I have a slight problem.

Old Info

It seems the .bin files are ever so slightly different from the original Persona 4, and TMX Viewer can't save the full file properly, specifically the bustup images.  It will only save up to the same size as they are in the original P4, but all of the data for the full file is still there.  So while my computer sees this:



The whole actual file, if it were uploaded somewhere that converted it to a different file type, is supposed to look like this:



However, it seems to view plane old .tmx files just fine, so I need to extract the .bins for the bustups.  One of the .bins is here.

As always, help is always appreciated!

EDIT:  Well, I managed to get the .bin files extracted!  Buuut... I'm seeing the same issue, and I'm starting to wonder if this was always a thing.  Like the .TMX file had something in it that kept part of the picture hidden; like the part that would normally be covered by the text box.  Here's my current comparison images:

Converted to .jpg through Plurk.
Directly off my computer.

Here is the .TMX file I'm currently working with.

[puggsoy]

It appears that for some reason, all the colours that appear below a certain line are transparent. Like, the colours are there in the palette, but their alpha channels are 0. All the colours that appear above that line have normal alpha channels. So you can only view the whole image if you ignore the alpha channels, but then you have the obvious issue of the background being black, and no anti-aliasing. So the program's working correctly, it's the files that are wonky.

Not quite sure what to do here. I even tried replacing the background colour (in the actual palette) with white, and got this:



So it looks like the actual background colour is part of his bottom half. Note that I don't just mean a different position in the palette with the same value as the background; it is the very same palette position as is used for the background.

All I can really conclude from this is that the full image is only supposed to be viewed against a black background, and I'd be surprised if it's seen in any other state in the actual game. Ripping it like this is fine if necessary by the way, this was a similar case.

[Skyla Doragono]

All right then; I guess I'll just carry on.

I could include both, I suppose; the one with the files as they're viewed normally, and ones with a black background... or I can futz around in Photoshop and try to get the full image?

I'll see what I can do. If not, they'll be up on TSR eventually. Thanks, Puggsoy!

[puggsoy]

I think posting both is probably best, yeah. I can think of one way to rip them in the way you'd prefer, (a very hacky and weird way), but it'd require a custom program and might not even work all the time. If you really want I can give it a shot I guess.

[Skyla Doragono]

Hunh, I can't even get Photoshop to even acknowledge that alpha channel exists. What did you use to produce that image?

And if you have time, that'd be awesome. If not... might have to just settle for what appears in the game, I think.

[puggsoy]

I used TiledGGD (PE). Here's a screenshot with the settings on the side:



In this the alpha is ignored, you can enabled it in Palette - Alpha Settings. If you do you should also tick Enable for the Alpha Stretch section and put Minimum to 0 and Maximum to 128.

In the particular image from the above post, what I did was edit the actual file so that the first palette value (i.e. the background colour) was white instead of near black, then viewed it while ignoring alpha. This helped show that it's actually is included in the bottom half of the image. That's also why the edges look rough.

I'll give it a shot. Might take a little while, but with luck it should work!

[Skyla Doragono]

Sheesh, how weird. I'd shake my fist more if it hadn't taken this long to get these files.

I'm actually off Friday so I'll have time to work on stuff. Lemme know how it goes!

[puggsoy]

By the way, would you be able to upload some more sample files? It'd be good to have multiple files to test with, especially if some of them are also 4bpp or something.

[Skyla Doragono]

In or out of the .bin file? Or does it not matter?

[puggsoy]

In the .bin preferably. I'm allowing support for both .bin and .tmx but I'd like to confirm that the .bin format is what I think it is.

[Skyla Doragono]

Gotcha. Have some more Yosukes:

http://www.mediafire.com/download/6p3v6d...b2_1_6.bin
http://www.mediafire.com/download/zaqgxi...b2_1_5.bin
http://www.mediafire.com/download/apuwfm...b2_1_4.bin
http://www.mediafire.com/download/1fwyfl...b2_1_3.bin
http://www.mediafire.com/download/46mhw8...b2_1_2.bin
http://www.mediafire.com/download/2a7she...b2_1_1.bin

[Struggleton!]

Gotcha. Have some more Yosukes:

http://www.mediafire.com/download/6p3v6d...b2_1_6.bin
http://www.mediafire.com/download/zaqgxi...b2_1_5.bin
http://www.mediafire.com/download/apuwfm...b2_1_4.bin
http://www.mediafire.com/download/1fwyfl...b2_1_3.bin
http://www.mediafire.com/download/46mhw8...b2_1_2.bin
http://www.mediafire.com/download/2a7she...b2_1_1.bin

For these types of bins, here's a script to extract the TMX files:

Code:

get FileCount long
for i = 0 < FileCount
  getdstring NAME 0x20
  get SIZE long
  savepos OFFSET
  log NAME OFFSET SIZE
  math OFFSET + SIZE
  goto OFFSET
next i

Just remember this only works on the new BIN files. The old Atlus bin files aren't supported just yet :/

[einstein95]

Just remember this only works on the new BIN files. The old Atlus bin files aren't supported just yet :/

If you mean "old" like Persona 3 old, this works.

Code:

do
    getdstring NAME 0xFC
    if NAME != ""
        get SIZE long
        savepos CUROFF
        set OFFSET CUROFF
        log NAME OFFSET SIZE
        math OFFSET + SIZE
        goto OFFSET
    else
    endif
while NAME != ""

[puggsoy]

Well after a lot of tries I finally got it working with Adachi:



As you can see, the bottom half of him doesn't have anti-aliasing. Since the alpha channels for those pixels are 0 in reality, the best I can come up for as "fake" alpha is 100%.

Unfortunately, none of Yosuke's ones work, they seem to have borders or other weird issues that prevent my method from working:



Nothing I can really do about that unfortunately :\ (The closed eyes also have some issues but they're not a huge concern.)

I think your best bet is just what we figured before, just submitting the normal ones and the ones with black backgrounds. However if it makes it any easier, I can make my program extract both versions at once for you, from multiple .bins/.tmxs at once.

[Dazz]

This is just really weird...