WWE SVR Menu Renders Research Thread

[Hollywood Akeem]

This thread is here to post my findings about menu renders and how to possibly add additional renders. For starters, all the superstar menu renders are located in DLC_HD.pac.  "SSFA", "SSFB", "SSFC", and "MENU/SSFD.patch" are folders that hold renders of superstars. Each superstar has four renders split into these three folders and one patch directory. I will break down what each folder holds.

SSFA & SSFB - These folders are for larger images (512x512). You see this for the versus screen for the royal rumble (the menu you see when you pick an arena and before you start the match). SSFB & SSFC are the same exact size. These renders, specifically, are distorted. (more on that later).

 

SSFC - Small Menu Render. (256x256) This render is for menu's like the story designer's character selection screen.

 

SSFD - Super small render (100x100).

 

Reference:

In case you want to make new renders for no slot superstars, I found out that every SSFA and SSFB render is exactly 2/3rd's of its original height. The width isn't stretched or distorted, only the height.  This is useful to avoid the horribly stretched looking renders that can be seen in game. (look at Trevor Murdoch and Lance Cade in brienj's svr 2010 hack for reference). Keep in mind that SSFC renders aren't distorted in any way, and is in it's correct proportions. When making renders for SSFC, make sure nothing below the waist is seen. This is because the picture's dimensions are in 256x256px. Showing anything below the waist will make the character render smaller than the other superstars render in game. It stands out like a sore thumb when you see it next to other superstars in game.

 

Looking into the Files

I had to use Pac editor because tekken57's X-Packer doesn't do well with reading regular folders inside pac files. A regular folder will not be indexed by X-Packer. Instead,  X-packer keeps going into folders, via file name in descending order, until it meets a file with an extension to index. For example,

 

As you can see here, there are six folders in the pac file; in alphabetical order. X-packer goes into the first one, finds the patch file in the next directory, indexes it, and disregards everything else. This why I was confused when I couldn't find where the renders originally were in this game. Instead, I used Pac Editor to browse  DLC_HD.pac, where I found out it had sub-folders that X-packer wouldn't index. Great, so now that I got that out of the way, here's how I believe brienj gave renders to empty ch slots in his svr 2010 hack.

Turns out brienj created pac files named DLC_HD"_".pac. The "_" would have a letter starting with A. The next pac file would be what letter comes after the last pac file that was created. For example, if a pac file was created as DLC_HDA.pac, the next one would be DLC_HDB.pac and so on. I don't know if letters have anything to do with the game reading the renders or not. I don't think so. I think it's just for cleanliness.

 

Inside the pac files (DLC_HD"A-D".pac), it's similar to the original pac file, however without the "MENU", "MMDL", and "IGST" sub-folders in the directory.

This makes sense because svr 2010 didn't need a small character menu icon (SSFD render) as it didn't have the same layout of SVR 2011. Unless you're going to add them on the character selection menu, I think it's safe to say that you don't need to bother adding this folder.

Here's where it gets interesting. Instead of being packed and compressed as bpe files, the files were uncompressed dds files! I didn't know the game could read straight up dds files. That makes it so much easier since you don't have compress it as a bpe file which was always a hassle.

 

The pac files were then written in the plist360.h files in order so the game can read them at startup.

 

Aside from the plist360.h and plist360_4x3.h files, I don't know if any other game file was edited for the purpose of the renders being read by the game. Please let me know If I missed anything.

Now, the million dollar question: "How do I make a Pac Archive with multiple folders that contain dds files". I can't answer that question because I don't know. The only reason why I'm making this thread is to find out that question myself. The Stuff on the top is really to get you up to speed on where I'm at in case you want to help me.

 

 

Edited May 24, 2020 by Hollywood Akeem
Formatting

[xtremebrett]

I've attempted to strictly inject dds files and then update them manually within the arc, but to no avail. I'm not sure why, though. The game can for sure read dds files, as I have a 2K14 game with the no arc method by Taker and thanks to that I always just inject the dds rather than compress and inject. There should be no reason 2010 and 2K14 can read dds files but not 2011. If anyone else wants to play around with it, feel free, but so far my efforts are unsuccessful. I imagine adding a new DLC_HD pac would be the same as adding additional data in X-Packer. Maybe adding a new wrestler data and then just replacing that new data with the data of the dlc pac would work? Not really an expert on arc-related matters.

[Hollywood Akeem]

On 5/25/2020 at 6:56 PM, xtremebrett said:

I've attempted to strictly inject dds files and then update them manually within the arc, but to no avail. I'm not sure why, though. The game can for sure read dds files, as I have a 2K14 game with the no arc method by Taker and thanks to that I always just inject the dds rather than compress and inject. There should be no reason 2010 and 2K14 can read dds files but not 2011. If anyone else wants to play around with it, feel free, but so far my efforts are unsuccessful. I imagine adding a new DLC_HD pac would be the same as adding additional data in X-Packer. Maybe adding a new wrestler data and then just replacing that new data with the data of the dlc pac would work? Not really an expert on arc-related matters.

Thanks. I'll try that method and update. I'll update this post if I find anything.

[Hollywood Akeem]

Edit: Yeah, didn't work ☹️. yumboy found a way how to do it. But I dont know how.

[MKKHAN]

are you talking about this