So, you're interested in learning to hex?
This is my guide to hexing Toys, with tinker, which do not clash with the originals. I won't go on to more advanced stuff, cause I don't know it lol, but with this method you should be able to create a fully functioning new toy for your babyz.
Before starting you will need the following things:
*Some kind of image editor (I recommend Jasc Paint Shop Pro 9 but if you really must, you can make do with MS Paint.)
*Tinker (download here- http://sherlocksoftware.org/page.php?id=15)
*LNZ Pro (download here- http://sherlocksoftware.org/page.php?id=14)
*A hex editor (download the one I use here- http://www.softcircuits.com/cygnus/fe/)
*& some creativity!
Now, I am assuming you have at least an idea of what you want to hex? If not, go away and think about it, and come back when you've decided. If you are really organised you'll have the picture already too. ;)
K, for the rest of this tutorial I am assuming you are hexing out of the stuffed man. If you aren't, that's fine, but the stuffed man is easy to hex from, that's why I am using it. (if you haven't already, you'll need to download the stuffed man which shows up on the playroom shelf from here- http://boardwalkerz.com/carolyn/babyztoyz.htm.) I am also assuming you are using the programs mentioned above, so if you get confused by what I refer to I suggest you go download them.
If you want, you can do the example toy I am hexing, using this image here as a base.
Step 1- the image
First of all you will need to have your image open up in your paint program, I also recommend having a babyz picture up too so you can get the scale right.
(Also a note that this is not a PSP tutorial- if you are new to the program I suggest playing around and getting used to it first. :))
Now, you see the white background? We want to get rid of that, or your toy will have an ugly white square backround in the game. Set your background colour to Magenta, Select the fill tool (keyboard shortcut is F) and fill all the white background in by right clicking. If you are getting white messy dots around the image, caused by jpeg images, try fiddling with the tolerance settings.
Now save the image as a windows bitmap (.bmp). don't worry about converting it to 256 colours, Tinker will do that for you in the next step. :)
Step 2- Tinkering your toy
Open Tinker. Before doing anything else, go to file>Settings and make sure it looks exactly like this-
Now go to file>open and navigate to your Toyz folder. Normally it is located at C/Program Files/Mindscape/Babyz/Resource/Toyz. Find the stuffed man, and right click on it and select copy. Then right click on an empty space, and select paste. Rename 'Copy of Stuffed Man' to whatever your toy will be called.
Now open up your toy. Where it says pick sprite to edit, choose the first option.
Expand the frames by clicking the little cross beside the sprite name, and choose the first one in the list. Click import, and navigate to wherever you saved your image before.
Double click on it, and tada! If you followed all the steps above, you should now see something like this-
Now, repeat the above for the rest of the frames, so all of the stuffed man images are replaced with your own. Once you have done that, save the toy (keyboard shortcut- ctrl+s) and close it.
While still in tinker (or if you closed it before re-open it), open up your toy again, and this time when it says pick sprite to edit, choose the second option. Repeat the above steps again. You may be able to use the same image, but this part controls how it shows up on the shelf, so if it turns out huge you may have to resize your image and import again. There aren't so many frames in the away filmstrip though, so if it is larger than you wanted, it won't take long to resize and re-import it. :)
Now, you are done with tinker! Save your toy and close tinker.
Step 3- the ID number
Do not give in to temptation yet and open up your game- it will crash if you haven't given the toy a new ID number. Trust me, I know.
This is where we need LNZ Pro! So open up LNZ Pro, go to file>open and navigate to the toyz folder, like you did in tinker. Find your toy, and double click on it to open it.
Click on RCData, and where it says Breed ID (as hex), change that to something unique.
At this point, save your toy, and it is safe to open babyz again. However, your toy may be showing up as a stuffed man still, or whatever you hexed it from. If you can't see any new items on the shelf, you may need to change the ID number again. The game can be fussy with which numbers it accepts, so you may have to try several different numbers in order for it to show up, especially if you have a lot of hexed items in your game already. :) Mine didn't show up the first few times. An example of one which does work would be 1B41, which is what I am using now.
DO NOT take it off the shelf, or if you did already, make sure you put it away before making changes in your hex editor as we do so now.
Step 4- the sprite names
(Do not try and change the sprite names in LNZ pro, it won't work.)
This is the most difficult part, and it may take a while to get right. It took me a very long time to understand this part, but it does get easier with practice. :)
Open up your hex editor. As always, open up your toy like you did in LNZ Pro and tinker.
Now you are probably thinking... what on earth does all this mean? You'll see a load of letters and numbers all gobbldygook. The part we want to find is the sprite name, which is different depending on the toy you hexed from. Everywhere you see Chew_W1, change that a little, for example, Chew_A1. (make sure you change it EVERYWHERE in your toy, to the same new name, or it will crash)
It will look something like this...
and here-
and again here-
and lastly, down here-
(the sprite name comes up quite a few times in this last section, so be carefull not to miss any.)
And... that is it! Save and exit your hex editor, and open up babyz. If your toy is not sitting on the playroom shelf, try going back into LNZ pro and changing the ID number again. :)
Also, if you get an error when you take it off the shelf, go back into your hex editor and check you changed ALL of the sprite names to Chew_A1 or whatever you used.
And don't worry if you don't get on the first attempt! Even the most experienced hexers make mistakes, lol. Especially me. :P
I hope this helped you! I spent the whole afternoon writing this, lol. If you need one to one help, you may e-mail me, but it would be easier if you asked on the forum. :) Several of our members are talented hexers, and if I can't help you then somebody else there probably can. <3 You'll have to register to see most parts of the forum, but it's well worth it. ;)
One more thing.. if you successfully hexed using this, Id love it if you told me about it! And if I missed anything, let me know.
This is Cinnamon Grace playing with the example toy, click on the picture to download it.
