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N64 notes

AJ Kelly edited this page Feb 5, 2022 · 3 revisions

This document covers notes specific to AKI Corporation's Nintendo 64 games.

Game Grouping

In terms of technical internals, it is helpful to set up "groups" of the N64 games based on their technical progression.

First Generation

Two games belong in this section:

  • WCW vs. nWo - World Tour
  • Virtual Pro-Wrestling 64

World Tour is based on an earlier version of VPW64, and has less features. However, they still belong to the same generation.

Second Generation

This is where it gets tricky... Three games in this section:

  • WCW/nWo Revenge
  • WWF WrestleMania 2000
  • Virtual Pro-Wrestling 2

WCW/nWo Revenge is the base for Virtual Pro-Wrestling 2. WWF WrestleMania 2000 is based on an earlier version of VPW2. The Japanese version of WM2000 has a few internal code changes that bring it closer to WWF No Mercy, but not in any player-visible way.

Third Generation

AKI did a lot of internal changes in WWF No Mercy. Some game structures might be similar or the same, but a lot of the wrestler models changed, among other things.

Texture Formats

"AKI Texture"

Identified by the magic characters TEX followed by an 00 byte (54 45 58 00).

This is more of a container format, typically used for user interface elements in the menus. The name is unofficial, because just calling them "TEX files" was bound to lead to some sort of confusion.

todo: details

CITexture

"CI" stands for "Color Index". On the Nintendo 64, there are two primary CI texture formats: 4 bit (16 colors) and 8 bit (256 colors).

The palette for these textures is often stored separately.

todo: details

ITexture

"I" stands for "Intensity". These textures are not often used in AKI games, but they do exist.

todo: details

Model Format

Surprisingly, the model format has stayed pretty much similar between the six N64 games.

todo: actual format details

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