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[FF7 PC] New Threat Mod - v1.5

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Sega Chief
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Joined: Tue Mar 31, 2020 11:07 pm

New Threat Mod v1.5

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[June 14th 2019] - Installer]
https://mega.nz/file/mklFlBQZ#ge5SIHuEN ... kk1NNATIXk
*Do not use with a Modding Framework; this is for simply installing the mod and getting underway. Remember that the 1998 PC version requires some setup to get it working on modern machines in the first place. This installer works with that (once it's set up) and the Steam version out of the box.

[June 14th 2019] - 7th Heaven - Sega's Catalog (IROs)]
Catalog URL: iros://Url/http$pastebin.com/raw.php?i=vXc4PpBS
Add the above to your 7h Catalog Subscription links in Settings > General Settings > Catalog Subscriptions.

Catalog IRO List:
*) New Threat Mod 1.5
*) New Threat Vanilla Combat 1.5
*) True Necrosis
*) Lv1 Challenge
*) NPC Mouth Replacer/Remover
*) Battle Model/Costume Swaps (OG Style)

The NT 1.5 IRO is here if the catalog link is unavailable/unusable:
https://mega.nz/file/m90VATqQ#_a0RK2fnE ... soFXaEt9h0
*Specifically for use with the mod-loader program 7th Heaven (7H).
For more information: http://forums.qhimm.com/index.php?topic=15520.0

[June 14th 2019] - R06 Version]
https://mega.nz/file/Po9zgDRR#-IEY3D3Nh ... rxcDaOBl0w
*Specifically for use with the R06 (Reunion) Framework.
For more information: http://forums.qhimm.com/index.php?topic=14914.0

[NT Manual & Documentation v1.5]
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ ... iHjLc/edit
*Contains information about the mod; equipment, characters, item locations etc. Full credit to Karsh Highwind for putting this document together.


[Prototypes & Variants]
[Spanish Version]
http://forums.qhimm.com/index.php?topic=18918.0
*The Spanish version of NT was put together and translated by Markul; be sure to give him props.

[French Version]
https://ff7.fr/forum/index.php?page=post&ids=430223
*This is a mod pack that the ff7.fr community put together for their translation project, Neo-Midgar, that has NT as one of the options. Satsuki_Yatoshi appears to have put the pack together.

[September 23rd 2019] - Vanilla Combat - Installer]
https://mega.nz/#!j41jlagJ!3C0if-ziU4ep ... AZPFFVRX9c
*Version of NT using vanilla enemies + characters but using NT's field scripts. Most new encounters were also disabled and unique items held by these encounters were returned to their original locations.

[September 23rd 2019] - Vanilla Combat - 7th Heaven IRO]
https://mega.nz/#!j51xFIiC!pv4vGBZ9UNmR ... -vfWqiTYPw
*Same as above, but for the 7th Heaven mod-loader.


[Feature List]
Spoiler
~~Features Overview~~
Below is an overview of each feature offered by the mod, broken down into section.
More detail of the changes can be found on the respective feature's page.

Event Scripting & Dialogue
-) Text:
+ Dialogue in the game, and all other text, revised.
+ Plot points made clearer & general grammar improved.
+ Original style and quirks maintained.

The goal of this change was to provide a better script while also retaining
what makes the game's dialogue unique. Characters generally speak in the same
way that they originally did, and new scenes were written carefully to make
them fit with the rest of the game.

These changes should not be viewed as a retranslation of the original script
in the Japanese version, though it was referred to at times for some of the
more obfuscated scenes.


-) Events:
+ Deactivated/bugged scenes restored to working order.
+ Party members can be found and interacted with in towns/cities.
+ Additional sidequests added.

A number of scenes exist in the game files that were either stripped out or
left unactivated due to oversights. The majority of these have been restored
and in some cases adapted into a more complete scene.

While visiting towns, the player can find various party members around the
area with their own dialogue (which may change depending on the player's
progress through the story).

New content was added that provides optional encounters or gates off certain
items/abilities. Each character has their own encounter to deal with in order
to obtain their final Limit Break, for instance.


Battle Balancing
-) Curve of Progression:
+ Intended to be moderate with a stable curve to the end.
+ Grinding not intended to be required but EXP is freely available if needed.
+ NOT a Hard-Type mod, though some difficult optional encounters exist.

FF7 NT's aim is to avoid the label of being a 'hard-type' hack, the name of which
carries a stigma of punishing fights, HP bloated enemies, and unfair mechanics.
The goal with this mod is to strike a balance between being accessible while also
having enough weight in its combat to make it satisfying to play.

That's not to say there aren't some excellent hard-type mods out there; Gjoerulv's
Hardcore mod is the best you'll find for testing your knowledge of FF7 mechanics to
its limits. But NT is trying to occupy a spot that's around the midcore area;
something that can be played casually while enjoying the enhanced features present.

Players will be looking for, and expecting, different things from their FF7 playthrough and
it's impossible to cater for both extremes. Instead, NT looks to cover as wide an area as
possible in the middle; for players who hit a problematic spot, grinding for additional
levels/items is easier than it was in the base game. For players wanting a more serious
challenge, optional encounters can be found and the Arrange Mode (hard mode) setting may
provide that challenge.


-) Characters:
+ Each party member has more defined base stats.
+ Unique innate ability for each character to use in battle.
+ Player chooses which stats to raise to help make character builds.

A criticism made of FF7 characters is that, in-battle, they can feel interchangeable
due to the lack of a character-specific skillset (Limits not withstanding).
NT first tackles this by altering the base stats of each character to make their role
in battle feel more defined.

Going further, an innate ability was added to each character that either works passively or
is activated by the player. These abilities cover effects such as surviving a KO once per battle
while retaining all buffs/any queued actions, raising stats over time or in response to certain
actions, refreshing MP, and others.

In addition to that, the stat growth of each character is no longer tied to level.
Instead, after unlocking this feature the player purchases upgrades for the character
to develop their stats. Players may want to build on the established strengths of a character,
address some weaknesses they have, or maybe even take them in a radical direction like turning
Barret into a tanky spellcaster or Aeris into a front-line fighter.


-) Equipment:
+ Full revamp of every weapon, armour, accessory, and item.
+ New effects and stat gains on equipment.
+ Better item effects.

Equipment serves as the other half of preparing a player party, with most pieces
having either a stat bonus or other effect like elemental/status resistance to consider.
These can be used to either bolster a character's stronger stats, round out weaknesses,
or exploit a weakness in local random enemies or a specific boss.

Items also have more consistent effects and provide more utility. Potions raise HP by 300
making them more relevant through early areas of the game and attack-items are more rounded
out. Some new items have also been added with their own effects to discover.


-) Materia & Spells:
+ All spells revamped.
+ Materia AP, Spell-Lists, and Bonus/Penalties revised.
+ New Materia and Spells added.

Every spell was tweaked and some effects modified to bridge some gaps and create more balance
and variety in the player's magical arsenal. Enemy Skills were mostly revamped to remove redundancies
and make some more interesting effects available that would be out of place in the conventional spell-set.
Summons ignore magic-defence, making them useful as a panic button or for busting highly defensive enemies
and some additional spells were added like Osmose and water/holy element equivalents to the Contain spells for late-game.

Materia has some alterations to AP levels and some new ones were produced to handle new spells like
the Osmose Materia. Some Materia like Summons have been locked to 1-star and cannot be divided; to
account for this, the way in which Master Magic, Command, and Summon are obtained has been changed;
they will no longer consume all the requisite Materia when being made, but can also only be obtained
once.

Finally, Materia has had the stat bonuses and penalties they give altered. HP penalties are less
prevalent with basic Magic materia and more situational Materia like status magic now carries some
better benefits to make them less of a dead weight when their spell isn't required.


-) Enemies:
+ Comprehensive overhaul of enemy stats, attacks, formations, and AI.
+ Remixed version of every boss.
+ Brand new enemy/boss encounters.

Every enemy in the game has been updated with stats that better fit the intended curve of progression,
adjusted attacks (and some new ones), some alterations to the formations they appear in, and more
importantly a full re-write of the majority of their AI. Unique behaviour has been maintained and
rewrites were made to fix bugs or to make the mechanic(s) more prominent.

Each boss found in the game has had more drastic changes made and will be sporting some brand new
attacks and behaviour in addition to their visual changes (mostly palette swaps, but in some cases
a few model modifications). A retry option was also added to a number of boss encounters that occur
during the lengthier story segments (which comes with an opportunity to adjust party set-up).

In addition to the pre-existing monster roster, brand new enemies were also added with their own
unique models. These new enemy models were made using pre-existing game assets for visual consistency
with the other enemies found in the game.
[Installation]
Spoiler
~~Installation Guide~~
There are two core versions of FF7 PC; the 1998 version, and the 2012/Steam version.
While both have a similar folder architecture there are some key differences that need
to be kept in mind before patching your game:

1) Do NOT use a cracked copy of the game
Games with patches to beat copy protection tend to have alterations made to the
executable that are lost when a mod is applied that makes its own changes to that
.exe file. This will then cause the game to no longer boot as the cracks needed
to make the game run will be lost.

2) 1998 version compatibility
Getting the original version of the game to run on a modern PC has some steps involved
as it was originally designed for the Windows 1998 OS and has pretty severe compatibility
problems when running on newer operating systems. You will need a copy of Aali's Graphics
Driver to get the game running in a state similar to the Steam version. Bear this in mind
if planning to acquire the 1998 PC version.

3) Patching to Spanish/German/French
The folder architecture and some file names are different in the spanish/french/german
versions of the game. Compatibility options have been added to the installer but the
files will mostly be converted into English. However, the mod has been translated to
French and Spanish and is maintained by Mexico (French version) on ff7.fr and Markul
(Spanish version).


Next to consider are the modding platforms available for FF7.

1) Stand-alone
For users wanting to play the NT mod on its own with no other modifications this is the
fastest and most stable option. The installer will patch the game files and you'll be
ready to play within a few minutes.

Download the Stand-alone installer, right-click it to bring up Properties, and ensure that
the installer has admin permissions + is unblocked (if this option appears).

Next, make a backup copy of your game's Final Fantasy VII folder; this is to quickly revert to the
default game files without having to perform a reinstall/file verification to reacquire
the base files.

Run the installer as Admin, and progress through until asked for the directory in which
FF7 is installed. The target address is the folder called Final Fantasy VII (or FF7).
Confirm and check the installer report; if it was successful, then you're ready to go.

Also note that the installer is fairly robust; it will overwrite any version of FF7
so if it has been modded already these changes will likely be lost; on the plus side,
this also means you don't have to have a 100% clean default copy prior to installation
and avoids issues with 'unknown version' problems.

2) 7th Heaven Mod Loader
Often abbreviated to '7H', this is a mod loader that reduces mods down to their constituent
files in order to combine mods and produce compatibility via a launcher without having
to manually combine mods together. It has its limitations, some mod types can't be
combined through this process, and both the program itself and its installation process
are prone to error.

A full set of instructions for preparing 7H can be found here: http://forums.qhimm.com/index.php?topic=15520.0
Once you have installed 7H and have tested that it is working as intended, you are ready
for the next step.

7H uses 'IROs' which are basically mods packaged up for use with 7th Heaven, and are named
after the original author of the tool. With 7H running, you can either import FF7 NT's IRO
and activate it that way, or you can activate it through the catalogs available through 7H.
They are the same file, just acquired in different ways.

When activating NT's IRO, make sure to have an appropriate mod load order (a
recommended list can be viewed on the 7H Tutorial).

3) Reunion Modding Platform (IN DEVELOPMENT)
This is still in development and a section will be added when it officially releases.

4) Sister-Ray Modding Framework (IN DEVELOPMENT)
This is still in development and a section will be added when it officially releases.


Cross-Platform Modding
Thanks to the efforts of certain individuals, the NT mod has been successfully installed to several
platforms including Android and the Nintendo Switch. No known port has been made to the PS4 version
but as the file architecture is identical to the PC version it may well be possible. I will try and provide support
for cross-platform, but it will be limited as I'm unfamiliar with the process and do not own a Switch to test.

Android: (Unsure where to find out more, a user reported getting this to work)

Switch: https://gbatemp.net/threads/final-fanta ... on.534578/

PS4: Not yet confirmed

Testing the Installation
The final step is testing that the mod has installed correctly across every file; the core files
for NT are: scene.bin, kernel.bin, flevel.lgp, battle.lgp, and the executable. Always start a
new game when playing NT for the first time; character stats and starting equipment is initialised
when starting a new game and will be altered/lost if starting from a pre-existing save file instead.

Scene.bin: This file is where the enemy data is kept. In the first fight of the game against MPs,
these enemies should be called 'MP Trainees' instead.

Kernel.bin: This file is where the equipment, spells, and character stats are stored.
It is also responsible for setting the game's initial state and acts as a look-up table for the scene.bin;
if the kernel is wrong, you'll have the wrong encounters loading in places and other issues.
To test this file, check that Cloud has access to the Fire spell at the start of the game.
If he does, this means that the kernel has been modified successfully.

Flevel.lgp: This file archive handles the game's dialogue and events.
When starting a new game, a new set if dialog boxes and options should appear
for selecting Game Type instead of jumping straight into the opening FMV.

.EXE: This file is what makes the game run and contains various pieces of information such as Limit Break data.
To test this has been patched, try using a Potion in the field menu; if it restores 300HP here then the .EXE is patched
(note, this test is to be performed outside of battle; the behaviour of Potions in-battle is handled by the kernel.bin).


Troubleshooting
1) I've installed the mod and now my game won't run at all
A) This can be due to either patching a non-English version of the game, patching a pirated
copy that relies on .EXE hacks to beat the copy protection, or a bad install of the game that
has been broken by a Windows update (common issue, particularly with the 7H Modified version).

2) I installed the mod but failed one of the installation tests
A) This issue typically occurs with the 7H version and with the kernel.bin file specifically
or the .EXE file will fail to patch due to security protection. For best results, it's more reliable
to have FF7 installed outside of protected systems folders (for instance, outside of Program
Folders) and to ensure that any installers used are being run as admin & are unblocked via
properties on your PC.

If the issue occurs on 7H, then you may need to repeat the installation process for 7H again.

In severe cases, a manual patch is available which is placing the mod's files directly into
the FF7 folder. This is available on request if troubleshooting fails.

3) The Installer (stand-alone) says it can't find files to patch/they are already patched
A) The target directory for the installer changed for the 1.5 and 1.5+ versions of the mod
from the FF7/Data folder to just the FF7 folder itself in order to apply changes to the
game's executable file. Older videos and materials of installation will report the target
directory as FF7/Data so watch out for that.

Another possibility is permission issues. The Installer should be set to run as admin and
be unblocked via its Properties. For better results, having FF7 installed in a non-systems
folder can also help (typically it installs to Program Folders by default which can make
it more difficult to alter by third party programs).
[Overview]
Spoiler
FF7 NT is a gameplay overhaul mod that's aiming to rebalance the game's systems while introducing new/revised content. The level of difficulty is intended to be accessible to all players, with grinding being optional rather than mandatory. Random enemies and boss battles have been revised with new mechanics, story scenes are tweaked with some deactivated scenes renovated for use, and some quality of life additions have been made. The central idea to the mod is to make the game a fresh experience but to also make it 'more of itself'; that means trying to maintain as much of the core game as possible but with adjustments to make the different gameplay elements work together better.

Feedback, bug reports, and suggestions for features are always welcome.
[Changelog]
Spoiler
*Note: Changelog was not maintained throughout NT's development, so previous updates are not listed or are heavily truncated

May 2019:
July 2018:
June 2018:

v1.5: Current version: undergoing revisions
v1.4: Arrange Mode added
v1.35: Rank-Up added for Sources and character stat advancement
v1.3: General overhaul of battles, etc.
v1.2: Additional features added
v1.1: Rebuild completed
v1.0.5: Hotfixes and amendments
v1.0: Initial release
[Credits]
Spoiler
FF7 NT has been a hugely positive part of my life and helped me get into programming, which led to a new vocation as a developer. The mod was only possible to build because of the effort put in by the modding community here in disassembling/supporting the game, and the continued support of players.

Tools & Technical Information:
-) Borde: Kimera & Img2TEX tools
-) DLPB: Assembly lessons, Hext-tools, and Ochu
-) EQ2Alyza: 7H Catalog support
-) Luksy: ULGP tool
-) Myst6re: Makou Reactor tool
-) NFITC1: Wall Market & Proud Clod tools
-) Markul: Creating & maintaining Spanish version of the mod
-) TenkoKuugen: Assembly information
-) Kalderasha: Donated new field models (chibi-style) & 7H support
-) UltimaEspio: Donated Aeris animations from her mod
-) Bosola: OpCode Sheet
-) Gjoerulv: For helping me get set up with modding using Wall Market

Thanks to players who got actively involved with NT's development, providing troubleshooting, feedback, and giving the mod exposure through videos/streaming:
-) Bowser9
-) Cicadian
-) FFMan
-) Jugend/Rob
-) Karifean
-) LetCreativityPlay
-) Loseless
-) Neurosephiroth
-) NGPlus Community (formerly ID Community)
-) PotatoHandle
-) RagingFlare
-) RedManMark86
-) TheStrahl
-) Xerokynos

Special thanks to these three, they've been ongoing supporters of the mod on a technical level for the last couple of years and helped to troubleshoot user problems and maintain interest in the mod. I was really lucky they came along and stuck around:
-) Strife98
-) iDerek759
-) Uprisen

For Donators: I really appreciate the generosity that's been shown, I'll pay it back by making sure NT continues to grow and improve; thanks to all of you.
[Donations]
Paypal: https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?c ... DGBN7KYLLW
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/segachief
Last edited by Sega Chief on Sun Jun 14, 2020 4:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Sega Chief
Posts: 5
Joined: Tue Mar 31, 2020 11:07 pm

Reserved for versioning
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Dark_Ansem
Posts: 5
Joined: Tue Jun 16, 2020 6:51 am

Fancy seeing you here Sega Chief!
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OatyBee
Posts: 3
Joined: Mon Jun 15, 2020 8:02 pm
Location: In a Grum Hole
Contact:

I would love to be immortalized in an early post on a NT thread. Thank you for all that you do with so much passion, quality and respect for the game and its community sega.
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Sega Chief
Posts: 5
Joined: Tue Mar 31, 2020 11:07 pm

Dark_Ansem wrote: Tue Jun 16, 2020 7:23 am Fancy seeing you here Sega Chief!
Yo, sorry for delayed response; it's a bit of a graveyard here at the moment.
OatyBee wrote: Thu Jun 18, 2020 1:59 pm I would love to be immortalized in an early post on a NT thread. Thank you for all that you do with so much passion, quality and respect for the game and its community sega.
Like hell you will, I'll work my way up to admin one day and come back to delete this post of yours. Mark my words.
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aladrin
Posts: 7
Joined: Tue Jun 30, 2020 7:21 am
Location: Nibelheim

Thank you very much for this great work, will you get a translation with the texts in Spanish? Thank you very much
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Sega Chief
Posts: 5
Joined: Tue Mar 31, 2020 11:07 pm

aladrin wrote: Tue Jun 30, 2020 7:43 am Thank you very much for this great work, will you get a translation with the texts in Spanish? Thank you very much
There is a Spanish translation by Markul, it should be linked in the first post under Variants.
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aladrin
Posts: 7
Joined: Tue Jun 30, 2020 7:21 am
Location: Nibelheim

Thank you very much I already found it happy holidays 👍🎄🎁
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