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Cyber Akuma - Dec 8, 2002

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		Cyber Akuma		Dec 8, 2002
			I have a movie file from a saturn game I want to encode. Its not an .avi file nor a .cpk file. I am not 100% sure it even is the movie, but seeing how the intro was a long full-screen movie and most files are 1 meg or less, with this file being 40 megs, I think its safe to say that this is the movie file. The format is .MVS, anybody ever heard of this format before? I trues using a hex editor, it dosent have any cinepak or avi standard headers, the header looks like this "dmpwev @ KB O" Any ideas anybody? Also, I am trying to extract the audio from some movie files from another game. The game is DraculaX The files are .AVI, and teh vidoecodec is TrueMotion (DUCK). I had a hell of a time getting the vidoe codec to work, anyway, I cant seem to get the audio to work at all, any suggestions?

		CyberWarriorX		Dec 8, 2002
			Not sure about this .mvs format, but as far as your other question is concerned, chances are the game is using the non-standard audio codec Duck DK3 or DK4. Cyber Warrior X

		Cyber Akuma		Dec 8, 2002
			Ok, so how do I decode this audio format then?

		CyberWarriorX		Dec 8, 2002
			Aside from using something like tmplay, you could always try writing your own converter. Here's some information on it: http://www.pcisys.net/~melanson/codecs/adpcm.txt... Cyber Warrior X

		Taelon		Dec 8, 2002
			Something in the back of my head tells me this .MVS file could well be an MPEG-1 video stream (M.V.S., get it?) - only there's no audio, which is what would make it different from a "real" .mpg movie. An MPEG movie is the result of multiplexing a video and an audio stream into a single file. Try TMPGENC and see if it recognizes the .mvs file, or change the extension to .mpv and see if Windows Media Player plays it.

		Cyber Akuma		Dec 8, 2002
			For the MVS file: I tried making various programs think its an AVI and an MPG, neither worked. Any other ideas? And I guess I could try isntalling those duck audio codecs, where can I get them?

		CyberWarriorX		Dec 8, 2002
			Even with the codec, you can't decode duck DK3/DK4 audio(it was a weird propriety format only used for saturn games that isn't officially recognized as a codec). All you can do is what I recommended. Cyber Warrior X

		Cyber Akuma		Dec 8, 2002
			Is there even any way I can make sure the audio is DUCK or soem other format?

		CyberWarriorX		Dec 9, 2002
			Sure. Get tmplay, load file, click on "Information"

		Cyber Akuma		Dec 9, 2002
			TMplay refuses to load the file, both the avi and the mvs

		M3d10n		Dec 9, 2002
			What game is that .MVS from? Maybe it uses the obscure 3rd Saturn video codec, prolly used in Grandia (I never got to decode those) and in a few others (I'm not sure, but I heard Tengai Makyou IV also uses it).

CyberWarriorX

Dec 9, 2002

Grandia seems to be encoded in some form of quicktime format.

	
	
		
		
			Maybe it uses the obscure 3rd Saturn video codec

There was only three known video codecs used: Truemotion, Cinepak, and MPEG. Chances are, GameArts decided to keep the videos in quicktime format while still using cinepak codec. It's obviously not mpeg, and it doesn't really look like truemotion either, hence why I suggest cinepak.

Cyber Warrior X

		M3d10n		Dec 12, 2002
			It's not QT cinepak. The video compression looks visually different from both Cinepak and Truemotion. I haven't done a deep check, but the .MOV extension doesn't exactly means it's quicktime. BTW, those movies are, as expected, rejected by the Quicktime player. I'll check their headers when I get back home. The video itself looks to be running at 24bpp, and has classic MPEG-style compression artifacts. If it is some sort of Quicktime codec, it might be an Indeo variant, since those compression artifacts are also found in Indeo compressed videos. But I ensure you that there are at least two other codecs other than Cinepak, Truemotion and MPEG used by Saturn games. In the Saturn forum, in the past, I remember someone strumbling upon undecodeable videos in some obscure Japanese RPG.

		CyberWarriorX		Dec 12, 2002
			In a hex editor, open one of those movie files, now go and open the sample.mov file included with quicktime. You know what? It's the same format. Now then, scroll down a bit till you find the "stsd" chunk. Move 12 bytes farther and that's the codec. "cvid" is the fourcc for cinepak. It could be this is a deviant format, but it -is- a quicktime file, and it -is- cinepak. Cyber Warrior X

		M3d10n		Dec 20, 2002
			I just did that before getting here... I even used the same sample.mov file But the similarities ends there. Beyond that point, things get pretty different in the Grandia file. Also, the audio is in ADX. If you scroll down the HEX editor, you'll see find a lonely © CRI in the midst of an empty area. But I fear it's interleaved, since the Saturn ADX decoding app I got here (that can perfectly load the massive .SZT file and even finds each track index and loop info) cannot play it. It loads the file, since it seems to detect the CRI header, but fail to find proper audio chunks (it finds zillions of 108Hz audio tracks). What puzzles me is that Grandia's videos look far superior to the Quicktime Cinepak I worked with. If it is indeed cinepak, it is a heavily mutated version. Anyway, kudos for GameArts for trying something new on the video compression area for the Saturn. They only failed in one thing: The grandia videos seems to run at a higher resolution mode (the screen shimmering is very visible), and are scretched to fit on the screen. This makes them a bit pixelated, and obfuscate the wonderfull video format they got running in there.

		Cyber Akuma		Jan 29, 2003
			Well? Any new information anybody? I have been kinda out of the loop on this topic For the .avi Let me re-state that the intro.avi, whose video I can decode but audio I can't, is from Castlevania. Personally I have no interest in actually making a movie out of this since I have the PSX version and the quality is much better, but I am very interested in being able to successfully extract the audio and video from this file, especially for future reference in case I ever run into a game I DO want to extract this format of video from. I am very interested in cracking this thing. As for the .MVS, absolutely no progress so far. Ideas anyone?

		Carnivol		Feb 1, 2003
			Hmm... I haven't actualy checked out the PSX version... But if my memory doesn't fail me completely, the PSX version of this game loads the music for the FMV's seperatly, and then runs the FMV's (without sound from the FMV files, but instead plays the sound from the console's memory) (atleast, a lot of PSX games does this, FF7,FF8 and FF9 does it in a lot their FMVs, just to take a few games) Darn, this guy has DraculaX for Saturn (Me want + saturn)

		Cyber Akuma		Feb 1, 2003
			So then how can I tell which file has the audio and how can I decode it?

		Carnivol		Feb 1, 2003
			I have basicly no knowledge about Saturn stuff... But anyway, here's atleast a few things you can check: 1: You said you had the PSX version of the game, the movies are the same there... So I guess you can check the PSX cd with PSXmc (multi converter) and see if the FMV's has music or not... 2: I guess you don't want to use the sound from the PSX version, as you're doing this as a project on ripping Saturn movies in different formats... I'd guess that the music is in some format similiar to MOD,MIDI,S3M,AMS or PSF. (PSF is the nice word for the Sheet music the PSX uses) So you basicly have to find a way to find the correct music sequence + evt/also the correct samples used for the music... (if it is in this format ofcourse) Guess I'm not realy of much help here, as I'm not 100% sure about how things are on the Saturn... (I'm comparing to other machines/formats I atleast know something about, so basicly, I guess most of it should be correct...)

		Cyber Akuma		Feb 14, 2003
			There is no psx version of this game, as far as I know it is on the Turbo Graphix 16, Pc98, and Sega Saturn. The original versions were hentai but they removed that on the saturn. I DID extract the intro movies and audio and music, but im still working on the in-game still image cutscenes.

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