EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Post by **Krishty** » 2024-Feb-17, 09:56

I don’t have all EF2000 versions installed, so I don’t know if any of the files here are actually unknown or not.

While spelunking through EF2000’s files, I noticed .zip in the list of supported extensions of did.dat. I searched did.dat for files starting with the ZIP signature PK and alas, the file with hash 6FD42313 is a ZIP.

: image.png (30.03 KiB) Viewed 429 times

It contains a few MIDI files with .mid extension that are identical to the ones found in the PROGRAM directory of the game installation.

But it also contains midi files with the .xmi extension. These are for Miles Sound System, which we know DID used for some time to bring audio effects to different hardware / OS. These are dated three months later than the .mid files.

There’s also .ad and .opl files, which I interpret as some kind of sound library? Both are identical. Dated 1993-11-09, which is really old for EF2000.

I cannot play these files, but maybe they are of interest for audio enthusiasts. ZIP file, converted to 7Z, is attached:

6FD42313.7z: (11.48 KiB) Downloaded 35 times

Post by **Krishty** » 2024-Feb-18, 00:04

Damson posted on Discord a way to play the .xmi files:

Cool find, that's pretty much ef2000 soundtrack - .xmi are used for fm synth and .mid for wavetable cards (MIDI). You can actually play the .xmi files in DOSBox with something like PX Player.

ef2.mp4

(639.14 KiB) Downloaded 31 times

https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?t=37630

there are basically 5 music tracks for different hardware - battle1, battle2, danger, search, victory

mikew · Post by **mikew** » 2024-Mar-25, 18:52

In the SEF2000 did.dat I'm looking at, that zip file has hash 64b4ab13 which corresponds to 'music\midi.zip'

Post by **Krishty** » 2024-Mar-25, 19:45

Makes sense, great! 👍

mikew · Post by **mikew** » 2024-Mar-25, 20:01

There's at least one .wav file in there as well, although .wav is not in the extension list.
If I play it, I get a voice saying 'contact'

One interesting file is 'iff\256\main.pmm' which is best opened in Wordpad. It comes from the Pegasus Mail sytem.
I don't want to post the contents here as I'm in a GDPR land...

Post by **Krishty** » 2024-Mar-25, 20:34

mikew wrote: ↑2024-Mar-25, 20:01One interesting file is 'iff\256\main.pmm' which is best opened in Wordpad. It comes from the Pegasus Mail sytem.

This is stunning 😲

I’ll quote a mail to “EVERYONE”:

Code: Select all

To:           #EVERYONE
From:         "██████████." <SERVER/██████>
Date:         31 Jul 95 01:39:00 
Subject:      ef2000 development
X-pmrqc:      1
X-mailer:     Pegasus Mail v2.3 (R5).

------- Forwarded Message Follows -------

To:            ██████
From:          "██████" <SERVER/██████>
Date:          31 Jul 95 01:36:03
Subject:       ef2000 development

BETA Test version of EF2000 to be reached by midweek
_____________________________________________________

...its looking good

The version of the game we want to deliver should include:
(and in no particular order)

*we need to put collision into all shapes and ground
all targets in world in correct position and map working with world

-texturemap and colour pallettes to be worked on including:
    new coast and tundra maps
    marsh land
    distance fade
    non fade cockpit in cloud
    good simple world

-views from the aircraft and enemy views inc.groundtargets ag weps,

-limited audio effects
*Network play (more than the current 2 v 2)

-Interface missions to have full briefing or removed into arcade
-section (which can store any missions that dont work correctly ie
any crashing ones or any that dont skip through time)
-mission types in correct menus

*weapons working crudely and able to destroy targets
worlds staying dead

*the campaign generator to be able to play through several missions

need stats for LOG
*all keys to work correcty to manual

From this point we now have entered a new deadline which is 8
weeks to clean it up and get it in a box!

so can you all please log any crashes, Bugs etc and use your Pmail to
send them down to a new area called EF2000QA (could some one make it
first) try not to bombard the coders unless its major.

for Press and media we need to show a finished look game in two weeks
so all major graphical effects should be wrapped up and Audio..press
for USA etc will commence in August.

we have a major presence at the ECTS show on 9th-12th September. The
game must have everything in and working by this point.

A few weeks after this point were in the process of having the
BIGGEST PISS UP IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD..

THANK YOU!

██████
                 ***
                (0 0)
                  U
                  ~

Excellent discovery!

mikew · Post by **mikew** » 2024-Mar-25, 20:43

Heh, very motivational!

I found another world called 'tim' (lev\tim.lev .le2 .asc .dat)
Worlds with longer filenames will take longer...
EDIT: found 'lev\ango_d.lev' etc
lev\world1.lev etc
lev\world2.lev
lev\world3.lev
lev\world4.lev
lev\kore_d.lev
lev\kore_n.lev
lev\ango_n.lev

Post by **Krishty** » 2024-Mar-25, 21:46

mikew wrote: ↑2024-Mar-25, 20:43I found another world called 'tim' (lev\tim.lev .le2 .asc .dat)
Worlds with longer filenames will take longer...
EDIT: found 'lev\ango_d.lev' etc
lev\world1.lev etc
lev\world2.lev
lev\world3.lev
lev\world4.lev
lev\kore_d.lev
lev\kore_n.lev
lev\ango_n.lev

Oh wow. On it …

Please also try the postfixes _tw/_t (twilight in addition to night and day) and _cl (cloudy)!

mikew · Post by **mikew** » 2024-Mar-25, 21:54

Yes, there's a kore_tw.lev and icebak.lev. ...to be continued.
EDIT: and ango_tw.lev

Post by **Krishty** » 2024-Mar-25, 22:23

Kore_d/Kore_n
Load well; some tiles damaged. Moving map korea.lbm matches perfectly. Probably identical to korea.lev? I will have to check.

Ango_d/Ango_n
Load well, but many damaged tiles. Moving map angola.lbm matches perfectly. Probably identical to angola.lev? I will have to check.

World1…4
All consist of only a single tile. That’s sea for World1; the others are endless road tiles. E.g. World2:

: image.png (2.23 MiB) Viewed 321 times

Interestingly, their moving maps are of different colors: One entirely red, another entirely green, and blue, and yellow.

Rest underway.

mikew · Post by **mikew** » 2024-Mar-25, 22:38

Cool!
I can add kore_dc,kore_nc, ango_dc & ango_nc

there are only 8 more files of exactly 40000 bytes, so only 4 worlds left.
The other suffixes, _st etc don't seem to work.

Post by **Krishty** » 2024-Mar-25, 22:46

Tim

This world is fantastic! It does have a few polygon glitches, but the terrain design is just amazing. So lovely to look at. Almost Norway quality here.

: image.png (3.11 MiB) Viewed 316 times

Note that there are very few towns, and absolutely no airfields. So this map may have been created early during development, when air traffic wasn’t implemented yet. It contains all kinds of landscape, so it may have been used as a test bed for the world editor / terrain generator.

Tim Johnson is credited on EF2000 for “3D World Design”, so I’m sure the map is named after him.

Does the moving map tim.lbm look familiar? I can’t recognize the place.

Icebak

This is Iceland again, but this version is much more damaged than the one we could already load:

: image.png (2.01 MiB) Viewed 312 times

So I assume it’s an older version that got completely fucked when they worked on the newer one.

Post by **Krishty** » 2024-Mar-25, 23:47

mikew wrote: ↑2024-Mar-25, 22:38there are only 8 more files of exactly 40000 bytes, so only 4 worlds left.
The other suffixes, _st etc don't seem to work.

I almost forgot: Please also try the new level names with .col, .pal, and .lbm!

I’m especially interested in finding the correct palettes for the five(!) Angola/Korea levels. Just from these palettes, I could be able to implement a dynamic day/night cycle like Norway’s. It would also reduce the work of writing five level descriptions down to writing one!

mikew · Post by **mikew** » 2024-Mar-26, 07:07

Sure, when I get time. tim.lbm is there at least.

Here's a list of cols and lbms, I've identified over the last day or so:
colours\day.col
colours\mix.col
colours\fws.col
colours\pcn.col
colours\tmp.col
colours\ian.col
colours\pit.col
colours\pcd.col
colours\pct.col
colours\mix1.col
colours\2000.col
colours\disk.col
colours\xpit.col
colours\xgui.col
colours\in_g2.col
colours\fade1.col
colours\fade2.col
iff\256\tim.lbm
iff\256\fws.lbm
iff\256\git.lbm
iff\256\cdra.lbm
iff\256\fire.lbm
iff\256\uns1.lbm
iff\256\dawn.lbm
iff\256\cdca.lbm
iff\256\cdc1.lbm
iff\256\cdc2.lbm
iff\256\has1.lbm
iff\256\shat.lbm
iff\256\test.lbm
iff\256\wgun.lbm
iff\256\rway.lbm
iff\256\ship.lbm
iff\256\f152.lbm
iff\256\fgun.lbm
iff\256\load.lbm
iff\256\main.lbm
iff\256\cell.lbm
iff\256\f163.lbm
iff\256\door.lbm
iff\256\cdcb.lbm
iff\256\f117.lbm
iff\256\pmsea.lbm
iff\256\wing1.lbm
iff\256\wing2.lbm
iff\256\main2.lbm
iff\256\y_map.lbm
iff\256\wing3.lbm
iff\256\trans.lbm
iff\256\tvcol.lbm
iff\256\main3.lbm
iff\256\oldsw.lbm
iff\256\deck3.lbm
iff\256\telly.lbm
iff\256\l_map.lbm
iff\256\spare.lbm
iff\256\pmcol.lbm
iff\256\pmsom.lbm
iff\256\dawn2.lbm
iff\256\s_map.lbm
iff\256\pmyug.lbm
iff\256\fgun2.lbm
iff\256\cred1.lbm
iff\256\fleet.lbm
iff\256\c_map.lbm
iff\256\map04.lbm
iff\256\pmang.lbm
iff\256\blitz.lbm
iff\256\icons.lbm
iff\256\prefs.lbm
iff\256\cell2.lbm
iff\256\cell3.lbm
iff\256\pmlib.lbm
iff\256\wales.lbm
iff\256\pmice.lbm
iff\256\log03.lbm

wales.lbm is a bit misleading.

Post by **Krishty** » 2024-Mar-26, 23:51

You can explore the new hidden scenarios with the latest source version of TFXplorer.

I removed World1…4 from the list because they are very repetitive and boring.
I removed Angola Day/Twilight/Night and Korea Day/Twilight/Night because they all look identical to the Angola & Korea we already have – because there are no proper palettes for this time of day.

To re-enable these scenarios, go to DIDtoUAW\DIDtoUAW EF2000 scenarios.cpp and replace REPETITIVE_SCENARIOS with 1

Post by **Krishty** » 2024-Mar-28, 10:52

Here is the list of TFXplorer file accesses that I promised you in some other thread. No forward slashes this time …

CAUTION: These are the files TFXplorer tries to find based on data and, sometimes, guesses. It does not mean these files exist! That’s up to you to check!

2024-03-28 TFXplorer EF2000 file accesses.txt: (73.15 KiB) Downloaded 33 times

Edit: Dammit, I just noticed that a few TAW files slipped in because I forgot to unload the TAW plugin during the tests 🤦‍♂️

mikew · Post by **mikew** » 2024-Mar-28, 18:27

Thanks! There were 17 files that I didn't have in my list.

Post by **Krishty** » 2024-Mar-29, 13:32

We (you?) could create a topic EF2000 Known File List that I could pin. We’d have a central place for the latest list then.

Same for the other games …

mikew · Post by **mikew** » 2024-Mar-29, 15:11

Yes, I should!

I'll do that when I something to show. There's still >1200 files that I don't know the names of.
It's been only a half hearted effort over the last week or so, but it's strangely compulsive.

Krishty’s Sim Forums

EF2000 Hidden Music Files

EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files

Re: EF2000 Hidden Music Files