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Documentation

A lot of information in this document came from Sonic Retro, though I did my fair share of adding to it. There is also a lot of information in the code that needs to be added to here.

Text Editing

Several instances of text can be found in the game. The format goes as follows:

  • For capital letters, use the character table below.
  • For lowercase letters, use capital letters.
  • Put 00 between each letter.

For the rest of the guide, we will refer to the lowercase letters as the capital letter part and the uppercase as the formatted letter part.

FE FF indicates that the text box now becomes blank, and will be followed by the next line of text in the ROM. Use FE FF at the end of text boxes.

FD FF ends a line of text.

FB FF ?? is a value for changing colors. Here is a table:

Hex Color
03 Black
04 Red
05 Blue
06 Green
07 Purple
  • 00 is a space for the capital letter part.
  • 0E is a period for the capital letter part.
  • The periods in the format = 0e
  • 1f = ? and 01 = ! in the capital letter part.
  • 07 = ' in the capital letter part
  • 02 = " in the capital letter part
  • + = 1 and / = 0 in the capital letter part
  • 08 = ( and 09 = ) in the capital letter part.
  • 0a = ... in the capital letter part

For example, the string for Chaos Emeralds would look like: 23 00 48 00 41 00 4F 00 53 00 00 00 25 00 4D 00 45 00 52 00 41 00 4C 00 44 00 53 00 FB FF

In your hex editor, it looks like: \#.H.A.O.S...%.M.E.R.A.L.D.S..

Offsets

All these offsets are for the English text, not the foreign language text; you'll have to search for the foreign language yourself, since I only know English and therefore can't list any offsets.

Description Offset (EU) Offset (US)
Skills? 0C6D3C - 109E9F
Sonic's story text 1DC290 - 1E2269 1DB468 - 1E1469
Tails' story text 1E2300 - 1E7E29 1E146A - 1E6FA7
Rouge's story text 1E7E29 - 1EE145 1E6FA8 - 1ED2C3
Knuckles' story text 1EE145 - 1F5000 1ED2C4 - 1F417F
Amy's story text 1F5000 - 1FAB5D 1F4180 - 1F9CDB
Cream's story text 1FAB5D - 1FF6F5 1F9CDC - 1FE86F
Shadow's story text 1FF6F5 - 206F70 1FE870 - 206103
Emerl's story text 206F70 - 20DA83 206104 - 20B131
Prof. Gerald's Journal 20DA83 - 2104B9 (see below)
Battle win/lose/start text 2104B9 - 212115
Phi text 212115 - 2121A9
Miscellaneous text 2121A9 - 212585
SONICTEAM access text 212585 - 212715
Journal & Misc. Text 20CC1A - 2118A7

NOTE: 1E2269 - 1E22FE may be lost text. It reads "Find out the forgotten secret of Emerl in the next episode, 'Tails'!"

Character Table

Note that if you subtract $20 to a character from the ROM, it will give you that character in ASCII. Hence all lowercase letters are uppercase in the ROM and will not be listed here.

Here is the character table:

Character Hex Value Character seen in a hex editor
! 01 N/A
" 02 N/A
# 03 N/A
$ 04 N/A
% 05 N/A
& 06 N/A
' 07 N/A
( 08 N/A
) 09 N/A
* 0A N/A
+ 0B N/A
, 0C N/A
- 0D N/A
/ 0F N/A
0 10 N/A
1 11 N/A
2 12 N/A
3 13 N/A
4 14 N/A
5 15 N/A
6 16 N/A
7 17 N/A
8 18 N/A
9 19 N/A
: 1A N/A
; 1B N/A
< 1C N/A
= 1D N/A
> 1E N/A
? 1F N/A
@ 20 Space
A 21 !
B 22 "
C 23 1.
D 24 $
E 25 %
F 26 &
G 27 '
H 28 (
I 29 )
J 2A -
K 2B +
L 2C ,
M 2D -
N 2E .
O 2F /
P 30 0
Q 31 1
R 32 2
S 33 3
T 34 4
U 35 5
V 36 6
W 37 7
X 38 8
Y 39 9
Z 3A :

Art Editing

unLZ-gba offsets

Most of the images are LZ77 compressed, meaning you can edit them in unLZ.

Overworld

Overworld char sprites go from 363 to 372. Before that are a bunch of option menus and whatnot, more on that later.

To get a view of the sprites normally, hit minus all the way, then plus 3.

Talking

Talking animations begin at 393 with Sonic and go to 425, ending with E-102.

Decompressed Art

Most of the art in Sonic Battle is decompressed, which is good. You can find many instances of decompressed art while browsing through the game with Tile Layer Pro. This art includes attacks, card text art, and more.

Offset Art
7AA00 ASCII characters (for the dialogue scenes)
8DDD0-A1400 Attack Text
A1400-A1600 Numbers for HUD
10FE00-113200 Unknown (Dialogue sprites?)
?????-1A5258 Central City "SONIC"
31FE00 "Go" in a battle's start.
333200-333E00 GAME SET
320000-322E00 Health bars. Very repetetive tiles.
322E00-323200 Looks like numbers. Poorly mapped numbers, that is.
323200-3237D4 Life icons
3237D4-323E00 POW and DEF icons. No recognizable AIR icon.
323E00-324200 GROUND, DEFEND, AERIAL
324200-324800 PRESS START (as in demo)
338000-363E00 Text in the credits.
366A00-3D2800 Unknown (A beach or a map).
3D5000-3DEE0 "Now you can play the new episode" info.
3E1000-3E1400 "Ground Aerial Defend", before the start of battle.
3E3400 "Ground Aerial Defend", before the start of battle(2).
3ED000-3EF600 "Comunication error" info.
423800-426A00 Title screen art.
47ABB8-A8C600 Character battle sprites.
A8F000-BE6600 Attack effects and other animated stuff in battle.
BE8400-BF1200 Chao (in battle?)

Character Battle Sprites

Note: Tile Layer Pro does not display these tiles correctly, each tile is off by 2 rows:

TLP Error Example

In this section there is a lot of notation using _'s and numbers, here's how this works:

  • _ 0 or "blank" space in sprite
  • 1-F the number from the palette which is used to display the pixel from the sprite
Character Offset
Ground Shadow 47ABB8
Sonic 47B078

Each section of each sprite is split up into 8x8 grids. The number that is in each space is the color that shows up in game, which is retrieved from the palette of the character. HxD can only go down to 8 bytes per line, so keep this in mind when editing.

The numbers are stored two per byte in reverse order, meaning 00 00 00 10 is one layer that shows up like _______1 in game. 00 00 00 00 10 00 00 00 will show up as:

________
_1______

Sprite sections are ordered in a weird way. Character sprites are 6x6 sections.

0123 OP
4567 QR
89AB ST
CDEF UV
GHIJ WX
KLMN YZ

####Animations Each animation has a certain number of frames (listed in order of appearance in ROM).

Animation Frames
Idle 6
Jog 1
Run 8
Halt 4
Dash 7
Turn 3
Change Direction 4
Fall 4
Jump 5
Land 3
Double Jump 7
Attack 1 6
Attack 2 6
Attack 3 7

####Ground Shadow The ground shadow (the shadow that displays underneath every character's feet, not Shadow the Hedgehog) has 4 states to it:

  • Jump 0 (Sqaures 1-7): When a character is on the ground, they will have this shadow.
  • Jump 1 (Squares 9-15): When a character jumps, they will have this shadow.
  • Jump 2 (Squares 18-22): For characters that can double jump, this shadow appears under them when they are at the peak of their jump.
  • Jump 3 (Squares 26-30): A third shadow for characters that can go really high like Rouge.

3D Map Editing

3D Maps are stored as little 2D grids on the BG2 and BG3 maps (use VBA to see how this works). They are made into fully-fledged 3D worlds on runtime. The texture for the bottom of the platforms are stored as sprites. Tiles are represented by a byte value and go along in rows. When one row is done, the tiles go on to the next. There are 2 maps for a battle map; the texture map and the ground map. The texture map contains the textures above the ground (except in the Crater map), and the ground map contains the textures and shadows at ground level.

Texture Map Section

Here are the offsets for all of the texture maps:

Offset Texture Map
456FA5 - 457FA5 Emerald Beach
44BC96 - 44CC96 Tails' Lab
47AB45 - 47BB45 Chao Ruins
42D405 - 42E405 Battle Highway
4449C5 - 4459C5 Club Rouge
454BA0 - 455BA0 Amy's Room
4353C5 - 4363C5 Metal Depot

NOTE: I can't find the Library texture map offset.

Each map has a set of tiles, represented by values from 00 to FF (obviously!), though not all of the slots are used. Here is a incomplete texture value list:

As a global value, 00 = Blank tile. Anything above values used = Black tile

Emerald Beach

Tiles use values 00 to 6C. Due to the huge texturization used in Emerald Beach, this has been divided into parts for your convenience.

Grass Texture
Value Tile
01 Grass Part 1
02 Grass Part 2
03 Grass Part 3 / 6 / 9
04 Grass Part 4 / 7 / 10
05 Grass Part 5
06 Grass Part 11
07 Grass Part 12
08 Grass Part 13
09 Grass Part 14
0A Grass Part 15 / 18 / 21
0B Grass Part 16
0C Grass Part 17
0D Grass Part 19 / 22
0E Grass Part 20
0F Grass Part 23
10 Grass Part 24
11 Grass Part 25
12 Grass Part 26
13 Grass Part 27 / 30
14 Grass Part 28 / 34
15 Grass Part 29 / 32
16 Grass Part 31
17 Grass Part 35
18 Grass Part 36
19 Grass Part 37 / 40 / 43 / 46
1A Grass Part 38 / 41 / 44
1B Grass Part 39 / 42 / 45
1C Grass Part 47
Rock Texture
Value Tile
1D Rocks Part 1
1E Rocks Part 2
1F Rocks Part 3 / 7
20 Rocks Part 4 / 8
21 Rocks Part 5
22 Rocks Part 6
23 Rocks Part 7
24 Rocks Part 8
25 Rocks Part 9
26 Rocks Part 10
27 Rocks Part 11
28 Rocks Part 12
29 Rocks Part 13
2A Rocks Part 14
2B Rocks Part 15
2C Rocks Part 16
2D Rocks Part 17
2E Rocks Part 18
2F Rocks Part 19
30 Rocks Part 20
31 Rocks Part 21
32 Rocks Part 22
33 Rocks Part 23
34 Rocks Part 24
35 Rocks Part 25
36 Rocks Part 26
37 Rocks Part 27
38 Rocks Part 28
39 Rocks Part 29
3A Rocks Part 30
3B Rocks Part 31
3C Rocks Part 32
3D Rocks Part 33
3E Rocks Part 34
3F Rocks Part 35
40 Rocks Part 36
41 Rocks Part 37
42 Rocks Part 38
43 Rocks Part 39
44 Rocks Part 40
45 Rocks Part 41
46 Rocks Part 42
47 Rocks Part 43
48 Rocks Part 44
49 Rocks Part 45
4A Rocks Part 46
4B Rocks Part 47
4C Rocks Part 48
4D Rocks Part 49
4E Rocks Part 50
4F Rocks Part 51
50 Rocks Part 52
51 Rocks Part 53
52 Rocks Part 54
53 Rocks Part 55
54 Rocks Part 56
55 Rocks Part 57
56 Rocks Part 58
57 Rocks Part 59
5A Rocks Part 60
5B Rocks Part 61
5C Rocks Part 62
5D Rocks Part 63
5E Rocks Part 64
5F Rocks Part 65
60 Rocks Part 66
61 Rocks Part 67
62 Rocks Part 68
63 Rocks Part 69
64 Rocks Part 70
65 Rocks Part 71
66 Rocks Part 72
67 Rocks Part 73
68 Rocks Part 74
69 Rocks Part 75
6A Rocks Part 76
6B Rocks Part 77
6C Rocks Part 78

Tails' Lab

Tiles use values from 01 to 10.

Value Tile
01 Cylinder Part 1
02 Cylinder Part 2
03 Cylinder Part 3
04 Cylinder Part 4
05 Cylinder Part 5
06 Cylinder Part 6
07 Cylinder Part 7
08 Cylinder Part 8
09 Cylinder Part 9
0A Cylinder Part 10
0B Cylinder Part 11
0C Cylinder Part 12
0D Cylinder Part 13
0E Cylinder Part 14
0F Cylinder Part 14
10 Cylinder Part 15

Crater

Tiles use values 00 to 1C.

Value Tile
01 Icepit Part 1 / 52
02 Icepit Part 2 / 53
03 Icepit Part 3 / 7 / 54 / 58 / 62
04 Icepit Part 4 / 8 / 55 / 63
05 Icepit Part 5 / 9 / 56 / 60
06 Icepit Part 6 / 10 / 57 / 59 / 61
07 Icepit Part 11 / 64
08 Icepit Part 12 / 65
09 Icepit Part 13 / 17 / 27 / 66 / 70 / 74
0A Icepit Part 14 / 18 / 28 / 67 / 71 / 75
0B Icepit Part 15 / 19 / 68 / 72
0C Icepit Part 16 / 18 / 20 / 69 / 73
0D Icepit Part 21 / 76 / 80 / 84
0E Icepit Part 22 / 77 / 81 / 85
0F Icepit Part 23 / 26 / 31 / 39
10 Icepit Part 24 / 32 / 37 / 40
11 Icepit Part 25 / 33 / 38
12 Icepit Part 26 / 34 / 39
13 Icepit Part 40 / 96 / 100 / 104
14 Icepit Part 41 / 97 / 101 / 105
15 Icepit Part 42 / 46 / 50
16 Icepit Part 43 / 47 / 51
17 Icepit Part 44 / 48
18 Icepit Part 45 / 49
19 Icepit Part 86 / 90 / 94
1A Icepit Part 87 / 91 / 95
1B Icepit Part 98 / 102 / 106
1C Icepit Part 99 / 103 / 107

Chao Ruins

Tiles use values 00 to 20.

Value Tile
01 Rocks Part 1
02 Rocks Part 2
03 Rocks Part 3
04 Rocks Part 4
05 Rocks Part 5
06 Rocks Part 6
07 Rocks Part 7
08 Rocks Part 8
09 Rocks Part 9
0A Rocks Part 10
0B Rocks Part 11
0C Rocks Part 12
0D Rocks Part 13
0E Rocks Part 14
0F Rocks Part 15
10 Rocks Part 16
11 Rocks Part 17
12 Rocks Part 18
13 Rocks Part 19
14 Rocks Part 20
15 Rocks Part 21
16 Rocks Part 22
17 Rocks Part 23
18 Rocks Part 24
19 Rocks Part 25
1A Rocks Part 26
1B Rocks Part 27
1C Rocks Part 28
1D Rocks Part 29
1E Rocks Part 30
1F Rocks Part 31
20 Rocks Part 32

Battle Highway

Tiles use values 00 to 20.

Value Tile
01 Metallic Boxes Part 1
02 Metallic Boxes Part 2
03 Metallic Boxes Part 3
04 Metallic Boxes Part 4
05 Metallic Boxes Part 5
06 Metallic Boxes Part 6
07 Metallic Boxes Part 7
08 Metallic Boxes Part 8
09 Metallic Boxes Part 9
0A Metallic Boxes Part 10
0B Metallic Boxes Part 11
0C Metallic Boxes Part 12
0D Metallic Boxes Part 13
0E Metallic Boxes Part 14
0F Metallic Boxes Part 15
10 Metallic Boxes Part 16
11 Stripes Part 1
12 Stripes Part 2
13 Stripes Part 3
14 Stripes Part 4
15 Stripes Part 5
16 Stripes Part 6
17 Stripes Part 7
18 Stripes Part 8
19 Stripes Part 9
1A Stripes Part 10
1B Stripes Part 11
1C Stripes Part 12
1D Stripes Part 13
1E Stripes Part 14
1F Stripes Part 15
20 Stripes Part 16

Amy's Room

Tiles use values 00 to 60.

Value Tile
01 Amy Confused Face Part 1
02 Amy Confused Face Part 2
03 Amy Confused Face Part 3
04 Amy Confused Face Part 4
0D Amy Confused Face Part 5
0E Amy Confused Face Part 6
0F Amy Confused Face Part 7
10 Amy Confused Face Part 8
19 Amy Confused Face Part 9
1A Amy Confused Face Part 10
1B Amy Confused Face Part 11
1C Amy Confused Face Part 12
05 Amy Shocked Face Part 1
06 Amy Shocked Face Part 2
07 Amy Shocked Face Part 3
08 Amy Shocked Face Part 4
11 Amy Shocked Face Part 5
12 Amy Shocked Face Part 6
13 Amy Shocked Face Part 7
14 Amy Shocked Face Part 8
1D Amy Shocked Face Part 9
1E Amy Shocked Face Part 10
1F Amy Shocked Face Part 11
20 Amy Shocked Face Part 12
09 Amy Angry Face Part 1
0A Amy Angry Face Part 2
0B Amy Angry Face Part 3
0C Amy Angry Face Part 4
15 Amy Angry Face Part 5
16 Amy Angry Face Part 6
17 Amy Angry Face Part 7
18 Amy Angry Face Part 8
21 Amy Angry Face Part 9
22 Amy Angry Face Part 10
23 Amy Angry Face Part 11
24 Amy Angry Face Part 12
25 Amy Talking Face Part 1
26 Amy Talking Face Part 2
27 Amy Talking Face Part 3
28 Amy Talking Face Part 4
2D Amy Talking Face Part 5
2E Amy Talking Face Part 6
2F Amy Talking Face Part 7
30 Amy Talking Face Part 8
35 Amy Talking Face Part 9
36 Amy Talking Face Part 10
37 Amy Talking Face Part 11
38 Amy Talking Face Part 12
29 Amy Posed Face Part 1
2A Amy Posed Face Part 2
2B Amy Posed Face Part 3
2C Amy Posed Face Part 4
31 Amy Posed Face Part 5
32 Amy Posed Face Part 6
33 Amy Posed Face Part 7
34 Amy Posed Face Part 8
39 Amy Posed Face Part 9
3A Amy Posed Face Part 10
3B Amy Posed Face Part 11
3C Amy Posed Face Part 12
3D Amy ??? Face Part 1
3E Amy ??? Face Part 2
3F Amy ??? Face Part 3
40 Amy ??? Face Part 4
49 Amy ??? Face Part 5
4A Amy ??? Face Part 6
4B Amy ??? Face Part 7
4C Amy ??? Face Part 8
55 Amy ??? Face Part 9
56 Amy ??? Face Part 10
57 Amy ??? Face Part 11
58 Amy ??? Face Part 12
41 Amy Goofy Face Part 1
42 Amy Goofy Face Part 2
43 Amy Goofy Face Part 3
44 Amy Goofy Face Part 4
4D Amy Goofy Face Part 5
4E Amy Goofy Face Part 6
4F Amy Goofy Face Part 7
50 Amy Goofy Face Part 8
59 Amy Goofy Face Part 9
5A Amy Goofy Face Part 10
5B Amy Goofy Face Part 11
5C Amy Goofy Face Part 12
45 Amy Sad Face Part 1
46 Amy Sad Face Part 2
47 Amy Sad Face Part 3
48 Amy Sad Face Part 4
51 Amy Sad Face Part 5
52 Amy Sad Face Part 6
53 Amy Sad Face Part 7
54 Amy Sad Face Part 8
5D Amy Sad Face Part 9
5E Amy Sad Face Part 10
5F Amy Sad Face Part 11
60 Amy Sad Face Part 12

Library

Tiles use values 00 to 10.

Value Tile
01 Bookcase Part 1
02 Bookcase Part 2
03 Bookcase Part 3
04 Bookcase Part 4
05 Bookcase Part 5
06 Bookcase Part 6
07 Bookcase Part 7
08 Bookcase Part 8
09 Bookcase Part 9
0A Bookcase Part 10
0B Bookcase Part 11
0C Bookcase Part 12
0D Bookcase Part 13
0E Bookcase Part 14
0F Bookcase Part 15
10 Bookcase Part 16

Metal Depot

Tiles use values 00 to 30.

Value Tile
01 Lined Metal Part 1
02 Lined Metal Part 2
03 Lined Metal Part 3
04 Lined Metal Part 4
05 Lined Metal Part 5
06 Lined Metal Part 6
07 Lined Metal Part 7
08 Lined Metal Part 8
09 Lined Metal Part 9
0A Lined Metal Part 10
0B Lined Metal Part 11
0C Lined Metal Part 12
0D Lined Metal Part 13
0E Lined Metal Part 14
0F Lined Metal Part 15
10 Lined Metal Part 16
11 ??? Metal Part 1
12 ??? Metal Part 2
13 ??? Metal Part 3
14 ??? Metal Part 4
19 ??? Metal Part 5
1A ??? Metal Part 6
1B ??? Metal Part 7
1C ??? Metal Part 8
21 ??? Metal Part 9
22 ??? Metal Part 10
23 ??? Metal Part 11
24 ??? Metal Part 12
29 ??? Metal Part 13
2A ??? Metal Part 14
2B ??? Metal Part 15
2C ??? Metal Part 16
15 Vent Metal Part 1
16 Vent Metal Part 2
17 Vent Metal Part 3
18 Vent Metal Part 4
1D Vent Metal Part 5
1E Vent Metal Part 6
1F Vent Metal Part 7
20 Vent Metal Part 8
25 Vent Metal Part 9
26 Vent Metal Part 10
27 Vent Metal Part 11
28 Vent Metal Part 12
2D Vent Metal Part 13
2E Vent Metal Part 14
2F Vent Metal Part 15
30 Vent Metal Part 16

Club Rouge

Club Rouge is *still* incomplete, but it will be complete soon, I promise.

Value Tile
01 Rectacircular Platform Rotated > Part 1
02 Rectacircular Platform Rotated > Part 2
03 Rectacircular Platform Rotated > Part 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 10
04 Rectacircular Platform Rotated > Part 11
05 Rectacircular Platform Rotated > Part 12
06 Rectacircular Platform Rotated > Part 13
07 Rectacircular Platform Rotated > Part 14
08 Rectacircular Platform Rotated > Part 15 / 16 / 17 / 18 / 19 / 20 / 21 / 22
09 Rectacircular Platform Rotated > Part 23
0A Rectacircular Platform Rotated > Part 24
0B Rectacircular Platform Rotated ^ Part 1
0C Rectacircular Platform Rotated ^ Part 2
0D Rectacircular Platform Rotated ^ #2 Part 1
0E Rectacircular Platform Rotated ^ #2 Part 2

Ground Map Section

Ground maps are the maps of things at ground level. Except for the Crater area, the BG3 Map is always the ground map(In the Crater, the maps are reversed; the texture map, BG3 is the stuff underground, and the ground map, BG2, is the stuff aboveground.

Offsets:

  • Emerald Beach: 46DC70
  • Tails' Lab: 44A664
  • Cyberspace: 4721B4

Cyberspace

NOTE: Cyberspace has constant cycling palette effects, so a fully accurate list is impossible. This list is based on the semi-squares at the corners being the Raster 0 (lightest) color. In other words, the colors start as light colors, gradually go on to dark colors, and then gradually come back to light at the ends. Raster 0 is the lightest color, and Raster 5 is the darkest. (Of course, I shouldn't call it Raster, because the color cycling isn't a rasterization effect, though I originally thought it was.)

Value Raster Effect
01 Upgoing line, Raster 0. Also acts as
02 Upgoing line, Raster 1. Also acts as
03 Upgoing line, Raster 2. Also acts as
04 Upgoing line, Raster 3. Also acts as
05 Upgoing line, Raster 3. Also acts as
06 Upgoing line, Raster 2. Also acts as
07 Upgoing line, Raster 1. Also acts as
08 Upgoing line, Raster 0. Also acts as
09 Rightgoing line, Raster 0. Acts as lines between Raster 0 square corners.
0A Upleft square corner, Raster 0.
0B Rightgoing line, Raster 1. Goes at end of Raster 0 square. Acts as corner.
0C Upleft square corner, Raster 1.
0D Rightgoing line, Raster 1. Acts as lines between Raster 1 square corners.
0E Rightgoing line, Raster 2. Goes at end of Raster 1 square. Acts as corner.
0F Upleft square corner, Raster 2.
10 Rightgoing line, Raster 3. Acts as lines between Raster 2 square corners.
11 Upright square corner, Raster 4.
12 Upleft square corner, Raster 4
13 Rightgoing line, Raster 4. Acts as lines between Raster 4 square corners.
14 Upright square corner, Raster 2. Goes at end of Raster 4 square.
15 Rightgoing line, Raster 2. Goes after the second Raster 2 upright corner.
16 Rightgoing line, Raster 2. Goes at end of second Raster 2 square.

OAM Editing

The OAM is a listing of the tile numbers of the sprites that are onscreen. It also lists the Y position of the sprite, the X position of the sprite, the flags, and the palette number. The OAM, in a way, is a sort of sprite map. This can be useful when editing battle maps; you'll usually have to edit the sprite map to get your work done. It can also be useful when editing sprite mappings; the OAM usually IS the mappings. Not only that, it determines the screen position for each part, so you can have a mapped part of a mapped sprite outside the sprite.

But sadly, the OAM changes every second, so lasting changes to the OAM are, as far as I know, impossible.

The OAM Format

aa bb cc dd ee f? gg hh (next entry in OAM)
  • aa = Y Position on Screen
  • bb = Flags
  • cc = X Position on Screen
  • dd = Flags
  • ee = Tile Number
  • f = Palette No. (Backwards)
  • ? = I have no idea what this is, but on some sprites it can do strange things when changed.
  • gg = I don't know what this is, but it does nothing.
  • hh = This byte is always either 00 or 01. But it doesn't do anything.

The default values in the OAM are:

  • Position: 0,0
  • Mode: 0
  • Colors: 16
  • Palette Number: 0
  • Tile Number: 0
  • Priority: 0
  • Size: 8x8
  • Rotation: 0
  • Flags: R

In other words, an empty slot will look something like:

    00 02 00 00 00 00 00 00
OR
    00 02 00 00 00 00 00 01
OR
    00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
OR
    00 00 00 00 00 00 00 01

The unused slots all use these values, making it easy to spot them.

You can also add to the OAM by changing the unused slots as you wish. Unused slots usually all have the same bytes, and therefore unused slots in the OAM are marked by a handful of redundant (except for the gg and hh bytes) space.

The end of the OAM is easily recognizable; the redundant space suddenly changing to all-unredundant space.

In VBA, the XY positions, the tile number, and the palette number are shown as decimal values, so it is helpful to have a calculator that can convert from Decimal to Hex and back. The Windows Calculator supports all of that and more.

Here is the value list for the two flags:

  • 00 / 10 / 20 = Nothing happens
  • 01 - 10 = Tile with same tile as following
  • 11 - 20 = Tile with same tile as following
  • 21 = REALLY glitchy 32x32 image
  • 22 / 23 = REALLY glitchy 32x32 image R
  • 24 / 25 = REALLY glitchy 32x32 image D (???)
  • 26 / 27 / 2F = REALLY glitchy 32x32 image R and D (???)
  • 30 / 40 = Same tile as following
  • 31 / 38 / 39 = REALLY glitchy 32x32 image mirrored
  • 32 / 33 / 3A / 3B = REALLY glitchy 32x32 image M and R
  • 34 / 35 / 3C / 3D = REALLY glitchy 32x32 image MD(???)
  • 36 / 37 / 3E / 3F = REALLY glitchy 32x32 image R and MD(???)
  • 41 / 48 / 49 = Nothing happens
  • 42 / 43 / 4A / 4B = R
  • 44 / 45 / 4C / 4D / 4E = D(???)
  • 46 / 47 / 4F = R and D(???)
  • 50 = M
  • 51 = M
  • 52 / 53 / 5A / 5B = R and M
  • 54 / 55 / 5C / 5D = MD(???)
  • 56 / 57 / 5E / 5F = R and MD
  • 58 / 59 = M
  • 60 / 68 / 69 = Random position, glitchy tile
  • 61 = Glitchy tile
  • 62 / 63 / 6A / 6B = Glitchy tile R
  • 64 / 65 / 6C / 6D = Glitchy tile D
  • 66 / 67 / 6E / 6F = Glitchy tile R and D
  • 70 = Random position, glitchy tile M
  • 71 / 78 / 79 = Glitchy tile M
  • 72 / 73 / 7A / 7B = Glitchy tile R and M
  • 74 / 75 / 7C / 7D = Glitchy tile MD
  • 76 / 77 / 7E / 7F = Glitchy tile R and MD
  • 80 = Double-tile
  • 81 - 8F = Glitchy tile R and MD, Y = 4 and on 81, X = 129 and goes up from there
  • 90 = Double-tile M
  • 91 - 9F = Glitchy tile R and MD. Y = 4 and on 91, X = 145 and goes up from there
  • A0 = Double-Y glitchy tile
  • A1 - AF = Glitchy tile R and MD; Y = 4 and on A1, X = 161 and goes up from there
  • B0 / B1 / B8 / B9 = Double-Y glitchy tile M
  • B2 / B3 / BA / BB = Double-Y glitchy tile R and M
  • B4 / B5 / BC / BD = Double-Y glitchy tile MD
  • B6 / B7 / BE / BF = Double-Y glitchy tile R and MD
  • C0 / D0 / E0 / F0 = Same tile as following one
  • C1 - CF = Same tile as following one
  • D1 - DF = Same tile as following one
  • E1 - EF = Same tile as following one
  • F1 - FF = Same tile as following one

That's a lot of values! The glitchy tiles, by the way, can be unglitched into good 256-color tiles by changing the tile number into the 256-color tile you want it to show.

Here is an example OAM slot: 0F 50 01 10 04 1C F2 01

This will produce the tile number 04, with the XY location 1,10, the flag R, and the palette in slot 1. The offset for the OAM in memory is 0x7000000. There are no offsets in the ROM.

Palette Editing: Beauty and the Binary

There are two ways to palette edit. One is to use Icy Guy's excellent program, GBA Color Picker; the other option is to convert RGB values into binary. Which one would you rather do?

Each palette line can hold 16 colors, but the first seems to be reserved for transparency reasons, so you've got 15 colors available in each palette. Counting from the 2nd second color to left (this one is often white), the colors are numbered according to standard hex numbering, sans 0, so that's 1-F. Palettes are byteswapped, meaning that 2700 shows up as 0027 in a hex editor. The first color in each palette controls transparency, for your information.

Here are the offsets for each palette.

Offset Description
1A7F90 Text/speech box palette
1A8E25 Emerald Beach
41A218 Title screen "background" palette
468A18 Emerald Beach shadow (on grass) palette
468A38 Emerald Beach shadow (on sand) palette
47AB78 Gray/"imposter" Emerl's in-fight palette
47AFB8 Sonic's in-fight palette
4CADD8 Knuckles' in-fight palette
5283F8 Tails' in-fight palette
58D818 Shadow's in-fight palette
5F3E38 Rouge's in-fight palette
636458 Amy's in-fight palette
681A78 E-102's in-fight palette
6F6A98 Cream's in-fight palette
7336B8 Chaos' in-fight palette
7822D8 Robotnik's in-fight palette
787CF8 Emerl's in-fight palette
BF2058 Dust cloud (from end of combo) palette
BF2078 In-fight shield palette ("opening" animation, when purple)
BF2098 In-fight shield palette/Tails' gun's power ball
BF20D8 Sonic's mine palette

VBA Hacking

Visual Boy Advance is THE ultimate tool for ROM hacking, when combined with Hex Workshop. This is especially true for Sonic Battle. These are steps that will let you do some radical stuff with VBA too for any game compatible with it:

  1. Open up the respective viewer and get the offset of the spriteData you want.
  2. Open up the Memory Viewer and go to that offset.
  3. Take notes on the format and experiment with it.
  4. Now that you've gotten the format into a file, do a search for the original hex values using Hex Workshop. Record the offset.
  5. Change as you please.
  6. If you want to distribute your results, make an IPS patch with StealthPatch.

Strange Things

There are many strange objects in Sonic Battle as can be seen by looking at the OAM. (What the heck is that messed-up Emerl doing there? Or the 1 1/2 Eggman?) This gives the location, the position, the color mode, the palette, the tile number, the priority, the size, and the description of each strange object I've come across so far.

NOTE: This would probably go in a glitches guide, but these slots can also serve as extra object places, I think.

Messed-Up Fire Thingy

  • Where: Emerald Town Map Cutscene 1 (Sonic Finds Emerl), OAM Slot 6
  • Position: 97, 160
  • Color Mode: 16-Colors
  • Palette: 2
  • Tile: 236
  • Priority: 3
  • Size: 32x32

Description: Sonic is covering up this object, but it's there.

White Sonic with ACH

  • Where: Emerald Town Map, OAM Slot 3
  • Position: 155, 160
  • Color Mode: 16-Colors
  • Palette: 0
  • Tile: 424
  • Priority: 2
  • Size: 32x32

Description: This White Sonic moves as Sonic moves. Now, you might be saying "It's the ACH in Emerald Beach with a wrong-palette Sonic! DUH!" It does become the slot for the ACH in Emerald Beach, but it might be relevant to note that the ACH is in a different location, and that we don't ever see this object.

Event Place with Arrow

  • Where: Emerald Town Map

(NOTE:There are two of these, so I have seperated them by slots.)

  • OAM Slot 6
  • Position: 98, 160
  • Color Mode: 16-Colors
  • Palette: 2
  • Tile: 116
  • Priority: 3
  • Size: 32x32
  • Description: N/A

  • OAM Slot 10
  • Position|107, 160
  • Color Mode: 16-Colors
  • Palette: 2
  • Tile: 116
  • Priority: 3
  • Size: 32x32
  • Description: N/A

*.SGM Savestate Hacking

Palette Editing

Like the ROM, palettes are stored in an RCGB value. R is Dark Red, C is Contrast, G is Green, and B is blue.

.sgm files are compressed. They could be decompressed with WinZip. First, add the "*.gz" extension to your file. Then open up WinZip, decompress, and voila. You don't even have to recompress.

The offset for the palettes in the *.sgm savestate is 0x05000000. Edit heartily.

RAM Breakdown

If you want to make savestate hacks the easy way, you need to know the memory and what goes where, and where where you want to put something is. Wow, confusing sentence, huh? If you don't know this, the chances of you making a savestate hack that accomplishes something OTHER than crashing the game is not that high, unless you use VBA (See "Hacking with VBA" section for info about that.). VBA is the ultimate tool for RAM editing, too. Get it or be doomed to not knowing what you're doing in the savestate.

Palettes in the RAM

The palette is located at 0x05000000, and it, like the game itself, uses an RCGB value.

Map Editing in the RAM

Map editing is a tile-by-tile grid, like the game. Here are RAM offsets for BG0, BG1, BG2, and BG3 maps:

In Battle Mode:

Value Map
600E000 BG2 Map(Texture map)
600F000 BG3 Map(Ground map)

In Menu Mode:

Value Map
600F800 BG0 Map(Mode)
600F000 BG1 Map(Fiery Thing)
600E800 BG2 Map(Menu BG with "SONIC BATTLE" on t)
600E000 BG3 Map(Rolling background behind menu BG)

In Episode Select Mode:

Value Map
600F000 BG0 Map(Drawings map)
600E800 BG1 Map(2 Semitransparent lines, below-screen lines)
600E000 BG2 Map(Two things, one at bottom and one at top)
600D800 BG3 Map(Rolling background behind everything)

In Training Menu Mode:

Value Map
600F800 BG0 Map(Semitransparent curviness at top)
600F000 BG1 Map(Black thing that menu is on)
600E800 BG2 Map(Menu)
600E000 BG3 Map(Rolling background behind everything)

In SEGA/SONICTEAM Mode:

Value Map
6007000 BG2 Map (Blurry Map)
600F000 BG3 Map (Non-Blurry Map)

In Intro Mode:

Value Map
600F800 BG0 Map(BG with the background)
6000000 BG1 Map(Glitchy-glitchy map)
600B800 BG2 Map(Drawings map)

In Title Screen Mode:

Value Map
6007800 BG0 Map(Top Background Cover)
600B800 BG1 Map(Bottom Background Cover)
600F800 BG2 Map(Rolling Background)
600F000 BG3 Map(SONIC BATTLE)

In Cutscene Mode:

Value Map
6009800 BG0 Map(Text Box with Text)
600A000 BG1 Map(Darkened version of things you can walk behind on map)
600C000 BG2 Map(Darkened version of things that are solid on map)
600E000 BG3 Map(Darkened version of the basic map)

In World Map Mode:

Value Map
6009800 BG0 Map(A text box? What the...)
600A000 BG1 Map(Things you can walk behind on map)
600C000 BG2 Map(Things that are solid on map)
600E000 BG3 Map(The basic map)

The OAM in the RAM

The offset in memory is 0x070000000.