Beginners Guide To Modding Rock Raiders

[Cyrem]

Beginners Guide To Modding Rock Raiders

^{The beginners guide to learn how to mod LEGO Rock Raiders for PC!}

 

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Dreams of Modding
• Getting Started: Tools
• Getting Started: Environment
• Getting Started: Things to Know
• Getting Started: Development Pathways
• First Mod: Change the 'Loading' Text
• Second Mod: Custom Menu Background
• Third Mod: Enable the Tunnel Transport
• Fourth Mod: Replace a Level
• Distributing your Mod

 

Video Tutorials:

LRR Modding Tutorial - Part 1 (WAD Extraction)

LRR Modding Tutorial - Part 2 (Unlock levels & Debug Keys)

 

Special Thanks

I would like to say "thank-you" to the Rock Raiders United Community. Without this great group of people Rock Raiders would still be just another failed game with long lost fans. The original sole purpose of Rock Raiders United was to bring together fans and put life back into this game through modding. With over 1500 members, this community has done just that and continues to grow.

 

[This tutorial is not complete yet]

[Cyrem]

Introduction

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LEGO® Rock Raiders has been around for almost 10 years since its release in 1999. It was classed as a kids game and received very little attention and low reviews. The Rock Raiders LEGO sets also were not very successful; they were cancelled a year later. Over time the game slowly died off and very little was talked about it besides the odd I need help question. Nine years later modding the game suddenly began with Rock Raiders United, a community of Rock Raiders fans was founded. Modifying a game is about making it fun, expanding it and improving it. This is what makes LEGO Rock Raiders a great game for beginner modders. LEGO Rock Raiders is not difficult to modify, but it keeps some technicalities for some more experienced modders.

 

Methods of modding LEGO Rock Raiders has changed a few times since it was first found that it could be done. It was first done by changing HEX values in the WAD data files. Once a WAD Extraction tool was created we were able to pull out all the files and edit the as they would have appeared to the developer. However until a WAD builder was created we could not yet mod the game. A little while later the ability to build the WAD data files was created. From then it was found that we no longer needed to compile WAD files every time to make a modification. LEGO Rock Raiders could load the extracted files itself, provided that those files are in the correct location.

 

This small guide is designed to teach you how to begin modding LEGO Rock Raiders. It will start off with teaching you the basics, initial programs you will need and some limitations of modding in this game. If you have never modified a game before, modding is not an easy task that can be picked up in a few minutes. It may take a few days to really understand how everything works and how to keep the game functional without breaking it.

[Cyrem]

Dreams of Modding

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If you have played Rock Raiders for some time you probably already have some "What if you could" ideas already. Depending on what you want to do you may or may not be able to achieve your dream mod. Game modding is usually limited by the game and it's graphics engine, Rock Raiders is no different. There are only certain things we can do in the game and there are only some many things the engine can handle, after all, this game is over 12 years old!

 

Before you start on your modding quest, you should know what you can and can't do so you can adapt your mod into the realms of what is possible.

 

Can't Do 

• Multiplayer
• Turn it into a First Person Shooter (or any other genre)
• Add new resource types other than Crystals, Ores and Oxygen.

 

Can Do 

• Add Custom levels with custom level goals.
• Replace vehicles and buildings
• Create a new storyline
• Add and replace monsters
• Add new environments
• Re-skin textures including the UI

 

Hopefully this has excited you rather than dampen your spirit to modding the game. Even if you may not be able to accomplish the mod you wanted to make, I encourage you to push the limits of what is possible. After all, this is how many things about the game were discovered.

[Cyrem]

Getting Started: Tools
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Next up you're going to need to get some tools for your toolbox. Members of RRU have developed such tools to aid game modding. Without these tools you will find it very hard to mod the game. Some tools are required and others are recommended to help you do game modding in general.

Required Tools

A WAD Extractor
You will need one of the to extract the Rock Raiders data archives. A few tools have been made to accomplish this and they all have their merits.

• Cafeteria (WAD Tools under the "Tools" tab)
• WAD Tool (Most Popular. Requires Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 to be installed)
• WAD Recycler (Drag & Drop WAD Extraction and Building)
• LMS Mod System (Also automatically sets up the DATA method.)
• Ogun's WAD Tool (No GUI, Command Line Tool)

Level Creation
These tool are used for creating levels for Rock Raiders. You will need some of these if you intend to modify or make your own levels.

• Map Creator (Most Popular/complete editor)
• Geo Tool (3D Editor, only partial modification)
• Map Expander (Tool for resizing old/exported levels)

A NPL Compiler
To compile level goal scripts so you can use them in-game you need to compile them. While this is a little more advanced, you'll probably need this at some point.

• NPL Scripter (Most Popular. Editor with a wizard and the list of level functions and triggers)
• Ogun's NPL Compiler (No GUI, Command Line Tool)

 

Optional Tools

PSPad
An excellent file editor that includes a HEX viewer, recommended for editing any files as the normal Windows Notepad will probably destroy them.

Website

Programs you should NOT use

Notepad
Yes it's handy but more than likely it's going to ruin the files the formatting of the files and render it useless, better get a programmers text editor.

Now that you have all the tools you need, we can move on.

[Cyrem]

Getting Started: Environment

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Preparation

Now that you know what you can do and have downloaded the required tools; it is time to start preparing a modding environment. Setting up the mod environment is required because if you don't you could easily forget the mods you have made and could wind up with a game that won't start and you won't know why. So please take the time to setup the environment.

 

The first thing you will need to do is make a backup of the LEGO Rock Raiders game directory. This is very important so we can keep our modded game separate from the original. If you have installed to the default installation directory you can find the folder in C:\Program Files\LEGO Media\Games\Rock Raiders . If you can't find the folder there try doing a search for LegoRR.exe and that should lead you to the correct folder. Next, copy the whole Rock Raiders folder and paste it in the same place. This will create a copy of that folder. Rename the folder to Rock Raiders (Modded) or any other name you please.

 

Next up, we will create a shortcut the will unlock all the game levels. The point of this is so that when you are modding you can test you mods on different levels without having to unlock them. We are going to create this shortcut in your Rock Raiders (Modded) folder, so go into there. Now, single click on LegoRR.exe so that it is highlighted then press (ALT) and drag and drop the file in the same folder. This will create a shortcut to that file. Rename the shortcut to LegoRR - Levels Unlocked. After that, right click on the shortcut and choose 'Properties' from the menu that appears. In the "Target" text field on the "Shortcut" tab you will see a path to LegoRR.exe with quotes around it. After the closing quote type in: -testlevels (Don't put quotes around this part.) and click "Ok" to close the dialogue. To test that you did this correctly, run the game from that shortcut and the game levels should all be unlocked.

[Cyrem]

Getting Started: Things to Know

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WAD Files

Now that you are initially prepared we'll take on some more preparation by understand what a WAD file is and what it does. WAD files are a data file that contains most of the graphics, sounds and configuration files that LEGO Rock Raiders uses. It is similar to a ZIP file however it does not encrypt and does not compress the files within. Rock Raiders comes with two WAD files and you will find them in your Rock Raiders (Modded) folder you previously created.

 

These two WAD files called LegoRR0.wad and LegoRR1.wad contain files within them. LegoRR0.wad contains the game graphics such as images and 3D models, level files and most of the sounds. LegoRR1.wad contains the main game configuration file and the objective text for each level. We will want to get these files out, so this is why you have downloaded the WAD Tool.

 

WAD Extraction

The WAD tool really makes extraction quite easy and it usually only takes a few clicks to do it. To begin the extraction process, start the program. On the program menu, click File then choose Open WAD. This will bring up the open file dialog to locate a WAD file to open. Now in this dialog, browse to the Rock Raiders (Modded) folder which we created earlier for modding. Now in that folder select LegoRR0.wad as the first file we will extract and click Open. After a few seconds to a minute the file will have loaded into the extractor. To finish the extraction process, click WAD from the menu and choose Extract All Files.

 

After around 30 seconds all the files should have extracted to a new folder called LegoRR0 within the Rock Raiders (Modded) folder. Now repeat this same process except open and extract the LegoRR1.wad file this time. Once this is done you will have two folders: LegoRR0 and LegoRR1 within the Rock Raiders (Modded) folder.

[Cyrem]

Getting Started: Development Pathways

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Modding Paths

At this point the tutorial splits into two methods. Which tutorial you follow on to read will depend on how you want to mod the game. These two methods are called the WAD and DATA methods. I have listed some information about each method below.

 

WAD Method (Yet to post these tutorials)

This is the original way to modify Rock Raiders. This method require that you rebuild new WAD files after you have done your modifications. You will not be able to see your mods until you rebuild the WAD file. The cons of this method is that it's a bit slower to mod however if you intend to create a big overhaul overhaul of the game the method allows you to easily distribute the mod.

 

DATA Method (Yet to post these tutorials)

The easiest way to mod. With this method you no longer need the WAD files. You can make changes and launch the game without needing to rebuild WADs like the previous method. However some people have experienced some odd gameplay issues with this method.

 

Neither method is a bad choice, you'll just need to keep in mind what your method requires or doesn't require you to do.

[Cyrem]

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