A query about ADXs and Tales of the Abyss by SquareTex at 7:53 PM EST on November 11, 2006
Although we only got to play the game recently here in North America, we've been able to enjoy the music for months due to the ADX rip once provided here. And definitely thanks for that. :)
What I'm curious about is how difficult it was to pull that particular rip off. Did hcs's ADX tools breeze through it, or was there some additional gruntwork involved?
The reason I'm asking is because there is a remake of Tales of Destiny coming very soon. I'm hoping beyond hope that its music will be ADX streams as with Abyss and Legendia, and I'd like to be prepared for that. (Unless, of course, someone more skilled beats me to it. :)
If it's ADX, then there's 2 things to look for, when reading the disc on a PC. If you can see the file structure (think of Chrono Cross for an example of where a file structure wasn't visable), then search for *.ADX or *.AFS (or is it AST, ASF, or AHX?). If you find any ADX or AFS files, the those are audio files, and you can pull them directly off the disc.
On the other hand, if there is no visible file structure, then (if you have the disc as an ISO, or something) you can run adXtract on it, and it will search the entire file for ADX files. Another method to try, is to take any large file on the disc, and run it through adXtract. Sure, it might not find ADX files, but if there's any in there, adXtract should find them.
In other words, it shouldn't be hard to extract the files, if they're there to be found. Good luck with that, and hopefully you find some good music. Mouser X over and out.
I think the Tales of the Abyss audio was in an AFS. There is a good tool for extracting them (don't recall the name at the moment); my adxtract will work but doesn't produce the exact same files (I leave off a bit at the end which isn't played but might be important to CRI's playback code).
The tool HCS is refering to is, I believe, located here. Specifically, AFS->ADX unpacker. There's a few other good tools there, so feel free to look around. But that tool should do what you need, if you find AFS files on the disc.
Anyway, hope that helps. Good luck, again. I hope to hear the music soon(ish). Mouser X over and out.
Thanks, I certainly appreciate the information. :)
However, after seeing a promo clip of the game in action, I'm beginning to have doubts that the music will be streamed after all. If that is the case, then it looks as if the music will only be extractable via the traditional PSF2 method.
BUT...this is good info to have for any other extraction experiments. So thanks again.
Oh, it's not a line-in at all. It's a pure audio extraction. In fact, the guy who's gonna supply me with the music for looping has released a preview of the entire thing:
http://www.sendspace.com/file/mjr7q6
Five massive OGG chunks, downgraded for Internet downloading. My project will be based on a much cleaner version.
I have a question about Tales of Destiny's music. Do you have any idea what the original format of the streamed stuff is? If it's VAG, in_cube supports it (unless it's headerless VAG). If it's ADS (I think that's the extension), then in_cube supports that as well. If it's neither, could you send HCS some bits of it? Like, one or 2 songs/files? He might be able to provide support for the format into in_cube. Though, I can't speak for HCS on that, but it might be possible.
Also, if it's one big data chunk, then send HCS a piece of it. He's pretty good at deciphering file systems. He might be able to figure out the data chunk, and format, of the music, and extract it all (as well as provide support for it into in_cube). Again, this is pretty much speculation, until some of the original streamed files are obtained, so I wouldn't get you're hopes up. Though, if you can provide the original unaltered files, that'd be awesome (since they might be easily supported, after all).
Aside from all that, that's great news! I look forward to hearing more (especially the music). Mouser X over and out.