Mario Kart 64 hacking

Is it possible to hack MK64 to have different characters? (IE, edit the characters in any way)

IDK but I would say yes

im not sure if you could do anymore other than change the textures

You could probably change the stats though. So if you consider Shadow Mario or Mr. L 'different characters', then yes.

How would you go about doing that?

just google n64 texture hacking or something, i have seen numerous amounts of people re-texturing supermario 64, and there is a semipopular ocarina of time one done to look like its cell shaded

Google isn't any help, just a lot of downloads of textures

Changing the textures in an n64 rom is waaay

waaaaaaaaaay

harder then you may at first think. You know, cuz you have to wade through trillions (Literally) of those little tiny useless textures, change everything so that it fits, and do a bunch of other useless stuff, ect. It's not easy.


I'm pretty sure it's possible to modify pretty much anything in a rom as long as you know how to code/hack really really well, but it's not recommended. Try contacting someone who's really good at this kind of stuff. Lightning comes to mind.

So I assume you have done it before?

Texture hacking -- yes (Although I didn't get far at all.)
Actually hacking the game and altering character files/encrypted data -- no

For texture hacking you need a special graphics plugin that dumps all the textures into a specified file. Try googling something along the lines of "Project 64 graphics plugin" and see if you can find one that does that.

I'd link you to it but I've lost the stupid plugin when I had to reformat my computer, thus forgetting the name D:

Hacking ROMs isn't easy, you know. Not every game has a Lunar Magic-like utility which makes hacking super-easy and requiring almost no effort. Hell, it's taken me 4 years to learn ASM and understand how Sonic 1 works, and even then I don't know everything. (Hacking Animal Crossing, on the other hand, was way too easy, and sadly, to this day I'm the only one who has ever done so. The text isn't even compressed!)

Anyway, to answer your question, I don't think you can actually edit the model geometry of the characters at the moment, because no one has quite cracked the N64's model format. (They have cracked the Gamecube's though.) Texture hacking SHOULD be possible, but, as Razz said, you'll have to dig through a lot of textures and find the ones you want. There's a plugin for the Project64 emulator (Rice's, I think) that lets you change the textures, but this doesn't change the ROM directly, which means you'll have to distribute the texture packs along with the ROM. I haven't tried the Rice plugin, but half the N64 texture hacking videos on Youtube seem to be made with it.

I thought Mario Kart 64 characters used billboarded prerendered textures instead of polygonal models...?

...oh. I forgot about that.

In that case, it would probably be possible to edit the characters to different ones by editing their sprite textures. Just remember that you'll have to edit all the character's frames (I'm assuming there'll be around 180 or 360).

there's only really 16 or 32, plus the ones when you get sent flying.

Good luck actually finding them


But yeah, I guess it's possible

Good luck, you'll need it

Cool thanks, this was an answer I was trying to pry out of someone.
And it appers I did a poor job of doing so :\

Well I don't plan on giving it away so I should be fine

This post has been edited by SuperMarioMaster on Aug 14 2008, 07:25 PM