Possible hidden track in Wipeout 2097/XL ?

[tigrou]

Hi,

Some weeks ago, I got some re-interest in Wipeout2097/XL game. After some play, I was looking for some tracks drawings, to study them and improve my laps times

I found some good ones on Wipeout Central.

As you can see, the tracks drawings looks detailed and precise, I came to conclusion it was probably not something hand made, but rather the output of some script or tool.

After a quick search, I found a page that describe game internal track format : http://rewiki.regengedanken.de/wiki/Wipeout
The format itself is actually pretty simple. After a few hours, I had a ready C# script that was able to export game tracks to some 3D format that can be easily imported in a 3D editor.
The results I got (wireframe only, no texture and no objects around the track) looks pretty similar to the ones found on Wipeout Central (which confirmed what I thought initially)

While looking in game ISO, here is tracks I found (PSX PAL version) :

TRACK01 > Talon's Reach
TRACK02 > Gare d'Europa
TRACK04 > ?????
TRACK06 > Vostok Island
TRACK07 > Spilskinanke
TRACK08 > Sagarmatha
TRACK13 > Valparaiso
TRACK17 > Odessa Keys
TRACK20 > Phenitia Park

As you can see, there is 9 tracks (while game has actually 8!).
"Track04" is not available from game menu. I plug it in track exporter and open my eyes .
Here is some screenshots :

Track overview	A series of tunnels
Big jump !

The beginning of the track reminds me "Gare d'europa".
It does not seems to be complete, the green line (which is actually a curve used by game AI and for various other stuff) does not make a loop (it should).
Is this a beta version of gare d'europa, which then evolve to become the real thing ?

I also tried to swap TRACK04 and TRACK01 in the ISO, then put it in emulator, hoping it would work and I would be able to play the track !
Unfortunately, it freeze after game loading screen (at 100%).

Not sure if the track is playable or it is just too much in bad state to be able to do something with it.
It would be also great to know what is around that track (city, buildings, forest ? ) and textures used.

As anyone already heard of that track ? Share your thoughts and comments !

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

EDIT : Big news !!! (24/04/2015)

It seems the wipeout model viewer made by Phoboslab (aka Dominic) is fully compatible with Wipeout 2097/XL.

This means we can finally view the hidden track ! (as it would have been in real game)

Some screenshots :

As you can see the track looks pretty unfinished.

Most of the track is totally covered in tunnels (as seen on second screenshot). There is no sky or whatever.

There is a huge white cylinder near the huge drop. Is this sort of elevator / teleporter ?

There is also a huge gray model after the jump (with sort of cross at top). It reminds me the cave with the clock in odessa keys. (after the first jump/drop).

As explained by some wipeout forum member (named "zone"), this was supposed to be a bonus track (after you unlock the first two hidden tracks) but it was never completed and dropped at some point.

Source : http://www.wipeoutzone.com/forum/sho...track04-folder

[Jonny]

I wonder if there should be even more tracks, when you look at the numbering of the files.
And that is certainly a big jump, or they intended to add a new gameplay feature (like teleporter or a sudden acceleration).

A shame that the dev studio is down, I wonder how they react to all these data extraction breamthroughs we recently had.

[tigrou]

I wonder if there should be even more tracks, when you look at the numbering of the files.

No, these are the only ones.



The gap in the numbering could be some other tracks they created (for testing) but that weren't included in the CD (because they were reserved for Wipeout 3?)

A shame that the dev studio is down, I wonder how they react to all these data extraction breamthroughs we recently had.

What do you mean by "these data extraction" ? Is there some other hacks done around that game ?

[Xpand]

gotta love C#

but yeah that's an amazing find. I'll try to look that up aswell.

Did you only export the racing track mesh or is that all there is in that file?

[tigrou]

Did you only export the racing track mesh or is that all there is in that file?

Only track skeleton was exported (the TRS, TRF, TRV files) . There is many other files in the folder like the other tracks (scene objects, textures, ...) so there is a lot more to find out about this track !

Nice to get a message from one SlipStream GX Developer, I read some post about your game physics some weeks ago (here). Would be great to discover the physics used for wipeout 2097 game as well.

[Xpand]

Hehe, that was zero3growlithe, he programmed the whole of Slipstream GX.

WO2097 physics are pretty simple, in terms of floatiness, they just use a spring equation based on the direction of the normal of the current polygon the ship is and how high the ship is in relation to that polygon (F=k/z, where z is the height of the ship to the polygon and k is a constant). Then use a bit of maths to refine that so you can actually control the ship. Hence why they have separate files for the actual racing track and scenery. I can see how it would be easier and faster to get the track's vertices and faces for use in the physics calculations from their own files rather than having to look for them in the midst of scenery objects.

[Jonny]

No, these are the only ones.



The gap in the numbering could be some other tracks they created (for testing) but that weren't included in the CD (because they were reserved for Wipeout 3?)

That's what I mean, may they got deleted and missed track 4.

What do you mean by "these data extraction" ? Is there some other hacks done around that game ?

There was someone who extracted all the visual data of the original wipE´out" tracks (forgot the name, was it you? ), as well as the ship models from wo1, 2097 and even PulsE (or PurE?)

[vincoof]

I saw those files while I was looking for ships but didn’t get the time to see what it was. I saw many other cluttered files that were clearly never used in the game. The thing is, they weren’t very organized at that time and it’s possible that unfinished files were shipped with the game. Back in the 90s, when CD-ROMs made their appearance into the video game industry, we had so much room that it didn’t matter much to waste a few Megabytes. Remember that you could read the WipE'out" tracks from a CD player, which is really a lot of wasted disc space (but was really convenient to play it on the CD player of your car hehe).

Back on track (so to speak), unless we have a means of displaying a full track, like the Reverse Engineering WipE'out" project, it’s hard to say whether this is part of a potential track or just trash files that weren’t cleaned before the release.

[tigrou]

Remember that you could read the WipE'out" tracks from a CD player, which is really a lot of wasted disc space

Isn't how it is supposed to work for most PS1 games ?

So that first CD track is data (it contains levels, game code and such) and other CD tracks are actually music, played while you play the game ? (so that CPU can do other things meanwhile)

Back on track (so to speak), unless we have a means of displaying a full track, like the Reverse Engineering WipE'out" project, it’s hard to say whether this is part of a potential track or just trash files that weren’t cleaned before the release.

Thanks for that link, looks really interesting, i will look at this later.

[Jonny]

The original Air Comnat even had the voice of the mission briefing saved as titles.

[vincoof]

Isn't how it is supposed to work for most PS1 games ?

So that first CD track is data (it contains levels, game code and such) and other CD tracks are actually music, played while you play the game ? (so that CPU can do other things meanwhile)

The first track is always game data, that is true. This data is not meant to be listened as music, but CD players believe it is a “track” nonetheless. Fun fact: when playing this track, some CD players don’t output any sound, and some players output the sound (which is garbage).

Many games decided to put the music into tracks after the first one, which is the case for WipE'out", but some games compressed the music inside game files (as mp3 or equivalent format). Every choice has its pros and cons, for instance having music as tracks allowed us to play it from a CD player but made copy easier, and having compressed files saved lots of space and made harder to copy the music.

The point is, WipE'out" game data was so small that they could afford to waste disc space with unused files, which they might have done eventually.

[Jonny]

I wonder if there is any PS1 game without an ingame music player

[tigrou]

The first track is always game data, that is true. This data is not meant to be listened as music, but CD players believe it is a “track” nonetheless. Fun fact: when playing this track, some CD players don’t output any sound, and some players output the sound (which is garbage).

Many games decided to put the music into tracks after the first one, which is the case for WipE'out", but some games compressed the music inside game files (as mp3 or equivalent format). Every choice has its pros and cons, for instance having music as tracks allowed us to play it from a CD player but made copy easier, and having compressed files saved lots of space and made harder to copy the music.

The point is, WipE'out" game data was so small that they could afford to waste disc space with unused files, which they might have done eventually.

OK. So if I got it right, in Wipeout 1 they choose to put music both as CD tracks (playable everywhere eg : car) and also inside first data track (as usual files, only readable from PS1) ?

I wonder if there is any PS1 game without an ingame music player

Actually a lot of popular PS1 games does not use music CD tracks (eg : Resident Evil, FF7, ...). They use a format similar to what is used in MIDI files, or Mario Paint if you see what i mean. It contains only notes to play by instrument (and thus it use a lot less space). This type of music can been extracted from some games to a special format called PSF (read more info there : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portable_Sound_Format)

[aybe]

Could this be the track seen on this beta version ? http://www.unseen64.net/2010/09/13/w...aturn-pc-beta/

[tigrou]

Could this be the track seen on this beta version ? http://www.unseen64.net/2010/09/13/w...aturn-pc-beta/

Might be.

I found this (quite old) thread some minutes ago :

http://www.wipeoutzone.com/forum/sho...track04-folder

Seems somebody else already noticed the Track04 folder

Most relevant post is from "zone" :

it was a special track that was planned to be hidden in the game. (Even more hidden than the 2 hidden tracks!)
It was kind of an after thought and it wasn't like the other tracks. It was to be set in space with a lot of tunnelling ie, so scenery would not have to be modelled.
It was a super high speed circuit (basically an oval) with a MASSIVE vertical shaft drop.
The problem was that the shaft didn't work properly and there were difficulties with extracting the track. As such, a call was made to drop it, but a version of the data for it remained on the disk.
As far as I know, there is no way of accessing the track and even if you could get the game to access it, it would probably not work.

He is talking about a track in space, which seems to be what the screenshot of the beta looks like. Unfortunately "zone" doesn't explain from where he got that info...

EDIT : some other stuff here : http://ngemu.com/threads/wipeout-xl-hidden-level.35603/ (unfortunately, not very useful)

[Jonny]

So I was right that the huge drop is a new feature ^^
Anyway, if there are textures, there is maybe a way to make this playable

PS: I always thought that the "Final Gameplay Screenshot" is on Altima VII

[aybe]

@tigrou

Interesting finding !

It might be instructive to gather all the versions of the game (Saturn and some PSX betas), there might be some surprise in them...

[vincoof]

I wonder if there is any PS1 game without an ingame music player

Many games didn’t have any, actually.

OK. So if I got it right, in Wipeout 1 they choose to put music both as CD tracks (playable everywhere eg : car) and also inside first data track (as usual files, only readable from PS1) ?

As far as I know, the music was stored solely in the CD tracks, not with game data.

Anyway, if there are textures, there is maybe a way to make this playable

Even if textures can be found, there’s a long “road” between having the visual appearance of the track and making it playable. Having a visual appearance would definitely make my day, though :p

[tigrou]

Many games didn’t have any, actually.
As far as I know, the music was stored solely in the CD tracks, not with game data.
p

No, this is as I tough initially : music is there as CD tracks and in track data :



Now if you sum the size of the SWP files, you will see this is a total of approx 500MB which means there is not more space for music CD tracks (a CD is max 650mb (approx)).

I think they use this trick when compiling the CD :

The actual music data is stored only once (as uncompressed 16bit PCM 44100 hz stereo...)
For a given track, the disc Table Of Content, TOC (how many tracks they are, where they begin and end and such) and the CD ISO file system reference the same bytes on the CD.

EDIT : Bump ! (mystery solved about hidden track, see my first post thread).

[Jonny]

That's interesting!
Since the track was set in space it doesn't surprises me that it is completely covered in tunnels.
The white tube seems like an open era, like the drop on Altima in 2048.

Honestly think that the lack of a proper starting grid and checkpoints will make it impossible to actually start a race there. May it needs some tweeking, that we aren't capable of.

About the music player: If I go through all PS1 games I have, the majority allows me to select a music ttack and listen to it.
May only depends on my game selection ^^