creation of a mod tutorial

ok i made this thread because i want to make a mod of nba live 08 but im a newbie in modding so hopefully the questions i post here will be answered to help me finish my mod.

my first questions:
1. how do i edit the pics of players that appear when they sub or foul? i mean the small pic (kinda avatar) that appears on the screen like when someone fouls and it appears:

" player's name"
4 personal fouls team 1

2. how do i edit the jerseys in game and in the jersey select just before you start the game? i know they are edited separately but i dont know how to edit them

sir andrew you told me that this forums is the only help i can get, so please dont take this thread as spam. thank you very much. helpful answers very much appreciated

1) The player pictures are called portraits. By default the portraits are contained in a VIV file. plyrprts.viv in the FE folder. Modders can add new players and updated players by placing a BIG file in the SGSM folder. The FSH file overrides the VIV file for any existing file. Since Allen Iverson was traded he can have a new portrait wearing a Detroit uniform. His file in the SGSM folder would be plyrprts~ALIVERS.big. Portrait creation has remained the same since 2005. Check for a tutorial in the patching sections for previous versions. It should be stickied so you can find it easily.

2) Jersey creation tutorials have been made by Lean (CrappyStuff) and myself. I also made a jersey preview tutorial. Lean used Photoshop and I used Paint Shop Pro but the concepts are the same. Look in the jersey download sections for 2007-2005.

For custom portraits, you may want to check out this tutorial.

thanks guys, i will try this as soon as i get my exams done and over with. btw, if i have any problems regarding those you mentioned or i have other things about modding to ask you, i will just post here so as to not make another thread which will be spam. thanks a lot guys

sir, i havent tried the things you taught me to do but some of my friends are going to do it so i dont need to do it now, thanks anyways, sir i have 2 new questions on the mod/patch i am doing:

1. how do i add players on the game itself? because when i create a player in-game using the ( roster management > create player ) in the game itself, the created player's name can be edited anytime using the edit player option, also like the shooting hand of the player and other info like the school, etc. i want to add players (created, not in the nba live by defalut) but their names cannot be edited, so are their other info like shooting hand, school, etc. how do i add players that would result in that?

2. can i make the all-star jerseys like the format of the nba (back then) where the players wear their respective teams' jerseys (back then T-Mac wears Magic, Carter wears Raptors, Kobe wears Lakers, KG wears Wolves, etc.). i also like to do this for the rookie-sophomore teams. is it possible to do this in nba live 2008? also i found a tutorial for editing all-star teams in the wiki of NLSC, is that applicable for nba live 08 or 2005 only?

please someone reply with helpful answers, thanks in advance

1. Create the players in-game, then edit their attributes so that they're recognised as original players (ie ISCREATED must be set to False). Note that if you do this you'll need to have a custom face file for the players you've edited.

2. A few people have tried it but I don't think anyone has been successful yet. And yes, that tutorial applies to NBA Live 08 as well.

thanks sir andrew, i will try those things later or tomorrow


sir, whoever was the one who posted the file here was missing:

http://download.nba-live.com/index.php?act=view&id=780

author: Granados

please upload it again sir because i need it for the jersey creation

Sorry, I don't have it so I can't re-upload it. That's a problem with files that were originally hosted on rapidshare.

Sir, the adding of players and then editing the ISCREATED to false works. but what do u mean by needing to have a custom face file for the players i edited.

for example, i created a player named: James (firstname) Jordan (lastname) inside the game via the create player option in the game, then i save the roster and close the game. then i edited the players.dbf and changed the ISCREATED to false, then i start the game and load the roster, the player i created (james jordan)'s face and body cannot be edited in the edit player option anymore. and i dont see a crash yet because i tried to play it in practice and its ok. did u mean cyberfaces? because i dont want to do CFs right now and complete the roster of the whole mod first, before i start to try doing CFs.

also,
1. can i duplicate a player so that i wont make another player of the same exact info?

for example, the player mentioned above (james jordan) was placed on the lakers, is there a way to make another player exactly like that to have on another team in the rest of the 29 nba teams then i will edit the ratings so that one of the two will be a better overall player than the other. like in the defalut game, there are about 3 kobe bryants in the game (USA,lakers,west) and like 3 tim duncans (west, adidas,spurs). but what i would like to do is to have multiple kobe bryants on different nba teams. is it possible without having to go through the process of creating another player exactly like the previous one?

2. how do i edit the legends teams? is it the same as editing the west and east all-stars? what is the difference?

3. is there a tutorial on how to edit the graphics of the game? i mean the logos of the teams, the logos that appears when theres a deadball, the background of the game itself)

edit:
sir, last question:
if i am already done with the teams, how would i change the way they play?
for example, among the suns first five, amare takes the most number of shots, nash always penetrates then shoots a j or passes, raja and barnes always spot up for a 3 and shaq sometimes isolates in the post (not as frequent as amare)? also how do i adjust the teams style, like if i want my custom team to play like the suns last season (mike d'antoni's 3 seconds or less possesion) or the spurs' methodical half court set or just like the lakers this year with kobe, pau and bynum? does this has anything to do with primacy? how do i edit primacy?

It won't crash if you don't have a face, but you should use one for best results. Don't change anything in appearance.dbf if you want to keep using the created appearance.

1. There's no Duplicate option, you'd have to just create another copy the same way you made the first custom player.

2. Yes, it's basically the same. The only real difference is that you're dealing with different team ID numbers (instead of 30 and 31).

3. That's handled by each player's Primacy rating. The higher the Primacy rating, the more shots they'll attempt. You can also edit the team's plays (see the DBF Editing Guides for more info on the columns in teams.dbf) but with NBA Live 08's AI the results might not always be what you want.

ok sir thanks

can i copy the CF of an existiing created player to another created player. like if i created player A then i made a portrait and CF for this player, then i made another player exactly the same as the first one, can i copy the CF and portrait of the first one to the second one so they will both have the same CF and portrait? is so, how do i do that?

edit:
another question sir, can i create custom teams (not replace existing teams) and is there a limit (or maximum)to how many teams the game can handle?

All you need to do is use the same PLAYERPKG. Multiple players can use the same art files in this way.

You can create additional teams through DBF editing, I'm not sure if there's a limit but I vaguely remember reports of problems with team IDs in triple digits. Given the team IDs already used in the game, that probably gives you about 25-30 teams you can safely create. I've never tried creating that many so I can't say for sure.

thanks sir

1. which of the files from nba live 06 can be used for nba live 08 without editing anyhing? if not, what should be done to make it work for 08?

2. if i want to change an existing player's hairstyle from short hair like lebron's to a bald head, what dbf should i edit and how do i change the hair to bald?

as a result of changing the ISCREATED to true, i tried to change an existing player's hair to bald and it crashed with codebase error about faces.dbf. thats why i wanted to do the thing on question number 2 sir

edit: sir, i created a player and its dunking is the minimum at 1, but it can still dunk. how does this happen? i dont want him to be dunking thats why i made the dunking to be minimum at 1 yet he still dunks. how can i solve this?

1. Cyberfaces and headshapes (including hair files). As for the second part of your question, it's pretty broad but it usually involves extracing the textures and importing them into the .fsh files for NBA Live 08. You might want to check out some of the tutorials and threads on converting patches.

2. You don't edit the DBF, you need to edit the face art. I can't really help you out there as I don't make face patches.

3. You need to change their dunk package to one that doesn't include any dunks. A DUNKPACK value of 0 or 1 should do the trick.

sir, the created player i was referring to has already a 0 value for its DUNKPACK. but it still dunks whenever its open and just below the rim. can u suggest anything sir? another thing sir, the created player's height is only 5'7", so how come it can still dunk after being that short and i adjust the ratings in-game so that his dunking is minimum at 1

you set the dunk rating to zero not the dunkpack. the dunkpack determines what types of dunks the players do not his ability to dunk.

No, you should also edit the DUNKPACK as well; if you select a dunk package without any dunks in it (there are a couple) then a player won't dunk. Try a Dunking rating of 1, DUNKPACK of 1.

thanks, sir i have new questions

1. when i create a player in the game, the body types available are thin, medium, and thick, but even the thin bodytype is not thin enough for the player i want to be realistic. how can i edit it so it will be like the body type of like darius miles or kevin garnett?

2. you mention that editing the legends roster is the same as editing the all-stars, but what are the team IDs of the legends (31 and 30 for east and west)?

1. As I understand it, some players have custom bodytypes. You'll need to extract the original .ebo files, rename to match the PLAYERPKG of your custom player and place them in the sgsm folder so they're loaded along with the other custom art files.

2. Please consult the DBF Editing Guides in the NBA Live 08 subsite for a listing of Team IDs and other values.

sir, finally i got my studies this term over and done with, sir i have some more questions:

1. i created 2 teams of created players (the team itself is not created, just transferred the players) with the following ratings for the offensive awareness fo my starting five of the two teams:
1st team:
C 95
PF 45
SF 65
SG 45
PG 35

2nd team:
C 35
PF 75
SF 60
SG 85
PG 45

in the first team, i want the center to take most of the shots like around 75-85 % of the time, then the second most active is the SG. but when i tried palying against it, the PG and SF are always attempting shots.

in the second team, i wanted the SG to take most of the shots about 75-80% of the time, then the PF will be the second scorer. but when i played against it, the SG is scoring alright, but the PF is not attempting shots at all.

how can i make them play the way i want them?

2. Sir, what is the equivalent of the PLAYERKPG for the teams? i mean that if i edit the lakers short name from LAL to something else, wioll the game crash? there are 3 columns for the teams shortcut abrreviations. if i edit them, will it crash?

1. You need to edit your player's PRIMACY rating. The higher a player's Primacy, the more shots he will take. Note that if you have a few players with high Primacy, they'll take the most amount of shots but share them more evenly between them. For example, with the Celtics' ratings in the regular rosters, Garnett, Pierce and Allen will take the most shots but won't score as much in simulation as they would if they weren't all on the same team.

2. TEAMABR2 and TEAMABR4 are the values that point to the team art files.

ok sir, thanks a lot, i will try later the things u mentioned

btw, sir some files in the download section are missing or theres an error when i download them like BigGUI, Dittie Importer, other tools for patching, etc.

another question, which of the software at the downloads section is used to open viv files? because im getting confused at all the functions of each software there. if im not mistaken, BigGUI is used to open BIG files only, right? thank you sir

BIGGui will allow you to open, export, import and rebuild VIV files. It will not allow you to view and graphic files. You need FshX, EAGraph and/or Dolffin Live to view, export, import graphics files. You will need all three graphics programs.

We definitely need to weed out the broken links, if we can track them down we can upload them to our server since we can provide hosting again now that we're on our new server. Shoot me an email with any you come across and I'll do my best to sort them out.

ah ok. thanks to both of you. i am really a newbie in patching.

sir is it impossible to change the legends and all-star teams names? cause in the mod im doing, i replaced all 30 teams names in the teams.dbf of my roster save and it went well, but the legends and the west and east allstars teamnames didnot change in the game even though it was changed in the teams.dbf file in my rsoter save. can you help me with this? thank you sir

another question although offtopic:
my friend and I wanted to play against each other in nba live 08 so we both installed it in our PCs which are LAN connected, but when we played online, we were shocked to see pistons roster still chris webber as starting center of detroit. are the NLSC roster updates not meant for online play (both LAN and thru internet)?