I feel like there should be a lot to say about this, but I am perhaps too exhausted to say it. So, in brief, some months ago (I can’t recall how many) I began to notice some mysterious code within Sword of Moonlight, that I thought must indicate something was removed, to do with playing more than one level at a time. I thought it could be “layers” or a corridor between levels, or both of these things. I looked into it once or twice since. I even felt it may have been a load balancing system.
A month or so ago a person appeared who was working on figuring out the contents of King’s Field II’s disc for the PlayStation. Speaking with them got me to take a look myself, since it’s something I’ve been meaning to do. I wasn’t much help, but I did notice that there is two layers on each of the game’s zones. The other layer is interleaved with the first. I realized that’s the only place it could be, going by the size of the files that remained. That was a few weeks ago or more. Ever since then, I began work on making a layer system available to Sword of Moonlight, starting with its strange code from before.
I didn’t stop at getting the extra layer working, since layers is actually a big deal for Sword of Moonlight! I stopped everything to complete work on it. It also gave me a chance to investigate the MPX file format containing level definitions, and the MapComp program that produces its file format. I had pictured myself doing this at the beginning of the year, in fact, but couldn’t help from getting sidetracked. And so, I was glad to have gotten the year back on track, right on schedule.
By now I know everything there is to know about that code from before. I kept coming across it in different forms time and again. I think I’ve seen every trace of it by now. It was a layer system more or less identical to the newly developed feature. In fact, I used what bits and pieces of it I could, in order to not waste it, and to be able to say that it is a part of Sword of Moonlight having origins in its earlier days with From Software.
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