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[Cruzz]

I see u can do what I've been trying to do for quite some time, repainting cars before u buy them. This means that u can repaint a "unrepaintable" car, such as the BMW M3? If u can, could u paint it in any color and erase all the decals that is fitted on when u buy it? And if so could u upload the complete .cab file somewere or just give it to me via hotmail? I would be highly grateful.

//Cruzz

[hwnd]

I pulled this back off the shelf after seeing DOS4GW's screenshots.  I'm still having problems getting my repacked .CA2 files to load without throwing a Dirty Disk Error.  As far as I can tell the .CA2 files each contain a .CAB, but it's broken into segments that are compressed individually, and then assembled into the .CA2 file.  The relative simplicity of .CAB files makes me think that i'm missing something obvious as the internal .CAB that i extract is identical to the .CAB that Forza extracts to the utility drive.  

Here are some of the questions i'm trying to answer

- Does the data from default.xbe (offset: 0x5B8AA8, len: 0x34) that's placed in installmarker1 and installmarker2 (offset: 0x3AAC, len: 0x34) play any role in validating the .CA2 files?
- CARS.CA2 and MEGA.CA2 each contain individually compressed segments of the CAB that need to be reconstructed to extract the contents; do the number, size, and offsets of the compressed segments need to be identical to the original when they are reinserted?  
- Does DEFAULT.XBE need to be modified to load the updated .CA2 files?  

This is driving me nuts...

-h

[Magical-Trevor]

dam dude that is pretty sweet, hope you get it working..

[forzadude2]

QUOTE(Cruzz @ Jun 13 2006, 08:11 PM)

I see u can do what I've been trying to do for quite some time, repainting cars before u buy them. This means that u can repaint a "unrepaintable" car, such as the BMW M3? If u can, could u paint it in any color and erase all the decals that is fitted on when u buy it? And if so could u upload the complete .cab file somewere or just give it to me via hotmail? I would be highly grateful.

I am trying to take off the back wing of the BMW M3. Repainting it is easy, but I haven't figured out how to remove the back wing yet or to add custom spoilers to it. If I figure it out I'll upload some custom-signed cab so you can try.

It would also be fun to add a lot of those orange cones to a track, but that's just wishful thinking at the moment.

This post has been edited by forzadude2: Jul 13 2006, 09:21 AM

[paulochon]

Hi there,

I've had a similar project for a while (even thought I didn't get a chance to finish it) written in C# 2.0.
After seeing Dos's work, I've reelooked at it but I also get DDE.

Do you steel want any programmer help ? If so, PM me

[forzadude2]

QUOTE(hwnd @ Jul 7 2006, 08:35 AM)

- Does the data from default.xbe (offset: 0x5B8AA8, len: 0x34) that's placed in installmarker1 and installmarker2 (offset: 0x3AAC, len: 0x34) play any role in validating the .CA2 files?

I didn't spend any time figuring out the installmarker stuff.

QUOTE(hwnd @ Jul 7 2006, 08:35 AM)

- CARS.CA2 and MEGA.CA2 each contain individually compressed segments of the CAB that need to be reconstructed to extract the contents; do the number, size, and offsets of the compressed segments need to be identical to the original when they are reinserted?  

No, but they need to be correct. And the pointer or whatever it is (the value which is 0x0 for the first file and 0xfffffff or something for the last) in the inode needs to be identical as far as i know. What this means, is that I haven't made any progress to actually add cars to the game.

QUOTE(hwnd @ Jul 7 2006, 08:35 AM)

- Does DEFAULT.XBE need to be modified to load the updated .CA2 files?  

You can hack the default.xbe to disregard the checksum, or you can crack the checksum and sign it yourself (which is the method I prefer).

If you look closely at the files, there is some bits between the filenames and the dnodes.

Happy hacking (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

And btw. cabextractor is flawed, so I suggest you write your own, if you want anything to actually work.

[forzadude2]

Another thing hwnd, have you been able to open the car meshes in 3ds or something?

[brad1123]

Any success??? Has anybody got a rebuilt cars.ca2 working on the box? Is the forza file manager to be released?