Tool A tool to unpack the VOL files of the old DAS game "Cobra mission"?

[Lednah]

A tool to unpack the VOL files of the old DAS game "Cobra mission"?
Well, as the topic says. I read there are different engines to create VOL files and different unpackers should be used. Any info will be highly appreciated.
Thanks in advance!
PS. If someone needs the game I'll upload it supplied with dumbproof DOSBox.

 

[BlackStar2k]

I just read this post after a google search. Had to register to at least give you some response.

I've done some research on the VOL format years ago, it can be found on moddingwiki, just google megatech vol format and you should find my reverse engineering work so far.
Other than that, I have posted my tool on github: cobra-mission-writer

This thing can at least generate the map files and using the wiki it should be straightforward to at least modify the maps.
Unfortunately I never got around to properly reverse engineer the GC graphics format. I got pretty far, but I never figured out exactly how they did the drawing.

 

[Lednah]

I just read this post after a google search. Had to register to at least give you some response.

I've done some research on the VOL format years ago, it can be found on moddingwiki, just google megatech vol format and you should find my reverse engineering work so far.
Other than that, I have posted my tool on github: cobra-mission-writer

This thing can at least generate the map files and using the wiki it should be straightforward to at least modify the maps.
Unfortunately I never got around to properly reverse engineer the GC graphics format. I got pretty far, but I never figured out exactly how they did the drawing.

Interesting. I simply presumed VOL means sounds file, but saw no sound files listed in your post (besides some entry sound files) on moddingwiki. Is there a way to distinguish which files contains game sounds? And is there any program which may be able to play them?

 

[BlackStar2k]

Hi Lednah, the sound files are PCM1 through PCM5.VOL. These contain a number of entries in the VOC format (Creative Voice File), a remnant from the past. Any modern audio editing program will likely have support for loading them.
My github thing is an absolute mess, but the dump functionality should work. It should compile easily with visual studio (you might need to change some things here and there) but from what I remember I could extract all resources from the VOL files.

In addition to this, after I found this post, I've resumed the work on decoding the graphics files. I now have a 1 million line file from Dosbox that has a full assembly run of a decode of one of the graphics files. Not sure how long this is going to take, but at least I have a very basic understanding of how this game encoded graphics... to be continued.

 

[BlackStar2k]

Interesting. I simply presumed VOL means sounds file, but saw no sound files listed in your post (besides some entry sound files) on moddingwiki. Is there a way to distinguish which files contains game sounds? And is there any program which may be able to play them?

Oh in addition, the VOL file is probably an abbreviation of VOLUME, where it's just a number of files right behind each other with a lookup table at the start of the file.

 

[BlackStar2k]

A tool to unpack the VOL files of the old DAS game "Cobra mission"?
Well, as the topic says. I read there are different engines to create VOL files and different unpackers should be used. Any info will be highly appreciated.
Thanks in advance!
PS. If someone needs the game I'll upload it supplied with dumbproof DOSBox.

Let me know if you can compile the source on my github, if not, I can give you a CLI executable that will extract all the resources

 

[Lednah]

Let me know if you can compile the source on my github, if not, I can give you a CLI executable that will extract all the resources

I'm afraid I know next to nothing about such stuff, so I can use it only if it comes with dump-proof "how to"

 

[BlackStar2k]

Hi Lednah, I did a quick and dirty edit of my existing code, attached is cmwriter, if you execute this in the cobra mission directory it will extract all resources from all VOL files. I think you're most interested in the PCM's, but still

Edit: gimme a second, seems like my quick and dirty edit was a bit too quick and too dirty.

Edit: This one will create a subdirectory with the VOL name + underscore and extracts everything in their respective directory.

 

[BlackStar2k]

I'm afraid I know next to nothing about such stuff, so I can use it only if it comes with dump-proof "how to"

The file above has a VIRUS warning for some reason, I ran it through VirusTotal.com,it does flag on some scanners.

Not sure how or why, because all it does is open the vol files and extract their contents. My (paid) AVG doesn't report a thing.

Security vendors' analysis

You must be registered to see the links

AhnLab-V3Malware/Win.Generic.C5228616
CynetMalicious (score: 100)
MaxSecureTrojan.Malware.300983.susgen
RisingTrojan.Generic@AI.96 (RDML:Z37/URfGqFZz5xbcQIjkQw)
SecureAgeMalicious
Acronis (Static ML)Undetected
AlibabaUndetected
ALYacUndetected
Antiy-AVLUndetected
ArcabitUndetected
AvastUndetected
AVGUndetected
Avira (no cloud)Undetected
BaiduUndetected
BitDefenderUndetected
BitDefenderThetaUndetected
Bkav ProUndetected
ClamAVUndetected
CMCUndetected
CrowdStrike FalconUndetected
CybereasonUndetected
CylanceUndetected
CyrenUndetected
DeepInstinctUndetected
DrWebUndetected
ElasticUndetected
EmsisoftUndetected
eScanUndetected
ESET-NOD32Undetected
F-SecureUndetected
FortinetUndetected
GDataUndetected
GoogleUndetected
Gridinsoft (no cloud)Undetected
IkarusUndetected
JiangminUndetected
K7AntiVirusUndetected
K7GWUndetected
KasperskyUndetected
LionicUndetected
MalwarebytesUndetected
MAXUndetected
McAfeeUndetected
McAfee-GW-EditionUndetected
MicrosoftUndetected
NANO-AntivirusUndetected
Palo Alto NetworksUndetected
PandaUndetected
QuickHealUndetected
Sangfor Engine ZeroUndetected
SentinelOne (Static ML)Undetected
SophosUndetected
SUPERAntiSpywareUndetected
TACHYONUndetected
TEHTRISUndetected
TencentUndetected
TrapmineUndetected
Trellix (FireEye)Undetected
TrendMicroUndetected
TrendMicro-HouseCallUndetected
VBA32Undetected
VIPREUndetected
VirITUndetected
ViRobotUndetected
WebrootUndetected
XcitiumUndetected
YandexUndetected
ZillyaUndetected
ZoneAlarm by Check PointUndetected
ZonerUndetected
Avast-MobileUnable to process file type
BitDefenderFalxUnable to process file type
Symantec Mobile InsightUnable to process file type
TrustlookUnable to process file type

 

[Lednah]

This "virus total" is totally fake shit. I program may give fake warning or such, but not three times. So it's intended. don't know what happens if you click on the link there but I can bet nothing good will happen.

 

[BlackStar2k]

This "virus total" is totally fake shit. I program may give fake warning or such, but not three times. So it's intended. don't know what happens if you click on the link there but I can bet nothing good will happen.

It should run fine, you can always run it in sandboxie, if there's really something in there, I have a bigger problem, that would mean my system is compromised.

Let me know if you can extract everything.

Also, I (well we) made great progress on decoding the GC graphics format. So if you want to decode the graphics files as well, a friend of mine has started some source code on

You must be registered to see the links

What took me 2 weeks to realize took him 2 minutes.

 

[Lednah]

I have a bigger problem, that would mean my system is compromised.

ESET online scanner for quick one time cleaning.

 

[BlackStar2k]

ESET online scanner for quick one time cleaning.

I can have a look, but I doubt there's an issue

In other news.
:

It's done. The graphics format is now open!

 

[Lednah]

I can have a look, but I doubt there's an issue

In other news.
:

It's done. The graphics format is now open!

I thought you think your computer have some malware problem to call it "compromised"
I'll try the exe file now.

Edit: I tried it and it worked as intended. The only weird thing is the Winamp cannot open some of the VOC files.

BTW - do you have an idea what happened with the successor of Megatech (called Megatech games)? I found only a more than 10 years old press-release and all the link on it were dead.

 

[BlackStar2k]

I thought you think your computer have some malware problem to call it "compromised"
I'll try the exe file now.

Edit: I tried it and it worked as intended. The only weird thing is the Winamp cannot open some of the VOC files.

BTW - do you have an idea what happened with the successor of Megatech (called Megatech games)? I found only a more than 10 years old press-release and all the link on it were dead.

Nice! Which of the VOC files can't it open?

As for Megatech, not sure what exactly happened. I indeed heard of the Girls of Cobra Mission, but after that it was all gone. A shame, as this game was more than just a port and Megatech made it their own (I also played the PC98 version)

Graphicsformat still has some mysteries unfortunately, some images are decoded perfectly, others are partially or fully garbage

 

[Lednah]

Nice! Which of the VOC files can't it open?

As for Megatech, not sure what exactly happened. I indeed heard of the Girls of Cobra Mission, but after that it was all gone. A shame, as this game was more than just a port and Megatech made it their own (I also played the PC98 version)

I found Cobra mission sold at Moby games which means they must be abandonware.
As for the files which cannot be played (I didn't update winamp but most of the files are ok) are the first 4 files of PCM1 (I'm almost sure are several more).

 

[BlackStar2k]

I found Cobra mission sold at Moby games which means they must be abandonware.
As for the files which cannot be played (I didn't update winamp but most of the files are ok) are the first 4 files of PCM1 (I'm almost sure are several more).

The only reason I can think of is that this is because they are repeating.
These play fine in VLC, and they keep playing due to a repeat marker in there. It doesn't seem like a coincidence that Winamp doesn't play these that have such a marker.

 

[BlackStar2k]

As an added bonus, here's some images I believe were never used in the DOS version. I think we are now at 99% of understanding how to decode the graphics format. There's still a chunk header we don't fully understand, but it shouldn't be long.

The great news? The PC98 version uses the exact same format, graphics from there also decode with our decoder.
Next step savegames

 

[Timetraveler_1]

so how to open the gc images XD ! TrID says that are printfox/pagefox images with .BS extension and variable .G

 

[Timetraveler_1]

well i tried to compile image.cpp but i got an file header error by opening a GC file. anyway in my previous research i found that .VOL files are made by GEM/Degas software and contains .pic .pc1 .pc2 .pic3 so GC files should be opened by mega cad. anywway i was able to open some of that .pic/.pc* files with gem paint software in a dosbox eviroment, but not the files that i wanted... sometimes it depends by the palette colors... so there are so much things to take care but i also think that should be possible and moreeasy to chatch things from the memory when you run the game and then being able to catch other elements as pictures that has the same headers patterns by a specific tool that find things in the game files.

anyway it looks someone of you got able to open these pictures.. so how you did it?