I got hold of a copy of rpgmaker MZ and I’m investigating if it’s at all feasible to covert the game from Vx Ace to MZ.
I learned of the existence of a converter script that should convert at least all the maps/event/tilesets to a format that can be used in MZ.
I’m not saying I’m going to convert it. I’m the process of doing research if it’s doable.
Pro’s:
-Can set higher resolution by default. No need to use falxonxp or dll anymore
-Hopefully gets rid of the random can’t create bitmap crashing?
-Comes with default features like auto saving and mouse support that required a script in VX Ace.
-Able to use new features like a phone plugin that looks really neat.
Con’s:
- Every function that I have used scripts for needs to be replaced by something similar. This also require manual changing all parts of the code where any of those scripts are used.
-By default only supports png for image format and ogg for sound files. Currently using a lot of mp3 format and jpg files those will all need to be converted. If for some reason I’ll have to stick to PNG the game size will inflate.
There are actually paid plugins to support JPG format, but the example I saw it needed additional script lines.
Considering there are over 9000+ images having to change those all manual is a big no. More research is needed.
So I wrote a wall of text about my first experiences with attempting a conversion. (feel free to skip if you’re not interested)
That's a lot of work. I remember when I converted Valentina Story from VX Ace to MV. It was really tiring, and at the time, the game was much smaller than yours.
I think it will take you a few months to finish, but I guarantee that the game will improve in performance, and you will love the new RPG Maker MZ plugins.
Hi Crazybat, I'm the maintainer of mkxp-z, have you considered it? mkxp-z is a much newer (and actively maintained) mkxp fork (like Falcon-mkxp) that generally has a lot of features and bug fixes that Falcon-mkxp doesn't have.
-By default only supports png for image format and ogg for sound files. Currently using a lot of mp3 format and jpg files those will all need to be converted. If for some reason I’ll have to stick to PNG the game size will inflate.
mkxp-z goes in the opposite direction; it supports JPEG, PNG, Ogg Vorbis, and MP3 like VX Ace does, but also supports additional formats like JXL (which has much better compression than JPEG and PNG), so it might lead to a smaller game size.
mkxp-z also supports more platforms, e.g. it has official binaries for Windows, macOS, and Linux (including some non-x86 architectures that MV and MZ don't support).
If you try it out and run into any bugs or need features added, feel free to let me know and I'll take a look.
That's a lot of work. I remember when I converted Valentina Story from VX Ace to MV. It was really tiring, and at the time, the game was much smaller than yours.
I think it will take you a few months to finish, but I guarantee that the game will improve in performance, and you will love the new RPG Maker MZ plugins.
Yeah it's quite a bit of work. Fortunately I won't have redo the maps, since MZ supports the same tile size.
And having all the text/event converted is also nice. Still plenty of work to do with replacing all the script with something similar and editing every part of the code where the previous script calls where.
Hi Crazybat, I'm the maintainer of mkxp-z, have you considered it? mkxp-z is a much newer (and actively maintained) mkxp fork (like Falcon-mkxp) that generally has a lot of features and bug fixes that Falcon-mkxp doesn't have.
mkxp-z supports arbitrary resolutions; I'm personally doing a game remaster that runs at 4320p and it works fine.
I've never seen this in mkxp-z, but if you run into it, please let me know so I can try to fix it.
Mouse scripts that work in Falcon-mkxp should work in mkxp-z as well.
mkxp-z goes in the opposite direction; it supports JPEG, PNG, Ogg Vorbis, and MP3 like VX Ace does, but also supports additional formats like JXL (which has much better compression than JPEG and PNG), so it might lead to a smaller game size.
mkxp-z also supports more platforms, e.g. it has official binaries for Windows, macOS, and Linux (including some non-x86 architectures that MV and MZ don't support).
If you try it out and run into any bugs or need features added, feel free to let me know and I'll take a look.
If I decide to keep using RPGMaker Vx ace I sure might consider replacing falcon-xp with mkxp-z.
I did managed to get to run rpgmaker Ace also at higher resolution with the help of a modified dll, but it seems to affect performace quite a bit.
As for for the bitmap crash. I don't think it's a falcon-xp thingie, since it happens in the regular RPGmaker too.
It just randomly trows that bitmap error at random point. I once had a short conversation with the author of falxon-xp and he suspected is was a caching issue. IDK since I don't have in deep knowledge of the engine.
It's also very hard to replicate. Sometimes I don't get it for ages and then I get it 2 times in a short time.
There were some people who have experience similar problem. In one case it was a driver issue on an old laptop.
Or a laptop that only supported a resolution of 1366 x 768 or something in that region.
The game uses 1280X960 resolution.
According to howtoedge.com site (How to Fix Error 0x0000FFFF on Windows 11/10):
"The error 0x0000ffff may occur because of different factors and they are discussed below –
Infected system files – When third-party apps interact with system apps, they often corrupt the system files or folders. This might be causing problems installing a new application or generating a restore point. To resolve this issue, you should either run SFC or uninstall the problematic apps from your device. Running a Full scan via Windows Defender is also a nice way to find and quarantine viruses or other infected files.
Hardware or RAM issues – The error 0x0000ffff might also occur if your device bears a failing hard disk or the RAM itself. Inspect both Memory and HDD and replace the one that is causing this issue.
Corrupted Windows or drivers – If you haven’t installed any updates to existing system drivers, they must have become corrupt or obsolete. In order to fix them, one must find, download and install optional updates".
So it can be your computer's personal hardware or software problem.
I'm not sure how others convert to renpy but the way I do is through copy/replacing a lot of the code in the map files, but this game is made in an older RPGM version... I don't really know of a program that can translate that version map coding to something I can easily copy/paste like I do with MV.
However I did recently purchase the "maker" for this version so can at least now see the data scenes in the maker. Would be a heck of a lot more work to do it that way, but this is one of the games I was thinking of spending time on... IF I do get back into converting...
Dear producer, hello, I like your game very much. I have been playing it from the version starting with 2 until now. I would like to give you some friendly suggestions. Are you considering releasing a new work? Please don't misunderstand me. I just think that the completion of this work is already very high, and some inconveniences caused by the backward production tools make it very inconvenient to play [I still cannot use the fast-forward function, it crashes as soon as I use it]. I have played many games of this type, but in terms of gameplay and richness, your work and [Succulence] are the insurmountable mountains of this type of game. It can be seen that you have put a lot of effort into it, so I sincerely suggest that you consider using new development tools to develop a new work, or a remake. This is a small suggestion from your fans.
It is built into the maker? Never even looked for that... Been just procrastinating lately... Converting vx to mv like that would make it much simpler to convert to renpy (for me at least)
