Rhythm Thief, History, Rom Exploring and builds

[VonKarma12]

Hello all, VonKarma12 here.

Today i want to give you a quick history lesson about Rhythm Thief the game, I shall also try to explore the rom and tell you about it the best I can.



Rhythm Thief was developed by Xeen and published by Sega in 2012, it’s a 3ds rhythm game.

Taking inspirations from things like Rhythm Heaven, Elite Beat Agents and weirdly enough Professor Layton as well, if you know the Layton series just imagine it, but instead its French and all the puzzles are rhythm games! (Aka helping people by dancing) However unlike many rhythm games it tried to have different mechanics for various levels, unlike lets say EBA which used the same rhythm mechanics for all of its music.


The DS port?

Surprisingly enough there was originally a DS release planned for it, however when the 3DS came out, it was likely decided that it would fit better on that platform



Its unknown if there is an actual playable version of this or if it was just a mockup.
Currently no sources have given me proper conclusions to that, a lot of it is also Japanese. if you got any more info of this I would love to hear it.
the producer said this ‘’ We started development of the game for the Nintendo 3DS around the summer of 2010, but it was originally developed for the Nintendo DS as you mentioned and it started about a year earlier. Actually we set up the plan itself long before.’’


Rom exploring
Our exploration is going to take place in RomFS, basically this contains

-Movies

-Sounds

-Readme.txt

# -*- Mode: text; tab-width: 2; c-basic-offset: 2; coding: utf-8-unix; -*- # @version $Id: 00_readme.txt 313 2010-10-21 08:44:32Z [email protected] $ # @revision $Revision: 8 $ # @author $Author: [email protected] $ # @date $Date: 2010-09-04 16:57:36 +0900 (土, 04 9 2010) $ ロムデータをいれておきます 最終的にどの様にデータにアクセスするかは、redmineを参照ください 2d ２Dデータ入っています fonts フォントを入れる予定 rhythm リズムゲーム用データを入れる shaders シェーダを入れておきます。 sound サウンドデータをいれておきます。 sample 確実にこれは開発時しか参照できません。 サンプルデータを入れておきます 作業が終ったものは消去してください。 debug/sys用データはsample/sysにいれてください adventure アドベンチャーパート用のスクリプトデータが入っています。

#-*-Mode: text; tab-width: 2; c-basic-offset: 2; coding: utf-8-unix;-*- # @version $ Id: 00_readme.txt 313 2010-10-21 08: 44: 32Z [email protected] $ # @revision $ Revision: 8 $ # @author $ Author: [email protected] $ # @date $ Date: 2010-09-04 16:57:36 +0900 (Sat, 04 9 2010) $ I'll put Rom data See redmine for how to access the data in the end 2d Contains 2D data fonts Plan to put font rhythm Include rhythm game data shaders I put a shader. sound Please put the sound data. sample Certainly this can only be referenced during development. 。 Put sample data Please delete the completed work. Please put the debug / sys data in sample / sys adventure Contains script data for the adventure part.

We cannot do much with the txt, except using it as a guide for the pjr.cpk where the game stores all of its other data. We shall discussing all the interesting data here that I found

2D

• Located in COMMON is a file called test_window.arc, can possible replace system_window.arc
• Located in ED are the credits of the game, surprisingly enough it seems that the game uses a slideshow for the credits instead of a video
• Located In GALLERY, are the thumbnails for the minigames and cutscenes, easily readable with pain.net for example
• Located in EFECT, are two test files called test_rhythm_effect.arc and test2_rythm_efect.arc, they could potentially replace the other two files in the same map
• Located in HAMON_KISEKI are two test files named test_hamon.arc and test_kiseki.arc, its difficult to say what purpose they served
• Located in SHOP_SS_TGA is pretty much the same as in GALLERLY, ingame you purchase the cutscenes for the Gallery in there
• Located in the root of 2d is a file called null.arc, purpose is unknown

3D

• Located in R24 is anm_brd_test.bcskla, presumably it can be replaced with files such as anm_bird_taikiL.bcskla
• Located in Effect is a map called TEST_058, it can be assumed it can replace other 3d effects

DEBUG

• In the map centersign, there is a single file named axis.bcmdl, its likely that it debugged the camera axis

LOCALIZE

• In the root of the map there 3 test files called eng_test_text_1.bin, 2.bin and 3.bin, it’s a guess that it can replace eng_sys_win01.bin 02.bin and 03.bin (this is repeated throughout this map, with other languages)

RHYTHM

• Located within the root of this map is a file called R00.rtb, which seems to be the early version of the rtb file for the R00 minigame
• Located in the root is a file called test.ebt, ebt is a file every dance uses however with it being the only file in root next to R00.rtb, it can be presumed it was a test for R00
• Located in R02, are two test files called R02_matsuzaki_test.ebt and .rtb, they probably can replace the used R02 files
• Located in R17 are three files called R17_TEST.ebt .rpd and .rtb, they can be used to fully replace the other files within the map
• Located in E01 are two files called E01_ltest.ebt, rpd and rbt, they can be used to fully replace the other files in the map

Sample

• Its unknown how to activate these files at the moment, they could however reveal a lot so it should be a focus point
• The map called bench is likely used for benchmarking the game
• The map called dance_test is likely used for what’s it named
• The map called dbg_akiyama is unknown
• The map called dbg_dance might have been used for debugging dancing mechanics
• The map called dbg_r04 was likely used for debugging the R04 minigame
• The map called hand_test is difficult to judge and may have been used for character hands or player controls

Builds discovered so far

Shout out to for Voodooween for actually having a prototype build of it. So far its discovered that it has the ingame menu used to select specific stages, is in the prototype fully unlocked by default, and that at least the French dub has got some audio issues with oversaturation, there is the same amount of folders and the retail build has 13 more files.

The future

The developer has expressed his willingness to make another sequel to the 3ds and WII U (presumably if he still wants that, it’s going to be the a switch game now) and there is a rumor about a beta tester being asked to test a 3ds sequel a while back, but there is no definite proof its still being worked on.



And that was it! Some concept art and unused ideas can be found here

(will be reuploaded if its taken down)

Interviews with developers

http://www.cubed3.com/news/16940/1/cubed3-interview-sega-discusses-rhythm-thief-nintendo-3ds.html

https://web.archive.org/web/20130223180044/http://www.1up.com/features/interview-stealing-music-crown-rhythm