Compiling valve.orange_box_x360 maps

[snake-biscuits]

Thanks to the Xbox 360 Source Engine Modding Discord for working this stuff out

Requirements

Steam

• Half-Life 2
  • Source SDK
• Dino D-Day
  • Dino D-Day SDK

NOTE: you can get away with just Xenia if you already ripped your copy of The Orange Box

Xbox 360

• A copy of The Orange Box
• Modded Console

Xenia (Xbox 360 Emulator)

• Xenia Canary
  • Game Patches
• https://github.com/XboxDev/extract-xiso
  only needed if you used the redump.org ripping method¹

Tools Setup

Hammer

• VDC: SDK Installation

NOTE: Any Hammer should do, the import thing is that we target the compilers in half-life 2/bin/

makegamedata.exe

• Install Dino D-Day & Dino D-Day SDK via Steam
• Copy bin/makegamedata.exe to <MyModTools>/game/ddd_mgd/bin/
  Where <MyModTools>/ is wherever you want to keep your tools / converted maps
  • also these .dlls:

bsppack.dll
FileSystem_Stdio.dll
mdllib.dll
Steam.dll
tier0.dll
vphysics.dll
vstdlib.dll

• Create a dinodday/ folder next to bin/

NOTE: I haven't tested game folders besides dinodday/; other names might work

Xenia Canary

• Xenia Project Wiki: Quickstart
  • Xenia Project Wiki: Quickstart: How to rip games
• xenia-canary/game-patches: Installing Patches

Change the following lines in xenia-canary.config.toml²:

# safety net
break_on_unimplemented_instructions = false
# console commands
# "-dvd" helps the game run
# "-game hl2 +map credits" sets the map to Half-Life 2's credits
cl = "-dvd -game hl2 +map credits"
# text rendering
d3d12_readback_memexport = true
d3d12_readback_resolve = true

NOTE: we will later change -game & +map to your map
NOTE: I have yet to launch maps with -game tf²

Xbox360 Files

If you used the Redump ripping method¹ your copy of The Orange Box will be in .iso form
You'll need to use extract-xiso to extract the files & add our map(s)

• Download the latest build of extract-xiso
• Extract the .iso

NOTE: porting files back to Xbox360 hardware is outside the scope of this guide; try the X360 Source Engine Discord

• Copy the extracted disc image to <360Files>/
  Where <360Files>/ is wherever you keep your Xbox360 disk images

Troubleshooting

Xenia Controls

I'd recommend using a controller w/ Xenia
Keyboard controls are available:

Bindings can only be changed by editing xenia-canary.config.toml

Baseline Test

Make sure to run <360Files>/default.xex w/ Xenia targeting an official map first³

cl = "-dvd -game hl2 +map d1_trainstation_01"

If that runs OK you'll know for sure that your map is the problem

Xenia isn't working

• Can your system specs handle Xenia?
• Is the latest version of Xenia broken?
• Double-check xenia-canary.config.toml
• Check the Xenia bug reports for The Orange Box⁴
  Someone else might've encountered the same issue

Compiling

• Make & compile a map with Hammer
• Run around on PC to make sure the map works ok
• Copy the .bsp from your working folder (or half-life2/hl2/maps to <MyModTools>/game/ddd_mgd/dinodday/

NOTE: you can skip this step if you keep the .vmf in <MyModTools>/game/ddd_mgd/dinodday/

• Open a terminal in <MyModTools>/game/ddd_mgd/dinodday/
  E.g. Shift+Right Click in the folder and select Open PowerShell window here
• In the Terminal, run: ../bin/makegamedata.exe <mapname>.bsp
makegamedata.exe refuses to run unless run from inside a sub-directory of game/

Running maps

• Copy <mapname>.360.bsp to <360Files>/<game>/maps/<mapname>.360.bsp
• Update the following line of the Xenia Config:

# change this line in xenia-canary.config.toml to play HL2's first map
cl = "-dvd -game <game> +map <mapname>"

• Open <360Files>/default.xex in Xenia (Drag & Drop works too)
• You should load directly into your map

NOTE: Xenia will give you an error message

Limitations

• No Props
  Mounting assets from <360Files>/hl2/zip0.360.zip in <MyModTools>/game/ddd_mgd/dinodday/ might help
• Maps with pickups crash on load (including the HEV suit)
  I remember hearing something about the physics load of everything falling OnMapSpawn crashing dev Xbox360s

TODO: look at Entity spawnflags in official maps, might fix this

Footnotes

1. Redump.org: Microsoft Xbox and Xbox 360 Dumping Guide ↩ ↩²

2. https://github.com/snake-biscuits/bsp_tool/issues/79#issuecomment-1769817598 ↩ ↩²

3. VDC: Half-Life 2 map reference ↩

4. xenia-project/game-compatability: 4541080F - The Orange Box ↩

[snake-biscuits]

Going to be updating this guide whenever I work on:

• [Test Maps] orange_box_x360 #60
• Can you port Source Engine maps to the Xbox 360? If so, how? #79
• how use x360.py? #153

While having a working valve.orange_box .360.bsp is cool, there's a long way to go yet
Left4Dead (Xbox360) maps are still unsupported & might need a new branch

makegamedata.exe basically just hooks a function in bsppack.dll that does the heavy lifting (see #153)
So, I might look at mixing other game's bin/*.dlls with makegamedata.exe
Compiling utilities from the 2013 Source SDK is also an option

[snake-biscuits]

Titanfall 1 shipped bin/bsppack.dll
I know Bluepoint did the conversion, but they did work closely w/ Respawn
Is it possible?

• [Test Maps] titanfall_x360 #46

[snake-biscuits]

Saw this was posted in the Xbox360 Source Engine Modding Discord:

https://github.com/marinesciencedude/xenia-canary-mousehook/releases/tag/source-engine
(Xenia Canary fork w/ Mouselook for Source Engine games)

[snake-biscuits]

More useful resources from the Discord:
https://github.com/Luctaris/game-patches/tree/TOB_TU5_Patches
(networking bypasses to play TF2)
looks like it sets some convars

NOTE: this patches Title Update 5 Server_360.dll, among others
-- you might need to rip TU5 specifically to take full advantage of this patch