A tip for "fast-hexing", i.e for making breed changes while the game is
running.  It also allows you to make very small downloads of over-
writing breedz because, after the initial download of a suitably
"doctored" breed, your downloaders will only need to get the latest
.lnz files.  With a little extra work, the method can also be used
to make quick conversions between game-versions.

This is for people who understand what they are doing when they
hex breedfiles etc.  It's not a "how to hex"; it's just a useful
tip or note for hexers who want the full control that you get 
from using a hex editor plus even more speed and flexibility than 
you get from using a Resource Editor such as ResHacker.  If you're 
scared that people might be able to steal your stuff more easily, 
or that they will re-distribute your items with bits missing, then
simply use this as a fast, efficient way of seeing your changes, or
to make litterz speedily.

The main point of this is that if you want to be able to edit breedz 
and see what they are going to look like right away, this is how to
do it.  All you need is a tiny change to the breedfile itself, and the
ability to use Notepad.exe.

To deal with big lnz files, and if you want to test things "on the 
fly", it's possible to re-direct the game to see the .lnz externally 
and completely bypass either the need for using ResHacker or 
copy/pasting into a hex editor.  You can then use the trusty Notepad 
to edit the relevant .lnz without having to close the game, and you 
won't get the occasional disconcerting crashes that Reshacker can 
be prone to during re-compilations.  The re-direction is a simple 
bit of hexing, you just find L.N.Z in the "List of all that's in 
the file" (this is the list that I talk about in my tutorials, it's 
directly above the BM of the Adoption Centre bitmap) and change a 
letter so that the game doesn't think there's a .lnz in the file. 

For instance, in the poodle the list starts like this:

00055856 0400 4600 4900 4600 4900 0500 5300 4B00 ..F.I.F.I...S.K.
00055872 4900 4E00 3100 0300 4C00 4E00 5A00 0200 I.N.1...L.N.Z...
00055888 5000 4400 0500 5000 4400 5000 5500 5000 P.D...P.D.P.U.P.
00055904 0600 5200 4100 5700 5F00 5000 4400 0900 ..R.A.W._.P.D...
00055920 5200 4100 5700 5F00 5000 4400 5000 5500 R.A.W._.P.D.P.U.
00055936 5000 0300 5300 4300 5000 0300 5400 5800 P...S.C.P...T.X.
00055952 5400 0D00 4200 4500 5600 4500 4E00 5400 T...B.E.V.E.N.T.
00055968 5F00 4400 4F00 4700 5F00 5000 4400 0500 _.D.O.G._.P.D...
00055984 5000 4400 5300 4E00 4400 0300 5700 4100 P.D.S.N.D...W.A.
00056000 5600 0E00 5000 4F00 5F00 4200 4100 5200 V...P.O._.B.A.R.

Changing the Z to a second N does the trick:

00055856 0400 4600 4900 4600 4900 0500 5300 4B00 ..F.I.F.I...S.K.
00055872 4900 4E00 3100 0300 4C00 4E00 4E00 0200 I.N.1...L.N.N...

 Then you copy the .lnz sections out to new files (either using ResHacker
or a hex editor) and save them as the correct names -- e.g. for persian- 
based breedz,  pr.lnz and prkit.lnz -- and pop them into a directory, 
off the game's root directory, created thusly:

\ptzfiles\cat\pr\

For people who have trouble understanding where to make these 
subdirectories, look for where your game's .exe is; that's the
root directory off which you need to make the pztfiles one, and then
you make the cat one off the ptzfiles one, and so on.

NOTE:  The files _must_ have the extension of .lnz, not .lnz.txt, or
this won't work.  It's best if you make sure that the file extensions
are visible in Windows Explorer (or My Computer); to do this, go to
the View menu at the top, choose Options, and make sure that the
"Hide MS-DOS file extensions" is _not_ ticked.  You can then easily
rename a file to have the correct extension by right-clicking on the file.

Of course the "pr" directory is different for other breedz -- "ac"
for Alley Catz, for instance, and the "cat" is "dog" for dogz breedz.
You can have a kitten (or pup) actually out at the Adoption Centre 
and change the .lnz section in Notepad, get another kitten or pup 
out, and see how it compares with the one that's already out, and so on.

This has another big advantage; it means that converting from one version
of the game to another, even when you have huge, complex .lnz files, is
as simple for everyone as it used to be before people started to use
ResHacker and similar resource editors.

But you need to do a _little_ more work to make sure that converted hexies
don't overwrite each other.  Most hexers keep the base-"folders" names in 
their breedz, which means that, say, all your Great Dane-based hexies' 
gd.lnz files would overwrite each other unless you make another small 
change or two.  Here's how to do it so they don't either overwrite or 
crash the game, using poodle-based breedz as example.

What you need to remember is that the game needs to find certain basic
files -- such as .lnz, scp etc, in a specific hard-wired "folder" either
inside the resource .cat or .dog or .dll file or on the hard drive.  We
have very little leeway in what we can rename here.  In the case of .lnz
files, the game looks for this: ptzfiles, then cat or dog -- these are
hardwired in the engine's processes, i.e. not changeable -- then the
2-letter identifying mnemonic, then the _same_ 2-letter .lnz file.  It
has to be the same two letters, there seems to be no way round that.  So
the structure needs to be

\ptzfiles\dog\xy\xy.lnz

where xy is the 2-letter mnemonic.  In the case of an un-doctored Great
Dane-based breed, that would be gd\gd.lnz, or in the case of an
un-doctored poodle, pd\pd.lnz.  And of course all the same-name .lnz
files will overwrite each other, so we need to do a tiny bit of dog-
file-doctoring.

So, take my poodle.  I want it to use normal poodle sounds which, at the
moment, are internal, and I want it to use an external set of .lnz files
which won't overwrite others, plus I want to be able to import
previously adopted poodles and have them breed with new ones.  (I also
actually want to experiment with different external .scp files, but that
just needs to be treated in the same way as external .lnz files, and is
not important here.)

Right.  The poodle has four .lnz files which I copy out, save and name:

pd.lnz
pdpup.lnz
raw_pd.lnz
raw_pdpup.lnz

I shall change the mnemonic to pp, so I rename them:

pp.lnz
pppup.lnz
raw_pp.lnz
raw_pppup.lnz

and inside them I change these lines:

in pp.lnz:

[Sounds]
\ptzfiles\dog\pp\pdsnd.txt
[Little one]
pppup.lnz

in pppup.lnz:

[Default Linez File]
\ptzfiles\dog\pp\pp.lnz

in raw_pp.lnz:

[Sounds]
\ptzfiles\dog\pp\pdsnd.txt
[Little one]
raw_pppup.lnz

in raw_pppup.lnz:

[Default Linez File]
\ptzfiles\dog\pp\raw_pp.lnz

(Note, I would only change the sounds line if I'm keeping the sounds
internal.  Actually I'm in process of making all my sound-stripped
breedz un-mute by redirecting the sounds to the hard drive, so I would
keep the \ptzfiles\dog\pd\pdsnd.txt azis, but if you want it to pick up
internal sounds you need to change it to \ptzfiles\dog\pp\pdsnd.txt)

Okay, now I open the Poodle-based file into my hex editor and find this
section:

00050240 4C69 7665 6C69 6E65 7373 0000 5C50 747A Liveliness..\Ptz
00050256 4669 6C65 735C 646F 675C 4245 7665 6E74 Files\dog\BEvent
00050272 5F44 6F67 5F4D 6978 6564 2E74 7874 0000 _Dog_Mixed.txt..
00050288 5C50 747A 4669 6C65 735C 646F 675C 7064 \PtzFiles\dog\pd
00050304 5C42 4576 656E 745F 446F 675F 5044 2E74 \BEvent_Dog_PD.t
00050320 7874 0000 5C50 747A 4669 6C65 735C 646F xt..\PtzFiles\do
00050336 675C 7064 5C70 642E 6C6E 7A00 5C50 747A g\pd\pd.lnz.\Ptz
00050352 4669 6C65 735C 646F 675C 646F 672E 7363 Files\dog\dog.sc
00050368 7000 0000 5C50 747A 4669 6C65 735C 646F p...\PtzFiles\do
00050384 675C 7064 5C70 642E 7363 7000 0000 0000 g\pd\pd.scp.....

I have to change some of the instances of "pd" to "pp" -- all instances
of the "directory" \pd\ have to be changed to \pp\ plus the pd.lnz and
pd.scp names need to be changed to pp.lnz and pp.scp.

00050240 4C69 7665 6C69 6E65 7373 0000 5C50 747A Liveliness..\Ptz
00050256 4669 6C65 735C 646F 675C 4245 7665 6E74 Files\dog\BEvent
00050272 5F44 6F67 5F4D 6978 6564 2E74 7874 0000 _Dog_Mixed.txt..
00050288 5C50 747A 4669 6C65 735C 646F 675C 7070 \PtzFiles\dog\pp
00050304 5C42 4576 656E 745F 446F 675F 5044 2E74 \BEvent_Dog_PD.t
00050320 7874 0000 5C50 747A 4669 6C65 735C 646F xt..\PtzFiles\do
00050336 675C 7070 5C70 702E 6C6E 7A00 5C50 747A g\pp\pp.lnz.\Ptz
00050352 4669 6C65 735C 646F 675C 646F 672E 7363 Files\dog\dog.sc
00050368 7000 0000 5C50 747A 4669 6C65 735C 646F p...\PtzFiles\do
00050384 675C 7070 5C70 702E 7363 7000 0000 0000 g\pp\pp.scp.....

And of course we've already changed the L.N.Z to something else in the
"List of all that's in the file".  Nothing else needs to be changed
there unless we're experimenting with .scp sections, in which case S.C.P
needs to be changed in the same way -- to X.C.P or some such.

There's one more thing that needs to be changed now, apart from the
normal breed name, ID and AC picture; that's the 2-letter mnemonic which
comes after the name in the naming area near the .dog file's end:

00731040 0400 4600 6900 6600 6900 0600 5000 6F00 ..F.i.f.i...P.o.
00731056 6F00 6400 6C00 6500 0200 5000 6400 0000 o.d.l.e...P.d...

to

00731040 0400 4600 6900 6600 6900 0600 5000 6F00 ..F.i.f.i...P.o.
00731056 6F00 6400 6C00 6500 0200 5000 7000 0000 o.d.l.e...P.p...

Eureka!  As long as you put your .lnz files into 

\ptzfiles\dog\pp\

The pets will come out of the AC, and will breed with others previously
adopted.  I know, because I just now tested it :-)

You can do this redirection to the hard drive with many things in the 
game files, not just the .lnz. As examples of this, my latest little 
piece on editing Petz 5 playscenes, and my earlier "howto" on giving 
hidden and difficult toyz their on-shelf graphics, use this technique.  
Basically for most things, you edit the relevant item's name in the "List 
of all that's in the file" so that the game thinks it's not in there, and 
then you copy out the actual item from within the breedfile (or Toy or 
clothing or playscene etc) and pop it into a directory, on your hard 
drive, that the game is actually looking for.

I keep meaning to update my tutorials to take these kinds of tips and 
hints into account, but I always seem to be too busy to get things 
written up clearly.  I hope that this little extra "howto" will help
people to deal with conversions and on-the-fly "hexing" more easily.  

I hope this helps people who have problems both with adding stuff with 
old-fashioned hexing, and with the new Reshacker quirks.

Enjoy

Carolyn Horn