Cheat Engine

MikeSantis · How do I cheat? Reputation: 0 Joined: 05 May 2016 Posts: 4

Greetings, all.

As the title implies, I have been trying to find where a game stores a table of floats which it loads from a configuration file. The table can have between 200 and 400 values, each value with around 8 decimal places.

I tried floats initially as I thought the game would round the value to fit in a 7 digit precision figure.

I am sure it is stored as a double, but either it is encrypted (doubt it, it is not the most important table loaded, and others are not encrypted) or some mathematical operation is done on it, because I can't find any of the the values loaded.

Tried everything, unknown initials, changed vaues, increased, decreased. NADA. Watched memory viewer around seemingly contiguous [to the table name, a string] memory addresses.NADA.

If the code loaded the values onto a simple vector <double>, it should be simple to find it. [And the values would be stored contiguosly, thus easy notice.]

Anyone has good hints/ideas/speculations on how to go about this?

Thanks in advance, people.

M.

++METHOS · Posted: Thu May 05, 2016 7:17 am Post subject:

It would be better if you just explain what it is that you are trying to do instead of trying to be so discreet. It's hard to say with the information that you have provided.

What are the values for? Do you know what the values are before they are loaded in to the game? Do the values change during game-play or at all? Do you know how/when the values change? How often do the values change? How do you know the values are being loaded from a 'configuration file'? Can you read the configuration file and see the values? Can you change the values in the configuration file? Does it have an effect in the game? etc...

MikeSantis · How do I cheat? Reputation: 0 Joined: 05 May 2016 Posts: 4

++METHOS · Posted: Thu May 05, 2016 8:00 am Post subject:

You're still all over the place and not really describing what it is that you are wanting to accomplish.

That said, if you can change the values in the config file and it has an effect in the game, then change those values to something odd, load up the game, and search for those odd values. Usually, values like these are read-only and may only be loaded once. If that's the case, you may have to adjust your CE settings for your search. If the values are being read several times, it'll be even easier to find them since you may be able to change the values in the config file several times, instead of just once, and narrow in on them during your searches.

MikeSantis · How do I cheat? Reputation: 0 Joined: 05 May 2016 Posts: 4

"still all over the place"

If that's your take on my request, all right.

--

Anyway, my difficulties come from not being able to locate ANY of the values in that table (and in some other parameters). For instance, say one such value is 0.172727389; I search for it as STRING, DOUBLE, FLOAT even ALL, and I get no findings.

So, those values per se are already "odd" enough, so to speak.

My objective ("what it is that you are wanting to accomplish") is as stated in the title of the topic:

to find those values.

Maybe someone has a strategy, a hint of some kind, that enables me to get there. Keeping my fingers crossed here.

++METHOS · Posted: Thu May 05, 2016 9:31 am Post subject:

ParkourPenguin · Posted: Thu May 05, 2016 10:13 am Post subject:

Are you sure the game even keeps those values around? It could just read them from disk, maybe put them on the stack, do some calculation, and then throw the values out.

When searching for those values, make sure you select "Rounded (extreme)" for the rounding type. Only search for a few digits of precision to start off with, and work your way up from there (i.e. for 0.172727389, search for 0.172). Search through all memory (not just writable) by setting the checkboxes in the "Memory Scan Options" section to grey. Also try setting "Fast Scan" (Alignment) to 4.

You can try a group scan. Selecting "out of order" might help, but that will increase scan time dramatically with many values. Use wildcards / spacing for values you couldn't find and/or you think might be likely to change.

It might be better to find some other value in the game you think would use one of those values on disk and backtrace some instruction which accesses it. Of course, you'll need to have a decent knowledge of assembly to do this, and there's no guarantee you could find it in a reasonable amount of time.

MikeSantis · How do I cheat? Reputation: 0 Joined: 05 May 2016 Posts: 4

@ParkourPenguin,

thank you for your time and reply.

You raised good points.

Each vehicle has a config file, so 30 vehicles equals 30 config files.

That (read values from file, put them on the stack and discarding them) may just be what is happening.

On the other hand, it's still a fileopen and read sequence of operations, the game engine would have to do that every time the player gets out of real time, out to main menu, chooses a different vehicle, for which it has to load all config data...and then back again if he/she chooses the same aircraft. As far as my detection efforts go, I'd say there's only one file ops sequence.

Furthermore, the szString (at least that I was able to find) containing the name of the curve/table doesn't change if I change it in the file AFTER initial game load, vehicle choice and subsequent changes of vehicle - and that leads me to believe the table values are stored somewhere until game exit.

I will try what you suggest (good tips).

I knew this would take a bit of time (perhaps IDA Pro would cut time dramatically...but it's too expensive for me), so I am taking it patiently.

Thanks again.

M.