Modzy wrote:Emergence can't unprotect these maps because 002 implemented some research I did on the process a few years back. You can't just salvage the data anymore, not without an added step.
You can always salvage the data in a map; and I don't feel like sharing how this would be possible, because then anyone can go and just do an app that will unprotect any map. But I'd rather include such a feature in Zeus, where you can also
scramble the map data so that the current map readers can't read it, but so that Halo will still be able to read it. Map readers are looking for certain information in certain locations, and so if you scramble that information or add an extra offset, for example, before reaching it (like a file alias works, which is how using an alias to link to a map file works with Halo maps in the maps folder), then the standard map editors won't be able to read the information, but Halo will still be able to follow the alias(es) to find it. On top of this, Zeus files, when scrambled and encrypted, use multiple methods of scrambling the information and archiving it, including blowfish encryption, base64 encoding, zip archiving, etc.
So yes, you can always salvage the data as long as it is still usable by Halo. You can salvage the data and the tag types and even match to a list of known tags based upon default metadata values from a folder of tags. Part of Zeus's map fixing method is to use the user's tags directory to match tag metadata values between the map's tags and the tags in the tags directory. That way, after the tag data is actually salvaged (using the same approach that lets even a protected map work in Halo) and matched to its tag type based upon its metadata format, it can be also given the tag name that it most likely originally had. This is a three step process: recognizing tags in the map based upon the same approach that lets Halo recognize them, determining tag types for them based upon their metadata organization, and finally matching them to existing tags that the user has in their tags folder.
If a map file cannot be read by Halo, and if this approach therefore finds no tag data, then the entire file is analyzed for tag data and fixed (regenerated/rebuilt/salvaged) accordingly so that it can be used in Halo. So Zeus will be able to fix broken maps also, and show you what the problems with it are when it has problems. And this is pretty easy to do, once you have all the tag type formats analyzed (which is what I'm doing and mostly have already done with Sparky's Plugins for Eschaton).
So yes, any broken map can be fixed, or at least salvaged in majority. But scrambled maps, which is what Zeus is going to do, will still be able to be "salvaged" but will be recognized as being scrambled and will also be encrypted.
When Zeus authors and scrambles maps, you can play them in Halo, but no other map reader will be able to read them; they won't even open in the map reader like Eschaton or appear to have any tags. Encrypting maps is for uploading to the BDCN and sharing, which other people can download and, after you give them the password, unencrypt and play it.