For German users: Eine kurze deutsche Anleitung liegt bei (liesmich.txt). NBA Live 96 ROSTER PATCH V3.40 ------------------------------ Date: 10/28/96 Probable release date for next version: ? NEW: - 1992/93 Rosters - preseason rosters, corrected jersey numbers Made by Lutz van Hasselt (willwink@pool.informatik.rwth-aachen.de) and Tim Tschirner (timt@pool.informatik.rwth-aachen.de) This patch and all related files are freely distributable, as long as all files included in the package remain unchanged, and you don't sell it for profit. The latest version can always be found at: http://www-users.informatik.rwth-aachen.de/~timt/nba96.html Introduction ------------ This is an unofficial patch for the commercial game NBA Live 96 by EA Sports, based on hex editing. It provides the executable with data of new players who were not originally in the game, and generally updates the rosters, regarding trades and the NBA draft. Furthermore, it updates the stats and includes retouched skill values and starting lineups, plus LOTS more. Installation ------------ First, copy all the unzipped files into your main NBA Live 96 directory (usually C:\NBA96) and make sure you have an unchanged copy of the NBA Live 96 EXE-File named NBA96.EXE in that directory. Then, simply type 'install' and follow the instructions on your screen. The installation will leave your original files untouched. You will be asked before installing each of the patch files. Every patched file requires about 1.8 MB of HD space. When finished, you can choose one of the created .exe-files to start. You can delete the files 'install.bat' and 'binpatch.exe' from recent patch versions. Once you have completed the installation, you may delete install.bat, *.p96 and update.exe. !!! If you are currently running a season, do not try to continue it !!! !!! !!! !!! using the patch, it may just mess up your saved game !!! !!! !!! !!! (start a new one with the patch or finish it without) !!! !!! Deinstallation -------------- To uninstall the patch, delete all of the files listed below under 'Files' plus 90-91.EXE, 92-93.EXE, 95-96.EXE and 96-97.EXE. Note that the installation routine moves career.pat and career.p97 to the \art\miscfe directory. Files ----- 90-91.p96 92-93.p96 95-96.p96 96-97.p96 install.bat update.exe rosters.s91 rosters.s93 rosters.s96 rosters.s97 career.pat career.p97 readme.txt liesmich.txt If you are missing any of these, try to get a fresh version from the site mentioned above. What you'll find ---------------- 90-91 ----- The Original 1990/91 Line-ups, with all the great players from that era, like Larry Bird, Dominique Wilkins, Magic Johnson and many others. Some players have wrong portraits here. Made by J.Bruno Fernandes (j.fernan@mithlond.esoterica.pt) with some help by Tim Tschirner. Please contact Jorge for all questions about this patch. 92-93 ----- The Original 1992/93 Line-ups, with the Bulls on their way to the Three-Peat, a new Phoenix Sun and a rookie named Shaquille O'Neal. Some players have wrong portraits here. Made by J.Bruno Fernandes (j.fernan@mithlond.esoterica.pt) with some help by Tim Tschirner. Please contact Jorge for all questions about this patch. 95-96 ----- The 1995/96 Rosters, with re-touched skill values, positions and jersey numbers (after the trades) plus full 95-96 stats, draft information and date and place of birth for all created players. 96-97 ----- This file has rosters for the 1996/97 season, including all the rookies, regardless if they are signed yet or not. Furthermore, you'll find all the free agents still with their old teams until they sign somewhere else. This file will be continuously updated during the offseason, so you should always look for new versions of this patch. Note that the 'active' patch is only available during the regular season. Additional notes ---------------- For some odd reason, EA Sports only left space for 14 players on each team. A few teams have 15 players on their roster, though, you'll find the 15th player for those teams on the free agent team. Also, there are way too few free agent slots available (The guys at EA Sports sure know how to make us buy NBA Live 97.), so we had to dump some of the unused players on the injured list of other teams where there was room. Then, the roster files are too small, so we had to replace a few of the original players to add new players. YES, SOME PLAYERS DO USE WRONG PORTRAITS. We have checked and apparently the only way to fix this would be installing all the portrait files from the CD on the HD - a grand total of 31 MB. Anyway, we made sure that only reserves use wrong portraits, so at least the portraits of the starters before a game are OK. Yes, we think that sucks, too, but there is no way to fix this. Changing player IDs would mess up the rosters. Some technical information -------------------------- The *.p96 files are used to create changed .exe files. The .exe files contain the data of all original players - the patch updates their skill values, positions and jersey numbers here. The Roster Files (rosters.*) are the same as rosters.dat; rosters.s96 is for 95-96.exe, rosters.s97 for 96-97.exe, and so on. You do not need to rename them to 'rosters.dat' or whatever, the patches will automatically load the correct file (we changed some ASCII strings in the .exe files there). The rosters.* files are for the correct roster orders as well as the data of the created players. Additional files career.p* are copied into the /art/miscfe directory and are loaded by the patches instead of career.idx, making sure some of the new players are not displayed with other players' career stats. How to edit the game yourself ----------------------------- If you want to edit the game yourself, get one of the NBA Live 96 editors available at the above site. The NBA Live 96 Editor for Windows does also have an option to create your own patch files, which you can then distribute. Acknowledgements ---------------- - EA Sports for failing to create a proper editor and giving us a lot to do every time they release a game - Joshua Bahnsen for providing us with some missing player data and for typing the 95-96 stats - just like we did :-( - Dave Zolnier for his editor - many thanks to Leo (leo@dragon.net.au) for looking up a lot of player information for us - Evan for his help with the rosters - everyone maintaining an NBA Live web site, especially Stan Olson