How to mod a Rom or Iso? Thread

So I was thinking to get into modding roms and isos.
There are some games i would like to mod for mame arcade and epcsx (Playstation) emulator.

How do I go about doing that?
What tools are there available to be able to extract textures or sounds out of an iso and recompile?

Huuurr duuuur Illegal, huuuuuuuuuurr

Well, I bought the games.
I have them in hard disc... I just play them on emulator and the mods would be solely for me to play.
I wouldn't share them.

No such magic tools exist.

I'm sure there' s some sort of tool out there to do it, as I've seen some modded/cracked roms. But, alas, I do not know of any.

Also, don't think ModDB would be the place for this type of discussion, but good luck to ya.

I think magicISO can open mdf's, and of course should be able to open other files, though I have only ever seen iso or mdf's used. After that, you just need to pack up the files again. Not sure about mame games, usually they need to be extracted, not sure how to get into those files at all.

Only problem is actaully modding the games files. I do believe it has been done on some playstation games, and possibly other console games. The games use file formats to store data, that is never before used on PC and usually only used by the consoles it was developed for, recognised by the developers tools (like the dev kits for the playstation). It may be possible to only change textures, and audio of some games.
However, not sure to the full extent, I've only looked at playstation games, unfortunately found there to be few tools beyond extracting content, few to alter anything besides textures, even then, attempts I've seen break the game.
Here is one good page full of some tools for file viewing and extracting.
Zophar.net

This one might be something to look at for textures
Zophar.net

Edited by: arieas

A hex editor can do a lot, if you're trying to change gameplay stuff. Otherwise even if you manage to extract the resource files you probably won't be able to read them.

I just been browsing through some websites i found, and it's almost impossible to mod roms due to the complexity of the games.
Thinking now if it's even worth the hassle and time put into it.

Thanks for all the replies anyways.
I think I'm better off sticking to pc modding.

There are quite a few mods out there for older games, because the games are less complex and it's possible to make modifications via sompler tools like hex editors - if you have the know-how to do it - but once we hit the Playstation era a lot of the simplicity went out of the window.

If you're looking for a game to try modding, try Cave Story. It's a Japanese sidescrolling shooter for PC.

Cavestory.org

It's not exactly what you're looking for, but you might want to try tinkering with the editing tools, which are basically assembly hackers.

BEWARE: Cave story, and editing it, are EXTREMELY flaky. Don't be surprised to watch hours of work go down the plughole if you don't make backups like a maniac.

Ambient_Malice wrote: If you're looking for a game to try modding, try Cave Story. It's a Japanese sidescrolling shooter for PC.

Cavestory.org

It's not exactly what you're looking for, but you might want to try tinkering with the editing tools, which are basically assembly hackers.

BEWARE: Cave story, and editing it, are EXTREMELY flaky. Don't be surprised to watch hours of work go down the plughole if you don't make backups like a maniac.

Actually the game i was thinking of modding is Yu-gi-oh! Forbidden memories.
I wanted to modify some cards with custom ones.
Like changing the images, name, attack and defense factors.
For instance change this:

With this:

It would be awesome if I could find a way around doing that.
I have yu-gi-oh! card maker that looks just like the originals, check some of the cards i made here: