Hoard - Olde Irish Edition features virtual stereo sound, as well as some hidden fixes.
GREETINGS, AND WELCOME TO HOARD - OLDE IRISH EDITION!
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THIS PATCH AND WALKTHROUGH SHOULD BE COMPATIBLE WITH ALL U.S. PLAYSTATION NETWORK DOWNLOADS OF HOARD PSP!
Well, what is there to say about THIS game? It's an uncontested PSN MASTERPIECE. Definitely Big Sandwich Games' best title yet! It's hard to find words to describe it better. Of course, you may consider my opinion of this game a bit biased, on account of certain biological differences of which it is safer for me not to mention...
When I first downloaded this game off the PSN I was flabbergasted at how fun it was. Everything was top-notch! The graphics, the gameplay, sound effects, re-playability... Of course re-playability is really more than nine-tenths of this game's main attraction, though isn't it?
I'm sure you noticed I left one obvious item out of my list up there... Ah yes, you remember now don't you? The MUSIC. Well, the default music in the game was alright, more at the okay level than anything, but, meh, I really didn't see any correlation among big brawny dragons, medieval graphics, knights, and techno music. As the minutes dragged on the soundtrack began to be more of an annoyance than before, and eventually became plain unbearable. It just WASN'T RIGHT! This game called for RENAISSANCE music, not a plucky, tinkling soundtrack made up of beat sequences! I turned my PSP off in frustration (Okay yeah I'm exaggerating).
"That soundtrack is just..unacceptable. Completely unacceptable." I said.
Now, I will say up front that I am NOT dissing the dudes at Big Sandwich Games. I'm just spitballing here. I appreciate ALL of their hard work, and understand and appreciate all the hours they put into composing Hoard's soundtrack, but sometimes, well, you know, game music doesn't always hit home. So what I wanted to do was take an already outstanding and great product and improve upon it audiologically.
So now I began to brainstorm. I sat down at the computer and began to dig out some old, ancient, public domain Irish tunes from the World Wide Web and chunk them into my game. It wasn't SUPER easy to do, but after hours and hours of perseverance and dedication I finally began to see results! A FULLY-WORKING, CUSTOMIZED OLD IRISH SOUNDTRACK! This type of music fit the game content much MUCH better than what came with it. I was overjoyed! I'm one of those...hmm...persons...that can't enjoy a game very easily unless it has a good soundtrack. I've always been that way. I figure I'm not the only one out there like that, so I wanted to give the world the same beautiful tunes I was hearing.
Presenting Hoard - Olde Irish Edition!
This version of hoard features a massive soundtrack composed of 72 old Irish tunes! When I say old, I mean, like, ANCIENT old. And don't get turned off on this sentence. Just because these tunes are old doesn't mean they sound boring! I am very confident that you will enjoy my music patch here, and I'm also quite positive that once you get a taste of Hoard - Olde Irish Edition you'll never go back to playing standard Hoard again! I want to thank God for giving me the perseverance to achieve and build this patch. Patching PSN games is a very new concept I believe, and quite difficult indeed. I am so happy to post this after so many hours of work and trial and error! I sincerely hope you enjoy this patch as much as I do.
Now, we both know that I could talk about Hoard - Olde Irish Edition all day, but that really isn't going to mean much of anything until you can play the game also, right? So let's get started with how to get this hack up and running!
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Applying my music patch for Hoard entails many of the same steps as in patching Lemmings PSP - Amiga Classic Edition, but there are a few new ones since we are working from an official Hoard PlayStation Network download.
1. So, the first thing you'll want to do is pay $9.99 and download Hoard off of the PlayStation Network on your PSP. Wait for it to install and all that jazz. You will have an EBOOT.PBP file.
2. Next, you're going to download my Hoard - Olde Irish Edition Patch + Tools.zip file off MediaFire. Use these links:
v1.7 - Mediafire.com
v1.7a - Mediafire.com
v1.7.1 - Mediafire.com - {Newest Release}
Unzip it anywheres(:P).
3. Inside the extracted folder, in PSP Tools, you will see a folder named "NPD". Copy this folder to your PSP Memory Stick, in "PSP/GAME".
4. Next you'll want to locate your Hoard PSN EBOOT.PBP. This file will be located in "PSP/GAME/NPUH10074". The "NPUH10074" folder may be named differently, depending on what region of the game you downloaded. I am using the USA version. As far as I know there are only 2 PSN networks: USA and UK. I assume that the UK folder will look different. The Hoard Eboot will be around 53 MB (megabytes), if that helps.
5. Copy the EBOOT.PBP in "PSP/GAME/NPUH10074" to your PC desktop. Rename it to "NP.PBP" (Make sure "Hide File Extensions" is disabled in Windows).
6. Copy your NP.PBP to "PSP/GAME/NPD".
7. Now you need to exit USB mode on your PSP (Or eject your card reader) and browse your PSP XMB to the game directory. Look for a file with no icon, named "NPEG-RV". Boot this file.
8. Press X to decrypt and compile the Hoard NP.PBP into an ISO. Wait for the process to complete. Press X when the "Terminated" message appears.
9. Reconnect your PSP Memory Stick to your PC or computer. Browse "/ISO" and locate the ISO you just dumped. It should be named something like "NPUH-10074.iso". Again, different-region games may throw out different names.
10. Now you're halfway done. You're going to want to point your computer to the "Hoard - Olde Irish Edition v1.7 Patch + Tools" folder in your downloads and run "Apply Patch.exe" (It's in the "PC Tools" folder).
11. Click "1) CheckMD5".
12. Select your Hoard PSP ISO file.
13. Wait for the check to complete. Program will turn white. This is not a freeze. Wait.
14. Click "2) Apply Ripkit".
15. Define your file-name.
16. Hit save, and wait for the patch to apply.
17. (Optional) Hit "3) Compress" to compress your ISO to CSO {This makes your game file-size smaller, but also increases the chance of lag time because of heavy compression.}
18. Copy your new ISO to your PSP.
19. This step is VERY important. You MUST delete your old Hoard save data, or Hoard OIE will have save corruption problems due to its attempts to overwrite it. I am working on a way to preserve old save data, but I have had no luck yet. Things may change in the future. For now, please pay special attention to this step.
20. Point your PSP to your ISOs and enjoy Hoard - Olde Irish Edition!
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That's it! That's all there is to it! You're ready to steep your ears in the gorgeous beautiful Irish melodies of long ago! There are some truly divine tunes in this soundtrack. I tried to include the best ones, and I'm sure you'll love the title screen music. Thanks for downloading! I hope you enjoy my patch. If there's anything wrong with it, let me know and I will surely fix it up for you. Thanks again!
NOTE: Sometimes the Apply Patch.exe program will refuse to pass the MD5 Checksum test. This can occur if your unpatched Hoard ISO (Step 8) has a different MD5 than the program is searching for. To help ease the pain of these errors I have included an extra MD5 in my patch tools main folder. In order to use the alternate MD5 simply copy it from my TXT file, browse to the "Files" directory inside "PC Tools", open "MD5.TXT", paste over what is already there, and save. If you have any issues or need help just let me know and I'll do what I can to help you. Enjoy!
If you have a different-region version of this game PLEASE let me know what your ISO's MD5 checksum is so I can expand my patch's compatibility! Thank you!
PSP XMB Dragon Background courtesy of ScorpHasashi on Deviant Art. Added jewelry is original.
