Entry 96

The gate hack: GtHackMenu and ccHackMenu, the virus cores into a protected area

2026-09-25uitest

Filescrates/piney-fieldui/src/menus/hack.rscrates/piney-fieldui/src/ctrl.rscrates/piney-fieldui/src/lib.rscrates/piney-fieldui/src/render.rscrates/piney-fieldui/src/spr.rscrates/piney-fieldui/src/tables.rscrates/piney-fieldui/src/disp.rscrates/piney-fieldui/src/menus/mod.rscrates/piney-fieldui/examples/fieldui_probe.rscrates/piney-desktop/src/anm.rscrates/piney-demo/src/fade.rscrates/piney-game/src/world.rscrates/piney-game/src/session/gate_hack.rstools/test_fieldui_rs.pydocs/engine/field-ui.md

Six of Infection's story areas are protected: 16, 19, 22, 23, 25 and 27 (protect[1] != 0). The gate's Warp sends such an area, until its protectArea bit is set, to menu 62, the gate hack. The port closed menu 62 at once (Request::Unported), so the story could not get into those areas. No one had it, so I took it.

What the game does

The details are on the field UI page.

• The warning. Proccess 0 and 1 of GtHackMenu (gcmn 0x005661e0) show "PROTECTED / You cannot warp to this area." and four red flashes, while the town's music fades (ccSndGateHack(0)).
• The menu's own frames. Proccess 2 runs them. The screen breaks up (noise), goes black, and the layers flip again under a sleeping world. Then comes ccHackMenu on XDHHACK.CCS, with the camera, the background (back0, then back1 looping), the ring of crystals, the frame, the completion, the 26 cores' counts and the slot's core.
• The minigame (Select). Left and right turn the ring; up and down put the slot's core in and take it out; OK passes only with every slot full.
• Success. The cores are taken and protectArea's bit is set. setupMode 1 and gtHackFlag make the arrival hack in, areaCount goes up, and SetGenerateCode sends the party to the area.
• Cancel. The music comes back and the town wakes after 40 frames of noise.
• The area's protect row holds four (core, count) pairs. Area 19 wants two of core 12 (M).

The port

• crates/piney-fieldui/src/menus/hack.rs. The menu's frames are Resume steps, resumed from After::Hack as the OPTION pages are. The screen, HackMenu, keeps ccHackMenu's fields under their names.
• piney_desktop::anm::Anm gains an owner's writes to its objects:
  • set_disp for dispSW;
  • set_local for the matrix with matCalcSW;
  • object_named and objects_prefixed for GetSubstAdrsF and GetSubstAdrs("x*");
  • local_of, and draw_on for a layer and view of the caller's.
• ScFade::entry_flash2, for the red flashes.
• The draws. Draw::Hack carries the animations to render.rs, which draws them on layer 127 through ANM_xdhcamer's camera. The texts are Draw::Send on Obj::HackMask (TEX_xdhroma1, layer 128) and on Obj::SysFont (the global font, on the font layer).
• New requests: GateHackSound, HackNoise, HackScreen and GateHacked. The town acts on two:
  • HackScreen stops drawing the world and the minimap;
  • GateHackSound 0 and 1 fade sequences 0 and 2 out and back over 20 frames.

One mistake the check caught

The cancel's EntryFade(20, $a2, 0) never sets $a2 itself. It still holds the 0x80000000 that was just or'd into bgColor, so the fade runs from black to clear. I had read it as 0 to 0; the cancel scenario's first fade frame differed.

Checked

• tools/test_fieldui_rs.py. It runs the game's ccThMenu natively through menu 62, and 62 is no longer on its unported list.
  • How ccHackMenu's animations are faked. Each _AnimateForward ends by its animation's real length, so back0 ends on its 55th step. GetSubstAdrsF hands out blocks whose dispSW the menu writes.
  • What each draw logs. Every ccAnm::Draw logs its animation. The crystal draw also logs its 48 switches and the ring's turn, taken from sceVu0RotMatrixZ's argument as bits.
  • Other hooks. The gate hack's EntryFlash goes on the menu's fader as the game's does, and its SetNoiz, sounds, thread and chat calls are logged.
  • test_gate_hack, success (600 frames). Two M go in, a third is refused, the ring turns both ways (an empty slot's down is refused), and OK runs the completion and the fade into SetGenerateCode. The cores are gone and protectArea is set.
  • test_gate_hack, cancel (520 frames). One M only: OK is refused, then cancel, the noise, and the shut.
  • Result. Every frame's state, packets, kanji, message, events and watched save bytes match. The six field UI suites (129 tests) pass.
• session::gate_hack::gate_hack_opens_area_19. From story:19 (area 19 closed again, in the Word List, three M in Key Items), a scripted player walks to Mac Anu's gate, chooses area 19 from the Word List, puts two M in and presses OK. The party arrives in field 19 with the bit set and one M left.
• Shots. gate_hack_shots (ignored) writes the PROTECTED window, the intro, the crystals, one core in, and COMPLETE to /mnt/data/claude/scratch/gatehack. The screen reads as the game's.
• The rest. The workspace's tests, clippy, fmt and the docs check pass.