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Welcome to the PKCore Wiki ⚔️

Framework: BepInEx 6 IL2CPP Game: Suikoden I & II HD Remaster License: MIT Nexus Mods

PKCore (Project Kyaro Core) is the next-generation core engine and modding framework for Suikoden I & II HD Remaster. It provides zero-compromise runtime texture injection, high-performance DDS decoding (BC1/BC3/BC7), CriWare sound swapping (ACB/AWB file redirection), dynamic dialogue and NPC portrait frameworks (for both Suikoden I & II), save slot party member mini portraits, battle formation spacing adjustments, character weapon range overrides, Suikoden II war battle rebalancing, UI scaling enhancements, and extensive graphical customization.

🧭 Navigation Portal

🚀 Getting Started ⚙️ Configuration Guide 🎨 Texture Modding
• Requirements
• Installation
• Directory Layout		 • Settings Reference
• Visual & UI Toggles
• Live Hot-Reloading		 • Formats (PNG, DDS BC7)
• Priority Hierarchy
• Manifest Caching
🎭 NPC & Dialogue Portraits 🔊 Sound Swapping ⚔️ War Battles
• Speaker ID Mapping
• Expression Variants
• S1 & S2 Integration		 • ACB / AWB Audio Banks
• Music & SFX Redirection
• Better Launcher BGM		 • JSON Ability Overrides
• Unit Stats & Attributes
• Commander Traits
🏹 Battle Ranges & Formations 🖼️ Save Slot Party Portraits 📦 00-Mods Guide
• Weapon Range Overrides
• 6-Hero Formation Spacing
• Hot-Reloadable Config		 • In-Memory Portrait Cache
• S1 & S2 Save/Load UI
• Custom Texture Priority		 • Mod Packaging
• Isolated Folders
• Conflict Resolution

⚡ Key Highlights & Architecture

                                  ┌───────────────────────────────┐
                                  │      PKCore Architecture      │
                                  └───────────────┬───────────────┘
                                                  │
         ┌─────────────────────────┬──────────────┴─────────────┬─────────────────────────┐
         ▼                         ▼                            ▼                         ▼
┌──────────────────┐     ┌──────────────────┐         ┌──────────────────┐      ┌──────────────────┐
│  High-Perf DDS   │     │  00-Mods Layer   │         │  NPC Portraits   │      │ War Battle &     │
│  & Texture Engine│     │ Overrides & Audio│         │ & Save Portraits │      │ Battle Formation │
│ (BC1 / BC3 / BC7)│     │ (Top-Priority)   │         │ (S1 & S2 Support)│      │ (S2 Range Mods)  │
└──────────────────┘     └──────────────────┘         └──────────────────┘      └──────────────────┘
  • ⚡ Zero-Lag Manifest Caching: Scans thousands of texture replacements and caches indices in XML — boot times drop from seconds to milliseconds.
  • 🚀 Native GPU DDS Acceleration: Direct in-place memory replacement using BC1, BC3, and high-fidelity BC7 textures (with DX10 header support).
  • 🖼️ Save Slot Party Member Portraits: Automatically renders high-resolution mini party portraits in save/load slots for both Suikoden I and II with instant 0ms cached lookups.
  • 🏹 Character Battle Range Overrides (S2): Configurable weapon range modification (e.g. Kasumi, Luc, Mazus, Viki, Gantetsu, Badeaux, Sierra from Short S to Medium M), removing formation warnings and allowing back-row attacks.
  • 📐 Battle Position Formation Adjustments (S2): Configurable party formation spacing presets (wide, widest) preventing back-row party members from blocking front-row characters.
  • 🎭 Dynamic NPC & Dialogue Portrait Framework: Inject high-res dialogue portraits for any NPC or character with multi-language, emotion variant, and cutscene fallback support across both games.
  • 🛡️ Data-Driven War Battles: Deep rebalancing of Suikoden II Tactical War Battles via intuitive S2WarAbilities.json.
  • 🔊 CriWare Sound Swapping: Drop-in .acb/.awb sound and music redirection without modifying game archives.
  • 🎮 UI & Immersion Customization: Customizable Save Point Crystal colors, UI scaling, Enhanced Gallery backgrounds, classic PSX save windows, and controller button prompt overrides.

🚀 Getting Started

Requirements

Quick Installation

  1. Install BepInEx 6.0.0-pre.2 IL2CPP into your game root folder.
  2. Download the latest Project Kyaro / PKCore release.
  3. Place PKCore.dll in BepInEx/plugins/PKCore/ and any mod assets in PKCore/Textures/, PKCore/Sound/, or PKCore/00-Mods/.
  4. Launch the game once to auto-generate the configuration file at BepInEx/config/faospark.pkcore.cfg.

Directory Layout

<Game Directory>/
├── BepInEx/
│   ├── config/
│   │   └── faospark.pkcore.cfg         <-- Primary BepInEx configuration
│   └── plugins/
│       └── PKCore/
│           └── PKCore.dll              <-- Core engine plugin
└── PKCore/
    ├── Cache/
    │   └── texture_manifest.xml        <-- Auto-generated texture index
    ├── Config/                         <-- Data-driven JSON configuration
    │   ├── S2WarAbilities.json         <-- War battle custom stats & abilities (S2)
    │   ├── PortraitMappings.json       <-- Character name to portrait image map
    │   ├── PortraitVariants.json       <-- Expression & emotion variant definitions
    │   ├── DialogOverrides.json        <-- Specific dialogue line portrait overrides
    │   ├── S1SpeakerOverrides.json     <-- Suikoden 1 speaker ID overrides
    │   └── S2SpeakerOverrides.json     <-- Suikoden 2 speaker ID overrides
    ├── Debug/                          <-- Runtime database & asset dumps
    │   ├── JsonDumps/                  <-- AssetBundle TextAsset & JSON dumps
    │   ├── TextDB_GSD1.json            <-- Suikoden 1 dialogue database dump
    │   └── TextDB_GSD2.json            <-- Suikoden 2 dialogue database dump
    ├── JsonOverrides/                  <-- Custom JSON TextAsset replacements
    ├── Textures/                       <-- Base texture overrides
    │   ├── GSD1/                       <-- Suikoden 1 specific
    │   │   └── NPCPortraits/           <-- S1 dialogue portraits (PNG / DDS)
    │   ├── GSD2/                       <-- Suikoden 2 specific
    │   │   └── NPCPortraits/           <-- S2 dialogue portraits (PNG / DDS)
    │   └── NPCPortraits/               <-- Shared dialogue portraits
    ├── Sound/                          <-- Base CriWare sound banks
    └── 00-Mods/                        <-- High-priority mod packages
        ├── PKS1/                       <-- Project Kyaro S1 sprites
        ├── PKS2/                       <-- Project Kyaro S2 sprites
        └── Better-Launcher-BGM-Mod/    <-- Launcher BGM mod

📄 Data-Driven JSON Files

PKCore uses several JSON files located in PKCore/Config/ for deep data-driven customization. Mod packages in PKCore/00-Mods/<ModName>/ can also supply their own versions to seamlessly merge overrides:

JSON File Default Location Description
S2WarAbilities.json PKCore/Config/ Custom unit stats (ATK, DEF, MOV, HP), subunit leader bonuses, and tactical abilities for Suikoden II war battles.
PortraitMappings.json PKCore/Config/ Links speaker and character names directly to high-resolution portrait texture filenames.
PortraitVariants.json PKCore/Config/ Configures emotional expression mapping rules (e.g., smile, angry, sad, shock, hurt, close).
DialogOverrides.json PKCore/Config/ Granular per-line dialogue overrides mapping specific dialogue IDs to custom portraits.
S1SpeakerOverrides.json PKCore/Config/ Maps Suikoden 1 internal speaker IDs to character names and portrait keys.
S2SpeakerOverrides.json PKCore/Config/ Maps Suikoden 2 internal speaker IDs to character names and portrait keys.
TextDB_GSD1.json / TextDB_GSD2.json PKCore/Debug/ Cumulative dialogue and speaker dumps created at runtime when exploring scenes. Useful for finding dialogue IDs and text references.

📂 Priority & Layering Hierarchy

PKCore implements a multi-tier override system ensuring modularity and conflict resolution:

Priority Layer Path Description
1 (Lowest) Vanilla Asset StreamingAssets/ Original base game files
2 Base Overrides PKCore/Textures/ & PKCore/Sound/ Default Project Kyaro replacements
3 Game Isolation PKCore/Textures/GSD1/ or GSD2/ Overrides restricted to Suikoden 1 or 2
4 (Highest) 00-Mods Packages PKCore/00-Mods/<ModName>/ Always wins. Multiple mods sorted alphabetically (zz_ prefix wins)

⚙️ Configuration Overview

All options are configurable in BepInEx/config/faospark.pkcore.cfg:

🎨 Visual & Sprites

  • EnableProjectKyaroSprites (true/false): Toggle Project Kyaro HD upscaled sprites.
  • DisableSpritePostProcessing (true/false): Strips bloom/vignette from sprites to eliminate bright border seams.
  • SpriteFilteringEnabled (true/false): Bilinear + Anisotropic filtering for smooth rendering.
  • SMAAQuality (Off, Low, Medium, High): Anti-aliasing quality level.

🖥️ User Interface & Controls

  • ControllerPromptType (PlayStation, PlayStation5, Xbox, Switch, Generic): Force controller prompt button glyphs.
  • ScaleDownDialogBox (true/false): Compact dialogue box (80% size) for improved scene visibility.
  • ScaledDownMenu (true/false): Scaled-down main pause/status menu.
  • ClassicSaveWindow (true/false): Restores the classic PSX-style save slot interface in Suikoden II.
  • ShowSaveSlotPartyPortraits (true/false): Displays mini party member portraits next to character level (Txt_Lv) in save/load slots.
  • DisablePortraitDialogMask (true/false): Removes the dark vignette gradient overlay from dialogue portraits.
  • EnhancedGallery (true/false): Replaces Movies, Events, and Sounds gallery backgrounds with custom textures inspired by the PSP release.
  • PSPLauncher (true/false): Enable the PSP-inspired launcher interface.

⚔️ Combat & Formations (Suikoden II)

  • EnableBattlePositionAdjustments (true/false): Adjusts 6-character party formation spacing so back-row characters don't obstruct front-row members.
  • S2BattlePositionPreset (default, wide, widest): Formation spacing preset (wide is recommended).
  • EnableCharacterRangeOverrides (true/false): Enable custom weapon/attack range modification with live hot-reloading.
  • S2CharacterRangeOverrides (string): Comma-separated list of range overrides (e.g. Kasumi:M, Luc:M, Mazus:M, Viki:M, Gantetsu:M, Badeaux:M, Sierra:M).
  • EnableWarAbilityMod (true/false): Tactical war battle ability customization via S2WarAbilities.json.

🌟 Aesthetics & General

  • SavePointColor (default, blue, green, red, purple, yellow, cyan, random, etc.): Customizes the crystal save orb.
  • DisableSavePointGlow (true/false): Removes the washed-out white glare from save points.
  • DisableWorldMapClouds / DisableWorldMapSunrays (true/false): Cleans up the world map visuals.
  • ColoredIntroAndFlashbacks (true/false): Restores vibrant colors to flashback sequences.
  • BetterLauncherBGM (true/false): Replaces launcher ambient music with Suikoden 2's adventure start theme.

🖼️ Save Slot Party Member Portraits

With ShowSaveSlotPartyPortraits = true, PKCore brings party member portraits directly into the Save and Load screens for both Suikoden I and Suikoden II:

  • Suikoden I: Dynamic resolution across in-memory save lists and decrypted save data, utilizing Ws_face_c.CharacterIDConvertToFaceIDStatic to index portraits accurately (e.g. fp_gsd1_000 for Tir, Joshua, etc.).
  • Suikoden II: Instant party member array lookup (party_cha_no) mapped directly to high-res character portraits.
  • In-Memory Caching: 0ms lookups after initial read during save menu scrolling, prioritizing custom DDS/PNG textures from PKCore/Textures/ over vanilla sprites.

📚 Wiki Documentation Index

Explore in-depth documentation pages for every system:

Guide Description
📖 00-Mods Guide How to build, package, and structure plug-and-play mods.
🖼️ Custom Textures Guide Dumping textures, DDS BC7 compression, naming syntax, and hash bypasses.
🎭 NPC Portrait Walkthrough Adding portraits to faceless NPCs, variant expressions, DDS BC7 support, and speaker IDs.
🏹 Character Battle Ranges & Formations Modifying character weapon ranges (S/M/L) and adjusting battle formation spacing presets.
⚔️ War Battle Modding Guide Customizing Suikoden II tactical units, leader bonuses, and special skills.
🔊 Sound Swapping Guide CriWare ACB/AWB audio swapping and custom BGM/SFX redirection.
⚡ Caching & Performance Deep dive into the XML manifest cache, scene unloader, and smart memory.
📝 Placeholder Text System Dynamic replacement of protagonist and castle names in dialogue.
⚙️ Configuration Reference Full variable list and default value reference table.

🛠️ Troubleshooting & FAQ

Q: My custom texture is not showing up in-game.
  1. Verify that your file is named to match the Unity texture name or hash pattern.
  2. Enable LogReplaceableTextures = true in faospark.pkcore.cfg to verify exact runtime names in the console/log.
  3. If you added new files with manifest caching enabled, delete PKCore/Cache/texture_manifest.xml to force a re-index.
Q: How do I run borderless fullscreen?

Use Unity's native -popupwindow launch parameter:

  • Steam: Right-click Game → Properties → General → Launch Options → add -popupwindow
  • Epic Games: Add -popupwindow to your desktop shortcut target.
Q: Migrating from old PKExtended / Special K?
  1. Remove PKextended.dll and faospark.pkextended.cfg from BepInEx/.
  2. Remove Special K (dxgi.dll / d3d11.dll) and SK_Res/ folder — Special K is no longer required as PKCore handles all injection natively.

🤝 Credits & Acknowledgements

PKCore for Suikoden I & II HD Remaster • Developed by faospark • Licensed under MIT

⚔️ PKCore Wiki

🎨 Modding Guides

⚡ Technical

🔗 Links

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