Formats
Byte-level specifications for every file format on the Legend of Legaia disc - from the raw CD sector layout, through the archive that holds the game's assets and the compression around them, to each asset type: textures, meshes, sound banks, dialog, stat tables. Every claim traces to a function in the game's own code, and every format has a from-scratch Rust parser in the workspace.
How this section is organised
Pages are grouped the way the disc is layered, outermost first: the disc and its one big archive, then how the game unpacks and routes what it loads, then the bundles a scene or a battle loads as a unit, then single assets by kind, the stat tables baked into the executable and overlays, and the archive entries that hold code. The sidebar uses the same groups in the same order. New here? Start with disc geometry and PROT.DAT - every other page assumes those two.
- Disc and archivesectors, PROT.DAT, CDNAME.TXT
- Compression and dispatchLZS, chunk streams, packs
- Scene and battle bundleswhat a room or a fight loads at once
- Textures and modelsTIM, TMD, palettes
- Characters and animationmeshes, clip banks, arts
- SoundVAB, SEQ, XA, SFX tables
- Textdialog, font, place names
- Static tablesitems, spells, equipment, move power
- Code overlaysMIPS code in archive entries
Each page carries a badge for how solid its decode is. The badge is a claim about evidence, not page length; a page's own confidence row is authoritative over the badge here.
- Confirmed - traced in the game's own code and verified end-to-end against real on-disc data.
- Inferred - deduced from byte patterns; structurally consistent but not exhaustively validated.
Disc and archive
The disc image before any in-game format is involved: the sector layout, the one archive that holds nearly everything, the text file that names its contents, and the archive slots that hold nothing. The disc map draws all of it at once - every file and every PROT.DAT entry as nested boxes sized by sector count, each linked back to its page here.
PSX disc geometry Confirmed
How a PlayStation CD is laid out: 2352-byte Mode2 sectors carrying 2048 bytes of file content, with an ISO9660 filesystem on top. The
iso crate hides the sector layer and returns clean user data.PROT.DAT TOC Confirmed
The disc's single asset archive - 1233 numbered entries holding nearly every texture, model, script, sound bank and code overlay - and the table of contents that indexes it. An entry's size is the gap to the next entry.
CDNAME.TXT name map Confirmed
A developer-left text file naming archive entries with
#define name N lines; each define marks a block start and names inherit forward. The numbers are raw TOC indices, two above the extraction numbering.DMY.DAT (dev fixtures) Confirmed
The archive's sibling file: a memory-bus test pattern plus paired random blobs, shipped on the retail disc but never loaded. The patcher uses it as an annex for oversized replacement assets.
Pochi-filler placeholder slots Confirmed
Unused placeholder entries padded with the ASCII word "pochi": each exactly one 2048-byte sector of fill, none carrying a parseable asset.
Compression and dispatch
How archive bytes become usable assets: the compression scheme, the chunk stream an entry decompresses to, the type-byte dispatcher that routes each chunk, and the one "many assets in one file" pack layout with its two readers.
Legaia LZS Confirmed
The dictionary compression around most bulk assets - a custom LZSS variant with a 4096-byte zero-initialised ring buffer. Random input decodes without error, so always magic-check the output.
DATA_FIELD streaming Confirmed
The typed-chunk multi-asset container: a chain of
(type << 24) | size headers each followed by raw, uncompressed data, ended by a zero-size header. Carries the battle-form character / effect run and a family of scene bundles.Asset type dispatcher Confirmed
How the game knows what a loaded blob is: an 8-bit type byte (0=TIM, 2=TMD, 4=MES, 5=MOVE, 6=ANM, 7=VDF, 8=SIN, 9=TMD2, B=MOVE2 - the clips ride MOVE, the "ANM" slot holds a CLUT-walk table) routes it to a handler and decides LZS-vs-raw. The type names come from the developers' own error strings.
Asset descriptor format Confirmed
The
(type_byte << 24) | size calling convention the dispatcher takes, and the descriptor-pair walker that only runtime overlays call.Pack format Confirmed
The simplest multi-asset bundle:
u32 count + u32 word_offsets[count], then assets back-to-back. Used inside DATA_FIELD streaming chunks.Standalone TIM-pack Confirmed
A near-identical multi-texture bundle in some standalone PROT entries with different header math (
byte_offset = word_index*4 + 4). Includes the boot-UI bundle at the head of the archive.“Field-pack” Confirmed
Not a format: the
0x01059B84 word is a DATA_FIELD chunk header wrapping an ordinary pack of one scene's textures. The page records how it came to look like a magic number.Scene and battle bundles
What a scene or a battle loads as a unit - room geometry, textures, scripts and audio together - plus the records that drive encounters, scene transitions and movies, and the battle side-band slots streamed beside them.
Scene bundles Confirmed
The family of per-scene container shapes, each read off its retail walker: battle backdrops, BGM streams, town asset tables, move-VM stager scripts.
Per-scene field map Confirmed
Slot 0 of every scene block, exactly
0x12000 bytes: object descriptors, the collision and floor grid, the per-tile object map and the trigger block.scene_v12_table Confirmed
Per-scene
.PCH walk-on trigger sidecar: a four-kind sub-table directory plus inline 4-byte trigger records, exactly one sector in all 97 scenes. The stager prescript is the next PROT entry.Encounter record Confirmed
Which monsters you can meet where: three header bytes, a count, and up to four monster ids, armed on a field actor and copied into the battle loader's formation cell.
MAN relocation Confirmed
How to safely resize a record inside a scene's script bundle: fix the partition tables, the section-0 offset, intra-record jump deltas and the external descriptor size. Powers the door randomizer and translation packs.
World-map slot-4 records Confirmed
Slot 4 of each kingdom bundle: the world-map scene's ANM animation bank, the same clip container every field scene carries. Not a mesh library and not the continent terrain.
STR FMV table Confirmed
How the game finds its movies: a 23-slot dispatch table in the cutscene overlay, nine retail slots covering every movie on the disc; per-scene triggers are literal operands in the scene scripts.
Effect bundles Confirmed
The hit sparks and spell flashes of battle: the runtime
efect.dat 2-pack (extraction 0873) - a sprite atlas, frame-animation batches and spawn scripts indexed by effect id.summon.dat / readef.DAT Confirmed
Battle side-band streaming slots (extraction 893 / 894),
0x10800 bytes each: per-special-attack palettes, texture pages, summon-creature actor records and the player art-animation "ME" archives.Per-scene primitive scratch buffer Inferred
A negative finding: the RAM cluster once read as a navmesh is a per-scene scratch buffer the renderer fills with GPU primitive data on scene entry.
Textures and models
What a single texture or mesh looks like once unpacked, and the palette and picture formats that ride beside them.
PSX TIM Confirmed
The PlayStation's standard texture format. 4 / 8 / 15 bpp; palettes (CLUTs) scatter across PROT entries.
crates/tim exports to PNG and encodes PNG back to TIM.Legaia TMD Confirmed
The 3D mesh format - a custom variant of stock PSX TMD, magic
0x80000002: primitives batched behind an 8-byte group header, with a 6-row shape table setting each record's layout. Most rows carry baked colour; the lit rows shade through the GTE light.Row-479 NPC CLUTs Confirmed
NPC colour palettes: plain PSX TIMs in scene PROT entries whose palette block targets framebuffer row 479. Uploaded with merge-zeros semantics so several scene TIMs share the row.
Save-slot portrait sheet Confirmed
Sixteen 16x16 tiles in one 256x16 strip in the menu overlay, one 16-colour palette per tile. Tile N is the memory-card icon for save N+1.
Headerless 16bpp stills Confirmed
Two entries that are a picture with nothing in the file saying so - raw BGR555 and a length. The 320 × 256 rectangle is four immediates in the routine that uploads them, and which of the two loads depends on the party leader's HP.
Characters and animation
How the party and the monsters are built and moved: the character meshes, the per-character battle files, the animation clip banks, and the art records that drive a Tactical Art.
Player-character meshes Confirmed
Where Vahn, Noa and Gala's models live. The field form is one pack (PROT 0874); the battle form is assembled per character from the equipment slots of the player battle files.
Player battle files Confirmed
The per-character battle files
data\battle\PLAYER1..4: an LZS animation record, a descriptor table keyed by equipment item, and one mesh + texture slot per item.ANM animation Confirmed
The animation container for party, NPCs and props: a frame-by-bone grid of 8-byte entries, each a packed translation and rotation that poses one mesh object directly. Rides asset type 5 (MOVE) despite the name.
MDT - move tables Confirmed
The per-scene
MOVE buffer the script VM's 0x22 EXEC_MOVE plays from - by its bytes the scene's ANM clip bank. Sourced per scene from a CDNAME slot, not from one boot-time PROT entry.Monster animation Confirmed
Enemy battle animation inside the monster archive (extraction 0867): per-action rigid-transform keyframes, one part per TMD object. Action 0 is the idle loop; the entry's first byte is an action tag, not an index.
Art data - Tactical Arts records Inferred
Per-character Tactical Art records (in each player battle file): command sequence, power bytes, hit-cue timing, impact-effect class. The menu's arrows are a separate table in the executable.
Sound
Instrument banks, music sequences, streamed CD audio, and the tables that route a sound-effect cue to a bank.
VAB sound bank Confirmed
PSX-standard instrument bank (program / tone / SPU-ADPCM sample).
crates/vab extracts and decodes to WAV. The vab_01 block (extraction 1070..1192) is wall-to-wall VAB.PsyQ SEQ Confirmed
The music sequence format - PsyQ's MIDI-derived
pQES container in Legaia's 15-byte-header variant: u32 BE version, PPQN 480, a placeholder tempo the first body event overrides, meta events without a length byte.XA-ADPCM Confirmed
CD-XA Mode 2 Form 2 streaming audio (voice shouts, ambience).
crates/xa demuxes per channel and emits one WAV per stream.SFX descriptor table Confirmed
The sound-effect lookup table in the executable: 100 8-byte rows naming a VAB program / tone, voice count, and the category that selects which of four open banks the cue plays from.
bse.dat battle SFX bank Confirmed
The runtime half of the sound-effect descriptor table: the rows behind cue ids
0x200 and up while a battle is on screen, loaded per battle.Sound-driver path strings Confirmed
The filename extensions the sound driver appends (
.dpk, .spk, .MAP, .PCH) and their consumers. The per-scene .dpk pack holds a VAB + SEQ pair.Text
Dialog containers, the proportional font they are drawn with, and the place names the map screens show.
MES dialog Confirmed
The dialog-text container, in Compact and Records variants. Message bytes are font-tile indices with two-byte escapes that splice in the hero's name, item and art names at display time.
Dialog font Confirmed
The proportional Latin font the dialog renderer draws with: a 256-entry width table and a 38-entry escape table in the executable, 4bpp glyph bitmaps in VRAM at
(896, 0).Place names Confirmed
One place name, three carriers: the executable's quick-travel cells, the label table trailing every kingdom MAN, and each scene MAN's banner name. Parser
legaia_scene_formats::place_names.Static tables
The game's numbers - item names, spell stats, equipment bonuses, steal chances, move power - are static tables inside SCUS_942.54, the main executable, or the data segment of the battle and menu overlays, not in the asset archive. Each is byte-pinned against its image.
Item-name table Confirmed
256 item ids, 12-byte stride - the id space monster drops, steals and equipment all index. Parser
legaia_game_tables::item_names.Item-effect table Confirmed
What each usable item does: 130 4-byte descriptors - effect class, tier, party / field / battle usability flags. Literal HP / MP restore amounts are a separate tier-indexed table beside it; stat-up magnitudes are handler immediates.
Equipment stat-bonus table Confirmed
8-byte records per equippable item: INT / ATK / UDF / LDF / SPD bonuses, equip-character mask, slot type, Ra-Seru flag. Parser
legaia_game_tables::equip_stats.Accessory passive table Confirmed
64-slot passive-index space mapping accessories ("Goods") to per-character ability bits, with stat-percent magnitudes inline. Parser
legaia_game_tables::accessory_passive.Spell table Confirmed
Static spell stats + name pointers, 12-byte stride. Player Seru-magic block
0x81..=0x8B; named monster attacks from 0x25. Parser legaia_game_tables::spell_names.Steal table Confirmed
Per-monster
[chance, item] pairs - chance first, the reverse of the drop fields. What the Evil God Icon steals. Parser legaia_game_tables::steal_table.Move-power table Confirmed
Per-move power + behaviour records (26-byte stride, PROT 0898): damage roll, homing, hit reaction, sound cue and spawned-effect lists, in the same id space as the spell table.
Battle attack-camera table Confirmed
Twenty rows of two signed halfwords in the battle overlay: the per-art swing camera offsets. The two columns are alternatives the game coin-flips between.
New-game starting party Confirmed
Four 26-byte records (Vahn / Noa / Gala / Terra) that seed the live character records; opening scene
town01. Parser legaia_game_tables::new_game.Per-character save record Confirmed
The in-RAM record holding one party member's whole state:
0x414 bytes per slot. Cheat-database-pinned offsets for stats, level, magic rank, spells, summons and equipment.Window widget scripts Confirmed
The bytecode behind the UI's window choreography - the shop's slide-in, the menu's staged windows. Fixed 4-byte instructions
[opcode][window id][operand] in the menu overlay's data segment.Code overlays
Archive entries that hold code, not assets: overlays are chunks of MIPS machine code the game loads into RAM on demand, and most of the game's logic lives in them.
MIPS overlay code Inferred
PROT entries carrying MIPS code that loads into the overlay window at
0x801C0000+, detected by the function-prologue fingerprint at byte 0.Overlay pointer-table code Inferred
Sister format: the same overlay-code family, starting with a table of function pointers instead of a prologue. 42 PROT entries, including the ones named after battle special attacks.
Slot-B module layout Confirmed
The file page for the 64 cast / summon modules that timeshare the second overlay window: head table, code, the spawn-record band that carries every effect the module fires, and the tail it inherits from another image.
The port's own formats
Formats the port defines rather than decodes. They carry no disc bytes, so they have no confidence level: each page is the specification. Start from the expansion packs hub for the tour.
Expansion packs
A modder's content pack: layout,
pack.toml, DiscRef coordinates, the .lxpack bundle, validation, cards and modes, and the no-disc-bytes rule.Battles and progression
Derived monsters, formations and waves, encounter overrides, bosses; the XP curve, multipliers and enemy scaling.
Quests, dialogue and saves
Quests and challenges, pack dialogue on the retail runner, and the
LXP1 block a save carries with its tagged tail records.Cutscenes
Scripted scenes on the pack's own sequencer: walks, camera moves, fades, lines that branch, parallel tracks, their hooks and the skip.
Maps
Tiles over a retail base scene, corner-height tiers, props, NPCs, visible walls, zones and entrances from the retail world.
Items and shops
New consumables and equipment beside the retail id space, sets, pack shops, the equip compare and the save record.
Audio
Retail music and cues by coordinate, the pack's own WAV / Ogg tracks and sounds, music zones that cross-fade, boss-phase music and positional ambient loops.
Arts and Seru
New Tactical Arts on the heroes' retail clips, chains into pack finishers, and Seru magic cast as a retail Seru, learned by capture.