Attention: This website is hopelessly outdated! The good news is that over the prior months and years, RB-III has been further developing BinEdit and it is now more powerful, user-friendly and just generally better than ever. The bad news is that I simply haven't kept pace with the new developments here. By all means, stay and read the tutorials here if you wish, but trust me when I say that you really want to be using the latest BinEdit v2.0+ for your modelling!
You can find the latest program downloads and up-to-date user guide at http://binedit.com.
From here you can download and install the latest version of BINedit (v1.03 Release 22, 7/10/02). This page contains some important installation notes, so make sure you read them all!
System Requirements
The program is designed to run under a Windows environment. The new version of the program should be compatible across all Windows operating systems - Win9x (Windows 95, 98, and 98 SE), and WinNT environments (includes Windows ME and Windows 2000).
BINedit requires a screen mode of AT LEAST 64,000 colours. 256 colours are not enough - the program will still function perfectly normally, but it won't look at all pretty!
You will also require a program that can extract .BIN files and their associated texture files from the game's .POD files onto your hard drive, such as WinPod or the "first time setup" feature of TRI's TrackEd program.
The latest versions of BINedit by Richard Borchard III are presented here; simply click the link to begin the download. You will need a .ZIP archive program such as WinZip to unzip the files once they have been downloaded to your harddrive. This .ZIP contains all the files necessary to run BINedit, however it is currently only available in SGI implementation.
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Newest version - BINedit v1.03 Release 22
BINedit v1.02 Release 21 |
If you have a suggestion for the new version of BINedit or would like to report a bug, please email me at d2smtm2@email.com and I will pass on to Rich any messages I deem worthy of attention. You can view the current list of wanted features, known bugs and latest fixes on the Updates and Wishlist page.
I have kept the older versions of BINedit here, mainly out of respect and just in case anyone wants to download those instead. I can't imagine that anyone would really want to do this, as you'll be missing out on the bug fixes and new features of the updated version of BINedit, not to mention the fact that the old versions aren't compatible with WinNT systems, but here they are anyway.
There are two versions of BINedit - the SGI version and the MS version. BINedit uses the OpenGL 3D-graphics library .DLLs, which are available in two different implementations. The SGI (Silicon Graphics Inc.) implementation is the faster, bigger, and less compatible version of the two. The Microsoft implementation is considerably smaller and slightly slower, but seems to work on all PCs. It is suggested you try the faster SGI version first. If it doesn't work on your machine, come back for the Microsoft OpenGL .DLLs.
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BINedit SGI v0.902 Release 20 BINedit MS v0.902 Release 20 |
Download a version of BINedit. Unzip the files and place them together in the directory of your choosing. Double-click to executable (*.EXE) file to run.
The first time you run BINedit you should get a message asking you to set the Preferences. (If you were to try to open a .BIN model now all you'd get is an error message about being unable to locate files, before BINedit crashes.) Before you can use the program to edit models you must first set the Preferences so it can locate the files it needs.
Start BINedit and click the File menu. From the list select Preferences....
The following window appears:
Here you must enter the paths to where your model (.BIN), texture (.RAW and .ACT) and truck (.TRK) files are located, plus the default .ACT colour palette. You can manually type the path for each one, or click the button to the right of each field to browse for the required file/folder.
You will need a program that will extract the files (.BIN, .RAW, .ACT and so on) from the .POD files that the game uses, so that you can edit them. Two good programs are WinPod (which allows you to manage PODs through a slick WinZip-style interface), and PodView (used for POD2 style format - everything post MTM2). These .ZIP files include everything you need to run these programs - just unzip and go.
Once extracted from the .PODs, the files will normally be placed in subfolders in your game folder. For MTM the default .BIN model directory is the Models subfolder of the MTM folder, the default .RAW and .ACT folder is the Art subfolder, and the default .TRK folder is the Truck subfolder.
I will use MTM2 as an example here. My BINedit is set up for use with MTM2, which was installed in the following directory:
C:\Program Files\Microsoft Games\Monster Truck Madness 2
The first field asks for the default .ACT colour palette file. BINedit uses this palette file for textures which don't have their own unique palette files, but use a 'global' palette file that is used for all textures in that game. All games previous to and including MTM1 use a global .ACT file, however even if you're editing a more recent game (such as MTM2) this palette file is sometimes still needed.
Any generic .ACT file will work - BINedit just wants a colour table in case it can't find the correct one. Metalcr2.act from MTM1 is good choice (you can click here to download this file if you don't have it). Metalcr2.act should be located in the Art folder,
C:\Program Files\Microsoft Games\Monster Truck Madness 2\ART\Metalcr2.act
The Models folder contains all the .BIN files that have been extracted from .PODs. This is the directory that BINedit will default to when you go to open a .BIN file.
The location of the Models folder is
C:\Program Files\Microsoft Games\Monster Truck Madness 2\MODELS
The Art folder is where all the texture files (.RAW and .ACT) will have been extracted. When you load a .BIN model, BINedit looks in this folder and loads the necessary texture files.
The route to the Art folder is
C:\Program Files\Microsoft Games\Monster Truck Madness 2\ART
.TRK files are extracted to the Truck folder. This is the folder that BINedit will default to when you send the command to import a Truck (.TRK file).
Truck folder is found at
C:\Program Files\Microsoft Games\Monster Truck Madness 2\TRUCK
If your game installation is different or you are using BINedit to edit the models of an entirely different game, you an just replace C:\Program Files\Microsoft Games\Monster Truck Madness 2 with whatever your directory really is.
Congratulations, BINedit is now fully set up and ready for work!
BINedit was programmed by Oliver Pieper (or OP as he likes to be called) during his time as a student at the Philipps-University in Marburg. You can find his current website and details at http://www.viaregio.de/pieper/.
Please be aware that OP no longer works on the program due to lack of time and lack of interest in MTM. However, salvation is at hand as Richard Borchard III has become interested enough in it to take on the mammoth task of updating BINedit and implementing some new features we've long wanted to see. If you have a suggestion for the new version of BINedit or would like to report a bug, please email me at d2smtm2@email.com and I will pass on to Rich any messages I deem worthy of attention.
Although OP no longer works on the program, he had as his last act decided to make the BINedit v0.920 source code and project files (Visual C++ 5.0) available for download for any programmers who would like to see how it works and maybe even improve it.
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Download BINedit Source |