Possible wall of text incoming. I wanted to research making my own abilities/attacks and there are little to no guides on how it's done or what I'll need to do. So I became inspired after playing with Dark Injection abilities, and that inspiration could be used to add my own things, that is if I can put it together. That leads me to a lot of curiosity as this can be very customizable, difficult and rewarding.
First thing I want to ask is.. how can I find the animations (for creatures) and is there some sort of way to have a preview? Is there a place (or places) where most or all animations are compiled in the game's data? I'm asking because I see there are a bunch of hashed names, and I don't think there is a way to decipher the hash directly.
Second, is it even possible to make new animations? I know, that's asking a lot! However, I've always been curious about animating in 3D. Is there hope, and/or can I extract animations from Darkspore if I'm really inclined to?
Next is effects. Is it too tall of an order to experiment with new effects? Where can effects files be found in the data of the game (and again, hash decoding would be helpful if that is possible)? Would it be a good or reasonable idea to grab effects from Darkspore?
I've been browsing the Dark Injection abilities and such so I can (hopefully) learn how to add attacks and the like. So, if I run into an issue or something goes awry, I guess I'll return to this topic and then ask about it.