Materials (Metroid Prime 3)

The format for materials saw a dramatic overhaul in Metroid Prime 3. The format is seen in both the CMDL and MREA formats and is identical in both. This particular material format appears in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption and Donkey Kong Country Returns.

This file format needs more research Need to find TEV values for each subsection type

Material Set Format

Materials come as part of a set; although most files will only have one set, some CMDLs will have more, as indicated by a count value in the header. The set format is merely a 32-bit count value followed by that number of materials.

Material Format

The material format starts with a 28-byte header, then after that is broken up into a bunch of subsections.

Header

Offset	Type	Size	Description	Notes
0x0	u32	4	Material size	Does not include size value
0x4	u32	4	Material flags	Only bottom 17 bits are valid
0x8	u32	4	Group index	Denotes groups of materials that share the same settings, but different textures.
0xC	u32	4	Unknown	Value is possibly unused; the material loading code seems to skip it
0x10	u32	4	Vertex attribute flags	Functionality is identical to Metroid Prime 2
0x14	u32	4	Unknown	Value is possibly unused; the material loading code seems to skip it
0x18	u32	4	Unknown
0x1C	u32	4	Unknown
0x20	End of header

Flags

Known flag values:

Bit	Hex	Description
0	0x1	Unknown
1	0x2	Unknown
2	0x4	Unknown
3	0x8	Enable punchthrough alpha
4	0x10	Unknown
5	0x20	Enable additive blending (probably - needs verification)
6	0x40	Unknown
7	0x80	Unknown
8	0x100	Shadow occluder mesh; meshes using this material are not rendered, but can be used to cast dynamic shadows on actors
9	0x200	Unknown
10	0x400	Unknown
11	0x800	Unknown

Subsections

The rest of the material data is made up of a number of subsections. These subsections generally set different texture slots, as well as other parameters like Konst colors and material opacity. There's no count for the number of subsections; it needs to be read in using a while loop. The "END " section denotes the end of the material.

The order of the subsections doesn't matter. One material can only have one of each type of subsection; if there's any additional ones, they will overwrite the previous ones.

There are three subsection types (aside from END): PASS, CLR, and INT. Each of these types has a number of subtypes.

PASS

Offset	Type	Size	Description	Notes
0x0	u32	4	PASS subsection size
0x4	char[4]	4	Section subtype fourCC	See below for possible subtypes
0x8	u32	4	Unknown	Only bottom 5 bits are valid
0xC	TXTR	8	Texture ID
0x14	u32	4	UV Source	Only bottom 4 bits are valid
0x18	u32	4	UV animations size	Needs verification; only bottom 8 bits are valid

List of possible PASS subtypes:

Type	Description
DIFF	Lightmap
BLOL	Bloom lightmap
CLR	Diffuse map
TRAN	Greyscale opacity map; white indicates transparent, black indicates opaque (Retro is backwards)
INCA	Emissive map
RFLV	Specular map
RFLD	Reflection/sphere map
LRLD	See RFLD
LURD	See RFLV
BLOD	See BLOL
BLOI	See BLOL
XRAY	Sphere map for X-Ray models; similar to RFLD

CLR

Offset	Type	Size	Description	Notes
0x0	char[4]	4	Section subtype fourCC	See below for possible subtypes
0x4	u32	4	Color value	32-bit RGBA value

List of possible CLR subtypes:

Type	Description
CLR
DIFB

INT

Offset	Type	Size	Description	Notes
0x0	char[4]	4	Section subtype fourCC	See below for possible subtypes
0x4	u32	4	Value	Actually an 8-bit value; the top 24 bits are ignored

List of possible INT subtypes:

Type	Description
OPAC	Sets the opacity of the entire material
BLOD
BLOI
BNIF
XRBR