DKRDS Track (File Format)

DKRDS Track is the nameless file format used in Diddy Kong Racing DS that stores the tracks' section models, collision and textures. Its type identifier in assets.bin is 0x9A.

File Format

The file byte order is always little endian.

Header

The file starts with a header that is 56 bytes long.

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	Int32	Number of sections (N).
0x04	Int32	Track Section Group offset.
0x08	Int32	Terrain Effects offset.
0x0C	Byte[4]	Unknown. Always 0xCCCCCCCC.
0x10	Int32	Culling Groups offset.
0x14	Int32	Culling Groups data type: 1 = 4-byte per N group. 2 = 8-byte per N group.
0x18	Int32	Number of textures (X).
0x1C	Int32	Texture Group offset.
0x20	Int32	Culling BSP Tree offset.
0x24	Int32	Wish Race Unknown Section entry count.
0x28	Int32	Wish Race Unknown Section offset.
0x2C	Byte[4]	Unknown. Seems to be some kind of flags.
0x30	Int32	Unknown.
0x34	Int32	File size.
0x38	End of header

Track Section Group

This group starts with a list of N offsets.

Track Section Header

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	Int32[N]	Track Section Entry offsets. Relative to the start of this group.

Track Section Entry

Every section entry defines model and collision data. The entry starts with a 32-byte header.

Track Section Entry Header

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	Byte	Unknown.
0x01	Byte	Unknown. Always 5?
0x02	UInt16	Unknown.
0x04	UInt16	Number of polygon groups (P).
0x06	UInt16	Number of vertices in Track Section Vertex Data (V).
0x08	UInt16	Number of UVs in Track Section UV Data (U).
0x0A	UInt16	Number of colors in Track Section Color Data (C).
0x0C	Int32	Track Section Triangle Data offset.
0x10	Int32	Track Section Collision Data offset.
0x14	Int32	Track Section Vertex Data offset.
0x18	Int32	Track Section UV Data offset.
0x1C	Int32	Track Section Color Data offset.
0x20	End of header, start of Track Section Data

Track Section Data

This data follows directly after the header of the section entry and starts with a 76-byte header.

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	Int32	Unknown. Seems to be always 0xFFFFFFFF and set to an address when loaded in memory.
0x04	Int32[3]	Collision XYZ offset.
0x10	Int32[3]	Visual model XYZ offset. The units are not the same as the collision offset.
0x1C	Track Section AABB[2]	AABB areas of the entire section used for collision detection. The second AABB always seems to be a duplicate of the first.
0x4C	End of header, start of Track Section Polygon Data

Track Section AABB

Track sections contain 2 identical AABB areas each. It is unknown why there's a duplicate, perhaps used during runtime after object space transform. All values need to be divided by 64 in order to obtain the absolute position data and match with the visual models.

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	Int32[3]	AABB minimum XYZ position.
0x0C	Int32[3]	AABB XYZ extent.

Track Section Polygon Data

This section seems to store P polygon groups' attributes.

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	Polygon Group Entry[P]	Polygon group entries.

Polygon Group Entry

Each polygon group entry is 12 bytes long.

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	UInt16	First triangle ID.
0x02	UInt16	Number of triangles.
0x04	Byte	Main collision attribute. AAAA BBBB: A: Shadow level. The higher the value, the darker the character gets. B: Collision flag: ID Description 0x01 Road and effects. 0x05 Wall (sparks on collision). 0x08 Special effects (turns off visual model). 0x0C Invisible wall (no sparks on collision, turns off visual model).
0x05	Byte	Secondary collision attribute: Main flag = 0x01: ID Description 0x00 Special effect? Used for water. 0x01 Pass through/no effect. 0x04 Road. Main flag = 0x08: ID Description 0x00 Invisible wall (no sparks on collision). 0x01 Water.
0x06	UInt16	Tertiary collision attribute. Split in bits. Main flag = 0x01: ID Description 0x01 Unknown. Used in non-collideable stuff. 0x02 Water, inflates tires in car. 0x10 Unknown. Used in non-collideable stuff. 0x20 Unknown. Used in non-collideable stuff. 0x60 Unknown. Used in non-collideable stuff. Main flag = 0x08: ID Description 0x30 Unknown. Used in non-collideable stuff. Main flag = 0x0C: ID Description 0x04 Ignore when using plane.
0x08	Byte[4]	Collision grid mask. This is an OR of all of the collision grids for all triangles in this group.

The number of triangles T can be calculated by adding the first triangle ID to the number of triangles of the last polygon group entry.

Track Section Triangle Data

This section stores T triangle entries.

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	Triangle Entry[T]	Triangle entries.

Triangle Entry

Each triangle entry is 20 bytes long.

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	UInt16	Attribute flags. AAAA AAAA AAAA AAAB: A: Texture ID. B: Collidable attribute? If 0 in roads, the triangles are not collidable. Unknown meaning in walls.
0x02	UInt16[3]	Face XYZ normals. Values need to be divided by 4096.
0x08	Byte[4]	Vertex position indices. The index for each of the 3 vertices is 10 bits long. 2 last bits are unknown.
0x0C	Byte[4]	UV indices. The index for each of the 3 vertices is 10 bits long. 2 last bits are unknown.
0x10	Byte[4]	Color indices. The index for each of the 3 vertices is 10 bits long. 2 last bits are unknown.

Track Section Collision Data

Each triangle corresponds to a 4-byte set of values to help with collision detection. These values encode local X, Y and Z coordinates that form a grid of cells inside the section's AABB.

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	Byte	Y occupancy. Values correspond to 8 cells of the AABB (AABB's Y extent / 8).
0x01	Byte	Z occupancy. Values correspond to 8 cells of the AABB (AABB's Z extent / 8).
0x02	UInt16	X occupancy. Values correspond to 16 cells of the AABB (AABB's X extent / 16).

The following ARM assembly instructions (@01FF95D0 from the game's code) demonstrate how the vehicle's current grid bitmask is compared to the current testing triangle's collision:

AND R0, R0, R5 // R0 = triangle's collision value AND vehicle's bitmask
TST R0, #FF // test byte 0 (Y)
TSTNE R0, #FF00 // if nonzero, test byte 1 (Z)
MOVNES R0, R0, LSR #10 // if still nonzero, test upper 16 bits (X)
MOVNE R0, #1 // collidable only if ALL 3 are nonzero

The following functions in C# compute a triangle's collision grid from its minimum and maximum positions and its containing section's AABB:

uint ComputeCollision(float xMin, float xMax, float yMin, float yMax, float zMin, float zMax, float aabbXMin, float aabbXExt, float aabbYMin, float aabbYExt, float aabbZMin, float aabbZExt)
{
    if (aabbXExt <= 0 || aabbYExt <= 0 || aabbZExt <= 0)
        return 0xFFFFFFFFu;

    uint xBits = ComputeCellBits(xMin - aabbXMin, xMax - aabbXMin, aabbXExt / 16f, 16);
    uint zBits = ComputeCellBits(zMin - aabbZMin, zMax - aabbZMin, aabbZExt / 8f, 8);
    uint yBits = ComputeCellBits(yMin - aabbYMin, yMax - aabbYMin, aabbYExt / 8f, 8);

    return (xBits << 16) | (zBits << 8) | yBits;
}

uint ComputeCellBits(float relMin, float relMax, float cellSize, int nrCells)
{
    const float Epsilon = 1e-4f;
    float faceMin = relMin / cellSize;
    float faceMax = relMax / cellSize;

    // Special case for degenerate faces (flat faces with zero extent in this axis, e.g. a wall parallel to XZ)
    if (MathF.Abs(faceMax - faceMin) < Epsilon)
    {
        int cell = Math.Max(0, Math.Min(nrCells - 1, (int)MathF.Floor(faceMin)));
        bool atExact = MathF.Abs(faceMin - MathF.Round(faceMin)) < Epsilon;
        bool atMaxEdge = cell == nrCells - 1;

        // Include the preceding cell only at an interior exact boundary
        if (atExact && cell > 0 && !atMaxEdge)
            return (1u << cell) | (1u << (cell - 1));

        return 1u << cell;
    }

    int cellMin = (int)MathF.Floor(faceMin);
    int cellMax = (int)MathF.Floor(faceMax - Epsilon); // Exact upper boundary stays in current cell

    // Exact lower boundary stays in the preceding cell
    bool atExactLow = MathF.Abs(faceMin - MathF.Round(faceMin)) < Epsilon;
    bool atMaxLow = cellMin == nrCells - 1;
    if (atExactLow && cellMin > 0 && !atMaxLow)
        cellMin--;

    cellMin = Math.Max(0, cellMin);
    cellMax = Math.Min(nrCells - 1, cellMax);

    uint bits = 0;

    for (int c = cellMin; c <= cellMax; c++)
        bits |= 1u << c;

    return bits;
}

Track Section Vertex Data

Vertex data is stored as 6-byte groups per entry V.

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	Int16[3][V]	Vertex XYZ position.

Track Section UV Data

UV data is stored as 4-byte groups per entry U.

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	Int16[2][U]	Vertex UV position.

Track Section Color Data

Color data is stored as 2-byte groups per entry C.

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	UInt16[C]	RGBA5551 color.

Terrain Effects

Each texture is linked to 2 specific terrain effects that affect the vehicle's speed, particles and lighting. This section contains 2 blocks of X UInt16s.

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	UInt16[X]	Effects, split in bits.
X * 2	UInt16[X]	Unknown. This seems to be a copy of the previous block?

Culling Groups

This section includes a 4-byte or 8-byte per track section values that determine which section models are loaded when entering a specific section. Each section is represented as 1 bit.

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	UInt16[N]/UInt32[N]	Culled model sections, represented as N bits, 1 per section, in order from the least to the most significant bit. 0 if culled, 1 if loaded.

Texture Group

See DKRDS Texture Group.

Culling BSP Tree

This section defines a serialized axis-aligned binary space partitioning tree used for culling sections along with the Culling Groups section. The game traverses it to determine which sections are candidates for rendering given the current player's position, and then performs a secondary AABB overlap test on each candidate before adding it to the active render list. The section consists of a sequence of variable-length nodes and leaves stored one after another.

Interior Node

An interior node is always 8 bytes long and can be identified apart from a leaf node if the first Int16 is not negative.

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	Int16	Axis index into the player position array: 0 = X axis. 1 = Y axis. Unused? 2 = Z axis.
0x02	Int16	Split value high bits.
0x04	UInt16	Split value low bits.
0x06	Int16	Skip count. The right child begins at (node_offset + 8) + skip * 2 bytes from the start of this section. The left child begins immediately at node_offset + 8.

The split coordinate is reconstructed by the game as a 32-bit signed result, then divided by 64 to obtain the coordinates in world units (the same scale as the section AABBs):

split = ((split_high << 16) | (split_low & 0xFFFF)) / 64

To encode a world-coordinate integer back into the two stored fields:

split_raw = round(split * 64)							   
(Int16)split_high = (split_raw >> 16) & 0xFFFF
(UInt16)split_low = split_raw & 0xFFFF

Leaf Node

Leaf nodes are variable-length.

Offset	Type	Description
0x00	Int16	Negative count (-L). The value is always negative. Its negation L gives the number of section IDs that follow.
0x02	Int16[L]	Section IDs. Zero-based indices into the Track Section Group. A section may appear in more than one leaf when its AABB occupies a split plane.

Traversal Algorithm

The game calls the function @02006CC4(bsp_ptr, track_sg, position, tolerance, out_list):

• bsp_ptr: pointer to the start of this section in RAM.
• track_sg: pointer to the Track Section Group.
• position: player XYZ position.
• tolerance: a proximity radius, observed as 0xF00 (60 in world units).
• out_list: output structure that receives the active section list.

At each interior node, in world-unit scale:

pos = position[axis]
split_raw = (split_high << 16) | (split_low & 0xFFFF)
split = split_raw / 64

If split - pos > tolerance, visit the left child only; else if pos - split ≥ tolerance, visit the right child only; otherwise, visit both children.

The left child corresponds to sections whose AABB satisfies min[axis] ≤ split; the right child corresponds to sections whose AABB satisfies max[axis] ≥ split. Sections satisfying both (i.e. whose AABB traverses the split plane) appear in leaves on both sides.

At each leaf node, for every listed section ID the section's data pointer is first looked up via the Track Section Group. Then, the player's bounding box is tested ((X ± tolerance) * (Z ± tolerance)) against the section's AABB. If the AABB test passes, add the section to the active render list.

Wish Race Unknown Section

This section is only used for the Wish Race tracks. TBD

Tools

The following tools can handle DKRDS Track:

• (none)