Syplheed-Reborn/docs/re/structures/cutscene-message-table.md

# The cutscene message table — speaker, portrait, timing and audio cue

**✅ Settled 2026-08-26.** The `MSG_DEMO_*` family is not called from any stage
script; it is driven by its own IDXD tables in the language packs. Those tables
carry, per line of cutscene dialogue: **who says it, which portrait is shown,
how long it stays on screen, and which audio cue plays**.

This answers the question left open by
[isl-message-dialogue-link.md](isl-message-dialogue-link.md) — what drives
cutscene dialogue, given that built-in 64 never mentions it.

## Where it lives

32 IDXD objects per language pack (`dat/GP_MAIN_GAME_<lang>.pak`). Each holds a
`Generic` record with a `Count`, plus some number of `Message_NNN` records —
**149 in total** across the English pack, covering **138 distinct ids**.

## Record layout

A `Message_NNN` record has two named fields, `ID` and `PageCount`, and then
**9 positional fields per page**:

| slot | content | example |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | speaker | `CharacterNATALIE` |
| 1 | portrait | `FaceNATALIE_01` |
| 2 | constant `None` at all 149 records | `None` |
| 3 | on-screen seconds, 1.00 – 5.00 (mean 2.48) | `1.9` |
| 4 | audio cue, or empty | `DEMO_017` |
| 5–8 | the four caption keys of that page | `MSG_DEMO_600_000_00` … `_03` |

The field count is exactly **9 · PageCount + 2**, and that identity holds for
every one of the 7 distinct PageCount values present (1→11, 2→20, 3→29, 4→38,
5→47, 6→56, 8→74). That is what pins the per-page grouping.

## Evidence

* **1 252 of 1 252** caption-key slots equal `<ID>_<page>_<line>` exactly, with
  **zero** mismatches. The grouping is not a guess about which slot is which.
* **78** records span more than one page — which independently equals the 78
  multi-page `MSG_DEMO` ids counted from the *caption* side, by a different
  method. Two measurements, same number.
* In **68 of those 78** the speaker changes between pages, confirming from the
  data that successive pages are successive utterances rather than one long
  speech.
* The id sets close exactly: **138 ids in the caption table, 138 in the message
  table, none on either side without the other.**
* 28 distinct speakers, 98 distinct portraits.

## The audio cue (slot 4)

296 of 313 pages carry a cue, and there are **296 distinct values** — one per
page, never reused. It joins to the `SOUNDS` table described in
[sound-cue-table.md](sound-cue-table.md):

    DEMO_017  ->  sound id 8017

The numbering rule is `DEMO_nnn` → `8000 + nnn`, which holds for **286 of 286**
plain-numeric cues. The 9 remaining cues carry a letter suffix
(`DEMO_067A`, `DEMO_190A`–`C`, `DEMO_216A`–`C`, `DEMO_278A`–`B`) and are
assigned 8400–8408 in order. There is no unexplained residue.

Within a message, **77 of the 78** multi-page records number their cues
consecutively; one does not.

**A guess I had and dropped:** slot 4 looked at first like a movie reference,
since the values resemble the `DEMO_nnn` naming of a clip. It is not — there
are 97 `.wmv` files on the disc and their names look nothing like this
(`ADV.wmv`, `RT01A.wmv`), and the values are unique *per page*, which no movie
reference would be.

## What this does not settle

* **`MSG_DEMO_500`** — one page, KATANA, 2 s, **no text and no cue**. A
  placeholder, apparently.
* **Slot 2 is `None` at all 149 records**, so what it would hold otherwise is
  unknown — a constant with no observed variation carries no information.

* **Nothing here was run.** This is a static read of the tables; the playback
  order, and whether slot 3 is really the on-screen duration rather than an
  audio length or a delay, has not been checked against the running game.

## Artifact

[`../data/cutscene-message-table.txt`](../data/cutscene-message-table.txt) —
all 313 pages with speaker, portrait, seconds, cue and text.
Regenerate with `tools/re-capture/sound_cues.py demo`.


## ✅ The cue-less pages are the resupply lines — and they corroborate the movie work

**Settled 2026-08-26.** 16 of the 17 pages with an empty slot 4 belong to five
ids, and those five are exactly the resupply lines already documented from the
*movie* side in [voice-bank-leading-region.md](../voice-bank-leading-region.md).
The caption text matches word for word:

| id | speaker | line | bank |
|---|---|---|---|
| `MSG_DEMO_600` | NATALIE | "Rhino 3 has landed. Commencing resupply." | `VOICE_D_450` |
| `MSG_DEMO_601` | NATALIE | "Rhino Leader has landed. Commencing resupply." | `VOICE_D_451` |
| `MSG_DEMO_602` | NATALIE | "Resupply complete. You are cleared for take-off!" | `VOICE_D_452` |
| `MSG_DEMO_603` | TCAFSUPPLY | "All right, beginning resupply." | `VOICE_D_453` |
| `MSG_DEMO_604` | TCAFSUPPLY | "Resupply complete. Switching to take-off sequence." | `VOICE_D_454` |

This also explains the duplicate records. Each of these ids appears **once per
stage that uses it**, and the repeat counts equal the movie-slot counts recorded
independently for the corresponding banks — **5 of 5**:

    DEMO_600 x3   DEMO_601 x3   DEMO_602 x4   DEMO_603 x4   DEMO_604 x2
    D_450    x3   D_451    x3   D_452    x4   D_453    x4   D_454    x2

Two facts fall out:

* the **11 extra records over 138 ids** are these repeats, not an anomaly; and
* slot 4 is empty on purpose — a resupply line's audio is bound through the
  **movie** path (`VOICE_D_45x`), not through the `DEMO_nnn` cue path, so there
  is no cue to name.

The agreement is worth something beyond closing two items: the cutscene message
table and the movie subtitle chain were decoded separately, from different
containers, and they land on the same five lines with the same multiplicities.