how can i set breakpoint before the game loads any assets?

[grief3r]

im trying to figure out how different games unpack the data found under the usrdir directory , however setting a break point to the default load adress (08804000) and dumping the ram seems to indicate this data has already been unpacked

example. if i wanted to view the assembly code in mgspw right as the game reads the first byte from slot.dat under PSP_GAME\USRDIR how would i go about doing this?

[[Unknown]]

Under "Debug", uncheck "Run on Load". Then open the game (it will be paused.)

If the data is already loaded at this point, it means it's compiled into the game's binary. Sometimes games do this - they may even have preloaded data that can also be found under USRDIR.

This means it's part of the EBOOT.

But games can (this is rare) load at a different address. If it isn't loaded yet with the above steps, you can now step through to find out when it is.

As for checking when games load from files, you can set a breakpoint inside the zz_sceIoRead function (which is the stub that calls sceIoRead - games can't/don't call sceIoRead directly, they always use the stub.)

-[Unknown]