A complete list of the functions of the pointers in SMILE's Pointers Dialog. Document created by John Garrity IV(Phazar), and may not be distributed without permission.

If you open SMILE and check out the Pointers Dialog, mainly used for advanced Super Metroid hacking, your first thought might be "Oh dear, how the heck am I supposed to know what all this crap means?" Well, this guide will give you a quick walkthrough of the functions of these pointers, as well as how to use them in your hack.

Level Data - This pointer holds all the information relating to the current placing of the tiles, what type they are, etc. DO NOT TOUCH THIS POINTER UNLESS YOU'RE REPOINTING THE LEVEL DATA TO FREE SPACE! See Grime's expansion guide for more on this if you're really curious.

FX1 - This pointer holds the current FX1 data.

Enemy Pop/Allowed - This pointer keeps track of the room's Enemies Allowed list, and possibly a few other enemy-related quirks.

Enemy Set - This pointer keeps track of the enemies in the room and their properties. When you want to move enemies from one state/room to another, copy that room/state's Enemy Pop/Allowed pointer as well as this one over to the new room. In some cases, they may vanish from their original room, but Help-->Offscreen Enemies to Screen will fix this.

Scroll - This pointer holds the information relating to the scroll areas and which type they are. If you change this to 0000, all scroll areas act like blue scrolls. If changed to 0001, all areas will act like green scrolls.

Unknown1/RoomVar - It should be obvious that this is unknown. Don't mess with it.

FX2 - This pointer holds the current FX2 data.

PLM - This pointer keeps track of the room's PLMs and their high/low set properties. Just like the enemy pointers, this pointer can be used to move PLMs from one room/state to another. Once again, if they become invisible in their original room, use Help-->Offscreen PLMs to Screen.

BG_Data - This pointer determines the room's background(invisible in SMILE, but RoomTest will show you what it is). If you want to use a Layer 2 BG instead, change this to 0000 and go to Tools-->Background Editor-->BG/Layer 2 SCROLLING-->Layer 2. This pointer can also be used to change the BG to the BG of another room. This last part, however, does not work between rooms with different tilesets.

Layer1_2 - This pointer is pretty obscure in function to most people, but has some effect with certain backgrounds and is neccesary for scrolling sky to work. DO NOT CHANGE THIS! YOUR ROOM MAY CRASH!

Door Out - This pointer keeps track of the room's doors and where they lead, and also has something to do with FX1. This pointer can be used to add new doors, but unless you know how to do this, don't mess with it.

That just about covers it. See ya around.