COB files

COBs are made with CAOS, and with special cob-making programs like BoBCoB. They are produced both by CL and by users of the game. For the original Creatures, there are no official cob-making programs - BoBCoB is probably the most popular unofficial one - but there are both official and unofficial tools for Creatures 2.

This stub could use more information.

Technical Information

Creatures 1

Creatures 1's COBs are simpler than all later COB/agent files. As with all Creatures file formats, they are in little-endian order.

They are simply defined as such:

Length	Type	Description
2 bytes	integer	COB Version (I've only ever seen 1)
2 bytes	integer	Quantity Available (for injecting)
4 bytes	integer	Expiration month
4 bytes	integer	Expiration day
4 bytes	integer	Expiration year
2 bytes	integer	Number of object scripts
2 bytes	integer	Number of install scripts
4 bytes	integer	Quantity Used (for injecting)
varies	0 or more Script blocks	Object scripts
varies	0 or more Script blocks	Install scripts
4 bytes	integer	Picture width
4 bytes	integer	Picture height
2 bytes	integer	unknown (always seems to be the same as the picture's width)
varies	SPR picture data	Picture. Encoded like a single frame of an SPR with no header.

Script blocks are defined as follows

Length	Type	Description
1 byte	integer	Script Length (if 255, use second script length)
2 bytes	integer	Script Length (if first script length was less than 255, this script length does not exist)
varies	string	Script (Lines of CAOS are comma-separated with no whitespace between them)

Related links

• COB Overview
• C1 RCB files

External links

• Creature Labs' Technical COB Information for Creatures 2