---------------------------------------------------------------
 LBA Brick and Sprite file format 
  they are described together because they are almost the same
 Author: Kazimierz Krl (zink)
 Revision: 1.0a
---------------------------------------------------------------

 Brick files are all entries of lba_brk.hqr file from LBA 1
  and entries 198 ~ 18100 of lba_bkg.hqr file from LBA 2.

 Sprite files are all entries of sprites.hqr files from LBA 1 and 2

 Main difference between sprites and sricks is that sprites have additional 8 bytes at the file beginning. All rest data (besides two bytes that will be explained further) has identical meaning.

 The Bricks/Sprites are images compressed in special format. The compression is lossless, and it's similar to RLE compression used in some bitmaps (*.bmp).

 
 First 8 bytes of sprite files:
--------------------------------

 Offset Type   Meaning

 0x00:  DWORD  Describes the offset of data block in the file, usually 
                (if not always) it is value of 8.
 0x04:  DWORD  Describes the size of data block in the file, usually 
                (if not always) it is value of FileSize minus 8.

 
 Common data block:
--------------------
 Offsets here are in format 0x41(0x49): 
  Number without brackets means offset in the brick file.
  Number with brackets means offset in sprite file (+8).

 Offset         Type   Meaning

 0x00(0x08):    BYTE   Width of brick/sprite in pixels
 0x01(0x09):    BYTE   Height of brick/sprite in pixels
 0x02(0x0A):  (s)BYTE  Screen offset in X axis
 0x03(0x0B):  (s)BYTE  Screen offset in Y axis
  
 In brick files and in LBA 1 sprite files the offsets are unsigned bytes. Only in LBA 2 sprite files the offsets are signed bytes. This is the last difference between bricks and sprites. The remaining data is identical.

 The next data describes the lines. It repeats as many times as the height of brick/sprite is.

 First byte of a line describes number of sub-lines that the line is made of.
 The next data describes sub-lines of specified line. It repeats as many times as the number of sub-lines is.
 Each sub-line has format as follows:
  First byte contains flags and length of the sub-line in pixels:
   bits 7 and 6 are flags and their values can be as follows:
    00 - the sub-line is transparent, no colour bytes after the first byte
    01 - each pixel of the sub-line has its own colour, there are so many colour bytes as the lenght of sub-line value is. The colour bytes are right after the first byte.
    10 - all pixels of the sub-line have the same colour, there is one colour byte after the first byte.
    11 - same as 01 (but never used).
   bits 5 ~ 0 describe the length of the sub-line decreased by 1 (000000(bin) = 1 pixel).
 
  After the flag/length byte there may be no bytes or a number of colour bytes (depending on the flags). The colour bytes refer to colours in the palette.

 Sum of all sub-lines widths in one line must be equal to brick/sprite width, otherwise it may be displayed in a wrong way. If your line ends before it reaches the brick/sprite width, put there a transparent line of appropriate length.      


 Thanks to Alexfont for telling me about sprite and brick format similarities.

--------------------------------------------------------------------
 That is all I know. 
 If you know something more, I will be grateful if you let me know.
 e-mail:   zink@poczta.onet.pl
 web page: moonbase.kazekr.net
--------------------------------------------------------------------

Revision history:
 1.0a: specification revised 