IWD-BG2 download and overview

[CamDawg]

OK, so no actual download, as I'm at work, but there will be one.

 

Like BGT or Tutu, this aims to convert IWD into the BG2 engine for more or less the same litany of reasons. I've spent a few weeks to examine whether this is even feasible, and made some good progress, so now I'm opening it up for assistance with the inevitable tedious monkey work that'll be coming.

 

I've done all of my testing and experiments converting a TotL game to a BG2 ToB game. I believe we'll be able to convert IWD and HoW games; however, I don't think we'll be able to do this on an SoA game.

 

EDIT by DavidW: this is Cam's original (2008) download, NOT the beta-test download.

iwd_in_bg2_alpha_negative_18.rar

[berelinde]

Put me to work.

 

The technical aspects are probably way over my head, but if there's anything I can do, I'll be glad to do it.

 

Edit:

"Ini files need to be turned into area scripts. This will be manual."

 

This sounds like something I can handle. I can probably also handle sound conversions.

[CamDawg]

Put me to work.

 

The technical aspects are probably way over my head, but if there's anything I can do, I'll be glad to do it.

 

Edit:

"Ini files need to be turned into area scripts. This will be manual."

 

This sounds like something I can handle.

They're basically spawn points for monsters in various areas that get set off by a various global variables getting set. Hopefully it should be fairly straightforward, though you may also need to clone the monsters since the ini files also sometimes assign them DVs, scripts, etc.

[berelinde]

Yeah, I think I'll be OK with that. I've spawned creatures and set DV's etc. before.

[cmorgan]

ETA on my availability is two weeks, I am afraid, but I have a clean ToB install set aside, and IWD from the Ultimate Collection. I can set up parallel HoW and vanilla installs, or TotL, whatever you prefer. Still slogging through miscellaneous mods updates and thoroughly enjoying Domi's IWD2 NPCs, but I expect to get some playing time in this weekend, so I think my timeline is good.

[CamDawg]

Download is now attached. I've been using this on clean, patched IWD+TotL and clean, patched ToB. It may work on base IWD or HoW games, but it won't work without ToB.

 

It'll take a loooong time to install so be patient. Since there's no uninstall, use a spare ToB install. It shouldn't make changes to your IWD install, so no worries there.

[berelinde]

Er, What's TotL? I've got IWD, and I can get a fresh BG2 installation easily enough, but all I've got is IWD and HoW.

[CamDawg]

During install, two logs are made in the lib folder--fx.tpa (see DavidW's spell thread) and dvs.tpa. DVs is the log of creature files that have secondary and/or tertiary DVs, which we'll need to handle via baldur.bcs or some other hack.

 

The real sleight of hand (and one of the major slowdowns for install) is dealing with strings. The batch file makes iwd.tra from the IWD dialog.tlk. Files with strings are copied, and lib/strings.tpa is created on the fly and then later included. Basically, files are copied to the override and strref's read as numeric values. Simultaneously, strings.tpa is appended with a COPY_EXISTING and a SAY @xxx to pull the real strings from iwd.tra instead of using the existing BG2 values. If there's a way to simply drop the IWD tlk on top of the BG2 one (and get the starting value) this could be done purely numerically and save a massive re-copy of resources.

[devSin]

What's TotL?

Free mod from BIS.

[CamDawg]

Er, What's TotL? I've got IWD, and I can get a fresh BG2 installation easily enough, but all I've got is IWD and HoW.

Trials of the Luremaster, the free expansion to HoW (with patchy goodness to boot).

[SimDing0]

If there's a way to simply drop the IWD tlk on top of the BG2 one (and get the starting value) this could be done purely numerically and save a massive re-copy of resources.

I was actually going to mention this, but I thought everyone would laugh at me. If Tutu taught me one thing, it's that I don't like on-the-fly converters (I couldn't make Tutu 4 work half the time, and I was meant to be maintaining the damn thing). I strongly encourage you to aim for an EasyTutu-style distribution ultimately, and with the TLK-append trick you can do that AND make translations super-duper easy. Just drop the IWD strings in around 60,000 or wherever we decide there definitely isn't anything related to the BG2 interface. It doesn't matter if we overwrite BG2 mod (or even original content) strings or whatever.

(If it turns out TLK filesize is an issue, Avenger developed a tool for DLTC which removed non-vital strrefs. And you're almost definitely laughing at me now and typing something about pulling a stripdown out my ass... )

[cmorgan]

Is Macready available? He isn't finished with EasyTutu Beta work, but he is the only person around who has created a full distribution packet using InstallShield. I took a look at the docs for this stuff when Ascension64 was getting reports of BGT installs failing with incomplete base install work. He had another way of dealing with it, but the InstallShield had the ability to script checking for a complete install, as well as creating the registry entries. It is a rockin' distribution system, too, since it creates independent installs without cannibalizing resources; it means you could run concurrent installs. (I need a larger harddrive).

[devSin]

Why not just append a unique string, get the strref that's returned, append the whole of IWD's tlk, and then write IWDref + start_ref + 1 (e.g., a new string appended at 74000 means you'd just write an IWD tlk ref 0 at 0 + 74000 + 1)?

[SimDing0]

Always appending at the same place has the effect of guaranteeing fixed strrefs for the conversion, though, which while not totally crucial goes that bit further to ensuring nobody accidentally distributes a mod turning skeletons into journal entries.

[berelinde]

Started the installer, typed in the path name, and then went off to do something else.

 

This morning, I found that the installation ran into a problem:

 

C:\Program Files\Black Isle\BGII - SoA\iwd_in_bg2\override\TOWER.MVE

C:\Program Files\Black Isle\BGII - SoA\iwd_in_bg2\override\TSRLOGO.MVE

C:\Program Files\Black Isle\BGII - SoA\iwd_in_bg2\override\WOTC.MVE

'weidu' is not recognized as an internal or external command,

operable program or batch file.

1 file(s) copied.

[..\weidu.exe] WeiDU version 20400

Unknown argument: [files/black]

 

WeiDU (version 20400: "Auto-start after update")

 

usage: WeiDU [options] BAF,BCS,D,DLG,TRA,TP,TP2-files

 

General Input Options:

 

--game X set main game directory to X

--nogame do not load any default game files

--search X look in X for input files (cumulative)

--tlkin X use X as DIALOG.TLK

//etc.

 

Suggestions?

 

I should probably point out that since I was using a virgin patched ToB installation, I hadn't actually placed a copy of weidu.exe in my game directory.

 

The window is still open. I have a feeling that if I close it now, bad things will happen and I'll have to reinstall BG2 again. Not that that's a big deal, but if I can avoid it, that would be nice.