Planescape - Questions.

[Guest Dave]

Hello all ,

 

Just built GemRB from CVS and must say, I'm very impressed - However, I;m having a few issues:

 

1: I cant seem to open any containers in PST, is this a known issue? or am I doing something wrong ? :| - No crash or anything, the character only walks upto them and wont open it :/

 

2: When trying to save, the actual full screen dialog seems to loose focus, making it impossible to save, or to cancel the save and return to the game, leaving me with the only option of killing it :|

 

Thanks all!

[Avenger]

Yeah, sadly none of those features (containers/saving game) have been implemented yet.

I believe containers could be done easily, and after a few bugfixes i'll head that direction.

 

Saving a game is another topic. We have not yet decided if we want our save games compatible with the original game (this might be a bit tough). Or we might have a special fileformat (at least a different version) for the saved files (gam/cre/are/wmp).

The internal format of the files is a special hybrid of all of the engine versions, and it would be quite complicated to extract the 'original' fileformat.

[Guest Dave]

Yeah, sadly none of those features (containers/saving game) have been implemented yet.

I believe containers could be done easily, and after a few bugfixes i'll head that direction.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Ahh, ok. Thanks

 

Saving a game is another topic. We have not yet decided if we want our save games compatible with the original game (this might be a bit tough). Or we might have a special fileformat (at least a different version) for the saved files (gam/cre/are/wmp).

The internal format of the files is a special hybrid of all of the engine versions, and it would be quite complicated to extract the 'original' fileformat.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Interesting, perhaps it'd be worth contacting the people who used to run TeamBG (The biggest Infitity community, seems to have vanished now tho :|) I'm sure they'd be happy to give you some info on the file format.

[Guest Avenger_at_work]

The problem is not with the knowledge of the formats

IESDP (hosted on this site) is the most knowledgeable resource of IE engine formats.

The problem is deciding if we want binary compatibility, and if we have it, how to achieve it while our internal format is a mix of all of the engines.

An example:

PST implements item dialogs a different way than BG2.

PST implements map notes a different way than BG2/IWD.

Creature spawns are implemented differently in different engines.

 

Our internal representation of these features is a generalised one.

It would be a bit inconvenient to create all those different saved games instead of a single saved game, which would be compatible only with gemrb.

[igi]

Interesting, perhaps it'd be worth contacting the people who used to run TeamBG (The biggest Infitity community, seems to have vanished now tho :|) I'm sure they'd be happy to give you some info on the file format.

 

I just have to point out, that Avenger *is* from TeamBG.

I'd also rate him in the top 5 most knowledgable people about the engine formats (outside of the original engine developers).

[Avenger]

As an update: container support is more or less implemented.

One can also check the tasklist of gemrb here.

The longest list is in the win32 porting subproject (which of course applies for linux too).

[Guest Lev]

Hi,

 

I've been watching this project for quite some time, since I've been a huge fan of the Infinity engine games (with the exception of Icewind Dale, perhaps) and I'm looking forward to be able to play them under Linux without the hassle of using Wine/Cedega. So great work

 

Anyway, have you meanwhile decided how you are going to implement game saves? Judging from your comment it seems that the natural choice would be to use a custom format. Personally, I wouldn't go through any hassles just to provide binary compatibility. After all, I guess that you could just write an import/export tool for the original save game formats, and that would be fine enough. I mean, when are you going to need this? You'd probably import some save games before you start playing, and that's it.

[Avenger]

Anyway, have you meanwhile decided how you are going to implement game saves? Judging from your comment it seems that the natural choice would be to use a custom format. Personally, I wouldn't go through any hassles just to provide binary compatibility. After all, I guess that you could just write an import/export tool for the original save game formats, and that would be fine enough. I mean, when are you going to need this? You'd probably import some save games before you start playing, and that's it.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Heh, a good question. And yes, i already decided, and partly coded it too.

The solution is a configuration flag: SaveAsOriginal = (0|1)

It will read any engine file (including own format), and will save a file either in its old format, or gemrb's own format.

I recommend using the own format, but anyone can set SaveAsOriginal =1 and load the savegame in the original engine, if they are brave enough.

I won't guarantee it will work, i can only guarantee that GemRB will be able to load the saved game in both case.

Of course, if someone finds an incompatibility and can point out a new unknown field, i'll be happy. And i guess Igi too

 

We have to provide binary compatibility only for area, store and creature.

Of these, only creatures are tough to implement, mostly because of iwd2 (3rd ed AD&D).

[igi]

And i guess Igi too

:-)

 

 

I'd be tempted to have a SaveGameAs() method, then you could save the game in any number of formats based on a parameter:

SaveGameAs(1) -> v1.1

SaveGameAs(2) -> v9

SaveGameAs(3) -> gemrb custom

SaveGameAs(4) -> igi's hacky save game format

 

Or something.

I havent looked at the gemrb code for quite a while though, and I have no idea how feasible this is.

[Avenger]

And i guess Igi too

:-)

 

 

I'd be tempted to have a SaveGameAs() method, then you could save the game in any number of formats based on a parameter:

SaveGameAs(1) -> v1.1

SaveGameAs(2) -> v9

SaveGameAs(3) -> gemrb custom

SaveGameAs(4) -> igi's hacky save game format

 

Or something.

I havent looked at the gemrb code for quite a while though, and I have no idea how feasible this is.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Theoretically this is feasible, because the system would throw away unused values and create default values for non-existing items.

But... there is no reason to save a game in a different version than its original (or the generic gemrb internal format, which is essentially saving a file in an "all-goodies-in-one" style).

Igi's hacky save game format could be achieved by clever configure options, for example the 'HAS_AUTOMAP_INI' option will make the area automap notes to be saved in PST style.

Or... modify the source.