Modding / experimenting in the game (Emperor: Battle for Dune)

NewUser1989
Above we wrote about mods that change the resolution and the camera in combat.

how did this game get me .. after 3x monthly suspended animation (there were a lot of things in real life) I decided to finish the mod and add the shooting TLINFlyer to the game .. it was added successfully. But in the last mission, instead of a mega gun - now a Sardaukar tank .. in general, there has been a shift. there are no other changes ... Maybe because there are too many lines in the rules because of the mod - I don't know.

Yowane's fan, White, do you have anything new? did you experiment more?

PS Version of the mod from September (without the shooting TLIFlyer) in which everything works.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/0o64uwfmxx0mo8v/SubHouseMod4.2.exe?dl=0

I found the reason .. there is a shift in the company when trying to give TLINFlyer its own cartridge - TLBlob.xaf ...

[BulletTypes]
TLINFlyerGun_B -- here is the error.
GuildRocket_B

Hmm .. I'll try to give him ammo from the guild flyer .. but it's a pity .. I really wanted to return my native ammunition. However, given that I have 2 launch files, one for the company - the second for a single shootout, then you can leave your native ammunition in

it
. From the link above.

Nothing new, I have not returned to the game for a very long time, while there is no interest.

Yowane's fan
So it's not just in battle, it's impossible to enter the game at all, since the resolution does not allow this

NewUser1989 Ca
n't see the options button because the resolution is too low?

NewUser1989
Ah, I re-read your message above and understood what it was about. I don’t know, I don’t see configs in the game folder, maybe somewhere in the game archives there are settings responsible for the default resolution? It is necessary to rummage through the RFH archives with the help of this program, which is DuneEx. I would climb myself, but there is no time for it yet.

Tell me more, what version of the game did you try to install.

In the meantime, I decided to look for possible solutions to problems with non-editable FX-data of units. I tried to open a raw xbf file in various HEX editors and in different encodings. I have not found anything worthwhile yet, but I am writing here so as not to forget: I came across another topic on the dune2k forum (here it is - https://forum.dune2k.com/topic/27482-the-xbf-format/), the author of the topic in basically solved the problem of adding new/editing existing units. Just in case, I kept a copy of the page on my disk. it contains a listing of the python code that handles xbf. Also, the author of the topic mentions that adding animation, although difficult, is possible if you use the collada format.

There is nothing about FX. Editors display the conversion from bytes to characters in different ways, but in all the source bytecode is visible, and it is the same. In FX-data, really, most of the bytes are either empty 0000 or an incomprehensible ASCII character with the CC code, see the screenshot below. (open in new tab)
Spoiler
I have no idea how to work with this. Not a single thought.

So the problem is not in adding new units, but rather in ensuring that they do not cause sorties and shifts in the company ... as you can see above - I couldn’t even add a new cartridge .. the megagun disappeared in the last mission. I had to use the one that was already ..

I mean, if you give a Fremen biker a machine gun, he will probably shoot - only the company can be covered.

However, it would be interesting to look at the very possibility of editing units by adding new animations.

Hello everyone) Well, modite?) I learned one thing about the game after 20 years. It turns out that the game has a cooperative (!) passage of the company for two players! Alas, it works only via the Internet, and even then, only with Westwood servers, as I understand it. So don’t play. Damn, there’s no way to do it according to the LAN ... But there were also common saves. Unfortunately, I did not find a video of the process. If anyone has it - write, it's interesting to see how control is given to two players in missions 1-4.

Emp20YearsLater wrote:
I mean, if you give a freeman
biker The funniest thing is that a freeman biker and a sandcrawler is a SG dev easter egg))

White
The cooperative mode worked not only with servers that had sunk into oblivion, but also over the network. There was some kind of medo with dances and a tambourine.

airstorm wrote:
There was some medo with dancing and a tambourine.
Curious about the method? Judging by the discussions on the Internet, everyone complained that it was impossible between two computers.

White
It was about 20 years ago. At that time, the most popular games in local were age of empires 2 and unreal tournament. This game was quickly forgotten. In addition, it was inferior to Dune 2000 in popularity. The only thing I remember is that at our work it was on the same game server as Unreal Tournament, Generals and Call of Duty 1

airstorm wrote:
In addition, it was inferior to Dune 2000 in popularity.
This is not surprising, since the pathfinding in this game by units is completely unsuitable for multiplayer.
It's unrealistically infuriates even when playing with a computer, when the army gets stuck out of the blue and cannot disperse.
If the cooperative passage of the company really worked for you, then it can work out now, you need to experiment with it.

White
Yesterday I asked those who still remained from the old line-up. One man remembered that the one who set it up wrote some text file, stupidly in a notepad, and then renamed .txt to something else. Also, a notepad opened some kind of game file, in which several lines were added. And he remembered this because at that time he had the only computer in the entire department on which Win 2000 was installed. The one who edited the file and wrote a new one did it on his computer, since the notepad from Win 95 or 98 did not fit. I needed Win 2000 or XP due to some limitations in older versions of Notepad. Well, with what I could - I helped.
Keep in mind that these were times when the Internet was not particularly developed even here in Finland. We used netscape navigator and wildly rejoiced at the speed of 128 kb / s, and all game gadgets, cheats, fixes, walkthroughs, etc. received from satellite television (yes, games were devoted to programs and even entire TV channels, mainly on satellites in azimuth 13E and 10E and there were a lot of them on Japanese / Korean), as well as expensive glossy magazines. Most likely, information about the modification of the game was obtained from such a source.

airstorm wrote:
One guy remembered that whoever set it up wrote some text file, stupidly in notepad, and then renamed .txt to something else. Also, a notepad opened some kind of game file, in which several lines were added. And he remembered this because at that time he had the only computer in the entire department on which Win 2000 was installed. The one who edited the file and wrote a new one did it on his computer, since the notepad from Win 95 or 98 did not fit. I needed Win 2000 or XP due to some limitations in older versions of Notepad. Well, with what I could - I helped.
Oh thanks. This information makes sense, apparently he made a bat from a txt file. And the second file could be a configuration file ... Now it remains to try to guess what exactly he wrote and do Internet archeology))

About satellites - interesting, never dealt with them)

White
White wrote:
About satellites - interesting, never dealt with them)
Satellite TV was gaining momentum in the early 90s, just like satellite Internet (but its price was simply astronomical). Back then, everyone was crazy about 13E, because among the 12 channels there was MTV, the second most popular was Eurosport. By the end of the 90s, many channels appeared, among which there were those that broadcast exclusively about games (new items, cheats, file editing, advertising, competitions, recruitment to the studio or training courses), as well as high-tech PC news (from special electronic tables for photo editing, before the announcement of the next video card like Voodoo Banshee). It was through the efforts of satellite TV channels on such topics that Baggerfall was advertised, ugh... I wanted to write The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall :D - As you can see, even in the mid-90s they knew how to promote the game, and then release bugged slag.
Good luck modding the game! I hope you succeed. But even if not, don't lose hope. Indeed, nowadays it has become so fashionable to create (the spelling is not lame, I know that it is necessary to write the turn "O") HD Remaster with screwing co-op / online mode (often with donated trash). If the Praetorians have been remastered, then Dune has a good chance.

airstorm wrote:
As you can see, even in the mid-90s they knew how to promote the game, and then release a buggy slag. In a word, it was fun and interesting.
Ahaha)

airstorm wrote:
Good luck modding the game! I hope you succeed.
Thank you for reading and experimenting. Quick googling has turned up nothing so far.

airstorm wrote:
If the Praetorians are remastered then Dune has a good chance.
I don't think so (The game has abandonware status and it's on the abandoned toy site.
I don't know why it happened, maybe Westwood never transferred the rights to the game to EA.
For now, all hope is for the open-source Corrino Engine https:/ /www.moddb.com/engines/corrinoengine

White
I don't think they'll make it. The new engine is essentially a game from 0. Now it is being developed by one person.

I even completely scored on new versions of my mod ..) There are a lot of problems in real life at work. In general, of course, it would not be bad to finish something new. The only pity is that none of us knows how to work with models (. This is essentially the most important thing.

The ideas are the same:

1. Make the repair site work, animation is there, animation of the shot is also there. We know how to make it possible to heal units (i.e. not just to do negative damage), but how to combine all this together - who knows.

2. I also tried to experiment with the Sardaukar landing ship (IMDropShip) - there is a model, the viewer shows it ... therefore the model is working. But she does not want to be inserted into the game. Crashes with an error.

3. Well, make them work - Scavangers, Smelters and garbage from technology .. but it seems that knowledge in the field of modeling alone is not enough here.

Hello Dune lovers!
There are two modding questions.
1. There is a music.bag file at Battle for Dunedatamusic
in the same place harkonnenmusic.txt , ordosmusic.txt, atreidesmusic.txt, music.txt and commonmusic.txt
on the advice far above :) commented out what is needed.
However, in skirmish mode, soundtracks never play. What can be wrong? Tried for the Harkonnen.

;
; Music tracks for house Harkonnen
;

[LocalDefaults]
Volume = 80
Group = Harkonnen cd2

[HKMenu]
Data = HK_Menu1
Loop = Yes
Phase = -1

[HKMap]
Data = HK_Map1
Loop = Yes
Phase = -1

[HKScore]
Data = HK_Score1
Loop = Yes
Phase = -1



;[Harkonnen1]
;Data = (HK01)The_Machine
;Title = The Machine

;[Harkonnen2]
;Data = (HK02)Surrounded
;Title = Surrounded


;[Harkonnen3]
;Data = (HK03 )Tribute_to_Evil
;Title = Tribute to Evil

;[Harkonnen4]
;Data = (HK04)Harkonnen_Force
;Title = Harkonnen Force


;[Harkonnen5]
;Data = (HK05)Legacy CD3
;Title = Legacy

;[Harkonnen6]
;Data = (HK06) Unstoppable
;Title = Unstoppable


;[Harkonnen7]
;Data = (HK07)Dark_Alliance
;Title = Dark Alliance


;[Harkonnen8]
;Data = (HK08)War_for_the_Spice
;Title = War for the Spice




and commonmusic.txt


[LocalDefaults]
Group = HD InvalidHouse
Volume = 80

;
; Generic Front End themes
;

[INMenu]
Data = IN_Menu
Loop = Yes
Phase = -1

[INScore]
Data = IN_Score
Loop = Yes
Phase = -1



;
; Atreides Skirmish themes
;

[Atreides1]
Group = Atreides HD
Data = (AT01)The_War_Begins
Title = The War Begins
Phase = 0

[Atreides7]
Group = Atreides HD
Data = (AT07)Ride_the_Worm
Title = Ride the Worm
Phase = 0



;
; Harkonnen Skirmish themes
;

[Harkonnen1]
Group = Harkonnen cd2
Data = (HK01)The_Machine
Title = The Machine
Phase = 0


[Harkonnen2]
Data = (HK02)Surrounded
Title = Surrounded
Phase = 0

[Harkonnen3]
Data = (HK03)Tribute_to_Evil
Title = Tribute to Evil
Phase = 0

[Harkonnen4]
Data = (HK04)Harkonnen_Force
Title = Harkonnen Force
Phase = 0




2. There are in skirmish mode such "random appearance of containers" with various property in the form of opening the entire map, units, disguise, or even "nothing", etc. is it possible to customize what drops out of the containers, and also so that the containers have their own color on the radar, if there is such an opportunity, in which files to find it.

That's basically it. Thanks in advance for helpful advice.