Diesel Mod.

atani · Post by **atani** » Mon Mar 12, 2007 6:35 pm

Dr Frag wrote:The problem is that existing content is inside .fpk files right?

That is part of the problem, but, I can detect if the Livery skins are there and then I know what the names are for the "basic" engines which come with the game (and/or the patches). So it is just going to be whatever is in content of the mods that are installed otherwise, but that is also solvable by packaging PakBuild.exe (from Firaxis) with the installer and then invoking it on the FPK files to list the contents and then look for the train tags in there.

Its mainly time to code all of this that I dont have a lot of right now. Currently rebuilding my linux box so I can set it up for dual boot with Vista for testing my game on Vista and linux (I have lots of machines here, 1 G4 Tower with OSX 10.4, one iBook with 10.3, one Solaris box [about to upgrade to Solaris 10], Lenovo Z61t [laptop with XP Professional], and my main desktop [Pentium D930, 2GB ram, 160GB HD, NVidia 7600, two LCD screens], 2 Dell GX110 machines in the garage acting as web servers, an HP Media Center PC [forget the numbers, i think 4760?] which has close stats to my main desktop machine which is running XP, soon to be Vista).

Mike

K-class · Post by **K-class** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 6:32 am

Cool thanks for the update - I will wait silently.

CeeBee51 · Post by **CeeBee51** » Thu Mar 15, 2007 2:01 am

this forum is oh so quiet what with the engine creators seemingly gone. I'd practically give my firstborn for new engines and skins and an installer to load them up for dummies like me.

dwax · Post by **dwax** » Thu Mar 15, 2007 2:17 am

I second that CeeBee51

Thats what happens when the game developers abandon the game. Me thinks this game was a quick way for them to make some quick bucks and forget it.

gforce · Post by **gforce** » Thu Mar 15, 2007 5:35 am

so, it's better that i don't publish my map, because in this way i work for firaxis for nothing,
still for all those firaxis-incognito-people:
give me a proposition (money), and maybe i will publish it...

for those that post a message stating out that firaxis sucks,
they will get a copy personnaly!

K-class · Post by **K-class** » Thu Mar 15, 2007 9:50 am

Yeah but we still have choobacca and Big Papa and the Basin & Range Demo v0.1 which is a leap forward.

The new port and goods, double locos and skins all in this one map shows what can be done.

Do we need firaxis for train mods and maps?????????

Even thoe I cant see us getting a patch anytime soon I still see a future as there is enough info in the wiki (hopefully backed so we dont loose this hint hint) and forum posts to still go forward so others and us can designe our own maps.

Most of the CTD's are a thing of the past as these are nearly all gone once the ofending xml is altered. (I save all the time and the odd crash I can put up with but the latter maps for me are CTD free, just slow down getting near the end of the game.)

firaxis sucks,

I understand the grrrrrrrr frustration but at least we have SMR could have been worst no SMR at all.

Im sure the are reading these forums as the power of the likes of google direct people to this forums so they would be wise to take notice.

atani · Post by **atani** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 5:03 pm

K-class wrote:Cool thanks for the update - I will wait silently.

I now have train skin installing working within my new version of the installer macros, but it is really inefficient when it comes to checking the FPK files (it does a brute force parse of the FPK file searching for the string required). I am going to try and write an extension to NSIS that can read the FPK file in an intelligent fashion (like reading only the TOC portion vs the entire file), if that speeds up the process enough I will release it with that, otherwise it will go out with the current solution in place.

Mike

dwax · Post by **dwax** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 5:19 pm

OxoB has alot of skins in some of his posts, I downloaded alot but could never get them to load. He has GP38SkinPac GP7SkinPac and alot more but I have no idea how to get them to work.

atani · Post by **atani** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 7:01 pm

dwax wrote:OxoB has alot of skins in some of his posts, I downloaded alot but could never get them to load. He has GP38SkinPac GP7SkinPac and alot more but I have no idea how to get them to work.

I downloaded all skins that are on this forum and will generate installers for all of them.

For the GP7/38 stuff, I will only deal with the packs since they are "cumulative"

Mike

K-class · Post by **K-class** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 7:03 pm

Thanks atani for the update. Sounds like a brutal process like getting blood out of stone.

Even if you getting a output of xml that needs to be added elsewhere, a file dropped into a folder or a set of instructions that work would be appreciated.

Same as dwax the instructions for installing skins does not work.

atani · Post by **atani** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 7:22 pm

K-class wrote:Thanks atani for the update. Sounds like a brutal process like getting blood out of stone.

Even if you getting a output of xml that needs to be added elsewhere, a file dropped into a folder or a set of instructions that work would be appreciated.

Same as dwax the instructions for installing skins does not work.

Actually, I found a posting (and C++ source code) for reading the FPK files, I am going to see if I can write a FPK file parser inside NSIS. If that fails or is horribly slow (which it might be) I will just rewrite the logic into a C++ NSIS extension. Doing this will also clean up a bit of the crap that is in there now to work around some of the limitations of NSIS (like splitting new XML entries so they dont go over 1024 characters)

More updates as I get time to look at the FPK parser..

Mike

atani · Post by **atani** » Sat Mar 17, 2007 8:54 am

GP7 basic installer

K-class · Post by **K-class** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 3:12 am

Thank you atani will go and play.

CeeBee51 · Post by **CeeBee51** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 11:58 am

Thanks for the gp7 installer Mike. I got the GP7 to work in my BC map so now I'm off to try some skins.

dwax · Post by **dwax** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 6:46 pm

I don't see the gp7 in any maps,except on the new Basin & Range Demo map. what maps should it show up in?