Character pictures

PicturesInTheDark · Post by **PicturesInTheDark** » Tue Mar 11, 2003 2:00 pm

When I tried to look into an elder save game of mine (CSB original, played with CSBwin) I got totally scrambled-up pictures of the characters. Is that a problem with 1.4 for certain games or do you have any other explanation? Has anybody else encountered this so far?

One more thing: with some *.dat files DMute crashes outright (equally on 1.3 and 1.4) - can the reason for this be generally found or is it possible that personal dungeons are modified by other tools so they cause that crash? (Suggestion: a log file or an error message what the problem is would be nice...)

Regards PitD

Post by **Gambit37** » Tue Mar 11, 2003 2:50 pm

Some people have stated that the portraits messing up only happens in DMute 1.4 but I sometimes got this editing CSB Amiga save games in 1.3 so it's an old problem.

DMute doesn't recognise everything about a .dat file, in particular new stuff discovered by Sphenx and Paul Stevens. So maps built with their editors often don't work with DMute. And any .dat files that use the expanded database from CSBuilder definitely won't work in DMute.

PicturesInTheDark · Post by **PicturesInTheDark** » Tue Mar 11, 2003 3:55 pm

Hmm. Agreed on the new builders and the expanded database (that is a pain in the ass, too - would be nice to have that changed!), but as I stated it was a standard CSB game (classical adventure) with no modifications whatsoever. I used to see the pics properly with 1.3 and by chance tried it yesterday with 1.4 - result as described above.

Regards PitD

PicturesInTheDark · Post by **PicturesInTheDark** » Thu Apr 10, 2003 1:39 pm

Ok, I'll try again. I tried to load a perfectly normal, non-CSBuild-orDMEdit-or-otherwise-changed game with a normal-sized database (not enlarged) and the pictures in DMute 1.4 are screwed up. Even trying to load them does not enhance matters.

A second matter: Following an old thread from Paul Stevens in Christophe's forum he said that it would be possible to enlarge the database and still be able to see games saved that way with DMute if the code of DMute gets changed along the lines of the Atari version. While I do not understand this, would such an enhancement be possible, George?

It's been bugging me a while and nearly every dungeon I played with CSBwin (not wanting to miss the sound compared to DM PC) at some point wants to enlarge the database because the objects (mostly weapons or food) get beyond 1023 and I can either enlarge the DB without then being able to view the game in DMute or let the game delete the additional ones. Enabling an enlargement while still be able to use DMute afterwards would be a help.

Regards, PitD

PicturesInTheDark · Post by **PicturesInTheDark** » Tue May 27, 2003 11:59 am

Got no answer on that one so far, so I'll revive it - did anyone experience a similar thing? I still have the save game - if somebody wants to try it, feel free to post or email me.

Regards, PitD

beowuuf · Post by **beowuuf** » Tue May 27, 2003 3:07 pm

i remember people complaining that even 1.3 had problems with CSB portraits, usually from modified games though

As for expanded databases etc. the problem is that DMute uses static positions - ie it always knows potion 20 is at line x, whereas what the other editors do is use the information at the very start of the .dat file to know how many ibjects are in the game, so will know that potion 20 should go to line (x items before potions + 20)

this sounds fairly fundamental, which would be why George probably hasn't done anything about it - he would effectively have to write a new editor, and there are already two people doing that with DMBuild and CSBBuilder!

another problem with CSB, to go back to your original point, and DM - in long games, the engine starts producing clones tiles, items, and other strange effects itself - this could easily crash DMute, which doesn't like nastier cases of this (well, 1.4 at least, 1.3 tended to open thigs but do a shuff;ling crash when displaying items)

PicturesInTheDark · Post by **PicturesInTheDark** » Wed May 28, 2003 12:50 pm

Ok, that might be possible, thanks fuzzy... it is indeed a long game, since it was the one where I cleaned up all the items from the dungeon to see if I could. Still think this is a flaw in the editor, though, since no modifications have been made to this game in any way.

Regards, PitD