Dungeon Master Forum

Hi,

I want to extract the images from the original dungeon master graphics.dat file. I have used a utility called DM_Decode_V5 by BrianL who was part of the dmclone project. Unfortunatley the utility is incomplete and some images are missing.

So.. does anyone have a utility to rip the graphics from the file?

Any help would be appreciated.

Regards
Matt

I believe that is the latest version of the ripper, and it DOES rip all the graphics, even though some of them look like gibberish. What ones do you think are missing?

Hi Gambit,

Images for WALLITEM_ALCOVE_ORNATE_F1 exist but not the F2 and F3. This is the case for many of the WALLITEM images.

If the images are not missing the only possability is that the original DM engine implemented bitmap scaling. Any ideas?

Matt

You've answered your own question - yes, DM does implement scaling.

i downloaded the csb source and sure enough i found a function that scales/fits bitmaps.

isn't it funny how dm still keeps on suprizing us after all these years.

Matt

As a newbie I would love if somebody could point me in the right direction of a util that would decode all graphics.dat's images.

Thanx,


Ian

go to http://dmweb.free.fr/Forum/

Go to the tools forum

look for a thread from, surprise surprise, zyx

the last post should be the latest version of his ripper, graphreader_v11

Thanks Beowuff!

A very quick response.

From a fellow Scot as well (I'm in Ayrshire, SW Scotland!)!

The link is exactly what I needed!

I am hoping to give a go at my own clone for fun. I will probably bug you for a few more questions as time goes on.

All the best, ( BAAA! )

Ian

np

I've got a site at www.dmjump.net with more links to the biggets clones, but for the FAQ use www.dmjump.net/faq.php instead of the current one.
Put ?s=1 or 2 at the end of that link to open the faq up instantly, or ?kword= and space seperated words if you want to search through it for something specifically.

and lol to the sheep : )

Thanks again,

Nice FAQ but...

One question I can't find answered in the FAQ (I will start a new thread for this as I am leaving the original graphics question here) is has anybody broken up an explained the RPG engine of DM? As a non-traditional-rpg'er, I find all the stats a little confusing. I understand how the likes of weight restrictions and strengths can affect movement or the weildinging of heavy items. But I would have liked to have seen a DM specific pseudo code example of how the stats variables affect various actions or combat. Even somesort of tree diagram showing the dependency of certain actions on certain attributes would be useful. How does time affect these attributes?

This may work out to be more of a wish list than an info request at the end of the day as I don't think there is a short explanation for this side of DM.

Cheers,

Ian

The closest anyone has come to is Paul Stevens with his CSB4windows....he had to convert everything to PC code

The source code he created for it is available on the DME in the clones section ...you can also ask questions in the forum there under CSB For Windows, but probably best for you to sort through the code yourself really, see if you can spot dependancies, and if you find anything cool, let us know!

As for attributes and their effects, it's this subtlety that have kept people guessing in DM. So nope, if anyone has finally gotten this information then they aren't telling.
There are also internal factors like armour, sub-levels and luck that can't be seen that govern actions too.

I used WinUAE to extract the graphics.dat files from the Dungeon Master and Chaos Strikes Back ADFs and copied them to my PC hard drive. When I try to load the Graphics.dat file in all I get is a stupid error message saying "Unknown Format". What the hell? I tried to look for an answer in the small help menu but there was nothing in there. Does anyone know what I'm doing wrong.

Each graphics.dat format is different
Zyx has only got Graphreader working for versions he has access to...
I think the versions are all so similar that they easy to spot what is happening when they are looked at, but not enough to have them dynamically read by the programme.
Like I said, I think that is what is happening, so if it is you'll have to wait for a v0.13, or simply use another set of .dat files... I'm sure it extracts the atari CSB that CSB4 windows uses, and it extracts from PC DM