Dungeon Master Forum

Hi everyone!

I’m at the end of my first walkthrough of the original game (DOS version 3.4 on iOS emulator, originally played on Atari ST, taking care of some unfinished business from my childhood when I couldn’t get past level 6).

I just retrieved the Firestaff but now I realized that I somewhere lost the Hardcleave on my way. I searched through so many levels but can’t find it. Now it would be the perfect weapon for Sonja!

Is there any way to look into the samegame file and retrieve the exact location??

That would be of great help!

Thanks Lorenz

You can use CSBuild to open your saved game. It runs on Windows.
http://dmweb.free.fr/community/tools/cs ... l-csbuild/

There is a search feature to locate anything in the dungeon. CSBuild was made for Chaos Strikes Back, so the item names in the search menu are the CSB ones, not the DM ones. In order to find the Hardcleave, you must search for "Executioner" instead.

You can find corresponding item names in DM / CSB here:
http://dmweb.free.fr/community/document ... roperties/

Thanks for your help @ChristopheF !

I succeded in installing and running CSBuild on macOS using the wine-wrapper Whiskey (https://getwhisky.app). When loading my DOS savegame it displays multiple error messages, some of them a little funny ("unnatural"):

"Number of Levels > 64"
"The databases in the savegame file appear damaged"
"Error reading big-endian...will try little-endian"
"Illegal object at 0(-4,00) Object value = 0xfffe"
"ONE OR MORE OBJECTS HAVE BEEN DELETED
FROM THE DUNGEON BECAUSE THEY ARE LOCATED
IN MORE THAN ONE PLACE IN THE DUNGEON AT
THE SAME TIME. THIS IS NOT ONLY UNNATURAL
IT CAN CAUSE BIG PROBLEMS.
IF YOU REALLY WANT THIS TO HAPPEN, SELECT
Edit|Options|Allow Cloned Objects BEFORE
YOU LOAD YOUR DESIGN TO BE EDITED.

Object 1784 at 0(-4,00) is in more than one place.
Object 1803 at 0(-4,00) is in more than one place.
Object 1835 at 0(-4,00) is in more than one place."

... but then after clicking "Cancel" it loads all levels without problems.

I found the Hardcleave in level 9 where it belongs! Silly me, I thought that I took it, but I didn't

Thanks again!

Just a short explanation about the messages. You get them for 2 reasons:
- CSBuild assumes first Atari ST savegame while you were playing on PC-DOS, then CSBuild complains and converts it to Atari format (little-endian).
- The illegal objects may come from duplicate objects, that should not exist but it can happen in DM. Though the location (-4,0) is weird, I don't know if it is a side effect of the conversion.
At least you've found the Hardcleave that you actually didn't lose