creating SWEaW - ModLauncher /help needed

[BertHunter]

Hi there,

for familiarising myself with nsis and coding practise in general, I am creating a launcher for EaW and FoC.
It turned out quite good, so I am toying with the idea of releasing the soon finished product to public.


http://imageshack.us/a/img832/8565/eawmodlauncheren.png


It's fast, reliable, works on 32x/64x, is availalbe in different languages and able to start vanilla, with mods, change languages, open special game-folders, etc ...
Although the design may be lacking (never been my strong point) it is nearly finished.
All left to do is adding in steam support.

Since I do not own the game on steam and I guess I am out of luck with trading it:
I need your help!

If you could provide me with the following information I may be able to release the launcher on eawfilefront or alike in the not so far future ...

----------
BertHunter



Info needed:

-1- Where is 'sweaw.exe' located?
-2- Where is 'swfoc.exe' located?
-3- Where is the 'CustomMaps' folder of EAW located?
-4- Where is the 'CustomMaps' folder of FOC located?
-5- Where is the 'Petroglyph' folder located (storing the savegames)? [Retail: %AppData%\Petroglyph]
-6- All content (please obfuscate cd-key) from "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\(Wow6432Node)\LucasArts\Star Wars Empire at War"
-7- All content (please obfuscate cd-key) from "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\(Wow6432Node)\LucasArts\Star Wars Empire at War Forces of Corruption"
-8- Which languages are availalbe (really only english and french as stated on the game's steamstore page?)
-9- Which language files are installed by default (only english or all available)?
	Retail_EaW: (the same files are found in FoC)
		\GameData\Data\#YOURLANGUAGE#Speech.meg
		\GameData\Data\Audio\SFX\SFX2D_#YOURLANGUAGE#.meg
		\GameData\Data\Text\CreditsText_#YOURLANGUAGE#.dat
		\GameData\Data\Text\MasterTextFile_#YOURLANGUAGE#.dat 
-10- Are previous language files still in place after updating game's language through steam and if, which are?
-11- Are there any different path strings to be found in the registry if EAW is installed to a custom SteamLibrary? (Search the Registry for path string)

[Greatsaga]

I can answer these tomorrow, as I am in the middle of stuff and cannot get the required information for you. But, I can tell you right now, I think you are out of luck creating a launcher for Steam - at least for Forces of Corruption. Valve set up the files in a weird way, and when you launch swfoc.exe, it will launch Empire at War instead. That is one reason why you have to "Modpath" in the game's launch options in Steam when you play mods, as using Mod shortcuts (which are modpaths, but using the swfoc.exe) or launchers will launch Empire at War.

[BertHunter]

I heard of it, but got one or two ideas to get around the limitation. May work, may not...
I will try to set up a steam prototype with different ways to start a mod with the steam version. I can write this prototype's shell but actually need to know 1-7 for finishing it.
But no rush: this project has no time limit. I may not even get anything done over the weekend ;)

Thanks for helping me out!

[BertHunter]

I found a bit of time to program, did some research on the location of the exe-files(which are hopefully right) and wrote a steam only prototype.

Would be great if someone could try it out and see if at least one of the 'start eaw/foc'-buttons works.

For non-testing purposes it is of NO use whatsoever:

---------
What this prototype does:
1. Searching the windows registry and nearby specific folders for the install location of EaW/FoC.
2. Checking if the found folder is a steam created one.
3. Copying a TestModEAWL to the mods dir.
4. starting the GUI.
--
5. If one of the GUI buttons is pressed, it will start the steam version of EaW/FoC and will try to include the previously(-->3.) copied mod. (if the game loading splash screen reads: 'FoC DEMO loading...' it worked!)
--
6. When closing the prototype it will delete the TestModEAWL folder.
--------

I know that there may be a trust issue regarding executables: I made many tests to assure that everyting is working as intended. It is no malware (you may check with your preferred anti-virus software or just: https://www.virustotal.com).

And finally I am posting this, logged in to my precious Steam account, which I really do not want to loose by posting malware or bad-joke-programs.
For the record: I will not provide any warranty whatsoever, but I still hope that somebody will help me out here and tests the prototype.


Regards,
BertHunter


Download the prototype:
https://...

edit: removed download link. No info needed anymore. Got the game myself on steam^^

[Greatsaga]

Originally posted by BertHunter:

I found a bit of time to program, did some research on the location of the exe-files(which are hopefully right) and wrote a steam only prototype.

Would be great if someone could try it out and see if at least one of the 'start eaw/foc'-buttons works.

For non-testing purposes it is of NO use whatsoever:

---------
What this prototype does:
1. Searching the windows registry and nearby specific folders for the install location of EaW/FoC.
2. Checking if the found folder is a steam created one.
3. Copying a TestModEAWL to the mods dir.
4. starting the GUI.
--
5. If one of the GUI buttons is pressed, it will start the steam version of EaW/FoC and will try to include the previously(-->3.) copied mod. (if the game loading splash screen reads: 'FoC DEMO loading...' it worked!)
--
6. When closing the prototype it will delete the TestModEAWL folder.
--------

I know that there may be a trust issue regarding executables: I made many tests to assure that everyting is working as intended. It is no malware (you may check with your preferred anti-virus software or just: https://www.virustotal.com).

And finally I am posting this, logged in to my precious Steam account, which I really do not want to loose by posting malware or bad-joke-programs.
For the record: I will not provide any warranty whatsoever, but I still hope that somebody will help me out here and tests the prototype.


Regards,
BertHunter


Download the prototype:
https://...

edit: removed download link. No info needed anymore. Got the game myself on steam^^

Does it work?

[BertHunter]

The prototype didn't, so it really was a good thing I buyed the steam version.
After a lot of trial and error I finally managed to start a foc mod using the command line (although it involves moving steamapps files).

Still got 4-5 'milestones' to go + making everything foolproof as good as I can.
Maybe I am able finish the launcher next week, but it will possibly take another or even another two weeks - I really want to be sure that no bug gets overlooked!

I will release it to public when I am pleased with it and maybe it will be useful to some people, althoug I think I am ~7 years late already... ;)

[Greatsaga]

Originally posted by BertHunter:

The prototype didn't, so it really was a good thing I buyed the steam version.
After a lot of trial and error I finally managed to start a foc mod using the command line (although it involves moving steamapps files).

Still got 4-5 'milestones' to go + making everything foolproof as good as I can.
Maybe I am able finish the launcher next week, but it will possibly take another or even another two weeks - I really want to be sure that no bug gets overlooked!

I will release it to public when I am pleased with it and maybe it will be useful to some people, althoug I think I am ~7 years late already... ;)

Sounds Awesome, will this launcher be able to launch Vanilla FoC as well? As you cannot currently do that, as I have stated

[BertHunter]

Yes! Vanilla/modded eaw, foc are all supported and I just finished a function to temporarily move files which have to be stored in the main 'data' folder of the game for a mod to work properly (--> e.g. better AI and custom maps for 'Republic at War'). This will maintain compatibility with other mods and online play if you have such a mod installed.

[Greatsaga]

Originally posted by BertHunter:

Yes! Vanilla/modded eaw, foc are all supported and I just finished a function to temporarily move files which have to be stored in the main 'data' folder of the game for a mod to work properly (--> e.g. better AI and custom maps for 'Republic at War'). This will maintain compatibility with other mods and online play if you have such a mod installed.

Technically, having the AI in the Data folder directly for RaW IS the only way to use the AI period. I have tried many times to get it to work from the Mod folder, to no avail. I pretty much already do what your launcher is doing XD, as I do have multiple Data folders that I switch to (for Mods such as RaW as I run the entire mod from the Data folder since I have to with the AI already). Basically, your launcher will move files from the Mods folder to the data folder when launched, then move them back when done (or does that require a push of a button?)

Also, mods such as Thrawn's Revenge require the Multiplayer maps be in your "CustomMaps" or else you will always Sync Error when loading in (and you will notice the map being called "Untiled") in Multiplayer.

[Greatsaga]

Originally posted by BertHunter:

Yes! Vanilla/modded eaw, foc are all supported and I just finished a function to temporarily move files which have to be stored in the main 'data' folder of the game for a mod to work properly (--> e.g. better AI and custom maps for 'Republic at War'). This will maintain compatibility with other mods and online play if you have such a mod installed.

Also, I am quite interested in knowing how you got FoC to run - I cannot for the life of me figure it out.

[BertHunter]

For now I made it work the following way:
The mod's creator or player may create a new folder inside the mod's folder called 'Data_main' (So besides 'Republic_At_War\Data' there would be a 'Republic_At_War\Data_main' folder, too).
Each file and (sub)folder inside the Data_main folder get's moved to the game's main data folder(EaW or FoC) when the player hits the 'PLAY Mod' button. If a file with the same name already exists, it will be moved to a new backup folder.
After the game quits every file will be moved back to their original place. (It will be quick and like it never ever happend... although it was quite complex to code ;) )

Works great for the retail version so far.
While using Steam, it is kind of difficult to detect wether a game has ended or not.
I may have to use a message box and the player has to hit OK in order to move the files back to their places... but I will try to find a better way!

But no matter what, you can look forward to getting more free disk space^^


@foc:
It is nothing which can/should be done without a program since a file has to be edited, folders have to be moved and a dummy file has to be created and in the end everything has 'to be made undone'.
I will tell exactly how it is done when I finished the launcher - it is kind of my 'killer' feature to maybe get the ten, eleven downloads which I aim for^^