Diadem of Maunstraut

[Holy_Diver]

I'm somewhat sad :(

I think my game has become broken...

The further chasm of floating magic circles in the Wind Lair castle keep no longer contains circles. I seem unable to progress. This is perhaps connected to the Baal servant resetting his event.

I wonder if this happened when I tried to load DoM into the SoM editor. I got most of it in there, but the map would not import. But I think I surely recall passing thru that chasm after doing so.

Anyway, any hints are welcome. If there is some way I can use SoM or something to force something, I'm up to it. I really can't fathom starting over at this point... and I just got the Truth Mirror and almighty Star or Lore pendant :(

[Hguols]

MIDI has actually come a long way in the past few years. I think towards the end of Windows 98, MIDI started using WAVtables. Meaning, for the midi sound, they actually record a bit of actual instrument via WAV - light years beyond the bloops and bleeps of convential MIDI.

Actually, the WAVTABLE set that comes with XP is quite a bit better than the set that came with Windows 98. You could probably tell a difference between the Maunstraut music (98 wavtable) and the newer clips I donated to Todd (XP wavtable)

I think one of the coolest things is you could spend $700 on an electronic drum set and not get as good a sound as the XP wavtable drums.... which just come with XP.

For the little girl to give you the healing bracelet, its a little on the ironic side. The same thing that sends her to safety is the same thing that sends you to safety.
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As for the magic symbols in the Wind lair, they're a bit tricky - but they have absolutely NOTHING to do with Eidolon's $5,000 deactivating trap offer. If they're the horizontal moving ones, and you walked around the level, walk out to the furthest symbol and it will reappear.

If its the vertical moving ones, there are two sides - one way leads to a dead end with the pit below the only way out. The other side (close to the corridor exit) leads to a small room which activates other symbols. From this room you can....

1) Go left (across symbols) to unlock a gate which will lead to the floor up....

2) Go right (across symbols) to enter the area with the elemental symbol needed to open the final doors.

If you raised the symbols on the corridor's side, fell and lived (for some reason) without unlocking the gate, you might have stucktified yourself.
>_<

Sorry.... If that's the case (I hope it's not) there are saved games on the site you can use so you wouldn't have to start over-over.

[Holy_Diver]

I understand how they work. I did run across them once (the raising set) but I'm pretty sure I reloaded my game afterward. They are just not there in any visible fashion. It seems pretty clear the game is stuck. Unless there is someway I can hack it, it is probably lost. If I could create a custom save game withe SoM's debugging feature set or whatever, that might work, but the event triggers might be a mess.

You really should figure out what the hell is going on if there are bugs like this lurking about. I'd be happy to donate money to game makers, but it's kinda tough when this sort of stuff is possible (or more specifically, happens to me)

Are there not even ways you can make your char fly/go thru walls for these sorts of situations?

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About Midi, I don't know if you're technically using Midi protocols and interfaces to drive sequencers or whatever, but I guess I was referring to Midi sound architectures, which I don't think anyone is using anymore, unless they're trying to use make music come out of retro hardware for retro production/event purposes (I don't know what I'm talking about, but I did understand Midi thoroughly when I was very young)

[Hguols]

Those magic symbols are invisible from the bottom - if they should be there, and they're not (and you're just going on what you see in the game) then you probably stranded yourself.

Don't feel bad. If you did do that, you would be the 3rd person that I know of who's done that.... It's not like it's unheard of. If I was wrist deep in the Sorgsvarte map again, I would concoct something a little less trapping.

You mentioned hacking - with SoM you can.
1) change your PROJECT.DAT to PROJECT.SOM,
2) load it in SoM via Preview Project, (trying to look at the maps will probably just freeze)
3) load your save - use F4 (toggle) to enter "Atari Mode" (where you can "fly" through walls and use A to "fly" up and Z to "fly" down.) ....land in the spot of your choosing
4) save your game

....don't forget to change PROJECT.SOM back to PROJECT.DAT. Mind your "debug" settings, specifically items.... lest you end up with a bunch of extra stuff....

....cheater. ^_^

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As for MIDI sequencing, that's exactly what I'm doing. It's much more precise than realtime, but it takes many times longer to complete.

I wouldn't so much say its "retro" as it is innovative, creative, different.

Reminds me of a recent album I got my hands on - released March 2009, recorded with tube amps and 2" tape. (as apposed to everything digital)

Nothing like a new sound taken 30 years back in the production for a very fresh breath of air.

While I'm sticking with what's digital, the sequencing approach does offer some freshness. Almost this "devoid of life" feel (in a good way) to the music.

[Holy_Diver]

This seems like the right strategy, but unfortunately whenever I load the game from within the SoM editor, all of the interactive objects are pretty much replaced with random other objects, so everything looks like insanity more or less, save for the interiors and monsters.

For instance, in place of the button in the middle of the chasm in question is a half smashed barrel, and pressing it elicits a barrel like response. Everything is strewn about chaotically.

My theory is this might have something to do with John's patching (my SoM is not patched btw) or could be memory corruption... or possibly it is because the map data is not in the project. Opening the map editor shows a void where a map might be, and choosing the import map data button doesn't seem to get me anywhere (I think that is for copying a map from another project into your project anyway)


PS: Generally speaking however, I think having any area of the game ever become unaccessible outside of linear plot advancement is very troubling. Same goes for enemies and other things like items for that matter. If btw, you're done with DoM... do you mind others working on it, to perhaps improve such holes, or even try to improve on the concept some? Really for games divorced from a release oriented market, I don't see the point in not continually polishing them (version by version) like any other piece of software.

[Hguols]

Strange - Perhaps I was too quick to judge "Oh, you probably just lifted those symbols and fell off 'em". That really looks like you've got some skewed model data, but to be honest, I'm not really sure why that's doing that. I wouldn't think that you'd have those errors without the game being patched, but I'm not certain.

As for the map data, that really doesn't have anything to do with your problem. I actually tested it last night, (I didn't want to just feed you a line of B.S.) and you should have been able to "hack" without having anything to do with the map.

Actually, if I would have loaded the map editor in my game, I would have gotten the 00 NEW MAP of wonder because the map data isn't in the correct corresponding folders.

As for the memory "corruption", it's more of a memory "leak" than corruption - at least, its supposed to be. A booboo in the GAME.EXE where it holds onto menu screens at 192kbs per menu open or remembering each map you've been to...

Naturally, having this area inaccessible at any time in the game was something I didn't intend. I expected everyone to ride the symbols (and clap while doing it - ok, not that), find their way to the gate to unlock the path that leads from the ground so that the symbol areas will be free to roam like the rest of the game.

Not so. Like I said, you're the 3rd person to contact me over grief of those damned symbols.

Perhaps if this project had a budget (more time than money) I could accomplish this very thing. Not to minimize your importance (because I really do appreciate every post you make here) but if I would have had 20+ people come to me about this problem, it would have been fixed by now. #_#

How long would it take to fix this and others? Probably not very long at all. I could probably do it on a weekend if I had the time. I've also mentioned that it would be a "someday" thing with me releasing v1.5. (with it getting to version 1.41, it's not like I did abandon it).

Heh, Trismegistus stopped at v1.0 for the moment because the frickin' project already took 4 months in itself to complete and "polish" - quite a bit more even including DoM's version updates.[/b]

[dmpdesign]

I think your problem is you are using the SOM data folders instead of the DoM ones.

When you create the DoM project, it has its own set of data including things like custom items, models etc. If you opened up DoM in SOM, and are using the default files that came with SOM along with John's converter, then you are likely now using the 'data' folder that is referenced by SOM itself. That would explain why certain model IDs and items etc may look completely different in DoM now.

For instance, if you were to use Dark Destiny's data folder in DoM it would be completely fubared. Maybe this is your problem. Try running DoM from the original place you extracted it to rather than through the SoM editor...or better yet, redownload DoM, pull just your save game file over to the brand new download and launch it and I am certain it will fix your problem.

As far as getting yourself out of a stuck area...rather than loading the game via SoM, edit the file, create a new item that warps you to a known safe spot on a certain map, use the SoM editor to make sure that item exists in your pack, resave as the .exe and you should never have to worry about getting stuck forever again.

Note to self, opening any complete and customized SoM game with a default SOM editor (no map files etc) can and will screw it up big time. SoM creates references in the files immediately after you open the project up, regardless of whether or not you actually make any changes while in the editors...I can almost 100% guarantee you that redownloading DoM will save you the pain of figuring out where the missing objects went.

[dmpdesign]

BTW Tom, I hate you for your ability to get DoM and Tris done so quickly (and yes I know Tris was 4 months) while DD is now going on its 8th month

[Holy_Diver]

Let me be clear. I did unpack the DoM download archive again, just to make sure SoM didn't change anything when I tried to investigate DoM initially. It's possible that some change was baked into my save game after subsequent playing before I noticed any strangeness, but I think the odds of this are very low.

Now using the clean DoM filetree (just to assuage any paranoia) I can change the PROJECT.DAT to PROJECT.SOM as suggested. Then I can open DoM up into SoM. I can inspect all of the settings for the project, and probably change them successfully. However the map editor draws a blank (as you probably expect)

Now if I preview the game from SoM... I can use F4 to freely move about. But the object IDs as you say are randomly assigned. All of the objects are objects from the floor, but their locations are all randomly shuffled.

Afaik, SoM should be using the folders in the DoM filetree. But you might know better than me. If so, please advise me very carefully about what I could do to open up DoM into SoM perfectly.


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Alternatively, I wonder if it wouldn't help to put the working DoM filetree (same as the author uses) on the internet so the map editor and all will open up correctly the way the KF1 remake does.

[dmpdesign]

Well the only way to really get everything to work properly running it through SOM is to have a copy of all the SOM files Tom used to create the final game.

The map stuff like you said is expected not to work as the files needed for that are in the original project file and not the output directory that DoM was created with.

Tom recently sent me some copies of a test file to use to try to cause freeze ups, and I can't get those to work because my SOM files are different than his, eventhough he copied his entire DOM directory for me to use.

I suspect when the .exe is written it really is not the same thing as a renamed .som project file....but even if it were, its highly possible the object ID's that were referenced in one project dont match what is in your base files.

For instance, when you create DoM, you may have obj number one on your object table a barrel, and maybe object number 2 was a box. At that point the file is pointing at two places for the information. For this example, lets use the barrel object...when you open the DOM.SOM project (not the .exe but Tom's original files) the actual barrel in the editor is pointing at two different places to get the whole file...part of the file (the model, texture and .prf file) the DOM.SOM file is looking into the C:\programfiles\KF\SOM\Data\Obj directories to grab that information...the other part of the file (the name you called it and its location on the obj editor's list for DOM specifically) is looking at the actual directory that DOM.SOM file data is stored in. The two combined tell DOM.SOM how to act when you run it via SOM.exe

Alternatively, when Tom finishes his game and outputs the .exe file...the file that was originall DOM.SOM now becomes DOM.exe, and a few things happen. Number one, the files originally referenced in C:\ProgramFiles\KF\SOM\Data are now written into the output file and data files somehow, this includes textures, models and .prf files. (There are some custom files this doesnt happen, but lets not confuse the issue at hand with these rare occurences).

Now, this is where my understanding is very limited, but that new DOM.exe file and however it incorporates the models etc that were originally a part of SOM now has a whole new table it writes to that references all the object models and part configurations. There is certainly no guarantee in mind that this matches its original SOM configuration, and even if it does, it most certainly is possible that your install of SOM differs from Tom's.

To avoid this problem with Tom testing DD for me, I have just uploaded my entire installed SOM program folder to an ftp server that he downloads and runs on a seperate machine. That way I know he has the exact same fiile structure I do.

Even if Tom gave you all his files though, I really think that there is a big difference between the .exe output file than there was in the original project.SOM file it was created from.

If you want my advice, and Tom is willing, I would zip up your DOM folder, including your save game and get it somewhere that Tom can download it and see if it operates correctly using his original SOM set of files. Or alternatively see if Tom will copy his entire directory somewhere for you to download and overwrite your files.

Either way, I think the answer will be that the .exe really isnt 100% compatible with being renamed .som and edited with random SOM file configurations. The sad truth is your save file (hopefully you have more than one) is probably jacked up.

Sorry if my post is long and confusing...