'.dat' Files

[The Old Dragon]

I've been looking into making a 'delivery' system for my mod (when I eventually get that far) when I realised that creating a new .dat file would be a nice and clean way as it'd pack away all the folders for you.

This turned out to be a lot easier than I thought it would and I soon had my very own little test .dat file. Problem is, Nexus doesn't like it. It complains about my shiptypes in the .sobj files for some reason, even though those very same files work fine when they're 'unpacked'. ?(

I tried repacking the original game files just to check that I wasn't doing something wrong and hey presto, worked like a charm. No problems at all.
I even tried packing the New Conflicts mod into .dat file as well. Nexus once again complained, though this time it was about the creators characters.

Anybody want to hazard a theory as to why our modded files won't work once they're packed?

[Arparso]

I don't know. Just tried it with the default Nexus Skirmisher mod and it worked alright. I copied datool.exe into the mod folder and used the following command to pack everything up:

Code: [Select]

datool c skirmisher.dat *.*
After deleting everything except that dat file, I also had to rename "skirmisher.dat" to the actual mod's name (e.g. "Nexus Skirmisher.dat") in order for it to work. The test mission loaded without any problems, so I don't know, what your problem might be.

Are you working on a campaign mod? Maybe this works differently. What name did you give your dat file and where did you place it?

[The Old Dragon]

Aye, it's for a new campaign.
Just done some experimenting and now know that it has to be called 'nexus_00.dat' or I get a general windows 'I'm not working, go tell ms' warning. The file itself I placed with the other .dat files in the Nexus root directory.
Perhaps the nexus_00.dap file is conflicting in some way.

But I still find it odd that N:TAA works when it's unpacked...

[Mularac]

Did you try unpacking and then re-packing nexus original campaign files? Perhaps there's a bug on the packing algorithm.

[Arparso]

I don't think so. It's just Nexus behaving oddly because using those .dat files was never intended by the developers and we don't really know how these files are being loaded.

By the way: the nexus_00.dap belongs AFAIK to the patch and contains some updated mission and campaign scripts, amongst other files. Just extract it using datool and see for yourself.

I don't know, if the .dat-approach is gonna work for campaign mods. As far as I can tell, Nexus only loads the nexus_00.dat and nexus_00.dap and nothing else (the other .dat files are encrypted bink movies and no archives). Replacing the nexus_00.dat with your mod is a bad idea, unless you don't rely on any vanilla nexus files... every file from the stock game you'd need would have to be included in your dat, since it can't be provided by the default file. Even a simple campaign mod would get fairly huge, if you needed to include all those meshes, textures and sounds. Replacing the nexus_00.dap might be a better approach, but you'd need to make sure to replace every file from the vanilla game you don't need for your mod with an empty file at least. Especially all the script files (missions, story, etc.) would have to be replaced by your own or empty files, if you don't want them to interfere with your custom campaign.

[The Old Dragon]

@Mularac...

Aye, the original game files work fine when I use them to create a new .dat file. It appears to be our modded campaigns (I've tried N:TAA and New Conflicts so far) that have issues.

@Arparso...

My intention is to create a whole new stand alone campaign. At the moment, I've removed some 90% of the alien presence plus any Human/NDF stuff that won't be required. In it's unpacked form, what I've got of the N:TAA campaign works great, so there are no missing files (especially the ones that it's complaining about). But yes, I'm afraid it will be a rather chunky download when it's ready.

Right then, I'm off to dismantle the patch and see what goodies are inside...

EDIT:

Found the problem... the .dap file was overwriting my tacticstypes.ini. Works great now

Maybe Nexus only sees a .dap file if there's an associated .dat file for it? With the game unpacked, it wouldn't find a .dat, therefore no .dap file, ergo no conflict.  Only a vague theory mind, but it would fit the problem I had quite nicely.
Anyway, this one's solved so we can relax the grey matter, for a while at least lol

[anr96]

I want to extract the content of the ig3 demo's genesis.dat, I tried both daTool and Nex, but none of them work. Is there a tool, that can handle this?

[Arparso]

Use Gentool - it's similar and was specifically made to work with the IG3: Genesis demo.

[anr96]

Thanks. I saw the developer of the Gentool (Rainman) is created a mod from the ig3 demo. Where can I find him?

[Mularac]

here: http://www.moddb.com/groups/the-nexii/downloads/imperium-galactica-iii-demo1