Fallout Hacking... How about Wasteland?

V

vovan

First time out of the vault
Hi, everybody. :)

I've been lurking the forums for a while now, but now I have a question. :)

Okay, so I myself like to code stuff. Now, summer is coming up, and I decided to take a break from everything, so I am not going to be working or studying during the summer (yay!). Hence, I was looking for some sort of a pet project for the summer. My first idea was: "Hey wouldn't it be cool to write an engine that would run Fallout, but also allow people to create their own adventures, and give them much more power than the fallout editor, and also make it more user-friendly to make mods."

Well... Upon consideration, I realized that it's much too big a project for me now, so I'll shelve it till I am a more experienced programmer and/or have more than a summer's worth of free time. :)

So, my next idea was: "Well now, wouldn't it be cool to have a pretty front-end to Wasteland?" It was a sweet game. Upon replaying it recently, I realized that, unlike fallout, this one could most definitely use a facelift. The GUI is the most problematic area for the modern user, IMHO, and plus, I'll bet many of the Fallout fans that never got to play Wasteland are put off by the looks of it even if they try it now.

Wasteland it is then. But now I have a problem. :)

I would like to keep it all legal, see. And technically, from what I understand, Wasteland is not free-/adandonware. Hence, I can't just take all of its contents and distribute them freely with my engine. I need to make my engine "require" the files that come with the game in some way.

So, I was messing with the game's data files in order to figure out how the actual game information is stored. Now, I figured that all the info is stored in the game1 and game2 files - everything else is like pictures and stuff. But what I need to know is what format is the stuff stored in? I know for Fallout there are docs on the web that specify the format you can use to extract the information you need from the dat files. Now, my question is: does anyone know of similar docs outlining the Wasteland file format? Someone must have figured it out, since there are utilities on the web that allow you to, say, reset the the progress in the game, or merge another person's characters into your game.

So, my question is: does anyone know of such docs that outline the format of Wasteland's data files?

TIA
 
Thanks. I already looked at that site, and actually asked on their forums, just today, so we'll see. :)
 
Let me know how it goes, Im tied up with MR MOD at the moment but would be willing help a little bit
 
Don't bother. This stuff is ancient, and game resources are probably machine instructions anyway.

http://www.thevats.net/doomsayer/megaton/index.html

Why should you be interested? That game helped me to get a job. Moreover, there's practically no grudge work like writing writing graphics utilities left (and that's my job anyway), and lots of opportunities to work on things that'll look good on your resume. For example, I'm working on item and inventory design right now and I could use someone to write utilities for them. Or if you want to help me to implement a freeware scripting engine (mine's okay, but it sucks compared to other stuff out there), that'll be great too.
 
APTYP said:
Don't bother.
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Thanks. That's very helpful.

APTYP said:
This stuff is ancient,
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Exactly. Everything new is old stuff that has been thoroughly forgotten. You know that one right? Well, let me tell you: it's still a great game, and since it is ancient, people like you don't even bother playing it. And I think it sucks, since there is truly quite a gaming experience to be had there, despite that fact that its ancient. And that's exactly the reason why I intend on giving the game a facelift. That, and since it was written in MASM, the logic is not incredibly complicated and is thus quite a breeze to implement using, say C++.

APTYP said:
and game resources are probably machine instructions anyway.
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Nope. If you dasm them, you see that they are not, though digging through the file header, I kinda think I have an idea of what the format is.

APTYP said:
http://www.thevats.net/doomsayer/megaton/index.html

Why should you be interested? That game helped me to get a job.
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Why should I be interested again?

APTYP said:
Moreover, there's practically no grudge work like writing writing graphics utilities left (and that's my job anyway), and lots of opportunities to work on things that'll look good on your resume. For example, I'm working on item and inventory design right now and I could use someone to write utilities for them.
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What incredible fun. :?

Any ways, thanks for the advice, but I'll just stick to this idea for now. I'd prefer to code a game from the ground up any way, and not just write utilities for someone.
 
I say stick at Vovan, I'd love to play it once it is completed. I know heaps of old games I used to love playing and would love to play them again, but the interface is just two combersome on mot of these. That and they are usaully old DOS game that ends up casuing problems.
Go for it, I know most fallout out fans look at Wasteland as being "Fallout 0" or the first fallout. I've never actaully played it myself, but would love to give it a go someday. I'm sure you will have plenty of downloads.

BTW, if you make an engine that can play quite a few old games like Bards tale etc... You will soon be famous! I if the engine mearly reads the exisiting game files you could sell it too, except of course I'm sure youd give it to fallout fans for free ;)
 
vovan said:
Thanks. That's very helpful.
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Any time, buddy.

Well, let me tell you: it's still a great game, and since it is ancient, people like you don't even bother playing it.
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I didn't say the game was crap, I meant the code.

Why should I be interested again?
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Because you like to code, you want to work on a game, you only have one summer, you are not experienced enough to make a game like Fallout, ...

What incredible fun. :?
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I see you never actually tried to write a game from scratch.

Any ways, thanks for the advice, but I'll just stick to this idea for now. I'd prefer to code a game from the ground up any way, and not just write utilities for someone.
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That's what I said to myself two summers ago, and I only started doing the actual game programming this week. Anyway, if you make Wasteland client by the end of the summer, I'll eat my shorts. Cheers, and good luck wasting your time.
 
I am normaly very nice on these forums, but would you please stop typing. I know contructive critism is very usefull but being as blatently rude as yourself is uncalled for. Must you be so bitter that you feel the need to pull down other peopes ideas all the time.

So what if someone does actaully give it a go and fail, at least they tried and most likely learnt something at the same time. Thereby actaully improving their chance of success next time. Like it or not, it is not a bad thing to fail at something or make a mistake, not learning from the experience is. That how humans learn things - By experience, by the actual doing.
 
I have no reason to be bitter, in fact things are just getting good. And I'm not trying to make him to give up, just pick a reasonable project to work on.

Yeah, I know you'll learn a lot from it, but I also know that at the end of the day you gonna wish you listened to all those people telling you to size down your expectations. A less ambitious project will not only give you the skills - it'll give you RESULTS. Something a failed 'mega-game' never will.

Wasteland Revival is dead. So says the news page. It's been hosted on DAC for some time, too.

http://thevats.net/revival/news.htm
 
That's Java, though. There's Wasteland Zero, which is for C++, although it's been abandoned too, and it was made for what, DOS? Then again it's probably too 'developed' and therefore 'boring' to our guy.
 
Yes, I can concede that setting your expectations to high can be as bad as to low. Yes you do need to be realistic in your goals, otherwise you become discouraged and give up. This is a good point APTYP
 
APTYP said:
That's Java, though. There's Wasteland Zero, which is for C++, although it's been abandoned too, and it was made for what, DOS? Then again it's probably too 'developed' and therefore 'boring' to our guy.
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No, the source they have available for download at Watseland Revival is VB. Apparently they may have some in Java, but you would have to email the author for that code.
 
Heh, I see this has turned into a heated discussion over my skills and aspirations. :)

Let us not concern ourselves with that matter, however. I'll just limit my response to that to the following: game two of my friends and I wrote last summer was featured as a finalist of the Student Showcase at the GDC this spring. So that will hopefully stop all the "oh, you are a n00b and need to get a clue" posts.

Next up, the project itself. As I pointed out above, I do realize that making a full-fledged fallout-like clone is still way over my head. That is why I chose Wasteland for cloning. :) If you look at the structure of the game, it is infinitely simpler, and hence I feel I can manage to finish the game in one summer.

As far as existing projects are concerned... Thanks for the links. I've seen all of those sites before, and they didn't help me much. All of the projects seem abandoned. Wasteland Revival doesn't show any signs of life any more, and Wasteland 0's site isn't even up any more. Although I did actually find the sources to both Wasteland 0, and WR, neither game actually utilizes the original game's files in any way. So, I can't really learn about the format of the data files, which is what interests me, from these old projects.

Additionally, like I said before, I'm just looking for something for myself to do. Hence, I would prefer to work alone and from scratch - I get tons of group projects at school, and it is hard enough to manage a group of four-five coders when you are all in the same place. To pull off the same over the web is nigh impossible, as far as I am concerned.

Back to the topic of this thread, though, I still haven't figured out the format of the data files for the game, so if anyone has any tips on that, they are more than welcome. ;)
 
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