UFO / TFTD Combo Mod

[Bomb Bloke]

Yeah, I'm finally done hijacking this thread.

 

What we have here is a mod that merges UFO and TFTD. You get a full world map, and can stage missions in pretty much any terrain you want.

 

This is, however, an alpha release. Consider it more of a "trial run" then a "working game". It's quite playable; just filled with bugs. Some of them I know about, more important are the ones I don't. There's plenty of polishing to do but the rough edges must first be found.

 

Installation & Usage:

 

Currently the mod is "invasive", that is to say, if you install it on your copy of TFTD, then it can no longer be played normally. Copy your game folder somewhere (anywhere) and use this secondary version for the mod instead.

 

Grab my toolpack and extract it into the game folder. Run the hybrid game generator with the path to your Enemy Unknown game as the parameter. This will create a Hybrid subfolder in your TFTD folder.

 

To do this, you'll need to open a command prompt window (Windows button + R, type "cmd", press enter), switch to the "bb_tact" folder in your game directory (eg, "cd\games\tftd\bb_tact"), then enter the command:

 

hybrid ""

 

When that's complete, copy the contents of the Hybrid Maps/Routes folders into your TFTD Maps/Routes folders. Say yes to any file overwrite prompts.

 

Do the same for the Terrain folder, but don't copy the files "plane.mcd", "plane.pck" or "plane.tab".

 

If you're using the CE version of TFTD, you must split your executable. If you have XcomUtil installed then this is already done. If not, run "_EXE Split.bat" (included with my toolkit) and that should do the job for you.

 

Ok, now extract the combomod into your game folder as well (again allowing any file overwrites). Run the batch file "CreateComboModBackups.bat" and the setup is complete.

 

Combo_Mod_Alpha_1.zip

 

To play your modded game, run "ComboMod.bat" (do this under DosBox if not using the CE version of the game).

 

What Happens:

 

You can build your bases pretty much anywhere you like (but note that aliens prefer flying around the sea, so make sure you've got at least some radar coverage in that area).

 

Sea missions have a 25% chance each of being either a plain seabed setting or coral. That leaves a 50% chance it'll be anything else.

 

Land missions work much the same as they do under Enemy Unknown (if you land in the snow, you get a snow mission, etc).

 

Artifact/base missions on land skip the entry phase and jump straight to the second stage of the mission (as the first stage is supposed to be on the sea floor).

 

Island/Port missions have a 1/3 of a chance of turning out to be Urban missions.

 

Known Issues:

 

* Mod is currently only for TFTD (due to the work required to create a new land/sea geoscape for EU, which uses less polys).

 

* Urban missions aren't generated very well, your dropship can land on the roads and certain other modules are placed badly.

 

* EU Alien/X-Com bases are plain broken, I need to mess with the unit/object tables to make them work, it's probably easy enough. I intend on introducing new "entry" missions by adding the bases elevators into the EU terrain sets. The artifact missions probably work.

 

* If a USO is involved, then your flying suits will work on land.

 

* Mod installation is a bit messier then I'd like it to be - it'll eventually be non-invasive so the game can be played as normal without requiring two copies on your drive.

 

* Saving the game mid-mission will only work for underwater stages.

 

* The modded geoscape uses very large polygons for the sea. The game will occasionally tell you that a base cannot be built in a certain location (when you should really be able to build the things ANYWHERE). Zooming ALL THE WAY IN results in the large polygons becoming invisible.

 

* TFTD thinks the whole world is made up of "sea" (so USOs will ALWAYS be flying "underwater" even when over a mountain range). This is about the only thing I can't do much about, though it's more of a cosmetic issue then anything (assuming the USOs aren't able to dive deeper on land then your craft can go, I dunno if this is the case or not).

 

* The hybrid generator currently can't deal with the overhead map sprites at all. I can probably fake this support pretty well though.

 

[Thunder_Gr]

Great! Thanks BB! I am glad you have gotten this far. I am sure this mod can go all the way!

I am grabbing it right now...I will give some feedback, soon!

[Thorondor]

I must applaud this effort. It's a very interesting concept, BB

 

::

 

Do you stock up on aspirine, though ? I fathom there's still a lot of water under this here bridge...

[Bomb Bloke]

Meh, I know how to fix most of the bugs on that list. It's just a case of bashing out the boring code to do it...

 

I'd probably be a lot more productive if I could be bothered with aspirin and coffee and such.

[Thunder_Gr]

First bug report. On my first land mission(touched down UFO on the north-african desert) I got this mesage:

"Too many map codes loaded" followed by a number for memory size and last conventional memory block.

By pressing a key, it moved on, stating 12 civilians died. Then it went to geoscape.

While on geoscape, I spotted a UFO, and clicked on intercept. The exact same message appeared, and then the screen with the 12 civilians died and so on.

[Bomb Bloke]

A copy of the MissDat folder would be handy to work out why the map was throwing the error code.

 

I've no idea why sending your craft out to intercept a still-airbourne USO would cause such an issue. Hmm. Maybe a full save game just before you sent that craft out would be handy, too.

[Thunder_Gr]

A copy of the MissDat folder would be handy to work out why the map was throwing the error code.

 

I've no idea why sending your craft out to intercept a still-airbourne USO would cause such an issue. Hmm. Maybe a full save game just before you sent that craft out would be handy, too.

 

I suspect the problem was just because I had this issue with the tactical mission. I had pressed the intercept button to send the Triton in the first place, so, the problem only appeared after the mission crashing issue. I just brought it in because I thought it might help you to figuer out what the first problem was about.

 

I will post a missdata folder and a save game asap.

[Bomb Bloke]

Just to be clear, the "12 civilians" appears when the geoscape engine restarts after the tactical engine was supposed to have run. You get that particular mission result because that's the last mission result the tactical engine successfully wrote to the HDD.

 

(You probably aborted a terror mission prior to trying the combo mod).

 

In your first case, the tactical engine didn't run properly (it crashed on startup with the mapcodes error).

 

In the second case, the geoscape engine shut down for no good reason - so the tactical engine fired up, crashed again, and went back to the geoscape again.

[Tepid tasoth]

This is great, I alwasys wanted to do such a mod myself but never made it. Thanks a bunch!

[Knan]

So this is basically TFTD with UFO maps merged in, right? Just checking.

[Bomb Bloke]

Yes.

[Thunder_Gr]

I want to apologise to BB for not having fulfilled my promise to post the missdata folder. This is because a lot of things have happened. I have moved out of where I lived at the time. My new location does not provide internet access, and I had to leave my country for over a month. I was only able to connect for brief periods of time and without having access to my computer.

At this time, things have began normalizing again, although I still do not have internet access from my house or work.

Since a lot of time has passed, I'd like to know if the posting of the missdata folder is still desirable.