MoO2 galaxy sizes

Clear Skies · March 19, 2002, 13:40

OK...I admit I'm something of a massive empire builder on MoO2, but does anyone else find even the Huge galaxy isn't big enough? Does anyone know of a way to alter the size of the galaxy?

(edit) just downloaded a HEX editor to see if I can't tweak some of the .lbx files, but I'm none too optimistic (especially since my programming skills are about equal to Robert Mugabe's niceness abilities). Anyone with a better solution?

The Mad Monk · March 19, 2002, 18:19

Bigger galaxies, more races on the board at once.

That's all I really need to make my MoO2 experience...perfect.

I really wish they had allowed as large a game as you wanted, whether they thought your computer could handle it or not.

vmxa1 · March 19, 2002, 19:02

Man I thought I was a big fan, but I do not play Huge maps anymore, hardly even large ones. It is too much work to get all of those planets. If only I could just finish and not be compelled to have all planets (maybe a shrink).

ravagon · March 19, 2002, 21:31

Quote:

Originally posted by The Mad Monk
Bigger galaxies, more races on the board at once.

That's all I really need to make my MoO2 experience...perfect.

I really wish they had allowed as large a game as you wanted, whether they thought your computer could handle it or not.

Now there's an idea! Being able to use all of the default races in a single game. Probably would have caused too many complaints with too many people exceeding their system specs though. Also I'm guessing it wouldn't become apparent until most of the galaxy had been colonized, hence a lot of game time is essentially wasted.

The Corion editor doesn't allow any more stars/colonies to be added to huge maps so I'd guess its probably a limit you can't break

Clear Skies · March 20, 2002, 12:03

I know there's a way to do it - I've got a .lbx file editor and I've got all the code set out. Trouble is, there's several hundred pieces of data per file, and I have no way of knowing which one is the galaxy size variable

Anyone with any ideas?

Tom Kelly · June 18, 2002, 14:22

Quote:

Originally posted by Clear Skies
I know there's a way to do it - I've got a .lbx file editor and I've got all the code set out. Trouble is, there's several hundred pieces of data per file, and I have no way of knowing which one is the galaxy size variable

Anyone with any ideas?

The max number of systems is 71 (including blackholes). Look for that value with the hex editor search function. What kind of .lbx editor are you using? Let me know where you got it so I can give it a shot too - bigger galaxy sounds tempting....

Spaced Cowboy · June 18, 2002, 17:41

Sounds like you would need to tweak more than that. What about the size of the screen and the zoom level? Could get real ugly, since some crashing might not occur until late game.

I'd really be sweet to have the source code. Is it possible to reverse engineer?

Zealot · June 18, 2002, 18:57

Quote:

Originally posted by RPMisCOOL
I'd really be sweet to have the source code. Is it possible to reverse engineer?

If it were, it would be the end of programmers in the long run. With other programmers copying your work, there wouldn't be editors to pay programmers to make new products and innovate.
Piracy steals editors; reverse engineering would steal programmers.

vmxa1 · June 18, 2002, 21:54

Well we have disassembler that can take objects and put them back to asm code.

vmxa1 · June 18, 2002, 21:57

see if this will help you it has the formats and shows the stars layout.

Spaced Cowboy · June 19, 2002, 08:59

Vmxa1,

Exactly, I knew about disassemblers, even wrote one myself. Just wondering if anyone had taken it to the next step and tried to diassemble to a high level language like C? Anyone ever hear of that?

I'm thinking that it is possible to some degree. The resulting code would be somewhat incomprehensable because of generic variable names, however. I would be an interesting project, though.

moomin · June 19, 2002, 10:21

C's been done, but the resulting code is often less than exciting... However, Java "executables" can be reverse-engineered to a state that's coparable to - or better - then the original code

Spaced Cowboy · June 19, 2002, 11:19

Really,

Any idea where one could find the C disassembler?

Tom Kelly · June 19, 2002, 14:53

Quote:

Originally posted by RPMisCOOL
Sounds like you would need to tweak more than that. What about the size of the screen and the zoom level? Could get real ugly, since some crashing might not occur until late game.

I'd really be sweet to have the source code. Is it possible to reverse engineer?

There are additional concerns. However, the zoom and screen size can be left alone. Just add more systems so that the empty space in the map is more densely packed.

The additional concerns are things like the name list, the formula for placing/spacing the stars, and problems with overlap placement.

The MOO2 editor Corion2 will allow you to move stars, change names, characteristics, etc. - but no additional stars past the upper limit of 72 (not 71 as in my previous post)

I think the key is to alter the upper limit of the galaxy size. I've dug through some of the code, but it's still unclear. I'm still working on finding it, but if anybody has ideas, post it.

Zealot · June 19, 2002, 15:03

vmxa1's doc has the constant that specifies the max number of systems to 72. Try chaging it.

Spaced Cowboy · June 20, 2002, 09:09

Moom,

Tried to find C dis....Do you have a hint?

Tom Kelly · June 20, 2002, 09:27

Quote:

Originally posted by Zealot
vmxa1's doc has the constant that specifies the max number of systems to 72. Try chaging it.

The document posted by Vmxa1 applies only to saved game files. It does not alter the galaxy size used in generating a new game. Further, alterations to the MAX_STARS value does not allow the addition of extra systems.

There is another value or control element that needs to be altered in order to generate a game with more star systems than the default 72. I suspect it is embedded in either the .exe file itself, or in one of the .lbx setup files. Again, any ideas are welcome.

Tom Kelly · June 20, 2002, 12:37

Quote:

Originally posted by Zealot
vmxa1's doc has the constant that specifies the max number of systems to 72. Try chaging it.

My first attempt was to alter the 72-system limit to 100 in a saved game using a hex editor, and I then used Corion2 to add a new system. The editor gives me an error message stating that I have already reached the max number of systems.

My second attempt was to copy the data for a specific system with a hex editor, and paste it in with a different name, and different coordinates. When I attempt to load this file as a saved game, it crashes back to the windows desktop. Also, if I load this file with Corion2, it crashes as well.

I think the system limit may be related to the position of the system data in the save file. I am still looking though. Any ideas or help is greatly appreciated.

Tom Kelly · June 20, 2002, 12:39

Quote:

Originally posted by Clear Skies
I know there's a way to do it - I've got a .lbx file editor and I've got all the code set out. Trouble is, there's several hundred pieces of data per file, and I have no way of knowing which one is the galaxy size variable

Anyone with any ideas?

Is the .lbx editor you are using shareware? If so, please post it. Thanks.

Tom Kelly · June 20, 2002, 12:41

Quote:

Originally posted by vmxa1
Well we have disassembler that can take objects and put them back to asm code.

As with the .lbx editor above, if the program you refer to is shareware, please post a copy. Thanks.

Spaced Cowboy · June 20, 2002, 14:30

Tom,

Just do a google search on disassembler. There are tons of freebies out there (It is not a hard program to write)

R:PM

moomin · June 20, 2002, 15:08

Quote:

Originally posted by RPMisCOOL
Tried to find C dis....Do you have a hint?

Heh. This sure brings back memories. Back when I was a uni student we used Sparcs a lot - and loo and behold, it turns out that the excellent C compiler Sun shipped with SunOS (and the less excellent they shipped with Solaris...) left the compiling hints in even when you specified a stripped binary - so disassembling the executables was really easy - the compiler came with a default decompiler that did just that. We used to try to write code that would trick the decompiler to produce a decompilation that wasn't a functional equivalent of the original code, some sort of meta-obfuscated C programming contest I guess - but the darn thing was good.

This can easily be simulated with most commercial Wintel compilers (except for MSVC, of course, which does not come with any kind of decompiling out of the box, although debugger trickery is still possible) but get your hands on a Borland Turbo C environ, and you'll see it does a good job too if you leave the hints in.

If you don't, it's another ballpark, but still possible. The tools of trade become proggie/hardware combos like an ICE disassember. It's orders of magintude more effort, but quite doable - for a recent outstanding effort look for the russian enthusiast version of Heores of Might & Magic III called WoG (Wake of the Gods). They took the binary, spent some serious effort and decopiled it to produce a entirely new game on the HoMMIII base, and the best Heroes game ever... impressive stuff.

Spaced Cowboy · June 20, 2002, 17:02

Moom,

Yeah, a couple o' links suggested that Borland had one. I sort o' remember that one myself from college. Anyway, have you seen any freebies (WinOS)?