Modifying the TRS files possible?
 

Used to, people would do sprite dumps every once in a while of all the unit graphics.

I am curious how they were able to do it, and if it is possible to replace graphic files in the game by inserting new graphics into the .trs files.

This would be useful for doing things such as changing icons for effects in unit screens, replacing site images etc.

Anyone know how to do this? And if so, can you give us a brief overview.

Thanks!

Re: Modifying the TRS files possible?
 

lch wrote some code for extracting the unit sprites. I can probably find it if it's needed. I don't know anything about it myself though.

Re: Modifying the TRS files possible?
 

That would be awesome. If you are able to find it, please post :).

Re: Modifying the TRS files possible?
 

I've delved a bit deeper since first posting this thread. It seems that the graphics are saved in some archaic format used on the old Atari Falcon ST using a program that Johan wrote called "Spooky Sprites". I've tried emulating the Atari Falcon and launching Spooky Sprites, but I've had no luck at this point.

In an old post for Dominions 2, I read that there is a windows version of this program as well, but it was never released. Maybe we can talk the devs into releasing Spooky Sprites for Windows :).

Re: Modifying the TRS files possible?
 

Yes, this "Spooky Sprites" program is indeed what produces the TRS files and it is something that JK has programmed over a dozen years ago on an Atari Falcon ST when he was still in college. When I tried to find out how to do sprite dumps, I tried to get every version that has been released of said program; and I did manage to still find archives that contained version 2, 4, 5 and 6 of the Atari Falcon program on old BBS and Usenet archives, together with nice documentation about the file format. I went as far as getting the programs to run on an emulator, but they were of no use as they crashed on everything from the games that I tried to load, with the exception of the original CoE game files, maybe.

Although many of the original Atari Falcon ST hardware restrictions are still in use in the current sprite format(!) which leads to funny code you have to create in order to make those sprites usable, JK has ported the program to Linux, which is what KO is using now, commenting that it'd be the "least user-friendly graphics program one can possibly imagine" ;) and of course the file format has since had a few additions to it as well. Which is why I couldn't get a "perfect" sprite extraction (Ulm's national flag still looks strange when I extract it), but something which works well enough to be of some use. The code that I came up with was a little messy and didn't receive any cleanup when I sent it to llamabeast, I'll pass it to you via mail as well now if you want to play with it.

Here's a screenshot that KO supplied from the Linux version:
http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/uploa...777-azazel.jpg

And here are a few very old threads that were concerned with the original software, which might interest you to read them:
- Updated graphics?
- I can't extract the sprites from the .exe
- Question about Dom 3 development

Re: Modifying the TRS files possible?
 

That would be great. I will PM you my email address :).