Transferring game from PC to iPad Not Working

grahamers

I am following the steps for this feature from the FAQ at:
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/comment/460954#Comment_460954

I am doing the following:

1) On my Windows 10 PC with the latest updates, in the "C:\Users\Graham\Documents\Baldur's Gate - Enhanced Edition\save" directory, I have a folder called "000000031-test" in which I have saved a copy of a game I want to transfer to my iPad.

2) In that folder are the following files:
i) BALDUR.bmp
ii) BALDUR.gam
III) BALDUR.SAV
iv) PORTRT0.bmp
v) PORTRT1.bmp
vi) PORTRT2.bmp
vii) PORTRT3.bmp
viii) PORTRT4.bmp
ix) PORTRT5.bmp

3) Using 7-zip, I zip up the "000000031-test" folder into a zip file called ExportSave.zip. Note: When I open that zip file, I see the "000000031-test" folder inside the zip file and I can see that the "000000031-test" folder contains the files listed above.

4) I rename ExportSave.zip to ExportSave.bg1save

5) I email that file to myself.

6) On my iPad, running iOS 9.2, I double-tap the home button to examine running aps. Baldurs Gate is not listed, which means it is not running.

7) On my iPad, I view my mail with the attached ExportSave.bg1save file. I tap on the file to download it to the iPad. The attachment is now represented by a BG icon.

8) I tap on the icon for the attachment, and iOS presents me with a set of coices, including "Copy to Baldur's Gate," which I choose.

9) BG opens with a black screen for about 1 second and then closes right away.

10) When I check for running apps, BG is not displayed.

11) I run BG and navigate to the Load Saved Games screen, my saved game is not listed.

I have tried this with zero other saved games saved on my iPad and with 1-2 games already saved on my iPad, it does not work, either way. I have tried it with BG running when I open the email attachment and get the same results.

I am thinking step 9, above, is the issue. BG slides open with a black screen and then closes right away. Should it stay open? What can I check? I tried attaching my saved game to this thread, but the web page says that such attachments are not allowed.

Please help!

grahamers

Edited for typos and to clarify one issue.

grahamers

Bump for love.

Gate70

Hi @grahamers I believe the issue is that the 000000031-test subfolder is not required. On your pc, try selecting the gam & sav files together, and archiving them without the folder.

grahamers

Thank

Gate70 said:

Hi @grahamers I believe the issue is that the 000000031-test subfolder is not required. On your pc, try selecting the gam & sav files together, and archiving them without the folder.

Thanks for the reply! I appreciate your help.

Two issues:

1) Your suggestion goes against the instructions in the FAQ I link to, above. In fact, the FAQ goes out of the way to note that you can transfer multiple save games in one .bg1save file because BG expects folders.

2) that said, I did try it without a folder in the .bg1save file and just the .gam and .SAV files. In that case, when I tap on the .bg1save attachment, BG does open on the iPad, but there are no new saved games listed. (Not sure how it would know what to call the new save game since the folder is missing unless it took the name of the .bg1save file. But, as I said, that is not what the FAQ says to do.)

Any suggestions?

Gate70

I used the Windows compress folder, it created baldur.zip which I renamed to baldur.bg1save and sending that to the iPad failed to open the save but started the game. I then went into the load menu and there was a save called baldur.

I appreciate this is not what the FAQ says, will try with a folder and see what happens.

grahamers

Success! Your method worked. I am now testing to see if the problem was 1) 7-zip's .zip algorithm, 2) the existence of space characters in the file name, or 3) the length of the file name. i will post my results.

Thank you very much to take the time to help me on this.

grahamers

I have tested this and confirmed that the issue was that the folder was included. As long as you only include teh contents of the folder, which may include images, too, this will work regardless of file anme, file length, or which zip program you used.

Should we edit the FAQ?

Hechada

I'm struggling with this - does the zip file need to be called something special? I get the option to copy the save game to baldur's gate - but it's not there once it's launched...

Gate70

Hi @Hechada
I think the attached pic is where we got to with this, if that helps.
- no subfolder
- suffix of bg1save
(looking at the folder contents on Windows)

Hechada

sorted

Dave_1024

I have been trying to do this all morning! Not working for some reason. I have done what you guys suggest. Used compression to create a. Zip of the save & game files. Changing the name of the resulted zip to bg1save. I open the attachment in my email on the Ipad. I can see the BG logo when it opens. I just get a loading screen. Nothing else happens. If I exit the screen then open the game, no save files.

Any suggestions?

Gate70

Attach your zipped save here please @Dave_1024 (you may need to rename it back to .zip to do that)

mskroch

I have the same issue. I tried zipping the folder of a single saved game, multiple saved games, and then the individual files. I get the same issues as above with the BG logo and then a loading screen. Nothing else happens. Any thoughts?

mskroch

worked! saved just the two sav and gam files in a zip renaimed to .bg1sav and it worked great

_Luke_

Maybe a little OT, but what about custom portraits?
I tried zipping a folder with the following items: a 210 x 330 bmp file and a 169 x 266 bmp file.
Next, I renamed the zipped folder to .bg1portrait and emailed it to myself.
Then, I tapped on the attachment ( represented by a BG icon) -> " Copy to Balder's Gate". The game launched normally, but this is what I got when I tapped on the "custom" button:

So, it seems I succeeded in importing the portrait, but it is invisible........
Any idea??

EDIT: Ok, I figured it out!
All you need is to zip just the 169 x 266 bmp file......

Surgical

Could you please direct me to a section in the forums that will instruct me to transfer my Icewind dale save file from my steam version to my ipad version. I found the instructions for baldurs gate but i can't get this way to work with icewind dale.

lolien

@Surgical ,try to change the zip file extension to .iwdsave

Edit: Sorry, i see you figured that out too.

CaptainSharkFin

I hate to reopen an old topic but I'm hoping someone can help me solve this problem. Whenever I try to transfer my save zip files onto my iPad, opening the file itself defaults to Notability. Is there a way to fix/change this?

JuliusBorisov

@CaptainSharkFin Make sure you're naming the files correctly.

https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/45100/bg-ee-on-ipad-copying-saved-games-back-onto-ios
https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/59802/transferring-saves-to-ipad

Canley

Bumping this because it worked much better than other guides on here

skystalker

I have trouble importing saves/portraits/characters on iOS from macOS. Opening a .bgsave/.bgportrait/.bgcharacter on the iPad immediately crashes the app. These are completely unmodified saves. I even tried making a new game with a stock character and just save the game at start, but no dice. The portraits from a .bgportrait actually show up after the crash, but not the saved games.

I'm using an iPad Pro (1st gen) with OS 16.2 (current) and macOS 13.1 (ARM, current) and BGEE is the GOG version on the Mac. (I also have the games on Steam, but see no reason that should make a difference.)

I have tried AirDropping the files, using iCloud Drive and access the file through SMB share.

My last attempt was to export my saves on the iPad, reset the iPad and reinstall BGEE. Now the game won't even import the iPad saves!

skystalker

Ok, I have finally solved it. The problem is compression. The games can't handle a compressed zip-file, they shit themselves and crash. This means that right clicking and using the "Compress" command from the Finder menu produces an unreadable file.

This is how to send a save, portraits or characters to an iPad from a Mac, using only macOS built in tools, nothing else:

1. Locate the data you want to send in Finder. (E.g. a folder named "000000004-Quick-Save-4")
2. Right click said directory and choose Services and New Terminal in folder
3. Execute the command:

   zip -0 000000004-Quick-Save-4.bg1save *.{bmp,gam,SAV}
   

   naturally you change the filename to whatever suits you.
4. Quit Terminal, send the file over AirDrop, iCloud Drive, e-mail or on a USB stick or whatever.

This command; zip -0 filename.extension files-to-include, is the same for BGEE, BG2EE, IWD and PST. The pattern *.{bmp,gam,SAV} catches all the relevant files for a save, skipping anything irrelevant to the iPad (GOG cloud sync file etc). When making a bg1character file, include bio,chr in the pattern.

I have verified this to be working on Baldur's Gate and Planescape Torment on an iPad Pro (1st gen) running iPadOS 16.2 and a Mac mini (M1) running macOS 13.1 and the GOG version of the games, though nothing here is really unique to software versions, and zip and Terminal has been included in macOS since it was Mac OS X 10.0 over 20 years ago.