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Simple android modding if also owning PC version?

levilumolevilumo Member Posts: 8
in General Modding
Just wondering if the current convoluted modding experience for Android (and IOS) is just because can't assume that people don't have the game on both platforms?

Would this work if I have both PC and Android games? (specifically BG1, BG2, SoD)
1) Mod game on PC (assuming same versions of the game)
2) Copy over override directory and dialog.tlk (anything else) to Android
3) Profit?

Because I would assume the parts that mods generally modify are the same on the various platforms?

If they aren't then would plan B work?
1) Copy over dialog.tlk (and anything else that is different) from Android to PC (if different, would break PC version, fine by me)
2) Then mod stuff on PC
3) Then move stuff back to Android original position
4) Profit?

I want to mod the game but don't want to dampen my will to play by going through a convoluted modding experience.

Comments

  • GusindaGusinda Member Posts: 1,915
    Hi @levilumo, I have done a bit of modfile creation for Android and tried various methods of making it run on the device.

    I don't know the procedure for iOS, so won't comment on it. Your first method, modding the PC version and using that as the base for the modfile, will work but...

    I will assume here that you are already aware of the file system in Android and PC and the location of the game files. If this is a bad assumption,, please correct me and I will explain further...


    Plan A
    ~~~~~
    This is essentially what is occuring now with the creation of modfiles for Android. Placing the dialog.tlk into a lang.zip file and applying centralfix to it allows the game to read the file and prioritises it to be read first.

    If you own the PC version, then there is no need to copy over the .obb files, unpack to generate a modding area etc..., you can just use the PC version for modding, or make a copy of the PC version to mod specifically for Android, and use the original for PC gaming.

    The problem is copying over the dialog.tlk (the rest can be copied over without problems except one which I will explain further down)... When you do so into the folder that corresponds with the PC version (using English as an example '../lang/en_US'), the game now has two dialog.tlk to contend with. It tends to go with the version that is locked away in the patch.obb. This isn't saying that Plan A can't be done, it just needs a little work to let the game know where to read the dialog.tlk. Below is a procedure that works...

    1. Firstly, make a backup of both main.obb and patch.obb (when I refer to patch.obb, I mean the file that looks like: 'patch.2750.com.beamdog.baldursgateenhancededition.obb' or similar depending on what game you are modding).
    2. Grab hold of 'RAR for Android' from Google Play and install. I am sure you can use others but this is the one that I used.
    3. Rename the patch.obb to patch.zip, open patch.zip with RAR and navigate to the appropriate lang folder
    4. Copy the '/lang/en_US/dialog.tlk' in the zip file to your game's files folder (so it should be '/files/lang/en_US/dialog.tlk'). This makes it easy to test whether you are heading in the right direction. If you are using a different language, you will also need to copy dialogf.tlk.
    5. In the .zip, rename the dialog.tlk to dialog.klt (it can actually be renamed to anything as long as it maintains the xxxxxx.xxx naming convention). If using a different language, rename dialogf.tllk to dialogf.klt.
    6. Save the file making sure that it saves as a uncompressed format (so that it is just a container). You can check this by examining the file properties and checking the file size of the original .obb then of the modified .zip. They need to be exactly the same size as the game check this and if they aren't as expected, then it will delete the .obb and redownload the correct ones.
    7. Rename the patch.zip back to patch.obb.
    8. Assuming that you have the vanilla dialog.tlk in place, you can now attempt to start the game. If all starts, then you have made the right edit and am ready to start modding. If the game attempts to redownload the .obbs, then you have made a mistake, the game has deleted the .obbs because they didn't pass the filesize check. You will need to restart the device to stop the download, copy your backed up .obbs to the .obb folder and retry the process.

    If all starts well, then you are ready to copy your mods over. I would also make a copy of the vanilla dialog.tlk (although you can get it from a number of sources: backup obb, the modified obb but it needs renaming or the vanilla PC version). You replace the vanilla .obb on your device to the modded on.

    Here is the problem of copying your override folder to the device. Depending on the amount of mods you are using, the file count in the override folder can be upwards of 5000 or more. This will take hours to copy to your device. The best way to counter this is to zip it up into one file which then can be copied over to your device in a flash, then unpack the .zip file into the the game's files folder (making sure that the override folder is directly off it (ie: /Files/override). Copy over the dialog.tlk to replace the vanilla one, the test the game. If it starts, you are generally good to go, if the game crashes, there is likely a problem with one of the mods.

    I have tested this in both BG1EE and BG2EE but reverted back to the original method of modding because it means that individuals don't need to modify content on their device to allow the modfiles to run any modfile that can be found for the game's version. You are basically doing exactly the same thing except the process of applying 'centralfix' to the lang.zip and the location of lang.zip on your device.

    When modding BG1EE on PC, it can only be BG1EE installed, so NOT with BGSOD installed.

    When you mod for BGSOD, then on the PC, you mod BG1EE with SOD installed. There will be some additional files (BG1 files) copied over with the override folder, but they will be ignored by SOD on Android.

    There could be some additional steps in BG2EE due to the known modding problems that crash teh game on Android but these are a solution that needs to be looked at depending on the mod and error (most mods work without problem). I expect it will be fixed with v2.6 as it was when we went from BG1 v2.5.16.4 to v2.5.17.0.



    Plan B
    ~~~~~
    The vanilla dialog.tlk are exactly the same files if the versions of the game are the same:
    BG1EE (only) on PC = Android BG1EE
    BG1EE+SOD on PC = Android SOD
    BG2EE on PC = Android BG2EE
    IWDEE on PC = Android IWDEE
    so there is nothing to copy either way.


    This is a very broad process shortened into a couple of paragraphs, and I may have been a bit technical but if you let me know which part you don't understand, I will expand further.

    Hope that helps and you gain as much profit as you expect. :)
    Gus
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