Any Civ3 saved game editors for Mac?

[jackg4]

I've seen several game editors for Civ3 but nothing for the Mac. I used to edit my games occasionally with HexEdit but the last upgrade patch to Civ3 puts the saved games into a different smaller format and I can't make heads or tails of it. Anyone know of a Mac game editor for Civ3?

 

[AlanH]

You could decompress the .SAV files, then you can edit them as you please, and the game will open the uncompressed version. Or you can just edit the Autosave files, which are not compressed.

One way to decompress .SAV files on a Mac is to use the JMapstat application in my sig. When you Open a .SAV file in JMapstat it decompresses it to a temporary file in the same directory as JMapstat.jar. The temporary file is deleted once you have run a Mapstat analysis on it. But if you duplicate the temp file after opening it and before analysing it you're in business.

 

[jackg4]

Thanks AlanH. That worked just fine. By the way, is Java difficult to learn? Any websites that teach it?

 

[AlanH]

I find it fairly straightforward., but it depends on whether you've previously used another object oriented language. I came to it from working in Object Pascal and C++, but I haven't done much with it. The JMapstat work was just a tweak to the existing application to get it to read the list of civs from the saved file instead of using a hard coded list.

As with most modern development environments, it's not the language itself that takes up the learning time, but finding out how to use the framework and class libraries. What's your previous experience?

Sun's site is the definitive location. They have full documentation and tutorials on line, and there are lots of other sources for example code etc.

You can develop in Java using the OS X development environment - Project Builder in Jaguar, XCode in Panther. But you can only use its graphical RAD tool - Interface Builder - if you are creating Mac-specific Cocoa applications in Java. [It's difficult to see why you'd write Cocoa apps in Java, as Objective C is so much easier]. Alternatively there's a Borland tool set called JBuilder that's free to hobbyists, and it provides a graphical layout tool for the Java cross-platform GUI APIs - AWT and Swing.

As this is off-topic we'd better take it to Private Mail if you want to discuss it further, before the local fuzz catch up with us

 

[SeanInWichita]

OK, I totally give up. Could one of you tell me how you go about editing a saved game with HexEdit? You don't have to repeat the aforementioned instructions, I already opened an uncompressed saved game, and I'm looking at all the data. But now what? How do I do anything useful? Can I give an airport to a city that doesn't have one, or give myself a little more gold, or stick a few modern armor units here and there?

I realize that the whole answer might be very long, but could you maybe give me just a brief pointer about just one thing, like, "This is how you add a modern armor unit," and maybe I can deduce the rest of my answers from that? I'd be most grateful.

 

[AlanH]

Hello and welcome

I can give you a very few pointers and then you're on your own, because the format of the game's dynamic information is not widely distributed, and those who know it (not me!) don't spread it about much.

Personally I can't see the point of editing a game in progress. If you need that kind of help to win a game then just play on a lower level until you learn enough to progress. Beating the game by editing in units or buildings or gold seems a pretty futile exercise, and much harder work than learning how to play better. However, each to his/her own ...

The save file consists of a section called the BIC which is invariant for the duration of the game. It starts near the beginning of the file and ends at a 'GAME' tag where the dynamic information starts that desribes the game state. The BIC section is well documented at Apolyton.

The GAME section includes things like the current date and turn number, the victory status if the game is over, etc. Then the big sections are the TILEs, the UNITs and the CITYs. CITY records include information about each CTZN. The contents of these blocks are pretty vague, and I wouldn't fancy my chances at inserting a new record into any of them sucessfully. Some people know some of what they contain. Your best bet is to get to know and befriend those people if this is important to you. The main centers of expertise are over in Apolyton.

 

[SeanInWichita]

Wow thanks for the quick reply! Just to clarify my intentions, I wasn't trying to edit the game in order to avoid learning how to play well. I just thought it would be a humorous diversion to greet some chariot invaders with some stealth bombers or something. I always really had fun with the 'secret' cheat units in Age of Empires, mowing down archers with that James Bond car, and smashing gates with that little monkey. Maybe not everyone enjoys that sort of thing? I'd find it therapeutic, after slogging through a 6,000-year struggle for survival, to replay it (briefly) with, "Now here's how it would have gone if I had some nukes in 4000 B.C."

I'm not really a 'Civ Fanatic,' just a guy who plays it every now and again. But I am getting better; I just won a Monarch-level Iroquois game... with the no-research gambit! I spent not a penny on science or wonders, just bullied the AIs into trading research for peace. Sadly, the peace proved fragile. Heh-heh-heh.

 

[AlanH]

Fair enough ... as I said, everyone gets his kicks in a different way

I'm hardly one to preach any particular variety of poison ... I counted up recently and I've only ever played eight Civ3 games to completion in 15 months of owning the game. Two of those were competitive Succession Games, four were competitive Games of the Month, and the other two were my first and only two solo games. So you could say I only get my Civ3 kicks from (a) playing against human competition and (b) writing code utilities to work around it.

 

[Mantis1]

Is there a way to extract the BIC file from a saved game (say, the 4,000 BC Autosave) and open it in the editor so that it can be saved as a scenario? I'd kind of like to start a new game on the same map I'm on at the moment, and play it as one of the other civs; I think the Romans got a much better starting location than the Greeks I'm playing (closer to the center of the continent, and to early strategic resources), and it would be fun to play them on the same map.
Later,
Mantis

 

[ainwood]

Unfortunately, not on a mac. Gramphos' Civ3Multitool will extract a bic, although I think it extracts it as a 1.29f bic, which isn't quite compatable.

You can always extract the start seed etc, if you use a tool like this one Unfortunately its PC-only. If you want to send me the save, I'll extract them for you.

P.S. - the easiest way to 'cheat' IS to use a scenario.