Silver Blades

[manikus]

It sounds like you've got a good method going here.

I'm surprised that the coders didn't do it a bit differently - since there is such a limited number of wall types, list the maps by wall type and then all of the wall coordinates that used that type. But, maybe they thought of that and it took up just as much room. Or maybe they made the maps with an in-house version of FRUA like they did with Pools of Darkness.

[Shadow Stranger]

I am glad that I looked at this, it is unlike anything that I have seen before. Presumably the programmers wanted to economize on floppy disk space above all else. Hence they might have compiled all the text messages received in game.

I still have not figured out what the numbers mean.

Edit: now if the map is based upon individual squares, 16*16 is 256. If on the other hand, it is based upon line segments then 16*17 + 16*17 = 544. Here the line segments are the sides of a square. As far as I can see, it is based upon line segments. This would make sense as all terrain is found on the sides of a square.

I changed all seven instances of byte 171 with 170, now there are six doors where there is no door when you are on the east but there is a door when you are on the west side of the doorway. (The seventh door is the old man's home, this place I can't actually enter.) Also the door opposite the portal does not appear on the west side too. Door on east side of square 1,1 is not affected. Knowing this I still can't pin down any coordinates.

(Friday 24 April, spreadsheet moved to latest post in this topic.)

[manikus]

Interesting stuff. I don't know what to do with it, but interesting just the same.

[Shadow Stranger]

There may be L-shaped pairs of walls, first north and east, then south and west. I have deleted one type 171 at a time. There are still some questions remaining.

Edit:
It seems that most walls have a thickness of two lines. When I deleted the type 171 walls, the relevant areas were shown on the automap as having walls only one line thick. This is in accord with what I know of the existence of one - way walls&.

My current understanding does not explain the numbers that I am seeing in places 45 thru 55, there are not nearly enough zeroes. I changed them to 00 then the map went all strange: all lines and columns. There are possibly modules in the map.

[manikus]

I look forward to seeing what you come up with.

[Shadow Stranger]

This is tough, there may be event information mixed up with maps. I am fairly sure that the map is not a straight 1:1 or 2:2 mapping. There may be a provision to express multiples by negative numbers.

Whatever it is, it won't be something that my spreadsheets can handle. My methods won't work here so Manikus will have to do it the hard way.

I was able to handle the maps in the two Ravenloft games, so it is not all SSI games.

[manikus]

That's okay. Thanks for trying.

[sokolkeep]

Originally Posted by Shadow Stranger The OldDosBox is up and running. Now the demo is shown at a normal speed. But still the program refuses to accept the file “install.bat”, I keep hitting the first error condition below: “echo Please change to the directory that contains the echo Secret of the Silver Blades Program and re-run install. echo Note: type "install" in all lower-case letters.” I delete the relevant five lines and replace them with “goto fine”, then I get: 'xcopy' is not recognized as an internal or external command, Looking at the file, it might be expecting two floppy disks not one. For reference this the text of the batch file: echo off cls echo %0 pause if "%0.bat" == "install.bat" goto fine echo Please change to the directory that contains the echo Secret of the Silver Blades Program and re-run install. echo Note: type "install" in all lower-case letters. goto exit :fine if "%1" == "" goto nodrive if "%2" == "" goto nodrive echo Installing as %1:\%2 md %1:\%2 xcopy install.bat %1:\%2 /s if not exist %1:\%2\install.bat goto died copy *.* %1:\%2 >nul if exist dungcom.dax goto cdone :nodrive echo Usage: install X Y echo where X=letter of your hard disk. echo where Y=name of the directory echo Example: install c SECRET goto exit :died echo There was an error creating %1:\%2 echo Secret of the Silver Blades was not installed. goto exit :wrongo echo Install must be run from the Secret of the Silver Blades Cd only. goto exit :cdone cd %1:\%2 %1: cls echo Secret of the Silver Blades is now installed. echo Run START.EXE to start playing :exit

Hi, actually you don't need to run install.bat for SotSB. I use the D-Fend Reloaded front-end and just have it access the start.bat. and it runs without the need to install it. Most of the gold box games are the same way. I'll look at my configuration when I out of work to doublecheck how I have it set up.

-Bri (from icestorm9999)

[sokolkeep]

Greetings Adventurers! Just a follow up to my previous email. You don't need to install SotSB. You just need to mount the drive and set DOSbox to access C:\SECRET\START.EXE

I have created a visual walkthrough for anyone having trouble getting Secret of the Silver Blades to run on your computer.

Check it out at the link below.
http://icestorm9999.com/sotsb/sotsb_setup.html

[Shadow Stranger]

I was able to get the program running alright, DosBox is wonderful. I just could not decipher the program data files, as explained in my post above.