Midas' hex musings on db files

[Midas]

Reading week is upon me, and having some time I've decided to sit down and sift through some of the database files that have been included in game. Afaik there's nothing wrong with doing this (it's the same as using the editor practically and I'm sticking to db files), but if this is conflictual with anything legal mods can feel free to delete the thread.

I anticipate little interest in this and I probably won't get that much done, but for the future if anyone wants a reference points for somethings I'll hopefully be able to test and see... this would be it. I'll just update the main page every so often with little diary bits of what I was able to find out etc.

First thing I'm checking out is nation files and nation swaps. I was looking into just whether or not it was possible, and decided to start fiddling around to see whether or not I could revive Team U.S.S.R.

10-02-11

~ Looked around in the 'nation.dat' file.
~ Swapped text preceeding the CDs between Russia and Soviet Union to see if I could successfully "swap" the nations.
~ Tested in game. Opened up the nations menu, went to Europe and checked teams. Partial successful. Russia became a "defunct" nation (not visible in the screen), Team Soviet Union popped up as an option. Clicking it crashes game. Thinking I may need to change team nationalities of all Russians to do this (hopefully can find alternative solution). Cool nonetheless.

[Midas]

~ Casually tried switching France and Austria. Swap worked, but text files seem to not have completely adapted. Team names are now "Team France" and "Team Austria" respectively, but in the nationality pane it still shows "AUT" and "FRA" for the player as it would be had I not swapped the files.

~ Can look at player profiles for new USSR players from the scouting screen, but if I go into the Team Soviet Union screen the game crashes. Odd, will have to look into whether it's possible to switch in defunct nations later.

[Midas]

Not sure if swapping teams is possible.

Have tried multiple alternate orientations of names using an altered eng. file and nations file. It seems like name-changes using swaps from real to defunct nations (i.e. Czechoslovakia and South Vietnam with) is not resilient. On your first save it'll work fine, with any name changes (for instance, Chinese initials from CHN to PRC) working out. However if you reload the file they get erased and it can end up with some pretty awkward combinations, which is very unfortunate and quite frustrating.

[maxrsp]

Hi Midas,

I've often wondered about a variation of this discussion based on the savegame files instead of the initial .dat files. Seems to me you would be better off to globally replace these values in the savegame file, otherwise you remain vulnerable to unexpected logic links between various .dat files.

The data structure of the savegame files must be known as both the savegame editor and the EHM scout programs reflect this data and enable some editing of it. Making global changes here would ensure there are no conflicting references to old values (unless hardcoded in the EHM code).

Setting aside the obvious file size drawback, I've always been really surprised that more extensive savegame editing tools were not developed by the community. Not just to do things like nation and club changes discussed by you and others, but to address the hardcoded start date issue we have all cried about for years.

I'm sure this is easier said than done, but in concept you would just need to start a game with the latest version of the Lidas/Manimal database so all the current players are there, auto sim a game forward to the 2010-2011 season, then update the resulting savegame file to reflect the real stats of these players (readily available for all pro and semi-pro leagues on the internet) from 06-07 to 09-10.

Now that would breath some new life into this great game... from an NHL perspective this would keep it current and real at least until then next major change in the CBA occurs (contract structures, cap calcs, etc.) or expansion (God forbid).

[archibalduk]

I'd be very interested to hear what you manage to find as you poke around the various DB files and saved games. Afaik, I don't think there's an issue with playing about with these files - it's the EXE file itself which is a definite no-no. But Riz / Graeme Kelly could always correct me if they see this thread at some point.

With regards to the saved games, I imagine you'd want to look at game that hasn't been compressed (i.e. disable the "save compressed" option in EHM). I think also that a number of temporary files are created in the EHM directory whilst you're running a game. I believe these are all packed back into the saved game each time you save. This is certainly how it worked with older versions of Football Manager and I believe it works this way with EHM.

In fact, I believe that information relating to the DB structure was posted on the SI Forums. Might be worth looking in their Editing Forum (although the forum may have since been pruned/archived).

[Midas]

This is a very interesting idea- when I have more time (atm it's term paper/exam season ) I'll start sifting through the save-game files to see what I can do.

[mne2]

The Db structure is still in the programmers forum but well down the list so make sure you look at all threads. The Saved game structure is different which is why my saved game editor is so basic. SI will not help with editing saved games so i had to go it alone to work out the file structure