[NEW UPDATE] Thief Buddy (v2.0) Quicksave Utility [upd. 17 Feb 2023]

VoiceActor on 20/1/2023 at 23:39

Quote Posted by Supremcee

What a great tool....but I'm hesitating to try it out.....in 20+years of thief I had this problem and only over the last 3 years maybe I forced myself to create hard saves at several points. Now that I'm used to that, you come up with this tool and I fear I'll end up in a limbo between well chosen hard saves and "damn it, alt+s, doesn't matter" - tabbing out of the game would also be an immersion breaker. but that's just me, I honestly think that this is such a great tool and I'm actually wondering why nobody came up with that earlier?! so thank you very much! for a taffers talk episode I think I will at least try it out so we can review it :)

Thanks Supremcee (and others for the pos comms :) ). I use it sparingly myself in that I know the app is there.... but happily, I now genuinely IGNORE it! I appreciate it could add a new temptation, but I love the game so much I don't let the extra backups become precious in any way. Instead, the app (for me) is used only to get out of a total screw up. Lol, this happened in the recently played, and excellent Religious Conflict FM. Without spoliers, I used something in Lord Cael's mansion too early, and then couldn't get to the next stage - last hard save was 90 mins previous - Doh! :grr: This is what made me write the app! :D

FenPhoenix on 21/1/2023 at 01:35

If only I'd been using this today during a certain mission with a hard-to-see mine in it. Woe. :laff:

If you're interested, I could make AngelLoader aware of Thief Buddy and be able to automatically pass it the current FM folder before playing, for example, if you have a way to accept it via command line or whatnot. Just an offer :)

VoiceActor on 21/1/2023 at 13:38

Quote Posted by FenPhoenix

Hi FenPhoenix - firstly, thank you so much for the brilliant AngelLoader - it is a top class interface, used every day, and always works so fab :cool:

Re Buddy, yes I could take in via parsed cmd, but its early days yet, so want to keep the app as it is for a while. It would be cool however, to maybe have just one extra AL context menu option of "Copy FM path"? That'd do the trick for a quick win and be easier for players to just paste into Buddy.

I may still polish tiny areas of the code a little further yet from a usage point of view, so the app is still malleable at this stage. This would be things like a folder clean-up option once finished an FM, a more modern UI, better user options for saves inc. setting of limits if desired, background timed autosave option. Not sure at mo, but all exciting to think about!

Best regs,
VA

Twist on 21/1/2023 at 21:22

This is a fantastic little tool: thank you for making it!

If I may offer one little suggestion: It would be nice to be able to customize the saving tone, both the sound sample itself as well as its volume.

I like the idea of having something there to ensure the user that the utility is enabled and working, but right now it plays the default windows tone... which I really don't want to hear while I'm immersed in Thief. :cheeky:

I imagine it would be difficult to pick a sound and volume that makes everyone happy, so allowing the user to customize this aspect would be handy.

Oh, and I'd love AngelLoader integration -- whatever you'll allow and the two of you could work out I'm sure would be great. :thumb:

Hit Deity on 22/1/2023 at 16:41

Quote Posted by Twist

Oh, and I'd love AngelLoader integration -- whatever you'll allow and the two of you could work out I'm sure would be great. :thumb:

I'd second this idea.

VoiceActor on 26/1/2023 at 23:24

Hi good folks,

I've built a beta (for now) of Thief Buddy v1.2 which I'm pleased to say seems to be bug free even at this early stage. Not for release yet until it's been tested more etc. Have passed to FenPhoenix to look over in the hope we can simultaneously release both new versions of AL and TB that both talk to each other. Command argument integration is now provided ready for Twist and Hit Deity's suggestion of being called directly from AngelLoader. Have also added an 'auto-activate!' possibility via command arguments. The theory being you just double click the FM in AngelLoader and Thief Buddy starts (but also self-activates) in the background while Thief loads. No fuss, no picking FM folders, no bother. To you - the player, you just run the FM from AL like always.

This new version takes on board other forum suggestions and has a few extra features:

Selectable sound files (with volume adjust) as per Twist's suggestion. Oddly enough, I had this feature in v1.0 (the very first version I never released). I dropped the idea because of file type restrictions doing my head in. Now fully solved though, rock stable, and works a treat! :thumb:

Timed autosaves: this gives MAX immersion. You never need to save - like EVER! A suggested setup is turn on timed saves (can choose every 1m / 2m / 3m /5m /10m /15m / 20m) and save-sound to MUTE. You just play the game and it saves in the background each period. On-screen you see a 'Successfully Saved" message at the top every period, but you only have to restore a save if you screw up, otherwise, just keep playing with the sound knowledge you are covered for catastophe. On top of this, you can also manually save with Alt-S at any point just like normal.

Folder maintenance: Because timed saves may create a lot of folder fodder for a long FM, there is now a feature to clean up your save folder when you've completed that FM - it does it all in one click.

Other build notes:

To have timed saves functionality, I needed to emulate the key press of Alt-S while in the game. A great Nuget package to do this is called InputSimulatorPlus (a dll). However, this means Thief Buddy is no longer portable as such, so I've pulled my socks up and written a swish MSI installer so it gets properly installed, a desktop icon added, and is uninstallable from Programs and Features etc. All neat and tidy like the pros hehe :cool:

The scaling for various desktops is still 'fun' (not!) and I've done my best to make it work well. The restorer has slightly larger thumbnails now and the time banner is better proportioned. In case you're wondering why the big buttons? Well I LIKE BIG BUTTONS haha!

Finally, the How to Use notes have been updated with thanks inside, to Twist, Hit Deity and FenPhoenix for their inputs.

So, just a matter of watch-this-space now. It may be a while yet but I hope you like the changes done.

Best ones all,
VoiceActor

Hit Deity on 27/1/2023 at 00:51

Yay!

Twist on 27/1/2023 at 01:31

That sounds awesome! Thank you!

FenPhoenix on 27/1/2023 at 03:05

(did you pass it to me? I don't see a PM)

Hit Deity on 27/1/2023 at 03:47

I don't believe I am owed any credit. I merely seconded Twist's suggestion. :)

I'll be a betatester for when you get ready to get some secondary input. I have separate installs of "vanilla" Thief 2 with T2Fix applied, ready and waiting in its own folders for just such an occasion. I use them to crash-test weird stuff in Dromed/T2 if I think there's any inclination to cause irreparable damage. So, don't worry, I won't screw something up that I desperately need.