[NEW UPDATE] Thief Buddy (v2.0) Quicksave Utility [upd. 17 Feb 2023] - by VoiceActor
VoiceActor on 27/1/2023 at 10:07
Quote Posted by FenPhoenix
(did you pass it to me? I don't see a PM)
Oops! - I'd sent the PM back to myself DOH! You should have it now
VA
Twist on 27/1/2023 at 17:08
Quote Posted by Hit Deity
I don't believe I am owed any credit. I merely seconded Twist's suggestion. :)
I don't believe I'm owed credit, either. For the most part I was just expressing my enthusiasm after Fen offered to somehow integrate it into AngelLoader.
I think it's awesome that this far along we're
still getting cool, new and genuinely useful tools to enhance our taffing experience. :cool:
Hit Deity on 27/1/2023 at 19:40
Quote Posted by Twist
I think it's awesome that this far along we're
still getting cool, new and genuinely useful tools to enhance our taffing experience. :cool:
Definitely!! I am still amazed at all the goodies still released.
Twist on 28/1/2023 at 21:27
I have an idea or suggestion for a completely unnecessary yet convenient feature... although I'm not sure if it would be for VoiceActor and Thief Buddy or for FenPhoenix and AngelLoader:
It'd be cool to load straight to a mission's quick save. By that I mean something like: you right-click the mission in AngelLoader and select "Load Quick Save", and this loads straight into the mission where you last quick-saved, rather than into the game's main menu.
That might not even be technically possible, but I thought I'd mention the idea.
A companion feature to this -- which I think would belong exclusively to Thief Buddy rather than AngelLoader -- would be the optional ability to have the game auto-quick save when you quit. (I suppose I could use something like Autohotkey to setup a quick save followed by Alt-F4 with a single key combo.)
Combined, this would make it faster/easier to save & quit and then later return to exactly where you left off.
Again... it's completely unnecessary, it's almost comically over-convenient, and it may not even be possible... but it's something I've enjoyed in emulators, where they have the advantage of working with save states.
FenPhoenix on 28/1/2023 at 22:19
Quote Posted by Twist
I have an idea or suggestion for a completely unnecessary yet convenient feature... although I'm not sure if it would be for VoiceActor and Thief Buddy or for FenPhoenix and AngelLoader:
It'd be cool to load straight to a mission's quick save. By that I mean something like: you right-click the mission in AngelLoader and select "Load Quick Save", and this loads straight into the mission where you last quick-saved, rather than into the game's main menu.
That might not even be technically possible, but I thought I'd mention the idea.
A companion feature to this -- which I think would belong exclusively to Thief Buddy rather than AngelLoader -- would be the optional ability to have the game auto-quick save when you quit. (I suppose I could use something like Autohotkey to setup a quick save followed by Alt-F4 with a single key combo.)
Combined, this would make it faster/easier to save & quit and then later return to exactly where you left off.
Again... it's completely unnecessary, it's almost comically over-convenient, and it may not even be possible... but it's something I've enjoyed in emulators, where they have the advantage of working with save states.
Those would both be nice but I don't believe either is possible*. As far as I know there's no way to tell the game to skip the menu and load straight into a save (though someone more versed in the newdark command line can confirm or deny), and as for autosave-on-quit, TB's autosave merely sends a key combo to the game, which isn't going to work in a menu and in any case if the user has clicked Quit then the game is just going to quit right away without giving a chance for anything else to happen.
*Reverse engineering and hooking into the Thief executables might allow things like this, possibly, but that's well beyond my wheelhouse and then you're depending on something that might change...
Twist on 29/1/2023 at 02:57
I figured that was the case for loading straight into a quick save. No biggie.
For quick saving and quitting, though, an Autohotkey script works. You basically just bind a single key (or combo) to quick save, wait a beat, then close the active window.
Since VoiceActor is using a dll to emulate key presses already, maybe he could incorporate something like this? Just optionally...
And then maybe some Dromed wiz will know a command line for loading quick saves directly (if it's at all possible... which I don't expect).
vfig on 29/1/2023 at 03:28
Quote Posted by Twist
For quick saving and quitting, though, an Autohotkey script works. You basically just bind a single key (or combo) to quick save, wait a beat, then close the active window.
you could also script Autohotkey to click through any intro cutscenes, click "Load Game" on the main menu, and then click on the quicksave.
Quote:
And then maybe some Dromed wiz will know a command line for loading quick saves directly (if it's at all possible... which I don't expect).
to the best of my knowledge, there arent any command line options like that.
FenPhoenix on 29/1/2023 at 04:24
Quote Posted by vfig
you could also script Autohotkey to click through any intro cutscenes, click "Load Game" on the main menu, and then click on the quicksave.
Can you really though? The game isn't a Win32 UI with discrete controls with classes and handles etc. that Windows would know about, so surely AHK would have to simply send a click to a certain screen coordinate, but then FMs can change the layout of the title screen buttons if they want (see Deceptive Perception 2 for example).
vfig on 29/1/2023 at 04:57
Quote Posted by FenPhoenix
but then FMs can change the layout of the title screen buttons if they want (see Deceptive Perception 2 for example).
true, though few do. for that matter an fm can change the layout of the load screen too (though even fewer do). and if you were really bothered by the script not working for those few, you could force the stock main menu and load screens with a mod that just provided all the relevant stock interface files, to override the ones the fm supplied.
on the other hand, if angelloader or anything wanted to build in this capability programmatically, you would just have to read the rect files, e.g. mainr.bin for the main menu, to get the coordinates of the buttons. that part is trivial.
FenPhoenix on 29/1/2023 at 05:26
Quote Posted by vfig
on the other hand, if angelloader or anything wanted to build in this capability programmatically, you would just have to read the rect files, e.g. mainr.bin for the main menu, to get the coordinates of the buttons. that part is trivial.
Oh, interesting. Now you've piqued my attention. mainr.bin is binary (as one would expect from the extension), can I assume that in the T2 source somewhere is some info on its structure? And did NewDark add anything?
