PoP1-Total Pack: New version development

[starwindz]

Prince of Persia 1 - Total Pack: 3.0 (Official release) is being prepared.
It will be released within this or next week.

[starwindz]

Prince of Persia 1 - Total Pack: 3.0 (Official version) has been released.
- Minor bugs fixed
- Random tournament level generator slightly improved

* Lite version: http://www.mediafire.com/?nkck35oseyxk176
(Original levelset only included)
* Full version: http://www.mediafire.com/?z8j8mv9181qaz2f
(124 full levelsets included)

[Norbert]

From here:

Updating total pack [...]

If you update it, I have two suggestions.

The first has to do with the User Created Media option to do a YouTube search.
Instead of, for example...
"Prince of Persia New 13 levels"
...I suggest you use
"Prince of Persia" "New 13 levels"
The former gives no hits, the latter gives several.

The second is to start diffpop.exe with --locations or -l (both do the same).
Then it won't just say, for example...
[ DIFF ] level 1: 4 (default: 3)
...but also
[ INFO ] Location: guard information (guard base hit points)
Then users understand that, for this example, the level 1 value of 4 is about altered guard base hit points.
With --locations or (-l) it includes (sub)section information.
The information that you also see with CusPop, the (sub)section headings.
(Both diffpop and CusPop get this information from princehack.xml.)

[Norbert]

Another small request.
Since mods/all-graphics/ is not being updated automatically, could you add the dungeon, palace and character graphics of Princess of Persia to the next Total Pack release?
Someone made a request for this on popot.org, here.
Thanks.

[Norbert]

Another suggestion: change "Use Original Graphics" to something like "Use The Mod's Official Graphics".
Because "Original" could also refer to the original PoP1 game, which makes it multi-interpretable.

[kj-5349]

Suggestion for starwindz:
Is it possible for graphics to be updated automatically like the mod packages? Or if not, you would manually add them in your next release?

As for character graphics, is there an option to change the individual characters rather than a preset package?

Like for instance:
Changing to the SNES fat guard or the lady warrior (Clive Dent's Princess of Persia).
Changing to SNES skeleton.
Changing guards to PoP2 (BlackChar), or the "Vizier" guards from my package.
And also changing to SNES Jaffar but customizing the Prince to Norbert's Micro Palace Prince or the Princess (Clive Dent's Princess of Persia).
This means having individual options for the Prince, Guards, Fat guards, Jaffar, and Skeletons.

Thanks.

[teterilla]

total pack 3.0.
Loses mac graphics version?

[Norbert]

Hi starwindz, I've e-mailed you a link to this post because mods.xml has been updated.

1.
It now includes, for each mod, a number in <i_replays>...</i_replays> and a <replays>...</replays> block.
To learn what replays are, see this page, and to download replays see, for example, this (MININIM replays) and this (SDLPoP replays).

2.
Instead of (just)
-----
<s_executable>...</s_executable>
-----
it now uses
-----
<s_executable>...</s_executable>
<s_executable_sdlpop>...</s_executable_sdlpop>
<s_executable_mininim>...</s_executable_mininim>
-----
If <s_executable> has a value, then it is a DOS mod.
If <s_executable_sdlpop> or <s_executable_mininim> have values, it is respectively an SDLPoP or MININIM mod.
Combinations are possible, for instance a mod that includes both a DOS and a MININIM executable.
Total Pack should not launch non-DOS mods with DOSBox.
An example of a non-DOS mod here.

3.
This one has been added:
http://www.popot.org/custom_levels.php?mod=0000001
This means Total Pack no longer needs to 'manually' add the original game at the top of its overview.

[Norbert]

Judging by a comment here, Total Pack may require an update to function properly.

[kj-5349]

HI Norbert, I encountered the same issue with Malvivio.
Btw my system is Win XP SP3 32-bit. Not sure if the same issue is occurring in other systems (i.e. your Linux).

I reinstalled Total Pack, and if by using the original mods.xml and disabling auto-update, it can work. But with the earlier 124 mods up to The Great Adventure.

Total Pack was fine until Feb 14. Not sure if there was some change that is now giving out this error "Could not convert variant of type (Null) into type (String)"

I'm no expert in any programming. Only thing is there could be a difference between the original xml in Total Pack and the latest one.

Also cause I'm having a concern Starwindz might not respond to this that soon...... So wondering if you, David and other experts could attempt some resolution first............

[Norbert]

Also cause I'm having a concern Starwindz might not respond to this that soon...... So wondering if you, David and other experts could attempt some resolution first............

I understand your concern.

Let me start by roughly outlining the XML issue.
Recently, I supplemented mods.xml, the XML file that recent Total Pack versions rely on.
Supplemented, so added (elements) to; not modified existing elements or attributes.
Normally, programs relying on XML will retrieve content by searching for matching tags.
Example: if I want to know the number of screenshots for a mod, the start-tag to search for is "i_screenshots".
Apparently, Total Pack's code expects elements in the XML to be in a specific order.
New elements were added, namely "s_executable_sdlpop", "s_executable_mininim", "i_replays" and "replays".
As a result, the elements' order changed and Total Pack currently fails to properly retrieve data.

Some solutions:

1. starwindz returns and fixes Total Pack. Preferably in a way that it won't break if additional elements ever get added to the XML.
2. I (temporarily) remove the new elements from the XML until I/we hear from starwindz.
3. starwindz open sources Total Pack, allowing other people to update it and fix the problem.
4. Someone creates a similar program that doesn't have the issue.

I feel reluctant to tackle the problem by rolling back changes made to the XML file, because I merely supplement it. Added to. Old elements remain unmodified. If this broke the program, then it's the program that needs fixing. We should give the program's author some time to look into this. We could also discuss with him the option of open sourcing his program, thereby allowing other people to fix things if other problems ever arise.

I was thinking maybe I could fix the problem by re-adding "prince.exe" for Secret of the Citadel's DOS executable, but that doesn't fix it.
That's another problem of the program being closed source, that I cannot debug the problem.

I've notified starwindz of the recent changes and also of the problem.
Let's wait a week, until February 24th, to see if we hear from starwindz.
Does that sound all right?

[kj-5349]

Let me start by roughly outlining the XML issue.
Recently, I supplemented mods.xml, the XML file that recent Total Pack versions rely on.
Supplemented, so added (elements) to; not modified existing elements or attributes.
Normally, programs relying on XML will retrieve content by searching for matching tags.
Example: if I want to know the number of screenshots for a mod, the start-tag to search for is "i_screenshots".
Apparently, Total Pack's code expects elements in the XML to be in a specific order.
New elements were added, namely "s_executable_sdlpop", "s_executable_mininim", "i_replays" and "replays".
As a result, the elements' order changed and Total Pack currently fails to properly retrieve data.

Thanks Norbert for the specific explanation. Now I've a better picture of the situation.

I feel reluctant to tackle the problem by rolling back changes made to the XML file, because I merely supplement it. Added to. Old elements remain unmodified. If this broke the program, then it's the program that needs fixing. We should give the program's author some time to look into this. We could also discuss with him the option of open sourcing his program, thereby allowing other people to fix things if other problems ever arise.

I agree with not going ahead with solution 2. TP program's behaviour became unpredictable and it's best not to do anything further. [Cap's quote CA:CW ] -> The safest hands are still Starwindz's on his program.

I've notified starwindz of the recent changes and also of the problem.
Let's wait a week, until February 24th, to see if we hear from starwindz.
Does that sound all right?

It's ok, for me, at least. There's no urgency yet - as a young adult, I've been only playing this sometimes on Fridays or weekends. And I understand Starwindz may need considerable time if he's fixing this.
Btw, other big fans of Total Pack may include teenagers and school-going kids, and they may have been playing it 7 days a week once they had no school. Looking at this Feb 17 comment, Total Pack was a big part of his life . So, these people may have to patiently wait...

[malvivio]

Hi guys, malvivio's here. I registered today to this forum to ask how is it going the work of Total Pack 4.0

I'm so excited for it, but I also would like to know why did 3.0 lose all the mods from a day to the other, if somebody understood what happened.

Anyway I've got some requests for 4.0:

1. Including only once Prince original (000001) cause I saw in the latest weeks that it appeared twice. Why?
2. Excluding King of Persia (0000141) and Secrets of the Citadel (0000153), cause they've got an extra window with some options to select before starting the game, and Total Pack doesn't support them.
3. Adding all the grafics that new mods bring (dungeon, palace, character). 3.0 didn't add them after the mods that were at the time of its creation
4. 3.0 has got in options of Sound (in DOSBox Setup) only On and Off where On is automatically soundblaster. I would like that in 4.0 there are the options Standard and Soundblaster (cause if someone wants the game silent can take off the sound at the PC). Soundblaster is good, is the best sound, but sometime I get nostalgic and wish hearing again the standard sound of the game: the original standard sound, not that of the emulator that is a bit different (sound of opeing gates is almost silent, sound of swords during duels is that of buttons pushed while button pushed here are also them almost silent) .

[Norbert]

There's another thing you could look into, starwindz.
Comments can now include text inside spoiler tags.
Mod 0000017, for example, has a comment that uses the tag.

[Norbert]

He released version 3.01:
http://www.popot.org/other_useful_tools ... _v3.01.zip
And will look into other things in the coming weeks.