How far can mods go?

[Thokari]

I think just look at what modding has done to RCT3.
It's partially the reason why RCT3 is being played to this day...

Im pretty sure i can do the same thing for PC on the long run.

And this is exactly why I am wondering, why did they not built mod support into the game right from the start.
It seems so needed for these types of games, because people are playing them so differently.

A perfect example of how this could turn out is Cities Skylines.
For example, check out the mods "Prop Anarchy", "Move It", "Traffic President" (and its predecessors) and "Prop Precision" to name a few.

Especially Prop Precision should be reverse engineered and implemented into Planet Coaster. And make it work with whole buildings, so you have the "duplicate-and-rotate" chore automated at least, if you can't get rid of it.

 

[edjenoh]

Hi DrChillgood. TS4's engine is very restrictive about the depth to which we could mod, compared with previous games in the series. Planet Coaster at this time is completely closed to modding apparently. As for solidity of foundation, I don't think it's gone far enough yet to judge. We already have the "only 8 terrain paints per world" restriction, which I think we'd have abdabs about if it was The Sims! Granted PC's reasons may be perfectly reasonable, but if EA used those same excuses they'd be lynched. There is definite bias going on.

Is that the same like in Skyrim's Creation kit where a certain cell can't have more than 8 different types of ground textures, else the ground starts to turn black? Is it applicable to whole map's or could it perhaps be broken to just certain sections of the map (like cells in skyrim CK)? Even with this restriction, a scenario editor would be great where we could at least choose the 8 specific ground textures we would like to use on in each park we start.

 

[dalemac89]

.prk files aren't encrypted - they are simply the zlib compressed result of our save / serialisation system. They contain checksums to ensure that the loaded file hasn't been corrupted, but they're standard checksums not any kind of encryption. I wouldn't attempt to modify these to be honest, although as long as you fix up the checksum then there is nothing stopping you from doing so!

Cheers

Andy

Thanks for your explanation here Andy.

I'm interested in decompressing blueprint files - When I looked at the pre-release they seem to have been 'fcompressed' (Fibonacci, perhaps?). Are the blueprints using the same zlib compression as the .prk sav files or is something else going on here?

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And this is exactly why I am wondering, why did they not built mod support into the game right from the start.
It seems so needed for these types of games, because people are playing them so differently.

A perfect example of how this could turn out is Cities Skylines.
For example, check out the mods "Prop Anarchy", "Move It", "Traffic President" (and its predecessors) and "Prop Precision" to name a few.

Especially Prop Precision should be reverse engineered and implemented into Planet Coaster. And make it work with whole buildings, so you have the "duplicate-and-rotate" chore automated at least, if you can't get rid of it.

Because modding toolkits are actually massive products, they are often released well after the initial launch of the game.

Official modding toolkits require official support. It's understandable why many publishers don't release toolkits.

As much as I'd love a toolkit for PC I'd rather they put the time and effort into the core gameplay for the time being.

 

[gregorburns]

Thanks for your explanation here Andy.

I'm interested in decompressing blueprint files - When I looked at the pre-release they seem to have been 'fcompressed' (Fibonacci, perhaps?). Are the blueprints using the same zlib compression as the .prk sav files or is something else going on here?

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Because modding toolkits are actually massive products, they are often released well after the initial launch of the game.

Official modding toolkits require official support. It's understandable why many publishers don't release toolkits.

As much as I'd love a toolkit for PC I'd rather they put the time and effort into the core gameplay for the time being.

All the files seem to be zlib compressed from what I have seen (deflate algorithm). The .ovls, .prk and the blueprints.

 

[Steamloco87]

I'm a bit incline to mods.

Don't get me wrong, I love them and have used them in games like Cities Skylines and Stardew Valley.

But at the same time, when ever a patch/update comes round, you need to check if your mods are still compatible.
And some creators never bother to update their mods, so you need to search for alternatives.

I don't play Cities Sky much now since some of the mods crash my game ever since the new 'disasters' DLC update. (kinda ironic in a way.)

 

[koekeritis]

I am quite tech savvy and a decently experienced programmer, but reverse engineering compressed files is not something I have experience with. I am able to open the .ovl files with a hex-editor, but that isn't of much use if the file is compressed and even if it wasn't compressed it wouldn't be very helpful for me. I am eager to learn and appreciate any help from fellow forummers or maybe even from a dev.

 

[Thokari]

Because modding toolkits are actually massive products, they are often released well after the initial launch of the game.

Official modding toolkits require official support. It's understandable why many publishers don't release toolkits.

As much as I'd love a toolkit for PC I'd rather they put the time and effort into the core gameplay for the time being.

Well...
From a software design perspective, extensibility is a very fundamental concern.

When I personally am talking about "modding support" I dont mean another separate editor (like the Warcraft map editor for example).
Instead I am referring to exposing game libraries and configuration files, which allow anybody to write their own software, and integrating it into the game, without any developer having to lift a finger.
This is the approach that Cities Skylines and Rimworld use, for example, both of course being developed using the Unity Engine, which facilitates this far more easily.

Building "good" modding support like this based on a "custom engine" is a lot harder, given the scope of the project, but I would still argue, that this kind of game is so succebtible to modding, that this could easily have gotten higher priority.
The risk of exposing things you don't want might have played a role...

 

[aDOLPHINjoy18]

There's A LOT players can do already In the game, to build their creations, without needing to mod and reverse engineer. This game (the full version anyways) is only what 2, 3 months old. Frontier will be regularly updating it for now, as it's a fairly new game (the full version). I've been in the Alpha since late April last year, and the game has improved quite a lot since then. There's already some big Youtuber's who have proved you can already create amazing things. It just takes skill, time, creativity, and effort, to do so. Just be aware of user created material from Steam. It is not from Frontier (some of it might be?) so Frontier is not responsible if we download it and it messes up our game. If and when that happens, likely best to delete that download. Sometimes downloads can trigger false and positive detections from you internet security software that you have on your PC. It could contain a virus or something. But usually people share interesting and safe stuff to share on Steam. I would say just play stuff legit and make the most out of it, rather than being a cheater.