v1.78 bug?

[geoschmo]

When manually loading the game you will get the players screen before the data mismatch error screen. If it were the other way around the game host could nto ever load the game and process with a different Version and games would never be upgradeable under any circumstances.

Now, to your problem. You do have the .gam file in the savegame under the mod folder, correct? When you click on it on the right hand side of the modpicker you should see a list of gam files, and near the bottom is your P&N game and it will look something like this [P&Nmod3]Mygame.gam. And not [None]Mygame.gam. the mod name in the brackets is how the modpicker decides what mod to use when autolaunching directly into your turn.

Geoschmo

[dumbluck]

I have the .gam in the right folder. Come on, Geo, give me some credit here!

[ August 27, 2002, 13:38: Message edited by: dumbluck ]

[geoschmo]

I have done it myself DL. I have had instances where i had a copy of the .gam file in the default and in the mod savegame folder and was clicking on the wrong one.

I know it's not a problem with 1.78. Otherwise I would be having the problem all the time, and I do exactly what you describe with no problems for all my games.

The only thing I could suggest then is to delete the "Launcher.ini" file from your space Empires IV directory. Mod launcher will recreate it the next time you open it up. Perhaps something in that file has gotten scrambled or something. Be warned though this will remove all the passwords and player numbers you have stored for your games, so you will need to put them in the first time you play each game after you do this.

Geoschmo

[geoschmo]

So, did that work DL?

Geo

[dumbluck]

Nope. *sigh* But I did learn something from the experience, even if it's unrelated to this bug.....

EDIT: I think it is specific to the situation of an updated mod. The part I don't get is that receiving the error message is dependant on whether or not the game is started using the command prompts. (the modpicker utilizes the command prompts, right?)

[ August 28, 2002, 10:31: Message edited by: dumbluck ]

[dumbluck]

What I need to do is try to re-create the error with a new game. But to do that, I need to find a copy of P&Nv3.1 (I overwrote mine with v3.1b). I'll ask SJ about it...

EDIT: On the other hand, It might not be dependant on those specific mods; maybe ANY mod change will be missed. THAT I can test right now....

[ August 28, 2002, 11:15: Message edited by: dumbluck ]

[dumbluck]

Ah-HA!!!

This is definately a bug. I was able to recreate the error with a simple mod (I deleted MinMiners 1 and 2).

• Started game in testmod.
• hit End Turn 4 times.
• Saved game as test.gam.
  

Then I...

• restored to default data files.
• attempted to open test.gam with the modpicker.
• game spit out "Data Files don't Match" error, as well it should.
  

However...

• Started unmodded SE4.
• Chose Load Game from the main menu.
• Chose test.gam.
• test.gam ran "normally".
  

Test.gam ran, but it used the modded facility numbers applied to the default facility list.
In the modded game, I simply had Research Centers instead of MinMiners on my homeworld. In the "illegal" unmodded game, I had the following facilities (med tech start):

• 1 x MinStorage 1
• 1 x SY 3
• 1 x MinStorage 2
• 5 x MinMiner 3
• 1 x RadExtracter 3
• 1 x OrgFarm 3
• 5 x ResCenter 3
  

So this is definately a bug. Isn't it?

[ August 28, 2002, 11:18: Message edited by: dumbluck ]