Hi All,

I've searched through the forums and the link to the HowToCreateYourOwnSets doc posted in CM10 forums seems to be dead. I noticed another user asked the same question I'm going to ask and never got a reply, so...is or will it be possible to fully modify/create your own chess sets, including 3D models, textures, animation..?

Thanks,

Erik

Textures should be fairly easy if you have Photoshop or some other graphics program that can work with layers. As for 3D models, that's a lot trickier, as the 3D modelling data may not be easy to get at and even if you're able to figure out how to extract the models and what program to use to edit them, 3D modelling programs are notoriously expensive and un-intuitive.

If you ever need to add games to the game's famous games database, or if you want to add personalities that's pretty easy, but on the chess sets issue I fear the developers will not have made it all that easy for us (unless it's just a matter of changing colours for existing sets).

I do a lot of 3D animation professionally myself, so I've already got licenses for two of those pretty expensive programs ;-)

When I saw the chess-set mods I couldn't help but think how cool it would be to create my own, but no harm done, Chessmaster is still amazing value for money, guess we just can't have it all..

Cheers,

Erik

If you have the ability to do the 3D modelling then that's more than half the battle. All you need to do is figure out how to extract the chess set models, which shouldn't be too hard.

The chess set models must be in some sort of library or cabinet file in the chessmaster folder somewhere. It's just a matter of finding it and finding the right program to extract data from it. I've looked through the game files myself but I'm not too versed in those kinds of files so I'm not really sure what to look for. They may be inside the *.dat files in the Chessmaster\Data\Dat folder. If the forum had more members we'd probably have someone who knew, but sadly the forum hasn't been able to grow as it should so we're effectively understaffed for mod projects like this. Hopefully someone will come along who knows this stuff, because I'd love to have a few more chess sets to play with.

quote:

Originally posted by Beeryus:
Hopefully someone will come along who knows this stuff...

Yes, hopefully

It shows how little you know about Chessmaster and how poor your knowledge of this forum is. There is a dat files extractor from Ubisoft (it's on one of their ftp servers) and there are already hundreds of user created chess sets which you can download. Not so long time ago all the links could be found here on this forum but.......you know the rest.

I've seen a link to a doc mentioning a post in the CM10 forum but whatever it pointed to is now defunct. I'll rummage through the UBI FTP and see what I can come up with, I know people where doing new sets, but I wasn't sure for which version and I thought this was largely textures, colors, etc. Any additional info would be greatly appreciated, I hadn't touched CM since CM3000 and have only used winboard based engines until I came across XI last month, so there's a big gap in my knowledge on what is and isn't possible.

Thank you both, no need to flame Beeryus for just trying to answer my question though.
I'll be sure to post anything interesting or perhaps even new sets if I can create a few ;-)

Cheers,

Erik

I would give you the link to the dat extractor and to the chess sets that other people have created (all the links and much more were on this forum two weeks ago) but I have been told that I am a very unhelpfull person (so I deleted all my posts).

So you see, I can't give you the links because it would ruin my reputation

quote:

Originally posted by ebutaljib:

It shows how little you know about Chessmaster and how poor your knowledge of this forum is....

Ok, im new around but this one amazed me. I wasnt aware that people are obliged to have a substantial knowledge about Chessmaster, modding or the forum itself to post here but i guess i've overlooked the "terms of use". Furthermore people don't really tend to ask questions about something they are well familiar with...
And its good to know that i could count on you should i need assistance with a problem
Respectfully
Odysseus

Please understand, the comment you quoted was not directed at newcomers to this forum, but rather toward a long-standing member who had a disagreement with the previous moderator.

You could read the thread entitled That's it, I quit to find out all about it, but it's not really worth it...

quote:

Originally posted by ebutaljib:
I would give you the link to the dat extractor and to the chess sets that other people have created (all the links and much more were on this forum two weeks ago) but I have been told that I am a very unhelpfull person

No one ever said you were uninformative. In fact we all said that your posts were very informative. But in order for information to be truly helpful it has to be given with no strings attached and with a good attitude. It's the arrogant and supercilious attitude that came with the information that some of us (and very many new members) found difficult to deal with.

And when you deleted all the information you had submitted to the forum, well yes, that showed you to be more interested in your own ego than in actually helping people. You never told people that the information you gave would be at risk if someone bruised your ego, and in the end when I suggested that you (as a forum moderator) should be a little more accepting of new members you reacted by removing all the information you had ever posted to the CM11 forums. That doesn't seem like the act of a 'helpful' person.

DAT Extractor

If you click on the link above, given that I've done this correctly, you should get the file you're looking for.

Also, notice how ebutaljib acts like he owns internet links. Fool.

I own the links???

I said many times that everything is still available, you only have to find it. I personally collected all the links over the time and then decided to remove them. That is all. So why are you still bothered that I deleted something that I have collected?

quote:

No one ever said you were uninformative.

Oh yes, they have. Quite a number of users said that I was very unhelpfull. So if I was so damn unhelpfull then why all the fuss that I deleted all my posts? They weren't any help at all and all I did was being sarcastic and obnoxious. What is all the fuss about?

ebutaljib,

You've made three posts and none of them answers the OP's question. You're useless.

quote:

Originally posted by chessumastahexa:
DAT Extractor

If you click on the link above, given that I've done this correctly, you should get the file you're looking for...

I believe CM11 was developed by Ubisoft's Romanian team. Based on my previous experience with Ubisoft Romania's games (Silent Hunter 3 and 4) the way the folder and file system works should be somewhat logical. After extracting the dat files it should be easy for a person with the relevant programs to modify the files and then it's usually possible to put the files in one of the game folders without having to recompress them into a *.dat file again. If it's possible to find and edit the 3D models it should be just a matter of finding the right folder to place them in in order to get them to work in the game. At first this can be done by a process of elimination - keeping the same filenames and just replacing one of the sets that's already in the game then placing the files in each game folder until the new model turns up. After the correct folder is found (someone may have already found this) it may be possible to actually add all-new sets to the game, either by just naming the files differently or by finding a file that governs the names of the chess sets and modifying that.

Alternatively, if the developers force us to recompress the files into a dat file that might make it a bit more difficult, but either way it can be done. It's just a matter of figuring out what the game's program will support - some developers make this stuff really easy for modders while others don't. If I had the time and the inclination I'd probably have a go at figuring it out but it's not really my specialty and I don't have the time to devote to it.

quote:

Originally posted by chessumastahexa:
ebutaljib,

You've made three posts and none of them answers the OP's question. You're useless.

Yes I'm useless and unhelpfull. I thought we already agreed on this.

"It is not enough to be useless, we still need to know how we can be ignoble"

Francis Blanche

quote:

Originally posted by Beeryus:
Based on my previous experience with Ubisoft Romania's games (Silent Hunter 3 and 4) the way the folder and file system works should be somewhat logical. After extracting the dat files it should be easy for a person with the relevant programs to modify the files and then it's usually possible...SNIP

Thanks for that, with the tools available I should be fine unless the 3D meshes were exported in a custom enginespecific format, but quite often it's well-known formats like OBJ, 3DS, DXF, etc. used for the raw mesh info. I'll give it a go next rainy Sunday (which usually means next weekend here in Holland )

Thanks,

Erik

if u open the dat extract with a text editor u can see create with calif but i don't know this editor...
So for 2 d its easy to customise.

I'm a 3d animator myself, too. Would love to be able to create 3d chess sets, but don't know how to extract the models.
If someone found out how to do it, please share it here.

Look in the Chessmaster Grandmaster Edition Downloads. There's a section called 'Creating Your Own Chess Sets'. You'll find a link to the extractor there.

Just follow the included instructions.