Stele 8: release time...

[Tellos Athenaios]

Yes, the Stelai are back, and in this Stele we will cover “Releasing Europa Barbarorum II: what could possibly go wrong?”

Take a minute to think about Medieval II: Total War (or Kingdoms, if you prefer) and some mods. Stunning mods, immersive mods, mods which provide hours and hours of fun as you play them over and over again. Mods that have been crafted with great care, and attention to detail, pushing the boundaries of the engine and making it the best it can be.

Now think a minute about installing them. Is it smooth? Easy? Does it just work, right out of the box? Unfortunately, no. It turns out installing a mod is surprisingly difficult. But that is not quite right. The better answer is that it turns out a lot can and does go wrong. As the Europa Barbarorum team, we have first hand experience of what can possibly go wrong since we have made a few releases of Europa Barbarorum I to start with and have the battle scars to prove it.

See if you would have thought of all these issues by yourself (this exercise is particularly useful if you were thinking of making an installer for your mod yourself):

1. The UAC feature in modern versions of Windows (Vista, 7).
2. Some fans might use 32 bit versions of Windows, and others might use 64 bit ones.
3. Medieval II Total War is typically installed under “Program Files”.
4. You should not need to be administrator to install a mod. Reason is that it may interfere with the ability to play the mod as a normal user (see 1 and 3).
5. Your mod is too large for a single installer.
6. Speaking of size: for your fans to download your mod, you must have uploaded it first!
7. Your mod needs to work with Steam versions of Medieval II Total War/Kingdoms
8. Desktop shortcuts and Start Menu shortcuts need to know the location of Medieval II Total War/Kingdoms
9. It is possible that Medieval II Total War/Kingdoms are installed, but you have no way of locating it automatically (see 8).
10. It is possible that both Steam and retail versions of Medieval II Total War/Kingdoms are installed on the same computer. Can you install only one copy of the mod which can be played through both?
11. You want the ability to support multiple languages for your installer (and mod).
12. Fans who do not understand your installation guide.
13. Fans who do not read the installation guide first (and may make mistakes).
14. Angry ones who did not manage to figure out how to install your mod for themselves and are now at the gates, demanding technical support from you.
15. Medieval II Total War requires numerous IDX/DAT files which you need to provide with your mod; and you can't ask your fans to jump through the necessary hoops to let the game generate those files themselves.
16. The Launcher program included with Medieval II Total War/Kingdoms has a few quirks. These quirks affect how you need to install your mod, in order for the Launcher to be able to launch it correctly.
17. Not all files you need to develop a mod may be needed to play it. For instance, for descriptions of units and buildings only the binary versions (strings.bin files) are required. The source code is not used by the game.
18. How long will it take for an installer to be assembled? Who is able to build an installer, and are they always available?
19. What if you want to release a patch for your mod?
20. What if a fan reinstalls the mod with a different configuration of options? (For instance the first time this fan selected to install a Desktop shortcut, but the second time he only wants a Start Menu shortcut.)
21. What if a fan wants to install multiple copies of your mod? (E.g.: for some modding of their own?)

These are all issues which we felt we needed to address in our installers with Europa Barbarorum II. It would be well beyond this Stele to provide answers for each of these issues; instead we will highlight a few choice examples.

Firstly, being able to install the mod in multiple different languages might not seem such a “must have” feature at first. That is, until you remember that Europa Barbarorum I has been translated into German at one point. Taking this into consideration early on also helped identify more technical issues: issue number 20 becomes more self evident once you realise that a shorcut called “Play Europa Barbarorum II” in English will have a completely different name in French!

Secondly, you may already have spotted that issue number 18 is actually another question in disguise: “how long will it take to release the first beta?”. The answer is: thirty five minutes (excluding updating the website). This is how long it takes to convert all the files that make up our mod into a file which contains the installer and make it available for download from our internal FTP server. We know this because we have done several of these releases for testing purposes (to test the installer, among other things).

Thirdly, with Europa Barbarorum II we attempt to automate the entire process of building an installer and doing a release. We use the server that hosts our website for this purpose: by building the installer on that server we avoid having the upload it over the Internet. This makes the whole process considerably faster, because in our test runs the final generated file topped out at about 1.1GB. Imagine you had to upload 1.1GB from your computer to a webserver!

That is it for now. Regards,

[Khazar_Dahvos]

sounds like crazyness and a headache to think of all those things!!!!!!

[DaciaJC]

Imagine you had to upload 1.1GB from your computer to a webserver!

Let's see, at 0.13 Mb/s, that would come out to be ... 18.8 hours.

Point driven home.

[anubis88]

Damn, seeing the title i was sure i'd find a ticking clock with good news

[Hotseat_User]

Anubis, remember that in some way it is such. They are thinking about the issues of the release, which means, that there aren't "that" much other things to fix. As usual, the EBII team wants to provide the best thing possible one can get.

In regard of the questions I've the opinion, that these are wise ones. Even as something in my head is just singing 'release, release, release --- nooooooooo matter whaaaaaat...'

I'm just looking forward and appreciate their work when it's done.

[Arjos]

If we can help by donating or whatever to get faster, better hardware; let us know :)

[Cybvep]

All these problems are technical issues. How do they relate to the progress you made in the creation of the mod? Can we expect anything from you this year?

[Brennus]

I take my helmet off in admiration to you for such a difficult task! Very best of luck!

[Barabbas]

That the word release is part of this threads title is good enough news!

Please keep up the fantastic work, I look forward to it with great anticipation!

[Tellos Athenaios]

All these problems are technical issues. How do they relate to the progress you made in the creation of the mod?

There's no direct relationship between the two. Some team member designed a better way of building installers for EB 2 and wrote installer code and some build scripts/tools to coordinate it... Meanwhile the other team members gave some occasional feedback...

[Tellos Athenaios]

Let's see, at 0.13 Mb/s, that would come out to be ... 18.8 hours.

Point driven home.

Yeah. Can you imagine the incredible patience of the people who did the EB 1 installers? Not quite 1.1GB, granted, but 786MB can't have been much fun either.

[LusitanianWolf]

Your effords are much admired! Thank you for all the patience you spend on this!

[Bucefalo]

I´m impressed of how much planning is going into this mod, i mean i know modding is a lot of hard work, but there are small details (like making an installer, checking compatibility, using vanilla files or create new ones, duplicate files or useless ones etc.) that many mods don´t dedicate enough attention, usually because they are so busy trying to get the mod finished.

It is encouraging to see that you have thought over these details so much, and i definitely think you deserve to put a big warning saying "Skip reading the installation instructions at your own risk". It is enough that you put effort into making the readme clear enough for the less computer savy person to understand, that i think people which don´t bother reading the instructions shouldn´t have any right to complain about it.

Anyway, thank you for the update and all the work you put into this mod. :)

[QuintusSertorius]

Medieval II Total War is typically installed under “Program Files”.

Are there really people stupid enough to install their games in Program Files (especially those they are expecting to use mods for)?

[I_damian]

Who else immediately skimmed the post for blue link text before reading anything? Srsly though I can only imagine how much of a pain in the arse it all is. Before EB, when all there was was RTR which I hated, when I got confident enough to mod the game myself, I spent a few days making my own personal mod for RTW, changing every single units' stats so they didn't chain rout so often and battles lasted more than 3 seconds, and added in about 3 units to the Roman roster to represent the auxiliaries they recruited, changed a few other things, and just those couple of things took me like 3 days.

[Blxz]

I would say number 5 was the only one I had never thought of. Too large for the installer. Interesting. All the rest seem like standard things to deal with, and I would assume many of them might have already come up just within the team itself. 32-bit and 64-bit OS's, etc.

Although I also didn't think much about having both steam and standard versions instealled at the same time. Is there that much difference? Couldn't you just do a system check for steam, if its installed ask the player if they want to install to their steam version. If 'Yes' then install via the steam path if 'No' then install normally. I am sure I have seen a mod do that already for me.

Otherwise, nice. I really liked the previous Stelae so this is a blast from the past!

[XSamatan]

Are there really people stupid enough to install their games in Program Files (especially those they are expecting to use mods for)?

Well, since it is the default location many do it. And it works fine as long as you don't meddle with files (what Tellos wants to avoid). Furthermore Steam is also located there (and it is a bit more difficult to move Steam-games than a normal game).

XSamatan

[Tellos Athenaios]

I would say number 5 was the only one I had never thought of. Too large for the installer. Interesting.

Installer compilers like InnoSetup and NSIS have a limit of 2GB payload or thereabouts (before compression) because they read all the data into a memory block (memory mapped) then perform the compression and write out the result as a data section of a PE32 executable (the installer you run).

EB 2 is currently significantly larger than 2GB and certainly will grow bigger still.

Although I also didn't think much about having both steam and standard versions instealled at the same time. Is there that much difference? Couldn't you just do a system check for steam, if its installed ask the player if they want to install to their steam version. If 'Yes' then install via the steam path if 'No' then install normally. I am sure I have seen a mod do that already for me.

You could, but what about issue 10? More importantly: as you can see there are a number of “issues” which point to “location” as being one of the tough nuts to crack for installers. Suppose a user has installed Kingdoms in “C:\Program Files\SEGA\Medieval II - Total War\” and also in “C:\Program Files\Valve\SteamApps\medieval ii - total war\”, what does this scenario imply for your installer logic? This one tickles all location (related) issues you can think of...

[stratigos vasilios]

EB 2 is currently significantly larger than 2GB and certainly will grow bigger still.

What sort of size are we expecting it to realistically swell to? 4-5GB?

I ask because I'll most likely buy a new pc just for EBII. I think it's the ultimate testament to EB team that so many fans are holding off buying new computers until the release of EBII to gauge what operating system is needed to run the game

[*]Desktop shortcuts and Start Menu shortcuts need to know the location of Medieval II Total War/Kingdoms[*]What if a fan reinstalls the mod with a different configuration of options? (For instance the first time this fan selected to install a Desktop shortcut, but the second time he only wants a Start Menu shortcut.)

Wow, I found this odd. Do alot of people use desktop shortcuts over start menu shortcuts? I personally prefer desktop shortcuts and leaving my start menu clean of anything that's a game, fill it with the utility type programs. But that's just my style!

[antisocialmunky]

You need slaves.

[QuintusSertorius]

Well, since it is the default location many do it. And it works fine as long as you don't meddle with files (what Tellos wants to avoid). Furthermore Steam is also located there (and it is a bit more difficult to move Steam-games than a normal game).

XSamatan

Well, as long as I've been playing games, I've never installed anything in the default location. I can't really appreciate the mindset of someone who doesn't take an active enough interest in their system management to have specific locations in mind for things.

I don't use Steam, nothing about it sounds good. I'd rather own an actual physical copy of a game.

I ask because I'll most likely buy a new pc just for EBII. I think it's the ultimate testament to EB team that so many fans are holding off buying new computers until the release of EBII to gauge what operating system is needed to run the game

I must admit, I'm doing this. I've got some money aside, but in no hurry to buy anything since EBII is the only thing I'd play on it.

[B-Wing]

What's wrong with installing games to Program Files?

[Blxz]

I regularly install to program files, and change settings and meddle with files all the time. No issues, not with EB1 or any of the other hundred games there.

As for XSamartan, to cater for people who install somewhere else just allow them to target the folder of their choice with the installer. I fail to see how thats difficult or a strange thing to do, its been done for as long as I've been gaming back in my old Win95 days.

I don't mean to trivialise your work by any means. I am sure it requires quite a bit of effort to set this all up (and I wouldn't know how to do it) but you write the list as if its things that are uncommon or likely to be missed during design when they seem (mostly) self-evident.

[GenosseGeneral]

That is, until you remember that Europa Barbarorum I has been translated into German at one point.

Quick, OT question (preferably answered by PM): It has? Where can I find more information on that?

[vartan]

Tellos, can someone have M2TW:K installed by both Steam and CD? If so, how does the registry reflect this? does it? If it does, then you might be able to reference the registry, say, using InstallShield, when making your installer and script it to allow the user to decide in which installation of the game she wishes to direct her EB install.

[QuintusSertorius]

What's wrong with installing games to Program Files?

Firstly, it's sloppy file management. Secondly, UAC on later editions of Windows (certainly crappy Vista, possibly Win7) prevents modification of files installed there. Which would include modding EBII onto M2:TW

[XSamatan]

Tellos, can someone have M2TW:K installed by both Steam and CD? If so, how does the registry reflect this? does it?

One can. As Tellos worked on that part I had both versions installed at the same time. The registry has then a Sega tree with both normal and Steam entries...

[Brave Brave Sir Robin]

Firstly, it's sloppy file management. Secondly, UAC on later editions of Windows (certainly crappy Vista, possibly Win7) prevents modification of files installed there. Which would include modding EBII onto M2:TW

While your second point it valid, your first point is being a little rude. Just as you don't install things there for your own reasons, many people do it for the convenience of knowing where all their games or other relevant files are located. I fail to see how it would be sloppy if you didn't plan on making any further modifications to the files.

This being said, I'd advise against installing in Program Files if you use Vista or Windows 7 because it does cause some small problems, though most that I have experienced are readily solvable.

[Tellos Athenaios]

I regularly install to program files, and change settings and meddle with files all the time. No issues, not with EB1 or any of the other hundred games there.

As for XSamartan, to cater for people who install somewhere else just allow them to target the folder of their choice with the installer. I fail to see how thats difficult or a strange thing to do, its been done for as long as I've been gaming back in my old Win95 days.

I don't mean to trivialise your work by any means. I am sure it requires quite a bit of effort to set this all up (and I wouldn't know how to do it) but you write the list as if its things that are uncommon or likely to be missed during design when they seem (mostly) self-evident.

The issue is not with the little detail of popping up an installer page where the user can select the directory to install to. The issue is making the mod play nice with whatever the host system is. That is a different can of worms altogether, it rules out any invasive changes/requirements (disabling UAC is a big no) and it implies having to install the mod in such a way that M2TW is otherwise unaffected.

[Tellos Athenaios]

Quick, OT question (preferably answered by PM): It has? Where can I find more information on that?

Yes but you might need some quality time with the Google search engine to find it, though.