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+--- Thread: Making communal save files in GM Studio 1.4/2 (/showthread.php?tid=2042)
Making communal save files in GM Studio 1.4/2 - VinnyVideo - 08-18-2019
What is the best way to make a save file that multiple GM Studio games can access?
Back in 2012, I started putting a "Stop 'n Swop" system in almost all of my games. This was a save file that multiple games could write to. This way, you could share data between different games. Finishing an objective in one game might unlock a special secret in another game. I never fully implemented cross-game unlockables, but the data is there so I could make it happen. I know @Hello has done some things like this.
My old friend GM 8.0 has served most of my game-making needs for the past decade. While I still prefer GM 8 in a lot of ways, GM 8 is showing its age, and it's harder to run it on my new PC. So I've doing more things in GM Studio 1.4 and GM Studio 2.
GM 8.0 lets you read and write to files pretty much wherever you want. However, newer versions of GM are a lot more restrictive with file access permissions - it's hard to access folders outside of working_directory. Some of the workarounds I've seen are pretty complex, requiring third-party plugins and other things that add layers of complexity.
Is there an easier way to save files in GM Studio 1.4 or GM Studio 2 without having to rely on the working_directory variable?
RE: Making communal save files in GM Studio 1.4/2 - Mario - 08-21-2019
Don't really know anything about GM but I'm thinking you could probably solve this outside of it. Try having the installer for the game check if the other save file exists and when creating the directory instead of making a new save file just put a symlink to the original one. That way it'll be in the same directory for GM to mess with. I suppose things can get weird depending on how GM saves the file though.
RE: Making communal save files in GM Studio 1.4/2 - DJ Yoshiman - 08-24-2019
I have nothing to contribute to this topic, except that I remember when we had the idea at one point of time of having a general file that could be accessed by Clickteam products, Game Maker, and some other program as well that could be used to unlock stuff or have games communicate with each other.
That would be amazing to have again.
RE: Making communal save files in GM Studio 1.4/2 - OssieTheOstrich - 08-25-2019
I'd love to see a MFGG fangame (or multiple fangames) with a "Stop N Swap" feature built-in.
RE: Making communal save files in GM Studio 1.4/2 - VinnyVideo - 08-25-2019
@DJ Yoshiman @Ostrich101 I'd love to see more MFGG games use a Stop 'n Swop system, too - whether it's multiple games by the same developer, or games by different developers. @Hello is the only person I know who's fully implemented such a system, although several of my games have the framework in place to share data.
@Mario Usually GM games don't use an installer, so I don't think that would be workable.
RE: Making communal save files in GM Studio 1.4/2 - Mario - 08-25-2019
Even better if GM doesn't come with an installer, you can use a third party one that should be able to do that kind of work in the install process. I'm not sure what tools are out there for that though- I think there's one by ClickTeam actually? At least there was years ago but I'm not sure its still around.
More importantly do you think having that file in each games directory but linked? Here's an article about symlinks in Windows 10- I'm not sure the state of them in Windows but pretty sure some kind of link exists- maybe you can try a hard link (basically have two places in the file system that link to the same exact data) instead if those won't work.