I got it from Feral also and I haven't been able to do anything either, not that I have any skills to deal with that sort of thing, it kind of sucks but from my view there is nothing to do, at least for now

Rinster, I've managed to get into the files!

In our case, Feral has inserted the game files onto what's known as a Disk Image. To mod files ourselves, we need to create a new Disk Image.

Follow the instructions in that link. This will create a new .dmg file and it's accompanying disk image.

Copy the files from the RomeData file that comes with the game to your desktop.

Then copy them into the new Disk Image.

Then move the RomeData Disk Image that came with the game into a backups file (encase you need to start over!)

Then transfer the new .dmg file and the new disk image to the file containing the games from Feral.

I havent tried it yet, but that's awesome!!

Did it!!
Did you edit descr_strat and can you play as any of the other factions, because when I start a campaign as one, it just goes back to the menu

[This message has been edited by Rinster (edited 07-07-2010 @ 03:11 PM).]

Hi Everyone,

My name is Edwin and I work for Feral (The Mac porting and publishing company behind Rome for Mac).

All you need to do enable editing of the data is convert the data to read/write instead or the retail read only. The data is set to read only so it is impossible for the average user to accidentally damage the game data. Damaged game data is the number one reason people have problems with games so by keeping all the data in a locked data image we have noticed a massive reduction in unhappy customers with problems.

The instructions above are the longer way round in converting your image file, all you needed to do was click on the convert button in Disk Utility. I have created a video guide which shows how to do this, please see the link below.

http://www.feralinteractive.com/downloads/support/RomeModding.mov

I created the data images myself (including adding in support for more than one language at once) and the data is byte for byte identical to the PC apart from the extra language string files to support more than one language at once. The data was taken from the 1.5/1.6 Sega "Gold Edition" of the game which is the final version of the Windows release. Most of the textures and sprites etc are in image files (mostly .tga as I recall) but a few pak files exist (9) however they are exactly the same as the PC retail data so modding is identical on both platforms.

Once you have a working read/write image you then can modify the BI & data folder on the RomeData image just like the BI and data folders found in the PC data folder.

Although we do not plan to support modding for obvious reasons we do not want to make it impossible to mod. As a big Rome fan I spent a lot of time making sure that the data was kept exactly the same so PC mods work if you place all the modified data in the correct places so if you notice something different let me know however I am very confident that the game data is 100% identical to the final PC release.

Cheers,

Edwin
Rome Total War Team
Feral Interactive

p.s. The latest Mac 1.1 version also re-enables the "process_rq" option for those of you who like a helping hand using the RomeShell.

p.p.s Rinster, You can enable all the officially playable (i.e. not crash-able) factions from day one in the Mac version bu selecting the unlock all factions tab in the advanced panel when you first start the game.

[This message has been edited by edddeduck (edited 07-08-2010 @ 11:21 AM).]

ya, and I enabled all of those from day 1, but the others aren't configured to play by a human? (like Macedon, Thrace, Scythia, etc.)

another question, what sorts of things do you have to change for the mods? So when you download them, how do you run them to change RTW?

[This message has been edited by Rinster (edited 07-08-2010 @ 12:55 PM).]

Thanks Edwin for posting that message here! The video is really helpful, I'll make sure to do everything I can to pass that along to anyone else who needs it. It's simply much easier than my way.

Rinster, you should be able to edit the playable factions within the strat file. Simply change the code from this:

---------------------------

Custom campaign script generated by Romans Campaign Map Editor

campaignimperial_campaign
playable
romans_julii
romans_brutii
romans_scipii
end
unlockable
egypt
seleucid
carthage
parthia
gauls
germans
britons
greek_cities
end
nonplayable
romans_senate
macedon
pontus
armenia
dacia
numidia
scythia
spain
thrace
slave
end

---------------------------

To include any faction that you'd like:

---------------------------

Custom campaign script generated by Romans Campaign Map Editor

campaignimperial_campaign
playable
romans_julii
romans_brutii
romans_scipii
macedon
pontus
armenia
dacia
numidia
scythia
spain
thrace
egypt
seleucid
carthage
parthia
gauls
germans
britons
greek_cities
end
unlockable

end
nonplayable
romans_senate
slave
end

---------------------------

I'm 99.9% sure that you can't actually play as the Senate or Slave as it causes a CTD if you try and do so.

Correct senate and slaves will crash and the others (the ones we did not enable) have side effects or are missing some types of troops or buildings.

I will do my best to check in on this thread but you can also contact me by using my user name in this forum and adding @feralinteractive.com to the end of it.

As I said Feral don't officially support mods but I will be about to offer advice and listen to suggestions and requests.

Edwin

[This message has been edited by edddeduck (edited 07-09-2010 @ 11:08 AM).]

Hey guys i just tried all that stuff to mod the game but when i made all the factions playable, except the senate and slaves, i then went into the game and clicked on imperial campaign and it said please choose an item from the list. So i just wanted to see if any of you were having this problem

Snorticus, which files did you modify and how? If it was just the descr_strat, then it shouldn't be causing that problem. Try restoring your backed-up descr_strat (you did backup, right?) and try again.

Hi All,

I have written a mod installer for the Mac that installs a bunch of mods and does other things like making the data read/write and enabling all factions mod.

http://www.facebook.com/topic.php?uid=118120444879134&topic=203

Full instructions and links in this facebook post.

Edwin

thank you thank you thank you thank you
that's awesome!
thanks so much!

This thread has been included in the sticky "List of Helpful Tools and Tutorials."

Very many thanks, Edddeduck, for creating and sharing the MAC installer.

not to be greedy, but do you think that there will be other mods converted to and or supported for mac?
just wondering
thanks