A Tim Cain Creation: The Bard's Tale Construction Set

First off, I should mention that I am an absolute sucker for classic gaming. This should give those of you who don't already know how old I am a good indication. I played alot of the Bard's Tale series on my family's old Apple II back in the day and the Construction Set was a lot of fun to build maps and quests with when it came out. Apparently it's gone the way of freeware over the years as I've found a few sources that openly offer it up for download. After saving myself a copy, I dicked around with it a little bit before popping the hood to see more intently how it worked, what types of files it used, etc. It offers you the chance to import 122x80 (if I remember correctly) custom pics to use for special encounters and shops and whatnot, but I'd like to also change the default wall and door graphics. I've searched to no avail for a program that let's you view or edit .pic files, which is what the default graphics are. The custom 122x80 pics support a different type that can be created with the copy of deluxe paint II that comes with the Construction Set, but it won't open the .pic files. I've seen a few examples of games with different graphics so I know it's possible, but the few retro communities I've been to aren't active anymore. So I figured I'd at least check with the one Interplay/Tim Cain related community I know to some personal degree that has a few members old enough and adventurous enough (rroyo!) to remember what I'm talking about.

Even if you don't remember or can't help, but woud still like to remenisce about an old gem of a series, I'm always up for the discussion. I figure it's somewhat appropriate for these boards considering some the crew were pretty heavily active even during the old Black Isle Studios and Troika days.

Anyway, here's a link to the Construction Set if anyone's curious enough to dust it off and take it for a nostalgic spin. It's the one that first got me into modding some 20 odd years ago.

 

Thanks.
There was a time when I could have tore into this and figured out what was needed to see the .pic files, but I no longer have any of those old graphics programs.

One thing I can tell you is, it was common practice to create a picture file in one format, then give it another extention as a way to confound the casual hacker. ie: .pcx pictures being listed as .pic.

I spotted this in the readme:

"Importing DPAINT(tm) Pictures
-----------------------------
To use the Import feature, you must have your picture stored
in Enhanced format and stored in the same directory as the
IMPORT.EXE file. Type IMPORT<ENTER> to run the program. It
will ask for the complete name of the picture file (include
the .LBM). You will then have to choose which slot (from 45
to 74) you wish to save your picture in. If that slot is
occupied, the new picture will overwrite it."

I've tried pic, pcx, gif, bmp, jpg, art, lmb, and tif without success.
All my current photo editors are too new for many of the old formats.

If you're willing to make the effort, find a copy of DPAINT or - what I used - a company called Alchemy Mindworks puts out a program called Graphic Workshop. You may need a version that was made in the 80's to cover all the available formats that were available. Start at the top of the format listings and change the extention of a file until you (hopefully) find the correct one.

Good luck!

 

Good. That gives me a new direction to take my search in. Thanks for the info.