how do i...?

im working on a mod, and my friend wants to try it out. thing is, my mod is not actually a mod, im editing the main game. My question is, which files do i have to send to him, for him to be able to play my game? he has arcanum 1074 nothing edited, no mods or whatever. another question that is slightly related: is there any other (easier) way to transfer him the files? say with an installer or something?

 

I'll answer your second question first. There is, but I haven't learned how to do this. Sorry.

However - There is one big thing to take into consideration here:
Is your friend playing a store-bought or warez version of the game? As far as I can tell these modified games refuse to work right on warezed games.

So - Assuming he is playing a store-bought one, getting the files you've modified to him isn't too difficult.

I've gone back and double-checked the screenshots you posted, and it looks like you're working from the unpacked main Arcanum.dat.
The bad news is, this thing is just too damned big to be reasonably uploaded somewhere as-is.
The good news is there's a fairly simple way to reduce it's size to something a lot more manageble.

In your Sierra folder - not the Sierra/Arcanum - create two folders. Name one Arcanum5.dat. Name the other Arcanum.patch1.

A bit of guesswork here - I'm assuming that you've only modified or added files to the folders in the Arcanum4.dat. If so, open the unpacked Arcanum4.dat and copy all the folders into the Sierra/Arcanum5.dat.
If you've changed any files in the Arcanum3.dat, I hope you kept notes on which ones. Find those files and copy them into the correct folder in the Sierra/Arcanum5.dat.

Here's where the weight-reduction happens. Open the main Arcanum.dat you've been working from and locate the folder named "sound". Single-click on it. Now go up to the menu bar and select Edit, then Invert Selection. Now you can copy all those files into the Sierra/Arcanum.patch1 folder.
You just reduced the upload size by over 200 mb! The MP3 speech files take up a hell of a lot of space and are not needed for what he'll be playing.

For further reduction, open the Sierra/Arcanum.patch1/maps folder and delete any of the maps that you haven't altered. If you made a change to - say - Shrouded Hills and created a new townmap to show that, then keep it. Otherwise it's dead weight.

Now that you're done with all that, use a file compressor that you both have (Winzip for example) and package both the Sierra/Arcanum5.dat and Arcanum.patch1 folders into a zip file. Upload this to the file-sharing site of your choice and e-mail your friend with the download link and the following directions:

After you unpack, the Arcanum5.dat goes into the Sierra/Arcanum folder.
The Arcanum.patch1 goes into the Sierra/Arcanum/modules folder.
Start a new game.

This is actually the simplist way to do this and it will let him play the mod without having to unpack his game.

One last thing - the unpacked folders makes for slow game start and shut-down. 1 to 3 minutes depending on CPU speed. Be sure to tell him this.

 

Ah, ok, thanks man , but i need some confirmation...

changing things in arcanum1 and arcanum2 dats, won't work, and will crash the game, correct?

again, thanks a LOT

 

Actually, it shouldn't. As long as everything is written or made exactly to specs, you should have no trouble.

But then again - this is coming from someone who made new folders to avoid that risk.