Portable FL [Updated 16/06]

Howdy folks, ok I have been working on this for a couple of days now.

Basically a way to make Freelancer portable.

It allows saved games and preferences their own folder within it’s structure (per copy of the game), it allows screenshots to be created in it’s structure (per copy of the game).

I’ve managed to get FLMM working with it, so in each copy there is an individual FLMM to manage the installation.

I included a little MPID tool that creates a backup of your MPID in the AppData folder if you happen to have the game already installed. If you don’t have a backed up MPID in there, then the game creates it as normal, you just have to then go run the MPID tool afterwards to back it up. Then just copy the resulting .reg file anywhere else, it can be named anything after that “Account1.reg”, “Account2.reg” etc.

I’ve created a little tool called ScreenGrab.exe that will organise your screenshots into the \My Pictures folder.

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I have created an Installer.exe file for it, so all you need to do is run that once you have extracted the folder, it will do the following:

1. Check if you have Freelancer installed.
2. If you do it will copy the files it needs.
3. Create the Account.reg MPID backup file for you
4. Launch the game
5. Delete itself.

Extract the ZIP linked bellow, enter the Freelancer folder you get, and double click Installer.exe, when it’s done the game will launch.

NOTE: Please ensure you are running from your default Freelancer not a modded installation, this way you can just make copies and install whatever mod you like - you will then always have a Vanilla install.

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The EXEs that I have created are simple batch files made into EXEs with a converter, you can confirm what code I have used by using http://www.angusj.com/resourcehacker/ and opening any of my EXEs and looking under RCData > B.

Obviously as these EXEs are coming from an untrusted source so to speak, feel free to check them out and/or run any virus checks you wish, just ensure that you come back here with the results. Nothing bad is baked into these.

Test it for me people, it’s designed to work with Windows 7 32-bit & 64-bit. Unsure if it works on Windows 8/8.1/10, would love someone to give me feedback on that as they are batch files I don’t know if the commands have changed in later versions of Windows.

DOWNLOAD:
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/134261089/PortableFL.zip

You are free to modify it in any way you like / improve it. It’s only batch code after all. Not a proper program, although I would like an launcher/updater for it. Doubt that can be done in batch ha.

Thanks!

EDIT: Ok guys, fixed an issue with a couple of the EXEs, they weren’t detecting if Freelancer had been imported correctly.

Fixed, go ahead and use, original download has been re-uploaded.

Remember this is still in Dev and is basically a portable framework for Freelancer.

Just a little update on the progress, I’m in the process of converting the batch code to VBScript so I can create a launcher of sorts to go with it, so you only need run one program to access all the features of the portable toolkit, no ETA just yet as I was pretty familiar with batch, but have very little understanding of VBScript right now. I’m learning, so expect further updates to make this a little more intuitive later on.

I realise this isn’t the simplest of things to explain and it’s probably why nobody has tried it/commented on it yet, hopefully I can make it easier/explain it better (expression has always been an issue of mine).

Thanks!

Hey guys, sorry, real life got in the way as it does…

@Thoughtless
Yes it was this June, I had just gone back to work at the time, after recovering from pancreatitis. It was placed on a back burner whilst I was getting back into work because I was still feeling pretty weak after work, and the lack of energy was making motivation hard.

I am a little stronger now though, but I also have other little projects on the go right now.

@StarTrader
Thank you for the kind comments.
I hope you find it useful, as it stands it’s a pretty neat proof of concept. Only thing left to do with it is tidy it up some more. I was going to start the project again for Windows 10 and was taking a break for just that reason, but me and Windows 10 have had a falll out, so I’m still on Windows 7.

I was experimenting with different GUI options, as the proof is rather GUI-less, I will revisit this soon.

Severe acute pancreatitis, I started with various infections, stomach, chest, pnuemonia, THEN severe pancreatitis. The as a complication got a cyst on my pancreas which they had to drain, then cut away half of my already dead pancreas, remove my gallbladder and fit me with a colostomy lol. I could barely walk for a couple of weeks after that surgery, they had to keep me asleep for 3 days to allow me to heal.

But enough about that.

Yes, it was a proof of concept, I never got into creating a server, but it’s the same principles, it was one of the stages I had in mind, but someone else will have to arrange that more than likely. I can make any software that needs to be installed, and that needs the default Freelancer folder, completely portable.

All I need is to grab the registry files and any needed DLLs or other frameworks and they will function fine. If anyone wants to contribute to this, then that’s awesome.

I wanted to include a bunch of mod tools as add on modules to the environment anyways. My time is just limited right now.

This platform can actually be applied to ANY software as long as it is made compatible.

The motivation behind this here was to make it as simple as possible for folk to get the game up and running from scratch, I do intend to even extract the needed files from the retail CD, ISO, or from the already installed game. Once done it is from that point a completely portable game.

The actual entire scope of the platform was to Unify a lot of stuff, I might call it that actually, The Unity platform.

I very nearly did die, I feel like it was one of those moments on the VOID server when I was BBD and was fighting against half the server lol.

I’m glad someone appreciates the effort

Working on a GUI based downloader/installer now actually. Lots of plans for this, it’s just going to take time, when the proof is functional in GUI form I will open it up to everyone to contribute to. Adding in extra modules or mods will be easy and follow a format. So there should be no issues in getting stuff add to it by the community.

Sigh, I hate work on logo’s, fonts look so rubbish, so I went and solved the god damn issue by creating a fairly simple app that I can just adjust the CSS of and display fonts so I can screenshot them and then edit them in an image program.

Some logo action. Not finished yet, some inside texturing work to do

Just to keep you guys in the loop, I got a new job a couple of months back, unfortunately as I was effectively starting again I had to focus on that for a while, which left me drained at the end of the day. Now I am more comfortable in the role it’s taking less energy, so hopefully I can put some time into this project soon.

I also have a Minecraft modpack I am working on too. Freelancer isn’t going anywhere though (hopefully lol).

PortableFL already functions independently of the main save location. It temporaringly overrides the windows environment variable that points to that location, saves are merely created and loaded from the My Documents folder internal to PortableFLs folder structure. It’s one of the main reasons for it being Portable.

Thanks for the detailed info though man.