Mecha Ace Steam Version

General
1

So I’m new to this forum, and to Choice games in general, but have just started Mecha Ace and am really enjoying it. However, I also love going through files and editing things (hence why I also love Paradox games, their files are pretty easily edited and navigated through). I’ve seen a couple of topics/threads on editing files for other Choice games, but none that specifically stated how to do it with Mecha Ace. What’s more, these other topics were several months old and I’ve no idea what counts as necroing around here. And since I’m experiencing issues with this that were unanswered in those threads (trust me, I was thorough in looking for one), here I am!

Should go without saying I’m using the steam version of Mecha Ace. I wanted to start small and see if editing stats was possible. I’ve seen people say editing stats is easy with the steam version of games through browsing those threads, but this is apparently untrue, and if true it was not outlined how to do so.

The general process is apparently this:
1: Left Click the application in it’s folder and then Right Click it and select 7-zip.
2: Choose the Extract option from the drop down menu and choose where you want to send, presumably a new folder somewhere else.
3: Open that folder and then open index and it should run in the Web Browser without you needing to set it.

But this is not actually using the steam version, rather extracting the files then running the game in a browser. Even more problematic, this process doesn’t work. I can extract the files from the application just fine, but when I go to the new file location and attempt to open the index.html file, it opens into my Chrome browser then gives me a script error popup and just loads indefinitely. This is regardless of whether I edit the startup.json file to have different stats or not.

That’s unfortunate, but what I really want to do (and what all these threads keep saying is easily done yet not actually outlining how to do so) is edit a stat, then be able to go to my steam library, click Play and load up the game with the new stat value. Not play what is apparently the browser version via extracting my files (and as I’ve expressed, not even this works for me).

If I try to simply open the .exe in 7zip and then change the startup.json file (which is how some threads stated you change stats), it does not let me save as 7zip tells me the archive is read-only, and I’ve been unable to find out how to actually change it away from read-only.

So, to outline my issue: I own the Steam version of Mecha Ace. I want to edit some stats and generally mess around with the files (as much as I am able to, anyways) while actually playing the Steam version (that is to say, I can press the Play button in the Steam library and load up the game with my changes to the files saved). If this just isn’t possible due to either Steam or how the files themselves are set up, then that’s fine. Unfortunate, but fine. If this is the case, I’d like to know if anyone has a solution to the index.html issue I’m having when following the instructions I included earlier in the post, obtained via another thread.

Again, apologies if this is in poor form, but I didn’t want to necro a several-months-old thread, and those threads that I saw that touched on this topic did not have an answer to my specific problem. So, yeah, any help is appreciated.

1 Like
2

Don’t feel bad about necroing! As long as the thread isn’t a dead WIP I don’t think it’s in bad taste to do so.

But as far as I know, it isn’t possible to do what you want on a Steam version of the game. At least, not to my recollection.

Google Play is a bit more free with it, allowing you to permanently alter files, but iirc the files are quite a bit harder to find.

1 Like
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Ah, that’s a shame. Since I saw people saying other Choice games could be edited, even the steam versions, I thought maybe Mecha Ace could as well and the problems I was encountering were just me be daft. Thanks for the heads up, though! Guess this means I’ll have to look into the other games now to get my file-spelunking fix.

4

I suspect it’s similar for Mecha Ace. You do have to use 7-Zip, other unzippers don’t seem to work. I know some users have edited steam files. I’ve not tried it myself though.

1 Like
5

I saw this, and as I mention in my post, I’m not having issues seeing the files, exporting them, or opening them, but rather I cannot get any edits to take. I’m wanting to edit the Steam version so that the edits that I make are saved and I can launch the game in Steam with the edits intact. I can’t seem to do that.

Also, exporting the files from the .exe into another folder and attempting to run the index.html like I saw other users mention doesn’t work either. It acts as though it will work, but gives me a script error in the browser.

6

Have a look through @Farsight’s old posts. He’s no longer on the forum, but he does speak of doing this. Maybe he’s posted in more details of how you edit the files and get them to take.

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Apparently he’s the one I saw as I was looking through similar topics before posting this one that gave the initial instructions on how to edit things, and claimed it worked with Steam. But attempting to replicate his instructions using the Steam version doesn’t work :confused: Alas, it seems I’m out of luck.

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try a different browser - chrome doesn’t allow local html files with javascript anymore.