Deus Ex, Steam, and You: THEY KINDA WORK TOGETHER

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Master_Kale
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Deus Ex, Steam, and You: THEY KINDA WORK TOGETHER

Post by Master_Kale »

As a good lot of you may know, Deus Ex is available on Steam for the paltry sum of $10. As some of you may know, this version of Deus Ex does NOT, for reasons unknown, work with many (if not all) mods out there. The question has come up many times, "WHY I CAN NOT HAZ DX MODZ?!". Well, boys and girls, read up and be learn-ed (Note: Most of the information in those post are copy-pasted from previous threads, so don't be surprised if it feels like you've read it before):

WHY does the Steam Deus Ex not work with mods?
The why is unknown to me, but I can speculate. It appears that Eidos modified the DeusEx.exe file to only run if it is called through Steam. The filesizes are the most obvious give-away; the retail copy of DeusEx.exe weighs in at 248KB, while the Steam copy of DeusEx.exe is only 62.5KB. It's anyone's guess what the exact differences (at a code level) between the two are; all I know is that if you try to run mods with a vanilla install of Steam DX, you'll get bupkiss. I also found out that the Steam DeusEx.exe doesn't like OpenGL mode at all, even with the new renderer in place; it's like Eidos enforced D3D functionality when they released it on Steam.

Well, that kind of sucks. How do I get mods to work, then?
Well, the long and short of it is, you need a copy of DeusEx.exe from a non-Steam copy of the game. Find yourself one (PLEASE NOTE: Hosting this EXE file for download is NOT LEGAL IN ANYWAY) Replace the Steam DeusEx.exe with the retail DeusEx.exe and it should work.

If you're trying to use a mod like HDTP or TNM through Steam, you'll need to replace the exe that shares the mod's name with a retail DeusEx.exe renamed to <mod name>.exe (for example, replace Steam 'HDTP.exe' with retail 'HDTP.exe'). The reason for this is that most full-conversion mod installers make a copy of DeusEx.exe that's found in the ./System/ folder; since the DeusEx.exe in the Steam folder is broken to only work through Steam, HDTP.exe is also broken.

I mentioned earlier that OpenGL doesn't work with the Steam install of DX. If you replace DeusEx.exe with retail DeusEx.exe, you'll gain back that functionality.

EER asked in another thread, "Isn't hdtp.exe just deusex.exe with some parameters strapped in? And if so, couldn't you just add the parameters through steam?" Technically, yes, HDTP.exe (and mods that used copies of DeusEx.exe) is just DeusEx.exe. When you add an external game to your Steam game list, Steam creates a shortcut to that game. When you click on that, it acts as though you just clicked a shortcut on the desktop. You CAN add in parameters to the Steam shortcut entry just like a desktop shortcut; right-click the game in the list, select Properties, and place "Target" from the desktop shortcut into the Steam shortcut's "Target". After doing that, you can launch games like HDTP and TNM from Steam. Note that this method must be done in conjunction with replacing DeusEx.exe with a retail copy

What mods work with the method described above?
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say all of them. The ones I've tested and know for sure work are listed below:
- HDTP Release 1
- The Nameless Mod
- Shifter 1.8
- Zodiac Mod (thanks Dead-eye!)

I've got a lot of stuff to do right now, so this was a bit rushed. If you have any more questions, I'll answer them and add them to the OP.
Last edited by Master_Kale on Wed Jan 02, 2008 5:07 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Post by Master_Kale »

Bump - There's content now!
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Post by Mr_Cyberpunk »

Definitely needed.. Sticky plz.
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Post by Jonas »

Stickeh'd.
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Post by Smike »

* puts down sharpened pencil *

Well done, Kale!

How's your face been doing?
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Post by Master_Kale »

Smike wrote:* puts down sharpened pencil *

Well done, Kale!

How's your face been doing?
Well, now that you've stopped stabbing it, I can only hope it'll scab over in a timely manner :lol:

And thanks for the Sticky; I'm sure it'll help clear up a lot of the confusion, especially since we're getting one or two new-comers wondering about Steam and DX every couple weeks.
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Post by Mr_Cyberpunk »

I did warn you all :P

And yeah thanks jonas. Now please tell smike to stop poking me! :D
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Post by Dead-eye »

I want to play Zodiac so I will install it on my steam version and PM you know if it works or not.
Last edited by Dead-eye on Thu Feb 11, 2010 3:00 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Paul1290 »

I might be wrong here, but couldn't you just download the latest 1.112fm patch and extract the DeusEx.exe from there and use that instead of having to get a retail copy?
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Post by EER »

Paul1290 wrote:I might be wrong here, but couldn't you just download the latest 1.112fm patch and extract the DeusEx.exe from there and use that instead of having to get a retail copy?
Yes, but where's the fun in that?
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Re: Deus Ex, Steam, and You: THEY KINDA WORK TOGETHER

Post by Y|yukichigai »

You can also use the "custom" Deus Ex executable that someone (I forget who) made to address some of the timing/etc. issues that newer CPU architectures cause in certain systems. That version IS legal to distribute. I'll dig up the link when I get the chance. UPDATE: It was "Hanfling" on the Deus Ex Editing forums, and you can find the custom executable on his launcher upgrade project page (http://coding.hanfling.de/launch/). The only ones there right now are under the heading "Depreciated" but I assure you that they work just fine.

Oh yeah, I'm pretty sure the exe in the official demo would work too.
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Re: Deus Ex, Steam, and You: THEY KINDA WORK TOGETHER

Post by Boltersdriveer »

I found a diferent solution!
Use the Custom Deus Ex .exe from here:http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/s ... p?t=808112, backup your old Deusex.exe and that other file deusex.int( i think?< anyway, the file also going to be replaced>)
You can get TNM working on DX just using the advanced launch options. Doing that eg.: -hax0r INI="c:\program files\steam\steamapps\common\deus ex\TNM\System\TNM.ini" USERINI="c:\program files\steam\steamapps\common\deus ex\TNM\System\TNMUser.ini" log=TNM.log (well, it';s mine), wonder why there is a -hax0r .
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Re: Deus Ex, Steam, and You: THEY KINDA WORK TOGETHER

Post by Jonas »

Boltersdriveer wrote:wonder why there is a -hax0r .
That is to enable cheats :)
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Re: Deus Ex, Steam, and You: THEY KINDA WORK TOGETHER

Post by AustinYQM »

I have tried everything mentioned in this post and it has all failed manificently.

I am on a dual core processor on windows 7.

The Nameless Mod starts up and a white square flies around my screen. It does some stuff that makes me believe it should be there. After maybe 2.5 to 3 minutes of this white box doing stuff and music playing (good music!!) the game freezes and I am stuck. I have to taskmanager kill the process.

Windows 7 Ultimate
64Bit Dual Core Processor (I know there are dualcore problems)
Steam Version of the game (DeusEx: Game Of The Year Edition)


I have tried to dual core fixed EXE mentioned twice in this thread (The steam forum link takes you to the same exe mentioned directly above it) aswell as grabbing the files from the patch.

Anything else I can possibly try? I want to be able to vote this mod up on moddb but I have to play it first (a moral thing you see) (Morals? Internet?! Lies!). I love DeusEx and internet subculture so I am excited but it just isn't working.


Thanks in advance,
Austin.
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Re: Deus Ex, Steam, and You: THEY KINDA WORK TOGETHER

Post by Jonas »

Hey Austin, it sounds like you need to change your renderer. Check out the Troubleshooting section of the PDF manual for instructions :)

If switching back to Direct3D works, consider downloading the DX9 or DX10 renderers (depending on your video card). They're linked here:

http://thenamelessmod.com/wiki/TNM_HD
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