Hi,
I have the German version of The Longest Journey on 4 CDs.
Some of the files in Global\xarc have a very large file size (800-900 Mbyte), which is impossible for the CD, and can't be copied - they file copy process freezes. Each of the 4 CDs has two such files - for example 3002.bbb and 3002._lo_res.bbb.
Is there a way to deal with that and still use ScummVM for playing the game?
Thanks for the help - and the absolutely fantastic ScummVM!
Sven
The Longest Journey - datafiles can't be copied
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Re: The Longest Journey - datafiles can't be copied
Hi Sven!
This looks pretty much like a copy-protection scheme to me. Back in the day, one early way of copy protection was to modify the TOC (basically the "inventory" of a CD) and create artificially big files, so in case you want to burn it to another CD-R, it would obviously fail.
Furthermore, often those files contain corrupted sectors which make copying it impossible (e.g. the RingPROTECH scheme which is pretty hard to dump).
What you can do is trying to skip those files when copying to your PC and check if the game runs anyway. However, if some sectors in these files contain "valid" game data, then you are out of luck. What you can _try_ to use is something like ddrescue, but be aware that trying to copy those files with probably thousands of corrupted sectors might ruin your CD-ROM drive - at least it will cause incredibly high stress to the drive.
All the best
Lothar
This looks pretty much like a copy-protection scheme to me. Back in the day, one early way of copy protection was to modify the TOC (basically the "inventory" of a CD) and create artificially big files, so in case you want to burn it to another CD-R, it would obviously fail.
Furthermore, often those files contain corrupted sectors which make copying it impossible (e.g. the RingPROTECH scheme which is pretty hard to dump).
What you can do is trying to skip those files when copying to your PC and check if the game runs anyway. However, if some sectors in these files contain "valid" game data, then you are out of luck. What you can _try_ to use is something like ddrescue, but be aware that trying to copy those files with probably thousands of corrupted sectors might ruin your CD-ROM drive - at least it will cause incredibly high stress to the drive.
All the best
Lothar
Re: The Longest Journey - datafiles can't be copied
Hi Lothar,
thanks for the reply. It seems that getting the original data from the CD is pretty difficult if not impossible.
However, at least for this game there might be a workaround. I realized in the meantime that there is a Longest Journey HD mod pack that ScummVM can use - and that mod pack includes the files that I couldn't copy.
Regards,
Sven
thanks for the reply. It seems that getting the original data from the CD is pretty difficult if not impossible.
However, at least for this game there might be a workaround. I realized in the meantime that there is a Longest Journey HD mod pack that ScummVM can use - and that mod pack includes the files that I couldn't copy.
Regards,
Sven
Re: The Longest Journey - datafiles can't be copied
Sorry for necroposting/resurrecting an old thread, but I just came across this while trying to copy the datafiles from my own copy of the German 4CD version.
While copying the files fails due to the copy protection, the installer works fine even on Windows 11( despite a warning it won't run under Windows NT, just ignore ist
) and if you choose the maximum size installation it copies all necessary files and these work fine in ScummVM. I don't know if this also works on Wine (my Linux install is bust at the moment but might be worth a try to run the installer in Wine I if you use Linux).
Just in case somebody else has the same problem, maybe this info could also be added to the Wiki for the game?
While copying the files fails due to the copy protection, the installer works fine even on Windows 11( despite a warning it won't run under Windows NT, just ignore ist
) and if you choose the maximum size installation it copies all necessary files and these work fine in ScummVM. I don't know if this also works on Wine (my Linux install is bust at the moment but might be worth a try to run the installer in Wine I if you use Linux).Just in case somebody else has the same problem, maybe this info could also be added to the Wiki for the game?