Manual page

NAME

GemRB - a reimplementation of the Infinity Engine

SYNOPSIS

gemrb [-q] [-c CONFIG-FILE]
gemrb PATH-TO-GAME
torment

DESCRIPTION

GemRB is a portable open-source implementation of Bioware’s Infinity Engine, which run fine RPGs like Baldur’s Gate, Icewind Dale and Planescape: Torment.

GemRB reimplements only the game engine. To actually play anything, you have to have the data from the original game(s), installed or unpackaged where GemRB can find it. See the GamePath and CDn settings in the engine configuration file below. A full install is recommended.

OPTIONS

  • -q
    Disable audio completely, regardless of supported audio plugins.

  • -c FILE
    Use the specified configuration file FILE instead of the default gemrb.cfg.

  • –color OPTION
    Set the ANSI color option for terminal logging. -1 (the default) will attempt to automatically set this according to the terminal environment. 0 will disable color output, 1 will set it to the basic 8 color palette, and 2 will use full 24bit color codes.

Note: You can also use the program’s name as a mean to select the configuration file. For example, if the program’s name is torment instead of gemrb, the engine first searches for torment.cfg and only if it’s not found it searches for gemrb.cfg.

To use this feature, just create a symbolic link torment pointing to the gemrb binary and then run torment instead.

CONFIGURATION

A configuration file consists of pairs PARAMETER=VALUE, each on its own line. The case of PARAMETER is not significant, GameType is the same as GAMETYPE. If the same PARAMETER is defined more than once, only the last occurrence is used.

Empty lines and lines starting with `#’ (hash sign) are ignored.

At least the GamePath parameter needs to be changed. That is often enough, so do not fiddle with the other paths too much.

General Parameters:

  • GameType=(auto|bg1|bg2|iwd|iwd2|how|pst)
    Type of the game. The value is a name of subdirectory in override/ and GUIScripts/ directories with game type-specific files and scripts. It is at present also used for various tweaks hardcoded in the GemRB engine. To autodetect the game type, use the default “auto”.
  • GameName=STRING
    Arbitrary name of the game. It will be displayed in the window’s title bar.
  • Encoding=(default|japanese|korean|chinese)
    Specify language used in the game data.
  • GUIEnhancements=INT
    The value is a bitfield. Set it to 1 to enable a few GUI enhancements, mostly in BG2. Add or set to 2 to try to autoidentify items on transfer (if the character has enough lore). Add or set 4 if you want to skip the item description window when opening bags. Enabled by default. Add or set 8 if you want the game to stop mouse scrolling the area at its edges when the window loses focus.
  • MultipleQuickSaves=(0|1)
    EXPERIMENTAL. Set this to 1 if you want GemRB to keep multiple quicksaves around. Disabled by default.

  • MaxPartySize=INT
    Set this to 1-10 if you want more party members or enforce fewer. 6 by default. NOTE: For bigger parties you need to choose a big enough resolution, so there will be enough room for all the party portraits! No space for that in PST or IWD2. The 10pp mod is required to fix various game scripts, so the extra party members don’t get stuck in cutscenes.

  • Logging=(0|1) By default (set to 1) logging is enabled and several loggers are used depending on the plaftorm. Use 0 to disable all logging, which can help in performance critical settings.

Video Parameters:

  • Width=INT
    Game window width (in pixels). This can be arbitrary, but results depend on the game data. Check the website for a detailed explanation of resolution modes.

  • Height=INT
    Game window height (in pixels).

  • Bpp=INT
    Color depth of the game window (in bits per pixel).

  • ScaleQuality=(best|linear|nearest)
    Use the specified quality for the texture scaling filter. The default is best.

  • CapFPS=(-1|0|n) Set FPS handling:

    • -1: no limit
    • 0: VSync (SDL2), 30 (SDL1)
    • n: cap to n FPS
  • SkipIntroVideos=(0|1)
    If set to 1, the intro and logo videos are skipped to save developer’s nerves. The default is 0.
  • GCDebug=(0|2047) Bitfield with reserved bits for drawing Map debug layers.
    • No Debugging features = 0 (default)
    • DEBUG_SHOW_INFOPOINTS = 1
    • DEBUG_SHOW_CONTAINERS = 2
    • DEBUG_SHOW_DOORS = 4
    • DEBUG_SHOW_DOORS_SECRET = 8
    • DEBUG_SHOW_DOORS_DISABLED = 16
    • DEBUG_SHOW_DOORS_ALL = 28
    • DEBUG_SHOW_LIGHTMAP = 32
    • DEBUG_SHOW_WALLS = 64
    • DEBUG_SHOW_WALLS_ANIM_COVER = 128
    • DEBUG_SHOW_WALLS_ALL = 192
    • DEBUG_SHOW_SEARCHMAP = 256
    • DEBUG_SHOW_FOG_UNEXPLORED = 512
    • DEBUG_SHOW_FOG_INVISIBLE = 1024
    • DEBUG_SHOW_FOG_ALL = 1536

Audio Parameters:

  • AudioDriver=(openal|sdlaudio|none)
    Use the specified plugin as the audio driver. The default is openal, while none will disable all audio.

Path parameters:

  • CaseSensitive=(0|1)
    When this parameter is set to 1, the engine will try to find files regardless of their names’ case at the cost of a slight speed penalty. This is especially important when using game files on CD-ROMs, where the files can’t be renamed. Like many Windows programs, the original games use inconsistent mix of lower/upper case letters for naming and referencing their files.

Set this parameter to 1 on Unix-like systems.

  • GamePath=PATH
    Path to the directory where the original game is installed. If you can’t install the game under MS Windows or with WINE, you can try to unpack the data files with the unshield program found at http://synce.sourceforge.net.

  • CD1=PATH

  • CD2=PATH

  • CDn=…
    Path to the data files for the game’s particular CDs or any other data sources.

  • CachePath=PATH
    User-writable directory where the engine caches uncompressed and temporary files. Defaults to a subdirectory of the current directory.
  • GemRBPath=PATH
    Path to the GemRB installation. (To be obsoleted; preset at build time).
  • GUIScriptsPath=PATH
    Path to the directory with scripts controlling the game’s GUI. (To be obsoleted; preset at build time).
  • GemRBOverridePath=PATH
    Path where GemRB looks for its game override directory. It defaults to GemRBPath. GemRB reuses some of the unused files from the original or replaces them and this is the where they can be found. The path is preset at build time. This directory has the highest priority when searching, so putting files in the game override will not affect them. Use another directory and add it as ModPath to the GemRB config.
  • GemRBUnhardcodedPath=PATH
    Path where GemRB looks for its unhardcoded engine data. It defaults to GemRBPath. The original games hardcoded this information in the engine. The path is preset at build time.
  • The following variables do not need to be altered, unless you are doing something really special!
  • SavePath=PATH
    Path to the directory with save games. Note that this directory has to contain save/ and/or eventually mpsave/ subdirectories and that only these subdirectories contain the actual saved games.

SavePath defaults to GamePath.

  • GameDataPath=PATH
    Path to the original game’s installed data files, relative to GamePath. Usually it’s data.
  • GameOverridePath=PATH
    Path to the original game’s override dir, relative to GamePath. Usually it’s override. Original games use this directory to place last-minute patches.
  • GameCharactersPath=PATH
    Path to the original game’s installed data files, relative to GamePath. Usually it’s characters.
  • GamePortraitsPath=PATH
    Path to the original game’s installed data files, relative to GamePath. Usually it’s portraits.
  • GameScriptsPath=PATH
    Path to the original game’s installed data files, relative to GamePath. Usually it’s scripts.
  • GameSoundsPath=PATH
    Path to the original game’s installed data files, relative to GamePath. Usually it’s sounds.
  • GameLanguagePath=PATH Path to the original game’s installed data files, relative to GamePath. By default it’s lang/en_US.
  • GameMoviesPath=PATH Path to the original game’s installed data files, relative to GamePath. Usually it’s movies.

  • ModPath=PATH
    Path where GemRB looks for additional engine override files. It is not set by default. This directory has precedence over GemRBOverridePath.

  • CustomFontPath=PATH
    Path where GemRB looks for additional font files. It is meant to be used with the TTF font plugin and fonts.2da as a way to specify where to look for system or other external fonts. Check the online documentation for the details. It is not set by default.

Input Parameters:

  • DoubleClickDelay=INT
    Millisecond threshold for detecting a double click. The default is 250.
  • RepeatKeyDelay=INT
    Millisecond threshold for detecting a repeated key press. The default is 250.
  • UseSoftKeyboard=(0|1)
    Toggles use of software keyboard on devices that support one. It pops up when text input is required. Disabled by default.
  • NumFingScroll=(2|3|4)
    Number of fingers for multitouch to trigger scrolling. The default is 2.
  • NumFingKboard=(2|3|4)
    Number of fingers for multitouch to open up the software keyboard. The default is 3. The value should not be equal to NumFingScroll above.
  • NumFingInfo=(2|3|4)
    Number of fingers for multitouch to emulate a special keypress (alt, tab). The default is 2.

  • MouseFeedback=(0-3)
    Bitfield with reserved bits for disabling the mouse. Show mouse+tooltips = 0 (default) Hide mouse = 1 Hide tooltips = 2 Hide mouse+tooltips = 3

  • TouchInput=(0-1) Override setting for when autodetection does not have satisfactory results.

    • Autodetect = -1 (default)
    • Force disable = 0
    • Enable = 1

Development parameters:

  • EnableCheatKeys=(0|1)
    This parameter is meant for developers. If set to 1, certain keys allow you to inspect the internal state of objects, do forbidden things, etc. The keys are listed in the CheatKeys.txt file. Do NOT use this option unless you want to make your hands dirty :-). The default is 0.

  • DrawFPS=(0|1)
    This parameter is meant for developers. If set to 1, the current FPS (Frames per Second) value is drawn in the top left window corner. The default is 0.

  • DebugMode=(n)
    This parameter is meant for developers. It is a combination of bit values

1 - count references,

2 - display cutscene warnings,

4 - display variable warnings,

8 - display action warnings,

16 - display trigger warnings.

32 - enable views debug mode.

64 - enable window debug mode.

128 - enable font debug mode.

256 - enable text debug mode.

512 - enable pathfinding debug mode.

The default is 0.

  • DelayPlugin=FILENAME
    Named plugin will be loaded after other (nondelayed) plugins were loaded. FILENAME is a name without path, but with extension, for example libNullSound.so or libNullSound.dll. You can use this parameter more than once.
  • SkipPlugin=FILENAME
    Named plugin will not be loaded. FILENAME is a name without path, but with extension, for example libNullSound.so or libNullSound.dll. You can use this parameter more than once.
  • SaveAsOriginal=(0|1)
    Set this parameter to 1, if you want to keep the save game compatible with the original engine. It is enabled by default.
  • KeepCache=(0|1)
    Set this parameter to 1, if you want to keep the cache after exiting GemRB. It is disabled by default.

  • GamepadPointerSpeed=INT Pointer movement speed with gamepads. The default is 10.

  • VitaKeepAspectRatio=(0|1) If set to 1, original aspect ratio is preserved while game area is scaled to native PS Vita resolution. It is enabled by default.

FILES

  • @SYSCONF_DIR@/gemrb.cfg
    system-wide configuration file
  • @DATA_DIR@/unhardcoded/
    directory with GemRB-distributed data files. These used to be hardcoded in the original engine. The files are sorted into directories for specific games.
  • @DATA_DIR@/override/
    directory with GemRB-distributed data files. These files override their namesakes in the original data.
  • @DATA_DIR@/GUIScripts/
    directory with Python scripts providing GUI setup and interaction. The files are sorted into directories for specific games.
  • $XDG_CONFIG_PATH/gemrb/
    user’s own configuration files.

BUGS

Many. GemRB is still in development stage and not complete.

If you stumble over something which is supposed to work but doesn’t, file an issue at https://github.com/gemrb/gemrb or first visit the official IRC channel #GemRB on the FreeNode IRC network.

AUTHOR

The GemRB Project development team at https://gemrb.org

COPYING

Copyright (C) 2003-2021 The GemRB Project

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301, USA.