Project Title

Battle Isle II + III Map Editor

Description

A map editor for Battle Isle II, Battle Isle III, and Battle Isle 2020 mission files (*.DAT). This tool allows editing all features of existing Battle Isle maps as well as creating new maps from scratch. Also supports special features from Battle Isle 2020.

Getting Started

System requirements

• Microsoft Windows XP/2003/Vista/Win7/Win8/Win10
• Microsoft DirectX 9.0c
• ca 20 MB free disk space
• PowerBasic Console Compiler - PBCC 6.0

If you just want to use the map editor without compiling it first, you can download the latest executable from: https://www.kitana.org/arena/bi2/bi2editor.html

Installation for Battle Isle II

1. Extract the content of the ZIP file to any folder. This folder becomes the application folder of the Battle Isle II Map Editor.

2. Copy the whole content of your "Battle Isle II" folder into the "BI2" folder of the just created application folder. The Battle Isle II Map Editor will overwrite the file "MISS000.DAT" when testing a map, so it is smarter to copy Battle Isle II to the editor's application folder instead of copying the editor to the folder from which you want to play the original maps one day.

3. Delete all savegames from the folder "BI2\SAV" so Battle Isle II will directly load your map instead of the last saved game. This saves you some clicks when testing your maps.

4. Copy the whole content of your "DOSBox" installation to the folder "DOSBox" of the just created application folder.

5. Open file "DOSBox\bi2ed.conf" in a text editor and modify the bottom-most line to make the game correctly detect your "Battle Isle II" CD. Currently this line should read:

   mount e f:\ -t cdrom -usecd 0 -ioctl -label BATTLEISLE2

   "e" is the drive letter that you have specified as CD-ROM drive during the installation of "Battle Isle II" and "f:" is your Windows path to your CD drive.

Installation for Battle Isle III

1. Extract the content of the ZIP file to any folder. This folder becomes the application folder of the Battle Isle III Map Editor.

2. Copy the whole content of your "Battle Isle III" folder into the "BI3" folder of the just created application folder. The Battle Isle III Map Editor will overwrite the file "MISS100.DAT" when testing a map, so it is smarter to copy Battle Isle III to the editor's application folder instead of copying the editor to the folder from which you want to play the original maps one day.

Executing program

Run bi2editor.exe

Operation

Left mouse button on map: Draw Right mouse button on map: Select shop Hold right mouse button: Scroll map Mouse wheel: Zoom map Shift: Select map section ESC: Unselect all F: Fill selected section with selected terrain CTRL+C: Copy selected section CTRL+V: Paste copied selection at cursor position CTRL+Z: Undo last change CTRL+O: Open map CTRL+S: Save map DEL: Delete unit at cursor position or delete object if no unit at cursor position Left mouse button on production/content slot: Insert selected unit Right mouse button on production/content slot: Clear slot 0..9: Show DF-layer 0..9 ,: Hide DF-layer and show normal layer only S: Highlight shops I: Select map element at cursor position F5: Test map inBattle Isle II

Author

Daniel Bekowies - sourcerer@kitana.org

Version History

v1.008 / 13-July-2021

• Added support for Battle Isle 3

v1.021 / 13-August-2023

• Maps with size up to 256x256 tiles
• User-defined player names for the AI
• Local weather (weather changes that affect only a part of the map)
• Cut scenes
• 30 DF-layers instead of 10
• up to 256 actions
• up to 10 missions on the same map
• use CTRL + left-click to draw on the map without smoothing
• Support for custom units and terrain
• Added scrollbars to all object palettes

License

This project is licensed under the GNU General Public License v3.0 - see the LICENSE.md file for details