anno1800-retroactive-dlc-activation

Description of how to retroactively activate one or more Anno 1800 DLCs in a savegame.

GUI Application

Download the built program from here. Or build it yourself using Python >= 3.11:

pip install pyinstaller
.\build.ps1

Alternatively you can run the gui.py script directly from cmd.exe

set PYTHONPATH=%cd% && python a1800da/gui.py

BELOW ARE DEPRECATED DESCRIPTIONS

These are no longer needed if your save game is compatible with the GUI version above.

Steps (v2)

1. Install most recent version of Python 3 from https://www.python.org/downloads/
2. Download this repository, open command line into v2
3. Copy a Anno 1800 save game file you want additional DLCs activated into the v2 directory. Save games can be found in %userprofile%\Documents\Anno 1800\accounts.
4. Edit the script main.py in line 27 and put in the file name of the save game file.
5. Edit the script main.py in line 30 and put in one or multiple DLCs that you want activated. See line 11-23 for possible values. The value must have DLC. as a prefix (as shown in the existing code). Save file.
6. Run python main.py
7. A file gamesetup.a7s is created in the same folder v2
8. Get the latest release of RDA Explorer here: https://github.com/lysannschlegel/RDAExplorer/releases and use it to load your save game from v2. Remove the existing gamesetup.a7s inside RDA Explorer (Right click - Delete). Add the generated gamesetup.a7s (Right click - Add files ...). Then save it (File - Save).
9. Copy the save game back to your Anno 1800 save games in %userprofile%\Documents\Anno 1800\accounts.
10. Launch Anno 1800 and pick the exact save game to load.

Steps (old, more complicated, still working)

1. Get the latest release of RDA Explorer here: https://github.com/lysannschlegel/RDAExplorer/releases
   • Load the desired Anno 1800 save game into RDA Explorer (Save games are stored in %userprofile%\Documents\Anno 1800\accounts)
   • Export gamesetup.a7s to a local folder
2. Use a zlib library (e.g. Python zlib.decompress) to decompress gamesetup.a7s to gamesetup_zlib_decompressed
3. Clone https://github.com/anno-mods/FileDBReader.git and open it in Visual Studio (the Community version is free).
   • Run FileDBReader with command line parameters in the working directory of gamesetup_zlib_decompressed: decompress -f gamesetup_zlib_decompressed. You'll get a gamesetup_zlib_decompressed.xml as output.
4. Open the xml file and find the section <ActiveDLCs>. Add the desired DLCs to the list of DLCs and update the count accordingly.
   Full list of DLCs as of Sept. 19th, 2022: <ActiveDLCs> <count>0A00000000000000</count> <DLC>B8410600</DLC> <!--Sunken Treasures DLC--> <DLC>B9410600</DLC> <DLC>BA410600</DLC> <DLC>E3410600</DLC> <DLC>81610000</DLC> <DLC>CB410600</DLC> <DLC>D6410600</DLC> <DLC>D7410600</DLC> <DLC>E4410600</DLC> <DLC>E5410600</DLC> <DLC>82610000</DLC> <!--Reich der Lüfte--> </ActiveDLCs>
5. Compress the xml file using FileDBReader: compress -f gamesetup_zlib_decompressed.xml -o fdbr -c 2
6. Use a zlib library (e.g. Python zlib.compress) to compress gamesetup_zlib_decompressed.fdbr to gamesetup.a7s
7. Use RDA Explorer to import the new gamesetup.a7s into your save game and save the file.
8. Run Anno 1800 and load that explicit save game.