Hi guys! This announcement will serve as a FAQ for some of the questions I've seen on the forums, as well as giving some acknowledgements and a tip on how to modify the game files.
FAQ
- Is the game still being supported? No. I released it 2.5 years ago and frankly I don't even remember how to push an update. And after my blunder where I accidentally reset some players' progress, that's probably for the best.
- Are all of the puzzles logically deducible? Almost. Puzzle 15x15-42 (Crescent) has an error that requires you to guess (there shouldn't be a cell filled in in the center). But besides that, every puzzle is deducible. Some of the mural tiles can be tricky and require thinking a few cells ahead.
- Can I migrate my progress to another machine? Yes! But not through Steam Cloud. See below for how to hack the game.
- Is there a Linux/Mac version? No. I'm a PC kinda guy.
Acknowledgements
- Thank you very much to everyone who posted a review! I read them all and they're very nice.
- Thank you to masterthewarrior, for your pleasant screenshots to populate the Community Hub.
- Thank you to FakeSecret, for your extremely comprehensive guide.
- Thank you to Dohi64, for your abundant positivity on the Discussions page. I hope you're still blessing other indie developers.
- Thank you to John Walker writing from Buried Treasure for his thoughtful review of the game. Go check out his page for some Indie game recs: https://buried-treasure.org/
- Lastly, thank you all for playing.
How to Hack the Game
If you want to complete puzzles without actually putting in the effort, get all the achievements with no sweat, change the sound effects or soundtrack, or migrate your work to another machine, then this guide is for you.
For each of these actions, you'll first need to find the folder where your Picross for a Cause information is stored, which defaults to C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Picross for a Cause.
- Marking puzzles complete
- Navigate to Picross for a Cause\Release\Collections.
- In each of these folders, there is a file called "CollectionInfo.xml". Inside this file, each puzzle in that collection is listed, followed by its difficulty and completion status (or unlocked status and completion status, if it's a mural tile).
- For each puzzle you wish to mark completed, replace false with true. If it's a mural tile (mural tiles are represented by an X and Y instead of a name), you will also need to replace false with true. Changing any of the other fields (Difficulty, PuzzlesPerPage, string, etc) in these files may corrupt the game.
- Getting all achievements instantly Simply go through all of the CollectionInfo.xml files mentioned above and mark every puzzle as completed.
- Editing sounds
- Get your desired sound effect as a .wav file and use an online converter to change it to a .xnb file.
- Navigate to Picross for a Cause\Release\Content\Sounds.
- The 3 sound effects are menu button press (ButtonPress.xnb), puzzle drag tick (Tick.xnb), and puzzle completion trumpet (PuzzleComplete.xnb) (listening to that trumpet now, it's rather offensive to the ears. Sorry!).
- Replace the old sound file by adding "_old" to the name of the old sound and naming your new sound the EXACT name of the old sound file and placing it in the Sounds directory. For example, if you want to replace the puzzle completion effect, rename the original to PuzzleComplete_old.xnb, name your new sound PuzzleComplete.xnb, and place it in the Sounds folder. It is important that the name matches exactly, otherwise the game will crash when it tries to load the sound.
- Migrating to a different machine
- Download Picross for a Cause on the new machine.
- Replace the new machine's Picross for a Cause\Release\Collections folder with the old machine's Picross for a Cause\Release\Collections folder.
- Changing corrupted settings If the resolution got messed up somehow and you can't fix it from within the game, open Picross for a Cause\Release\Settings\Info.xml and change the values to something appropriate for your screen.