I just did a quick test and it looks like the Steam version respects a DataPath.txt file, so you should be able to work around it.
Start by finding the directory where DROD is installed. If you right-click on the game in Steam and select Properties, Local Files, Browse, it should open a Windows Explorer window in the right place. That directory should end in "
...\steamapps\common\DROD Gunthro and the Epic Blunder"
(or "
...\DROD The Second Sky"
). I'll write the rest of this assuming GatEB, just replace everything with the TSS version if that's what you have.
In that directory that Steam opened you to, right-click and create a new text file called DataPath.txt. You need to put one line in it, something like the following but customised for your system:
C:\Saved Games\DROD Steam Gunthro;C:\Program Files(x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\DROD Gunthro and the Epic Blunder\Data;
The first path is where your user data will be saved, and it can be any directory you want (as long as it's all ASCII characters). If you have both GatEB and TSS, make sure you use a different directory for each game.
The second path needs to be where the official holds are. It will be the same directory that you're creating the DataPath.txt file in, plus "
\Data"
on the end.
There is a semicolon after each path.
Save the file, but
before you run the game, go and create the user data folder you specified. It should be empty, but it needs to exist.
Then run the game through Steam, and hopefully things will work. You should see about 6 files get created in the user data directory as soon as the game starts, even before you put in a player name or start importing old files.
Also, if you're trying to import data from an older version of DROD, make sure you're importing from a directory with an all-ASCII name as well.
[Last edited by Tuttle at 09-02-2022 02:16 PM]