Surviving Mars - Attempting to install mods results in file system error [Win10 Store ver]

[yxkillz]

Description
Attempting to install mods results in file system error [Win10 Store ver]


Windows



Other

What is your game version?
245805
Do you have Space Race installed?
No

Please explain your issue is in as much detail as possible.
The game has issues accessing the file system where Windows 10 apps are installed which results in a file system error whenever any attempts to install mods are made. Even the mod editior is unable to function right.

Can you replicate the issue?
Yes. Just try installing any mod on the Windows 10 store version of the game.

Attachments

 

[AndrewT]

Anything in the log?
C:\Users\{Username}\AppData\Roaming\Surviving Mars\logs\

Make sure the game's executable (I assume it's not called MarsSteam.exe?) is in the exceptions list/whitelist of your antivirus app; ESPECIALLY if you have Windows Defender, add it to the Ransomware "Apps Allowed Through" list.

 

[yxkillz]

The appdata folder for Surviving mars does not exist.

I don't think you fully understand the situation here. Windows store apps are installed into a hidden folder location which users barely have any control of and functions rather differently to games installed via other means such as steam.

At this point I am unsure if the WIn10 store version is a port of the Xbox version or the regular pc version but it is not behaving like the regular pc version (appdata files don't exist, mod file locations also not found etc..).

 

[Necroclysm]

This is very likely a result of the extreme permissions settings that get assigned to the Game Pass games(may apply to all the Store installs now).

It is forced read-only and I cannot find a way to alter the permissions to allow writing to the directory(so we could try manually installing mods, even).
It has some bizarre setup that you can't even force change the owner in order to modify permissions.

Maybe an experienced sysadmin could chime in on how to fix it, but I don't have enough experience with it to know what the workaround would be.

My guess is that the mod manager is a separate executable and isn't inheriting the permissions that the game gets to write to the directory, as Microsoft does claim that mods are up to the developers to enable.

EDIT: I can also confirm that the appdata directory does not exist for Surviving Mars.

EDIT2:
I found the log(I assume this is the correct one) and attached it.
It appears that it is trying to use the original directory that you specified, but the Windows Store install has it in a package directory. I can try and make a symlink and see if it works, but it looks like it will need to be modified to use this new directory structure.

D:\WpSystem\S-1-5-21-2457361802-1663956398-289811123-1001\AppData\Local\Packages\ParadoxInteractive.SurvivingMars_zfnrdv2de78ny\LocalCache\Roaming\Surviving Mars\logs

Excerpt:

POPS: [CDiskstorage] C:\Users\bobby\AppData\Roaming\Surviving Mars\cache
time 0:01:21:484
POPS: [CDiskstorage] Error: Root path dir doesn't exist



Game install is in
D:\WindowsApps\ParadoxInteractive.SurvivingMars_1.0.5.0_x64__zfnrdv2de78ny

I have the Xbox beta app set to use D:\ instead of C:\ as it is a small SSD.

 

[AndrewT]

Thanks for finding that! I haven't yet got my own copy on this platform.

From that log I'm pretty sure this is a bug, and I see we now have another report in this forum.

@Azurespecter is this something you can pick up and run with?

 

[Azurespecter]

Hey! we're investigating this with our mods team. Thanks for reporting!

 

[Brian_C_AU]

Commenting to follow this is affecting me as well.

 

[Crimson L]

I too am getting this issue. Tried installing mods manually only to find there is no mods directory to be found. Following this thread for answers.

(I am using the Xbox Beta App)

 

[sn2006gy]

Same problem here, Got Xbox Live Ultimate, Downloaded to PC. Game plays great but the mod editor when clicking open starts from my documents but doesn't expose the path where to open or save files and i can't even find where the game is installed - probably in one of the hidden/protected folders. Would ya'll be able to expose the Mod Path through "My Games" or "My Documents" so we could download and save files there? Also, could a shim be setup so we could use twitch/curse client to manage addons for the game? Or expose add-ons/mods through the Xbox Beta app?

 

[yxkillz]

I've been out of town the past couple days, glad to see this thread has made some progress. Thanks Necroclysm for finding the log location, I too have similar results in the log file. (My game is installed to the E: drive and this system is running an insider build of 1903)

I did play around with the windows file system, taking as much control as I could of the windows apps folders but windows will only let you go so far. A linux environment can get around windows restrictions but either nothing worked or windows was really unhappy about it. Interestingly enough, in my game folder I saw some symlinks. One of them was to the root of my C: drive but since we are hitting errors with the mods then clearly it either isn't functioning as intended or isn't being used for the mods at all.

Long story short and a word of warning, leave the Gaming Services folders alone as it will break any games relying on it for permissions if you take control of it away from windows (heh yes I went too far and broke all my apps). I haven't found any workaround yet and I believe the only solution is for the devs to sort out how the game handles the files. The Xbox version of Surviving Mars does mods just fine so I'm guessing the windows store version will have to behave more like the Xbox edition than the regular pc version.

 

[ChoGGi_2]

If you manually install mods in
C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming\Surviving Mars\Mods (AppData is a hidden folder)
Do they work then?

Edit: To get hpk mod archives working: You can either use hpk.exe to extract them (hard way), or (easy way) make a new folder, rename the .hpk to ModContent.hpk (case-sen) and place in the folder (one folder for each mod, name doesn't matter).

 

[ghostury]

If you manually install mods in
C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming\Surviving Mars\Mods (AppData is a hidden folder)
Do they work then?

Came here with the same issue regarding mods with Xbox on PC. Manually created the folders Surviving Mars\Mods in AppData, and dropped mods in there resolved the issue for me. I was able to load the game and enable them.

 

[Mr Velocity1577]

I'm having this problem to, has there been a fix yet?

 

[hexaae]

I have the same problem: installed the game from MS Store but can't install mods reporting "Attempting to install mods results in file system error".
This is ridiculous: Paradox released a game for MS Store and don't even know how the games are installed and their restrictive permission rules with the store? I suppose the game can't basically create required dirs to install mods because Paradox didn't study how to grant file writing permission to a MS Store game… sigh This reminds me of first days with Windows Vista when MS introduced UAC and developers didn't bother to learn the new security structure...

I expect a fix ASAP for the MS Store version. Mods not working are game-breaking for Italians, Koreans and other officially unsupported languages.

 

[hexaae]

News? Has this been finally fixed (don't have the MS Store version installed ATM)?

 

[Confusedjack]

News? Has this been finally fixed (don't have the MS Store version installed ATM)?

Yeah i figured out a way to make it work.

I dont have my games from the windows store installed on my system drive so the instructions above didnt work for me but i found a different solution:

C:/ Windows boot drive

A:/ My Games Harddrive

I found my logfiles, game data, mods here: A:\WpSystem\S-1-5-21-2702712463-2462994442-292648778-1001\AppData\Local\Packages\ParadoxInteractive.SurvivingMars_zfnrdv2de78ny\LocalCache\Roaming\Surviving Mars\PopsMods

i then just manually downloaded the mods, renamed all of them to "ModContent.hpk" and put them into individual folders

and voila just like magic it worked

 

[hexaae]

Yeah i figured out a way to make it work.

I dont have my games from the windows store installed on my system drive so the instructions above didnt work for me but i found a different solution:

C:/ Windows boot drive

A:/ My Games Harddrive

I found my logfiles, game data, mods here: A:\WpSystem\S-1-5-21-2702712463-2462994442-292648778-1001\AppData\Local\Packages\ParadoxInteractive.SurvivingMars_zfnrdv2de78ny\LocalCache\Roaming\Surviving Mars\PopsMods

i then just manually downloaded the mods, renamed all of them to "ModContent.hpk" and put them into individual folders

and voila just like magic it worked

Just to be complete to manually download mods you have to go to

mods.
paradoxplaza.
com/games/surviving_mars

(due to stupid link antispam in this forum I have to type in the link this way , so copy & paste it in your browser)

To extract the correct name of the dir to be used, you can use from MS-DOS prompt this command:
find /I ModContent.hpk ".csv"

EDIT:
Pssst, just (re)installed the game from XBox app/MS Store and the mods seem to be installed correctly now from within mod-manager, so no need of manual hacks anymore. They fixed the MS Store version of the game which uses the usual dir (same for Steam etc.)

 

[Ackis]

It looks like if you use a non-standard install location, it breaks things with the the game - I'm having issues on multiple PC's because of this.

A:/ My Games Harddrive

I'd recommend you don't use A or B drives in the future - they have special meaning for removable media.

 

[Confusedjack]

It looks like if you use a non-standard install location, it breaks things with the the game - I'm having issues on multiple PC's because of this.




I'd recommend you don't use A or B drives in the future - they have special meaning for removable media.

Well I get what you mean with A: and B: but none of my other games (steam, uplay, origin, epic or Windows store) have any problem with me installing them on my A: drive. I tried the reinstall twice before I found the above mentioned solution. But if it works for you then that's great

 

[Fred (SAS)]

Has there been a fix for this issue? I'm getting the same "mods cannot be installed". I also can't UN-install mods either. I click delete to remove, the game seems to do it, then immediately refreshes the mods list and ALL the mods reappear again as though they were never removed.