Migrating from Mods Manager Bridge to OpenKH Panacea
This guide helps you migrate from using Mods Manager Bridge (build_from_mm
) to the OpenKH Panacea mod loader. This
guide is not meant to be a first-time setup guide - it assumes you already have a working setup with Mods Manager and
Mods Manager Bridge, and that you’re comfortable using them to patch your game.
1. Make sure your game files are back to a vanilla/unpatched state before migrating
You absolutely want to make sure you start from a fresh set of game files. There are two ways to accomplish this:
- Option 1: Verify your game in Epic Games Store. This is the most foolproof way to ensure your game files are unpatched.
- Option 2: Use the
restore
option in Mods Manager Bridge to restore the backup packages it created automatically when you first patched. This option will be faster than verifying in Epic Games Store since the backup files are already on your PC.
- Go to your game installation folder and delete the DBGHELP.dll, Luabackend.toml, and Lua54.dll files before continuing as well.
2. Install the latest version of the OpenKH tools
- Determine where you have the OpenKH tools installed on your PC. This is the folder that contains the Mods Manager program that you have already been using to add/remove mods.
- Download the latest version of the OpenKH tools (linked on the Downloads page).
- Or click HERE for direct download
- Copy all files from the OpenKH tools zip file to your OpenKH tools location. When prompted to replace existing files,
do so.
- Alternatively, you could choose to copy all the files from the OpenKH tools zip file somewhere else to start fresh without affecting your existing OpenKH tools version.
3. Run the Mods Manager setup wizard
- Open Mods Manager. The setup-wizard should automatically open first after updating your files. If not please choose
Settings -> Run Wizard
.
- On the
Game edition
screen, choosePC Release via Epic Game Store
and browse to the folder containing the game executable files (for many setupsC:\Program Files\Epic Games\KH_1.5_2.5
but could be different for your PC). ChooseNext
to move on.
- On the
Install OpenKH Panacea
screen, choose toInstall OpenKH Panacea
. The wizard should inform you that Panacea is now installed (this should not take long). ChooseNext
to move on.
- OpenKH can launch KH2 directly from the Epic Games Store Launcher. This option can save you time and a few clicks whenever you want to run the game after changing your mods or seed. It’s recommended to enable this but is not required.
- For the
Set Game Data Location
screen’sExtraction folder location
, you can use one of two approaches:- Browse to the folder where you extracted your KH2 game data using Mods Manager Bridge originally. As long as you’re confident your extracted game data was from vanilla game files, this option should be fine.
- Alternatively, choose a desired location and choose
Extract game data
to start an extraction. This will take several minutes, depending on your PC. - Either way, once finished, choose
Next
to move on.
- Choose
Finish
to close the setup wizard and save your settings.
4. Configure LuaBackend Hook for Mods Manager integration
Download the latest version of the Seed Generator HERE
Version 2.1.5 and above of the seed generator adds a screen to help you configure LuaBackend Hook automatically.
- Open the seed generator and choose
Configure -> LuaBackend Hook Setup (PC Only)
.
- On the LuaBackend Hook Setup screen, browse to the location where your OpenKH tools (such as Mods Manager) are
located, and choose your intended Mod mode. This choice affects the name of the LuaBackend Hook DLL file.
- Choose
Panacea (Mod Loader)
if you intend to use OpenKH Panacea to load mods without patching game files. Panacea usesDBGHELP.dll
to hook into the game, and it knows to look for LuaBackend Hook’s file with the nameLuaBackend.dll
. - Choose
Patch / Fast Patch
if you intend to patch your game files. In this configuration, LuaBackend Hook is namedDBGHELP.dll
itself.
- Choose
- Choose
Check Configuration
.
- If you already have LuaBackend Hook installed, the files will all be found, but
Configuration File Status
may report that LuaBackend Hook is not yet configured for Mods Manager integration. If this is the case, you can just chooseApply Configuration
to apply the necessary configuration. - If any of the files are missing, or if you just want a fresh copy, choose
Download/Install/Configure
which will download, install, and configure a compatible version of LuaBackend Hook.
After you’ve configured LuaBackend Hook for Mods Manager integration, you can now take advantage of several common mods with bundled scripts.
- Remove GoA ROM, auto save, and soft reset Lua scripts (if they exist) from your
Documents\KINGDOM HEARTS HD 1.5+2.5 ReMIX\scripts\kh2
folder. We’ll manage these scripts via Mods Manager now. If you have other Lua scripts in this folder, you can still manage those manually. We just don’t want duplicates. - Make sure GoA ROM Edition is up-to-date in Mods Manager. GoA ROM bundles its Lua script in recent versions.
- Install
KH2FM-Mods-equations19/auto-save
andKH2FM-Mods-equations19/soft-reset
in Mods Manager. The order for these two mods doesn’t matter.
5. Use Mods Manager to configure mods
- Use Mods Manager to add/remove/check/uncheck mods as usual. (You may have fewer or more mods than shown here.)
- You may notice that your old
Game
tab has been renamed toMod Loader
. This is where you can now build your mods and run your game. If you enabled theLaunch via Epic Games
option in the wizard then you can choose theBuild and Run
option here to build your mods and immediately start your game. Otherwise you only want to use theBuild
option and then run your game through the Epic Games Launcher manually.
- A console window will come up while preparing mods and will disappear once finished. After this has finished, start your game normally and your chosen mods should be applied.
6. Preparing a new Randomizer Seed
- Works essentially the same as it did before, but without the additional patching step. Remove the previous randomizer seed from Mods Manager, add the new seed, and then Build Only again. The next time you start the game, the new seed will get loaded.
7. Removing Panacea (if desired)
- Once Panacea is installed, it will run every time you start the game and will attempt to load any mods that are built.
To remove Panacea, you can run the setup wizard again and there is an option to
Remove OpenKH Panacea
.
- If you still want to use LuaBackend Hook, rename
LuaBackend.dll
back toDBGHELP.dll
after Panacea is gone.
What happens to my old KH2PCPATCH files?
The new update to the mod manager allows it to load in kh2pcpatch files as if they were regular mods. Just add your kh2pcpatch files the same way you would add a zip seed and the mod manager will handle everything for you.