Cities (DARKLAND.CTY)

City-specific data: names for every location within each city, coordinates, dock connections, building inventory, and shop quality ratings. Non-city locations are in DARKLAND.LOC.

Extension: DARKLAND.CTY
Location: Game root
Byte order: Mixed — <code>city_contents</code> word is big-endian; all other fields are little-endian
Size: 57,225 B — 1-byte count (92) + 92 × 622-byte city records
Compression: None
Magic: None — num_cities byte = 0x5C at 0x00
Status: Partial
Source: Wendigo — darkland.cty.xml; partially correlated with in-game city content

Partial. Two name slots are not fully resolved: +0x18E (populated in 6 cities as Munzenplatz / German Reichsmuenzstaette — likely maps to $imperialMint variable, but not runtime-proven) and +0x1CE (gate/tower names; correlates with city_contents bit 0x2000 in 31/34 cases). The city_contents word must be treated as big-endian — earlier little-endian readings shift all flags and produce wrong results.

Canonical source: darkland.cty.xml (Wendigo’s Darklands repo)

File Layout

Offset 0x00:  byte      num_cities = 0x5C (92)
Offset 0x01:  city[92]  cities

City order here is the definitive ordering; the full name is the best unique identifier.

city struct (622 bytes = 0x26E)

Offset	Size	Field	Description
`+0x00`	32	`short_name`	Short city name
`+0x20`	32	`full_name`	Full city name
`+0x40`	46	`city_data`	Coordinates, dock info, flags, shop qualities (see below)
`+0x6E`	32	`leader_name`	Name of the city leader
`+0x8E`	32	`ruler_name`	Name of the ruler
`+0xAE`	32	(unknown)	Possibly unused
`+0xCE`	32	`polit_name`	Name of the political centre / town square
`+0xEE`	32	`town_hall_name`	Name of the town hall
`+0x10E`	32	`fortress_name`	Name of the city fortress or castle
`+0x12E`	32	`cathedral_name`	Name of the cathedral
`+0x14E`	32	`church_name`	Name of the church
`+0x16E`	32	`market_name`	Name of the marketplace
`+0x18E`	32	(unknown)	In the stock file this is non-empty in exactly 6 cities, and every populated value is `Munzenplatz`
`+0x1AE`	32	`slum_name`	Name of the slums
`+0x1CE`	32	(unknown)	Many populated values are `Zeughaus`, gate names ending in `-tor`, or tower names ending in `-turm`
`+0x1EE`	32	`pawnshop_name`	Name of the Leihhaus (pawnshop); either `Leifhaus` or empty
`+0x20E`	32	`kloster_name`	Name of the Kloster (church law/administration)
`+0x22E`	32	`inn_name`	Name of the inn
`+0x24E`	32	`university_name`	Name of the university

city_data substruct (46 bytes = 0x2E)

Offset	Size	Field	Description
`+0x00`	2	`city_size`	City size: 3 (small) to 8 (Koln)
`+0x02`	4	`entry_coords`	Map coordinates when entering the city
`+0x06`	4	`exit_coords`	Map coordinates when leaving the city (chosen to avoid untenable positions)
`+0x0A`	8	`dock_destinations[4]`	Indices of cities reachable via this city’s docks; `0xFFFF` = no connection
`+0x12`	2	(unknown)	Coastal side: `0xFFFF` = inland, `0` = north of river, `1` = south; flood risk indicator
`+0x14`	2	(constant)	Always `4`
`+0x16`	2	(pseudo-ordinal)	Runs `0-0x5B` with gaps; probably unused
`+0x18`	2	`city_type`	Ruler type (see enum below)
`+0x1A`	2	(unknown)	Values `0`, `1`, `2`, or `3`
`+0x1C`	2	(constant)	Always `0`
`+0x1E`	2	`city_contents`	Building-presence bitmask (see below)
`+0x20`	2	(constant)	Always `0`
`+0x22`	1	`qual_black`	Quality of the blacksmith (`0` = not present)
`+0x23`	1	`qual_merch`	Quality of the merchant
`+0x24`	1	`qual_sword`	Quality of the swordsmith
`+0x25`	1	`qual_armor`	Quality of the armorer
`+0x26`	1	(unknown)
`+0x27`	1	`qual_bow`	Quality of the bowyer
`+0x28`	1	`qual_tink`	Quality of the tinker
`+0x29`	1	(unknown)
`+0x2A`	1	`qual_cloth`	Quality of the clothing merchant
`+0x2B`	1	(constant)	Always `0`
`+0x2C`	1	(unknown)	Often paired with the next byte; may be half of a word-like value
`+0x2D`	1	(unknown)	Usually `0` or `1`

Quality note: A zero value means the city does not have that shop. Non-zero values are relative - a higher number does not equal an item quality number directly, but a city with a higher value than another offers equal or greater quality items. Example: Nuernberg has 0x31 for the armory but offers quality 37 (0x25) armor.

city_contents bitmask

Byte-order note: city_contents is stored as a big-endian 16-bit word in the file. Earlier little-endian interpretations shift the flags and produce the wrong mapping.

Mask	Flag	Meaning
`0x8000`	`is_kloster`	Has a Kloster
`0x4000`	`is_slums`	Has a slums district
`0x2000`	(unknown)	Strongly correlates with the unknown name slot at `+0x1CE`
`0x1000`	`is_cathedral`	Has a cathedral
`0x0800`	(constant)	Set in all stock cities
`0x0400`	`is_fortress`	Has a city fortress
`0x0200`	`is_town_hall`	Has a town hall
`0x0100`	`is_polit`	Has a political centre
`0x0080`	(constant)	Zero in all stock cities
`0x0040`	(constant)	Zero in all stock cities
`0x0020`	(constant)	Zero in all stock cities
`0x0010`	(constant)	Zero in all stock cities
`0x0008`	`docks`	Has docks
`0x0004`	(unknown)	Matches the second unknown name slot at `+0x18E` (`Munzenplatz`) exactly in the stock file
`0x0002`	`is_pawnshop`	Has a Leihhaus (pawnshop)
`0x0001`	`is_university`	Has a university

Validation notes from the KB:

is_fortress now behaves like a positive fortress flag, not a reversed boolean
is_kloster, is_cathedral, and is_town_hall match their corresponding name fields across all 92 stock cities
is_polit, docks, is_pawnshop, and is_university each have a single known stock-city mismatch
the +0x18E slot is populated in Koln, Freiberg, Mainz, Frankfurt am Main, Trier, and Prag
the German edition preserves the same six populated +0x18E cities, but translates the value as Reichsmuenzstaette
that German rendering is a much stronger semantic clue than the English Munzenplatz; it points specifically toward an imperial mint / imperial mint site
the executable variable table includes $imperialMint, which now looks like the strongest candidate mapping for the +0x18E slot
no shipped English or German MSGFILES card references $imperialMint, so the linkage is still not runtime-proven
the 0x2000 flag correlates strongly with the +0x1CE slot (31/34 exact matches); the flagged-but-empty exceptions are Groningen, Koblenz, and Basel
the German edition preserves the specific gate/tower names in +0x1CE, but translates many generic Zeughaus entries as Kaserne
that pushes 0x2000 toward a garrison/barracks/fortification-landmark reading rather than a simple armory label
all cities with populated +0x1CE strings also have both a political center and a fortress name
both +0x18E and +0x1CE look more like CTY-only landmark labels than ordinary visitable LOC records or widely exercised message-card variables

ruler enum (city_type)

Value	Name	Note
0	Free City	Approach message 7
1	Ruled City	Approach message 1
2	Capital	Approach message 6

Message indices refer to $CITYE00.msg.

Confidence

Medium-high. Confirmed by darkland.cty.xml; partially correlated with city content in play.