(Feature Request) Support loading games from ZIP64 archives

[jroyvde]

https://community.easyrpg.org/t/easyrpg-fails-to-load-large-zip-files/1699

As discussed in the above thread, EasyRPG doesn't currently support loading ZIP64, meaning user-created compressed archives over 4GB in size will fail to load. Most RPG Maker games aren't so big, but notably, Yume 2kki cannot be played from a .zip. Collective Unconscious, another large Yume Nikki fangame, only fits under the 4GB mark thanks to encoding all of its sound to .opus.

The proposal is to implement support for ZIP64 archives, so that they can be loaded and played in the same way as <4GB ZIPs.

[Mimigris]

I do have doubts whether such a feature would be of much use, at least with the cases presented:

• Yume 2kki is distributed each time with a major version weighting several gigabytes, either distributed as a zip, 7z, or has an archive separated into several chunks, depending on who distributes it and where it is distributed, as well as minor versions, only adding content without removing any, distributed as patches usually inside zip files. The period of time where you only have to download a major version to play the last version of the game usually only lasts a few days, as after that minor versions serving as patches can be distributed for the game as the only update method for months. So, in any case, someone wanting to play the last version of the game would not have much purpose of having this feature.
• You already mentioned Collective Unconscious is not over 4 GB, as it compresses audio files, but additionally, the game is distributed with two archive files, one with the data of the game and one with the audio files, as to allow users who do not need the audio part to have access to a smaller archive. As such, with this method of distribution, were the game 4 GB or more, this feature would not serve any purpose to the game as either the archive weighting 4 GB or more would not be the one of the game, but the one of the audio files, and even if it were the one for the game, the user would most likely need to uncompress the files too to be able to get the audio, rendering this feature also not used.

Another issue for user accessibility for those that would try to only play through zip files is porting save files: if you play with a save file on an older version of your zip game and want to update to the latest, you need to boot the new version of the zip game to create the save folder, and then place them inside, which is less practical than just overwriting your existing game folder to reuse its save files, and is the current way to do that properly.

I'm not aware of other games in the scene having game files that big, as it really requires having a lot of files, lot of audio or video files; closest I can think of so far is Aëdemphia, which is distributed as a 7z and "only" weights 2 GB as such (after all, distributing big games through zip files is not really common in the first place, as other compression methods tend to get chosen over when distributing files so big).

Ultimately for now, since there is a lack of distributed < 4 GB games, the most realistic user cases I can see for it are a) users compressing all their games to be put into zip files or b) huge archive of games distributed as zip files.

If I'm not mistaken, playing games into zip files can require to have a device with more memory, as info about the zip needs to be stored somewhere, which could make this feature not as useful as it could be if it were to cause performance issues.
I was thinking that this feature could perhaps see a bit of use on the Nintendo Switch version, as the Switch version can only read files as having SHIFT-JIS filenames if not in archives due to platform limitations, but if it causes performance issues or if not enough RAM is available it would ultimately serve no purpose.