GFX modding questions

[UFOhunter]

I'm trying to get into modding the game. From what I've read here, I understood I can just unpack pk3 files, and the game will use files from the unpacked folders first? I did unpack 0ufos.pk3 to tweak some weapons, costs, etc. This worked quite well, the game accepts my changes just fine.

However, now I want to test some gfx changes, and added a new main menu screen. I unpacked 0pics.pk3. Then I placed my own main_bg.png under \UFOAI-2.5-dev\base\0pics\pics\background\ (overwriting the original)

But my new file does not show up in game, only the standard screen with the greenish earth.

I also tried to move the whole background folder incl. new gfx into a newly made mods/mymod folder, then launching the game with the suggested parameters to load "mymod", but I always get the green earth menu. How can I tell the game to use my gfx instead?

[DarkRain]

Shouldn't that be: '\UFOAI-2.5-dev\base\pics\background\'? You seem to have an extra directory in there: '0pics'

[H-Hour]

If DarkRain's post doesn't help, checkout the /mods/ui2 folder. The main menu is replaced there so you can see how it was done.

[UFOhunter]

Thanks guys, got it to work. The path was wrong indeed, but it also turned out the png was saved initially with wrong settings.

[UFOhunter]

I actually managed to put something together. It builds on the stock GUI of course and needs still quite some work. See below for previews.

Some things, like the UFO AI headline are only temporary since they need still improvement and the font is nothing special.

Feedback is welcome of course, and when there's interest I could provide all the gfx when they're done.



Questions regarding the gui:

1. As far as I see some screens are present as big screen-filling gfx, some others use a lot of tiled elements. Is this all coded, or is there somewhere an editable file non-programmers like me could change to have the game using a new custom screen? Because I use a lot of gradient filllings which doesn't work well with small tiles.

2. The tiles under pics/tiled have all some magenta colored markers on the right and bottom. What are these for, and does changing them have any effect, for example on window borders?

[H-Hour]

The UI is laid out in the files in /base/ufos/ui. You can learn more about these files and how to create a custom UI here.

If you don't have 2.5-dev, I'd also recommend downloading that and looking at /mods/ui2, which has a partially complete custom UI.

[Crystan]

Thats some really nice improvments to the original interface. Looks indeed great.

[UFOhunter]

Thanks for the answers

Yes, I have 2.5dev, so can look into those files. I'll certainly continue work on this.

[UFOhunter]

Made some progress. I changed the darkish background somwhat, and did more work. Still lots of stuff to do. Here are some examples in the current look:





I also tried to get into editing the UI files, I'll probably come back with questions about this soon

Edit: links should work now