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Hach-Que

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Posts posted by Hach-Que


  1. I tried adding a team in TibEd, by adding a team to RulesMD.ini (Cloning YuriCountry).

     

    ; Clone of YuriCountry
    [HQTeam]
    UIName=Name:HQTeam
    Name=HQTeam
    Suffix=Hach-Que's
    Prefix=H
    Color=NeonBlue
    Multiplay=yes
    Side=ThirdSide
    SmartAI=yes

     

    Under sides, I also put

    ThirdSide=YuriCountry,HQTeam

     

    I just looked at some other topics, do I need NPatch for this? (Currently using unmodified RA2:YR)


  2. Creating cameo images from PNGs

     

    It took me ages, so I'd figure I'd share how I got an RGB PNG successfully converted to a SHP file. A big thanks to Doctor Destiny. I'm not the one with all the know-how here, I'm just interpreting it :)

     

    You need:

    • The GIMP
    • XCC Utilities

    1. Setup XCC

    • Open the XCC Mixer (Start->All Programs->XCC->Mixer).
    • Select View->Directories... from the menu, and set your Red Alert 2 directory.
    • Restart XCC Mixer.
    • Once it has restarted, click and drag the second vertical bar (as part of the double vertical bar) to the right, to open another file view.

    2. Setup your working environment

    • Create a directory to work with all your files. You could create this folder in My Documents, or for quick access in XCC, you probably want to store it directly under C:\.
    • I recommend copying your RA2 directory underneath your working directory, so that you always have the original game available. If you do follow this step, change your RA2 directory in XCC, and restart XCC.
    • In the left fileview, navigate to your RA2 directory (or the RA2 you are working with if you followed the above step), and find the languages.mix file. Double-click on it.
    • Navigate to your working directory in the right fileview.
    • Right-click on cameo.mix in the left fileview, and select "Extract...". Save this file to your working directory.
    • Select File->Close on the XCC menu (make sure that you have the left fileview selected; just click a file in the left fileview).
    • Double-click cameo.mix in the right fileview (you may need to press F5 while the right fileview is selected).
    • In the left fileview, you should have your working directory open, and in the right fileview, you should have cameo.mix open (a whole bunch of shp files listed)
    • Locate engnicon.shp in the right fileview. Right-click on this file, and select Copy as PCX.
    • In the left fileview, right-click on any file, and select "Explore". This should open up a Windows Explorer window.
    • Drag engnicon 0000.pcx from Windows Explorer into the right fileview. Right-click on engnicon 0000.pcx in the right fileview, and select "Copy as PAL (JASC)"
    • Rename the PAL file if you want.

    3. Setup the GIMP

    • Open the GIMP.
    • Create a new file. It doesn't matter about the settings of this file, we're only using it to access the Dialogs menu.
    • Select Dialogs->Palettes on the menubar (image window).
    • Click the little arrow in the top-right corner.
    • Select Palettes Menu->Import Palette...
    • Select the Palette File radiobox, click the browse button and navigate to the PAL file you saved in step 2.
    • The palette should appear as shown in the image below. If your palette appears darker than this, then you most likely selected "Copy as PAL" instead of "Copy as PAL (JASC)" in step 2. Go back and correct this.

      [/img]

    • Click Import.

    4. Create your image

    Create your image in any image program you want; it doesn't have to be the GIMP. To maintain the RA2 appearance however, I recommend setting the 4 corner pixels and their direct horizontal and vertical adjacent pixels, to #0000FF (blue), and then applying an inner bevel (1 pixel wide) to the remaining image.

     

    ##............##
    #..............#
    ................
    ................
    ................
    #..............#
    ##............##
    
    # = Blue Pixel
    . = Image

     

    5. Convert your image

    • Open your image in the GIMP.
    • Select Image->Mode->Indexed on the menubar (image window).
    • Select the Use Custom Palette radiobox, click the image on the button to select the palette you imported in step 3.
    • Save your image as a PCX (not sure it matters though). Make sure the filename is in the format <text> ####.pcx, where <text> is any text no longer than 8 characters you like (you probably should follow the RA2 naming conventions though), and #### is a 4-digit, 0-based number. An example name is hqhero 0000.pcx.
    • Repeat these steps for each image.

    6. Import your images

    • Go back to XCC Mixer. Make sure the left fileview is your working directory, and the right fileview has cameo.mix open.
    • On the menu, select View->Palet->Red Alert->"ra2.mix - cache.mix - cameo.pal".
    • Navigate to your working directory in Windows Explorer. You should have this window open from before, but incase you don't, you can right-click on any file on the left fileview and select "Explore" to open it.
    • Drag the PCX files you created in step 5 into the right fileview.
    • Right-click on each imported file in the right fileview, and select "Copy as SHP (TS)".
    • Right-click on each imported file in the right fileview, and select "Delete". (We don't want to clutter our cameo.mix file with unneeded files).
    • Drag the new SHP files from the Windows Explorer window into the right fileview.
    • When you select one of your SHP files in XCC, the preview should show you the image correctly. If it doesn't, well, you've done something wrong.

    7. Using them in RA2

    • Open up XCC Mix Editor (Start->Programs->XCC->Mix Editor).
    • Click New to create a new .mix file.
    • Name your .mix file ecachemd##.mix where ## is a two-digit number of your choosing, placing it inside the RA2 directory.
    • Click Insert to add your .shp file. It is recommended that your .shp files for cameos are using the Westwood naming convention, ####icon.shp, where #### is a 4 or less character string.
    • Click Save to save your mix file.
    • To test it's working:

      • Open the ArtMD.ini file in your RA2 directory.
      • Use the search feature of your text editor to find [GI].
      • Change the [GI] Cameo so that instead it is ####icon, where #### is the 4 or less character string you named you file before (without .shp on the end).
      • Save the file, and start RA2. When you build an Allied barracks, your icon should show for the standard GI.
      • If instead you see Missing Cameo, see this topic.
      • To set the GI cameo back to default again, follow the steps above, instead setting Cameo to GIICON.

     

    --------------------------------------

     

    That's all for now. I hope you enjoyed the guide. If you have problems with the guide, or I've missed anything out, reply to this topic. I hope to extend this guide with how to create a unit (with it's own graphic) as soon as I figure it out :P


  3. I came back to RA2 editing today, because I want to make my own team.

     

    I've got XCC, and I tried to follow the guide, but I can't find out where to set the Palette, the tutorials tells me to select a menu item which doesn't exist, and none of the other ones work. I've extracted cameo.mix and cameo.pal. What do I do now?

     

    EDIT: I didn't have my RA2 selected, and I need to restart XCC Mixer for the change to take effect.

     

    UPDATE: I've made my PNG, and I've applied the palette I extracted from giicon.shp (I'm using Fireworks CS3). When I convert my PNG back to SHP however, it looks all friggy and the colors are all wrong. I presume that's because when I apply the palette in Fireworks it doesn't keep each color in it's position. Does anyone know any free software that will take a full image and allow me to apply the .pal file to it?


  4. Well I managed to get Yuri's Revenge, so I want to start manual editing instead of TibEd (also because TibEd's trial will run out soon :( ), but what do I need to manually edit things?

     

    I'm also not sure where to start, can anyone point me to some tutorials for Manual Editing (as well as NPatch)?


  5. I'm using TibEd 1.x, and I've created a building called UltraCoil. Now this is a very powerful weapon, and instead of it costing lots of money (which is how I'm delaying the person from using it at the moment), I'd rather have it a superweapon. Now I've got the superweapon showing in the side (and counting down), but I'm not quite sure how I can apply a weapon to it. If anyone can help that'd awesome.

     

    P.S. Anyone have some links on how to change the images; it kinda sucks having to use the Tesla Coil icon for the Ultra Coil...

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