New Wonders--How to Add Splash Images?

[Mxzs]

Has anyone successfully made a new Wonder? If so, how do you get the new game to insert an image in the screen that announces a Wonder has been built?

As I read the code, it requires reference to a dds in the entry <WonderSplashImage>. (For example <WonderSplashImage>WonderConceptKremlin.dds</WonderSplashImage>.) Lacking any idea of what to do, I just made some dds images and put them in an Art folder in my test mod, alongside the Atlas.dds files I've made for other new buildings. However, the game gives me an error message like "Unable to load texture [WonderConceptTempleofAthena.dds]" when the Wonder is built.

So, can somebody offer me some guidance on where to put the dds file, or what code to write, in order to get these splash images to load?

 

[Spatzimaus]

I'm just guessing here:

> It's likely expecting a specific size of image, although I don't know what size that would be. It's trying to fit the image into a popup that probably has a set size, so you could probably find that out by parsing through the Lua files.

> There could be layer issues; after all, the icon atlases contain an alpha layer in addition to the image layer. So your file might just be missing something like this that the script is expecting.

The solution would be to unpack the image library, find an existing wonder's image, and see its size and layers. No idea how to do this, exactly; I thought Nexus could do this, but if it can't then I'm sure someone's written a program for it already.

What I'm trying to do, for my own mod, is put Wonder Movies back in. I've got all these .avi and/or .mve files sitting around that I'd like to insert for my new wonders, and there are all of the Civ4 movies for the older ones.

 

[Mxzs]

Thanks for the suggestions, though they confirm my fears that it's going to be very hard to get splashes in. I'll dig around a little more and see how much trouble I can get into ...

Funny thing is: Why would they go from those awesome movies from Civ IV to the boring static images in CiV, if they're not going to make it relatively easy to mod in your own custom images? It's kind of a pain to make new building icons, but it's doable. But hiding splash images inside libraries without an obvious way to unpack them? Sigh ...

EDIT: Hmmm. Found two "WonderPopUp" files in Assets/UI/InGame/PopUps. The LUA file might as well be written in cuneiform for all the good it does for me to look at it, but it seems to suggest that .dds image size shouldn't be a problem; there is code that seems to resize images. As for the properties of the original .dds images themselves, I'm switched if I can find where they are hiding.

 

[cuc]

The dimension of Civ5's Wonder files varies:

972x448 - Hagia Sophia, Hanging Garden and Taj Mahal
971x565 - Notre Dame
972x568 - other Wonders

 

[6underground]

where are the wonder splash images (I presume .dds) I'm clueless as to their location? :s

I thought Nexus unpacked them, but all I can find are the model & unit textures and some leader art.... =/

 

[Decimatus]

Dr Balthar has successfully made a couple dozen wonder splash images for my mod, so they are certainly possible, and I think not that difficult to do if you already know how to work with image files.

If you haven't yet figured it out yet or the help here is not sufficient, I suggest asking DrBalthar on the 2k forums for tips.

http://forums.2kgames.com/member.php?129948-DrBalthar

 

[kaspergm]

I'm doing a bit of thread necromancy here, but I'm having the same issue as this thread is about. I have added a wonder to the game, and the building appears perfectly well in-game and all. However, once I complete the wonder, the game freezes and gives me an error message that it is unable to load the splash image:

I have made the splash image as a 972 x 568 pixel 1-layer DDS file, which I've put in the art folder. I've set it to VFS True in Modbuddy, and added this to my building information:

Spoiler :

		<Row>
			<Type>BUILDING_FORUM_ROMANUM</Type>
			<BuildingClass>BUILDINGCLASS_FORUM_ROMANUM</BuildingClass>
			<Cost>210</Cost>
			<PrereqTech>TECH_PHILOSOPHY</PrereqTech>
			<Help>TXT_KEY_WONDER_FORUM_ROMANUM_HELP</Help>
			<Description>TXT_KEY_BUILDING_FORUM_ROMANUM</Description>
			<Civilopedia>TXT_KEY_WONDER_FORUM_ROMANUM_DESC</Civilopedia>
			<Quote>TXT_KEY_WONDER_FORUM_ROMANUM_QUOTE</Quote>
			<MaxStartEra>ERA_MEDIEVAL</MaxStartEra>
			<SpecialistType>SPECIALIST_MERCHANT</SpecialistType>
			<GreatPeopleRateChange>1</GreatPeopleRateChange>
			<NukeImmune>true</NukeImmune>
			<HurryCostModifier>-1</HurryCostModifier>
			<MinAreaSize>10</MinAreaSize>
			<ConquestProb>100</ConquestProb>
			<FreeBuildingThisCity>BUILDINGCLASS_FORUM</FreeBuildingThisCity>
			<IconAtlas>FORUM_ROMANUM_ICON</IconAtlas>
			<PortraitIndex>0</PortraitIndex>
[b]			<WonderSplashImage>FORUM_ROMANUM_splash.dds</WonderSplashImage>
			<WonderSplashAnchor>L,B</WonderSplashAnchor>[/b]
		</Row>

The last line I'm not sure about, but I downloaded another wonder mod (one of Paokai's mods) and copied it from there, hoping it would work - but apparantly there's something I need to do more than this, which I'm not aware of. Can somebody help me out with the last part?

 

[whoward69]

check the compression you've used, BC2/DXT3 definately works

 

[kaspergm]

check the compression you've used, BC2/DXT3 definately works

Thank you, this solved the problem, I had used no compression!