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// Visible Wonders - A mod by the Immortal Wombat and Pedrunn
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Ben Weaver (The Immortal Wombat) weaver1@tinyworld.co.uk ICQ: 114083698 20th July 2002 |
Introduction:
In April of 2002, Leonidas suggested a mod that would allow the wonders that you built in cities become visible on the map. Using Martin (the Dane) Bo Vestergaard's TileEdit, it was possible to add the wonder graphics as tile improvements to the game; unusable by the player, but placed by SLIC onto the map.
The upshot of which is that for the first 8 wonders built in a city, a small image of it appears next to the city. This is quite an impressive sight for an exploratory unit, and a nice eye-candy add-on.
Installation:
This mod is intended as an add-on to the 'major' mods - The Apolyton Pack, Cradle, MedMod2, Absolute State, GoodMod etc. and not as a standalone graphics add-on. However, the files are included for an add-on to the default game, i.e. a standalone mod.
See below for intructions on how to include the wonders with your own mod.
Requirements:
- A computer,
- CtP2,
- Patch v1.11
- ModSwapper 1.5
- open ctp2_program/ctp2/userprofile.txt and change the line "DebugSlic=Yes" to "DebugSlic=No".
To install the visible wonders as a standalone mod:
- Find ctp2_data/default/graphics/tiles/gtset565.til and make a backup copy. (copy and paste it, the rename one to "BACKUPgtset565.til".
- Then unzip this archive into the main CtP2 directory, you may be prompted to overwrite gtset565.til.
- If you have made a backup, select "yes".
- IF YOU DO NOT WISH TO USE THE CITY EXPANSION CODE: Open cityexpansion2.slc, and search for "CTX" - delete the blocks of code indicated.
- Run ModSwapper, and select the "Visible Wonders" option.
- Play.
To use the visible wonders in an existing mod, please see below.
The Wonders:
The final list of wonders was formed by combining the wonders from Civ2, Civ3, CtP and CtP2, all the additional ones in hexagonia's Cradle of Civilization mod for CtP2, and the 1st version of the wonder list for Locutus' planned mod. Then all wonders that could not or should not be represented by a building were removed, leaving 40 in the final list. It is not intended that all of these be used in any game or mod, but all are provided in an effort to reduce the number of modded tile files floating around the ether.
As I have mentioned above, most of the best graphics are from other computer games (even RTS games are useful for something... ) and the game in question each is from is listed below with the wonders. Thanks to all the games that we stole graphics from.
The final list of wonders - in alphabetical order, (and viewing from left to right along the rows) are as follows:
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* The Great Wall wonder actually uses two tile improvements on two adjacent tiles. The left of the two (WONDER_GREAT_WALL_A) uses Tileset ID 369. The right one (WONDER_GREAT_WALL_B) uses Tileset ID 370.
Integration:
To use the wonder code as an addition to your own mod:
- This assumes you already have the wonders you want in the mod, and have graphics and GL entries for them.
- Unzip the mod into a temporary directory
- Tiles: Backup your gtset565.til file, and copy the modded one into the tiles folder.
- Text: For every wonder you want to make visible, you need to make an entry in [mod]_tileimp.txt. You can copy a template from IWW_tileimp.txt as provided in the download.
It should cost 0, take 0 time, be buildable on plains, exclude all other tile improvements, except roads, railways and maglevs. The enabling advance for the improvement should be the same as the one for the building of the wonder. Make sure there is no Great Library entry, by including the line "GLHidden" somewhere in the entry. Then choose the effect it is to have on the city. To keep it as purely eye-candy, have it with no effect. Otherwise, add some bonus commerce (tourism), or production, or food.
Most importantly, the Tileset ID should be the one alongside the desired wonder in the above table. - SLIC: Copy cityexpansion2.slc into your default/gamedata folder.
- Open your [mod]_script.slc, and at the bottom, include the line '#include "cityexpansion2.slc"'.
- Next, fill in the list of wonders and tile improvements you want, in the arrays**:
The number in the square brackets increases by one, on each line.
For each wonder, you need a corresponding tile improvement.VISIWONDER[0] = WonderDB(WONDER_PYRAMIDS); VISIWONDER[1] = WonderDB(WONDER_CHICHEN_ITZA); WONDERTIMP[0] = TerrainImprovementDB(TILEIMP_WONDER_PYRAMIDS); WONDERTIMP[1] = TerrainImprovementDB(TILEIMP_WONDER_CHICHEN_ITZA);
Simply add one to the number in the square brackets ( [0], [1] etc.) for each successive wonder and tile improvement, keeping the corresponding wonder with the same number in the square brackets as the tile improvement has.
Or more simply, using the structure already in place (for the first 8): replace the wonder names with your wonders, as named in [mod]_wonder.txt, and the tile improvements that go with them, as named in [mod]_tileimp.txt. - Your mod should be ready to play.
** This has one exception: the Great Wall (or Hadrian's Wall). This does not to be included in the array, but can either be left in, as the Great Wall, or by running a search and replace scan for WONDER_GREAT_WALL, and changing it to WONDER_HADRIANS_WALL (for example).
To remove the wall completely, simply search the code for "GWW" and delete the blocks of code indicated.
Further Mod Materials:
Images for the wonders, great library entries etc., are in the works, and will be available soon. This should make it easier to use the available wonders in mods.
NOTE: It is recommended that wonders are not added 'because you can', but because it aids the gaming experience. I do not recommend at all using all 40 wonders in one mod, the balance would inevitably suffer.
Thanks:
To Leonidas, for the initial idea; Wouter Snijders (Locutus) for help with the list of wonders; everyone else who contributed to the monstrously long discussion at the Apolyton forums.
Most of this mod is my own work.
The SLIC code was written by myself, and then adapted to fit in with the City Expansion mod by Pedrunn. I have to thank Locutus, Dale Kent, and Martin Güehmann for checking it over, and helping with some bugs.
The graphics of the mod would not have been possible without the help and time of many people, especially Leonidas, Locutus, Dave Sobotka (hexagonia), Pedrunn, Child of Thor, and The Big Mc, who all helped me hunt down photos and game images of the required buildings, and aiding in the compilation of the final list of wonders (and sorry if I left anyone out: thankyou too). Without the aid of these people, the mod would have taken far longer to complete than it has done, and I think four months is long enough.
The editing of the images, resizing, image sharpening, quality control and pixel recolouring was all down to me, with the exceptions of the AI entity, and Hollywood, which Pedrunn created, and the Petronas Towers, which caused a lot of grief, but with Locutus' trip to Malaysia (not solely for this purpose...), a photograph was found, and hexagonian kindly made a presentable image from that.
The only two wonders whose graphics I am still not 100% happy with are Angkor Wat, and the Madurai Temple, where no other computer game has made graphics for them, and thus I was forced to resort to imperfect photographic angles and lighting.
And Finally:
I hope you find this mod fun, useful, helpful, enjoyable, or whatever, to make it worth the time I spent on it.
Look out for an updated version of BlueO's city expansion mod in the near future.
Special thanks to Apolyton Civ Site, which showed me the vast world of Civ-gaming online.
Apolyton CS - Thankyou Dan Quick & Markos Gianopoulos.
Legal Junk:
THIS MATERIAL IS NOT MADE OR SUPPORTED BY ACTIVISION.
Feel free to use/adapt/alter and distribute this modpack, on the conditions that credit is given to the author of the original game materials and if possible, this readme file is included; and that any use of this mod is completely non-commercial.
The author takes no responsibility for any damaged software, damaged hardware, lost data, exploding modems, unexpected melting, or any other damage or loss of property potentially or actually caused by this download.
Tough Luck.