Why aren't the pictures being used?

[alley_cat]

This maybe a stupid question, but I noticed that the game is shipped with a lot of images of leaders (maybe for diplomacy use) adn a lot of images for the technologies. In order to see the technologies images through the game you must go all the way to the great library and you cant see them the same way in civ2 that when you discovered a technology it shoed its image right away. I havent found the leaders image anywhere in the game.
What a waste!

[Sean]

It's things like this that really detract from the games "atmosphere".

[Martin Gühmann]

All the images are compressed in the zfs file put in the pictures folder. But these images are in an unknown format to us. You can uncompress the zfs files but you will only find rim files. But i didn't found the emissiary photos. The names of theese photos can be found in the add_str.txt. But Activision removed theese pictures they are not in the zfs files. I don't know why. If you like to decompressed the zfs file you can search in the internet for UNzfs.
And by the way avoid it to post a topic twice.

-Martin

[alley_cat]

I posted a thread twice?
Didn't noticed. Sorry.
Anyway, I didn't really understand your post...

[alley_cat]

I do have access to all the images. Thats not my point. My point is that the game is shipped with lots of cool images that are never used!

[Locutus]

Twice? I think this is the third time I saw the thread (but I could be wrong). Anyway, what do you mean with 'I do have access to all the images'? Where did you find these images and how do you access them exactly?

[Martin Gühmann]

Now in detail: I found the leader images, they are stored in the pic555.zfs file. This file can be found in the ..\ctp2_data\default\graphics\pictures folder. If you want the single picture files you need a program called UNzfs.exe. This program can be downloaded from http://www.fortunecity.com/silverstone/impala/176/.
After unzfsing you have the single picture files, but you can't view them, because these files are rim files. And I haven't a rim file viewer except the game. In the add_str.txt you will find something like:
# Diplomat pictures. Bit weird storing these in a string file, but it works.
# Transplanted, and modified (filenames are updp* now, ctp1 was upd*), from civ_str.txt
GREEK_DIPLOMAT_PHOTO "updp023.tga"

But in the zfs file you won't find a file like updp023.tga only like updp023.rim. This file format is unknown to us.

To view these emissiary photos you can put them to a place somewhere else in the game, use the uniticon.txt. My first impreesion of the photos was poor: The diplomatic images looks like buttons and are smaller than the CTP1 pictures but I don't know how to put them at the correct place in the game.

-Martin