DeeZire
02-17-2003, 07:00 PM
OK, to gently get things started, I'll share the benefit of my experience on the INI files in this basic guide - and I mean very basic ;) Theres not enough room or time for me here to go into the kind of detail thats need. Having been playing about with them since last March (ish) I can say I know what Im doing by now LOL.
Important Note: you just cant take the task of modding Generals lightly. The INI files are all completely interdependant and one small screw up in one file will bring the whole house down around you (well, not quite, but the game wont start).
First off, if things do go wrong and the game refuses to start with the old 'Sorry a serious error has occurred' message, then dont panic - the INI files are only text based files and you can easily correct any mistakes *provided* you keep regular backups of files. If youre using WinXP, my preferred editor of choice is Notepad, as that has an undo function that works even after you have saved the file ;)
TOP TIP: if you get the crash and the game wont start, hop to the default folder that Generals creates for you - normally this is;-
C:\My Documents\Command and Conquer Generals Data
If the game has crashed, it will place a text file in there called ReleaseCrashInfo.txt (it keeps the previous one too, called ReleaseCrashInfoPrev.txt) - open that file, and it will tell you which entry in which INI file is causing the problem ;) If the file tells you that its an 'Uncaught exception during initialization' then youre in trouble because that can, quite literally, be anything - and I mean anything, from a missing space in a list to an extra or omitted End statement.
You can change that default folder BTW, simply amend the UserDataLeafName = tag right at the bottom of GameData.INI but I highly recommend that you never do this - every map and mod out there will rely on that folder, if you change its path youre going to confuse the hell out of the game ;)
Im going to follow the basic way of INI file modding - this is NOT the preferred convention for modding Generals as we will be messing with the SYSTEM settings rather than USER settings, but its enough to get started with. Every mod Ive seen so far messes with SYSTEM settings, meaning it cant be used online or over a LAN properly - more on the difference between them another time.
For this purpose, lets assume a default installation path of C:\Program Files\EA Games\Command & Conquer Generals\
Every set of INI files in Generals follows this directory structure;-
Data\
This folder can contain your STR or CSF file, which (as in RA2) should contain all your text strings. Only do this for your mods native language!! If you are going to make multi-lingual versions, you need to make a new directory here for each language. So for English, your CSF file needs to go in Data\English.
Data\INI
This folder can contain the core INI files
Data\INI\Default
The game uses the INI files in this folder to build its tables and arrays with default of empty values. Leave it alone, unless you want to make change that for example would apply to every object.
So if youve edited FactionUnit.INI, it goes in C:\Program Files\EA Games\Command & Conquer Generals\Data\INI\Object and your changes will take effect.
Basically, once youve extracted the INI files from INI.big, they go in the Generals directory but maintaining the same directory structure they had in the .big file.
More to come, but that will get you started and its not even close to scratching the surface :)
Important Note: you just cant take the task of modding Generals lightly. The INI files are all completely interdependant and one small screw up in one file will bring the whole house down around you (well, not quite, but the game wont start).
First off, if things do go wrong and the game refuses to start with the old 'Sorry a serious error has occurred' message, then dont panic - the INI files are only text based files and you can easily correct any mistakes *provided* you keep regular backups of files. If youre using WinXP, my preferred editor of choice is Notepad, as that has an undo function that works even after you have saved the file ;)
TOP TIP: if you get the crash and the game wont start, hop to the default folder that Generals creates for you - normally this is;-
C:\My Documents\Command and Conquer Generals Data
If the game has crashed, it will place a text file in there called ReleaseCrashInfo.txt (it keeps the previous one too, called ReleaseCrashInfoPrev.txt) - open that file, and it will tell you which entry in which INI file is causing the problem ;) If the file tells you that its an 'Uncaught exception during initialization' then youre in trouble because that can, quite literally, be anything - and I mean anything, from a missing space in a list to an extra or omitted End statement.
You can change that default folder BTW, simply amend the UserDataLeafName = tag right at the bottom of GameData.INI but I highly recommend that you never do this - every map and mod out there will rely on that folder, if you change its path youre going to confuse the hell out of the game ;)
Im going to follow the basic way of INI file modding - this is NOT the preferred convention for modding Generals as we will be messing with the SYSTEM settings rather than USER settings, but its enough to get started with. Every mod Ive seen so far messes with SYSTEM settings, meaning it cant be used online or over a LAN properly - more on the difference between them another time.
For this purpose, lets assume a default installation path of C:\Program Files\EA Games\Command & Conquer Generals\
Every set of INI files in Generals follows this directory structure;-
Data\
This folder can contain your STR or CSF file, which (as in RA2) should contain all your text strings. Only do this for your mods native language!! If you are going to make multi-lingual versions, you need to make a new directory here for each language. So for English, your CSF file needs to go in Data\English.
Data\INI
This folder can contain the core INI files
Data\INI\Default
The game uses the INI files in this folder to build its tables and arrays with default of empty values. Leave it alone, unless you want to make change that for example would apply to every object.
So if youve edited FactionUnit.INI, it goes in C:\Program Files\EA Games\Command & Conquer Generals\Data\INI\Object and your changes will take effect.
Basically, once youve extracted the INI files from INI.big, they go in the Generals directory but maintaining the same directory structure they had in the .big file.
More to come, but that will get you started and its not even close to scratching the surface :)