Tip 31 - Custom Races

Making a custom race is easy.  Making it COMPLETE... is another story.  Here I'll show you how to integrate a race with custom graphics, sound and animation.

Please install the Sentient Data Network     custom race before you begin.

1.  You have to go through the process of starting a new game.  When you get to the choose opponent, select Create New Opponent.

2.  I'm not going to go into detail on the next screen since it's all self explanatory (just fill in the details and customize it as you see fit for now).

3.  The personality tab is the one screen that differs in the create opponent options vs. creating a playable custom race (from the first screen when you select who you're going to play).  I just wanted to mention that for aggressiveness setting... I think ALL of the default AI's have an aggression level of 50.

4.  After you save your race, the game will create a .customracexml  file in your  My Documents\My Games\GC2DarkAvatar folder.  Let's take a look at it:

I created a race call Sentient Data Network based on SHODAN from the System Shock series.  So the file it created is Sentient Data Network.customracexml

5.  Open up the file in your text editor and find the lines in red below.  These movie files are in bink format ( http://www.radgametools.com/bnkdown.htm ) and I believe they need to start with RaceImage_ (may not matter though).  These files go in the My Documents\My Games\GC2DarkAvatar\Gfx\Movies

<DefaultTradeMovie>RaceImage_shodan_neutral.bik</DefaultTradeMovie>
<FriendlyTradeMovie>RaceImage_shodan_happy.bik</FriendlyTradeMovie>
<UnfriendlyTradeMovie>RaceImage_shodan_angry.bik</UnfriendlyTradeMovie>
<UnitedPlanetsMovie>RaceImage_shodan_Small.bik</UnitedPlanetsMovie>

The neutral, happy, angry movies are 430x280 and should be rendered/recorded at 30 frames per second.

The small movie is 128x128 and should be rendered at 30 fps.

6.  The sound/music file that gets played for the race has to go in the \\Gal Civ 2\Event Music folder.  I believe it to be in the series:  Race00.mp3 - Race99.mp3  In my custom race I named the sound/music file Race11.mp3 and changed the line accordingly in <RaceMusic>Race11</RaceMusic>

7.  The portrait entry:     <Portrait>C:\Documents and Settings\XXXXXXXXXX\My Documents\My Games\GC2DarkAvatar\Gfx\Portraits\RaceImage_shodan.png</Portrait> needs the XXXXXXXXXX to be changed to whatever the person's computer name is so it points to the correct directory.  The picture  itself should be 256x256 in .png format.

8.  The trade portrait entry:    <DefaultTradePortrait>C:\Documents and Settings\XXXXXXXXXX\My Documents\My Games\GC2DarkAvatar\Gfx\Portraits\RaceImage_shodan_Trade.png</DefaultTradePortrait>    once again needs the XXXXXXXXXX changed to whatever the person's computer name is so it points to the correct directory.  The picture itself should be 393x256 in.png format.

9.  The logo picture:    <Logo>C:\Documents and Settings\XXXXXXXXXX\My Documents\My Games\GC2DarkAvatar\Gfx\Logos\SHODAN_logo3.png</Logo>     once again needs the XXXXXXXXXX changed to the whatever the person's computer name is so it points to the correct directory.  The image itself should be 128x128 in .png format.

** Please see the Gal Civ WIKI and the Gal Civ Modding Forum for more in-depth topics on modding the game. **

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