Baltazhar
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WARNING: Until further notice, this tutorial should not be used.
Read the comments for more information.
How to make a custom loading screen, without "Press any key to continue"
Introduction:
Hello everyone, and welcome to my very first tutorial.
I initially had problems doing this, and spent hours searching for any hints to a useful solution. Now that I have found it, I thought some of you might have had the same problem. Well here it is, easily accessable.
Why:
I have seen several maps with this feature (popular reference would be DotA), and really wanted this for my map.
It not only makes the map feel a bit more professional, but it's also very useful. When playing multiplayer, I think, some players have an idea that it's okay to go the bathroom for 10 minutes, because it's just a loading screen. The problem is, that it halts the game for everyone else, because one player didn't "Press any key to continue". This, is what I wanted to get rid of.
How:
How does it work exactly? At the end of the tutorial, you loading screen will not need a key to be pressed, unless (always the exception), you play singleplayer. It will skip directly past the "Press any key.." to "Waiting for other players".
You cannot remove it from singleplayer.
However, that's not important. The important thing is, that it will work for all forms of multiplayer (B.net and LAN).
The Tutorial:
I've chosen to divide this into steps and highlighted key points, which I believe, makes it easier to follow. Here goes.
Step 1 - The image:
First you'll need to find the image you want to use. The image has to be of the resolution 1024x768.
When you have found your chosen loading screen image, we will need to slice it into four parts. The two top parts needs a resolution of 512x512 and the two bottom ones will be half the size, with a resolution of 512x256.
The four slices of the image should be saved in .tga format.
The four .tga files can be named anything, but as a best practice, I would suggest naming them TopRight.tga, TopLeft.tga, BotRight.tga and BotLeft.tga.
In the example below I have used Adobe Photoshop, but if you want a freeware application to slices and save as .tga, I would suggest IrfanView.
In this example I have used our current loading screen image, made by our graphic engineer ey-Coco.
Step 2 - Conversion:
The four .tga files we have, needs to be converted into .blp format, before we import them.
There are probably several tools for this, but I have used Warcraft III Viewer by The Prophet. Click the link to download directly from TheHelper.net.
When saving as .blp, you will be asked about compression of the file. I would suggest leaving it at the default 85 percent, for optimal size and quality.
Again, for naming the .blp files, anything goes. I prefer the above mentioned namesuggestions, for easier overview.
Step 3 - The Import:
This is probably the most important step, and yet the easiest. Just be sure not to make typo's anywhere.
In the World Editor you open the Import Manager (hotkey F12), and import the four .blp files (hotkey Ctrl+I).
When all four files have been imported, these must be renamed. This is the important part.
For all the imported files, you doubleclick them, choose to write a custom path. The path used must be as follows:
UI\Glues\Loading\Backgrounds\Load-Credits\Credits\Loading-BotRight.blp
UI\Glues\Loading\Backgrounds\Load-Credits\Credits\Loading-BotLeft.blp
UI\Glues\Loading\Backgrounds\Load-Credits\Credits\Loading-TopRight.blp
UI\Glues\Loading\Backgrounds\Load-Credits\Credits\Loading-TopLeft.blp
I hope it's fairly easy to get which file goes where, in my oppinion the names are very intuitive.
The screenshot shows how it's supposed to look in the Import Manager.
Step 4 - Changing Map Settings:
To make our loading screen complete, we need to modify the map slightly. This wont have any impact on your map except for the loading screen changes.
In the main World Editor windows (where you see terrain), go into Scenario -> Map Options. Here you need to change the dropdown Game Data Set to Melee (Latest Patch).
When this is done, you go into the tab labeled Loading Screen and choose to Use Campaign Screen, and select Credits on the list.
Make sure the the bottom fields labeled Loading Screen Title, Loading Screen Subtitle and Loading Screen Text are completely empty. There must not be any text in these.
If you want text in your loading screen, you can put it directly into the image itself.
Once this is done, you press OK, and save your map.
Step 5 - The end is near:
When you test your loading screen, make sure that you do it in a LAN game, not singleplayer. As mentioned previously, singleplayer will require pushing a key no matter what you do.
You should now be able to make a LAN game (throw in a computer player if you have none to test with), and click start.
Once the loading bar finishes, it should skip directly to Waiting for other players, and thus beginning your game.
The End:
This is my tutorial about creating a custom loading screen, without the "Press any key to continue" to appear.
Should you have any questions, I will try to answer them.
A few lastminute notes.
This can only be done with a High Quality loading screen. I know there are methods of importing a single file, and an .mdx file, but this is not the case here. Another important notice about this tutorial is, that you do not need a loadingscreen.mdx, only your image.
Hope someone finds this useful.
Sincerely,
Baltazhar
Read the comments for more information.
How to make a custom loading screen, without "Press any key to continue"
Introduction:
Hello everyone, and welcome to my very first tutorial.
I initially had problems doing this, and spent hours searching for any hints to a useful solution. Now that I have found it, I thought some of you might have had the same problem. Well here it is, easily accessable.
Why:
I have seen several maps with this feature (popular reference would be DotA), and really wanted this for my map.
It not only makes the map feel a bit more professional, but it's also very useful. When playing multiplayer, I think, some players have an idea that it's okay to go the bathroom for 10 minutes, because it's just a loading screen. The problem is, that it halts the game for everyone else, because one player didn't "Press any key to continue". This, is what I wanted to get rid of.
How:
How does it work exactly? At the end of the tutorial, you loading screen will not need a key to be pressed, unless (always the exception), you play singleplayer. It will skip directly past the "Press any key.." to "Waiting for other players".
You cannot remove it from singleplayer.
However, that's not important. The important thing is, that it will work for all forms of multiplayer (B.net and LAN).
The Tutorial:
I've chosen to divide this into steps and highlighted key points, which I believe, makes it easier to follow. Here goes.
Step 1 - The image:
First you'll need to find the image you want to use. The image has to be of the resolution 1024x768.
When you have found your chosen loading screen image, we will need to slice it into four parts. The two top parts needs a resolution of 512x512 and the two bottom ones will be half the size, with a resolution of 512x256.
The four slices of the image should be saved in .tga format.
The four .tga files can be named anything, but as a best practice, I would suggest naming them TopRight.tga, TopLeft.tga, BotRight.tga and BotLeft.tga.
In the example below I have used Adobe Photoshop, but if you want a freeware application to slices and save as .tga, I would suggest IrfanView.
Step 2 - Conversion:
The four .tga files we have, needs to be converted into .blp format, before we import them.
There are probably several tools for this, but I have used Warcraft III Viewer by The Prophet. Click the link to download directly from TheHelper.net.
When saving as .blp, you will be asked about compression of the file. I would suggest leaving it at the default 85 percent, for optimal size and quality.
Again, for naming the .blp files, anything goes. I prefer the above mentioned namesuggestions, for easier overview.
Step 3 - The Import:
This is probably the most important step, and yet the easiest. Just be sure not to make typo's anywhere.
In the World Editor you open the Import Manager (hotkey F12), and import the four .blp files (hotkey Ctrl+I).
When all four files have been imported, these must be renamed. This is the important part.
For all the imported files, you doubleclick them, choose to write a custom path. The path used must be as follows:
UI\Glues\Loading\Backgrounds\Load-Credits\Credits\Loading-BotRight.blp
UI\Glues\Loading\Backgrounds\Load-Credits\Credits\Loading-BotLeft.blp
UI\Glues\Loading\Backgrounds\Load-Credits\Credits\Loading-TopRight.blp
UI\Glues\Loading\Backgrounds\Load-Credits\Credits\Loading-TopLeft.blp
I hope it's fairly easy to get which file goes where, in my oppinion the names are very intuitive.
Step 4 - Changing Map Settings:
To make our loading screen complete, we need to modify the map slightly. This wont have any impact on your map except for the loading screen changes.
In the main World Editor windows (where you see terrain), go into Scenario -> Map Options. Here you need to change the dropdown Game Data Set to Melee (Latest Patch).
If you want text in your loading screen, you can put it directly into the image itself.
Once this is done, you press OK, and save your map.
Step 5 - The end is near:
When you test your loading screen, make sure that you do it in a LAN game, not singleplayer. As mentioned previously, singleplayer will require pushing a key no matter what you do.
You should now be able to make a LAN game (throw in a computer player if you have none to test with), and click start.
Once the loading bar finishes, it should skip directly to Waiting for other players, and thus beginning your game.
The End:
This is my tutorial about creating a custom loading screen, without the "Press any key to continue" to appear.
Should you have any questions, I will try to answer them.
A few lastminute notes.
This can only be done with a High Quality loading screen. I know there are methods of importing a single file, and an .mdx file, but this is not the case here. Another important notice about this tutorial is, that you do not need a loadingscreen.mdx, only your image.
Hope someone finds this useful.
Sincerely,
Baltazhar