Tutorial
- The ZT2 Recolouring Guide by Sideshow Bob and Otter Lord
What
you'll need for this tutorial: WinZip (download it here),
a decent image editing program (Try the Photo Shop Pro 9 Demo
here),
DirectX 9.0 SDK Update 2004 (download it here)
1.
First
thing you'll need to start your ZT2 animal are the base files
to then go from there and edit. Here's a list of what you'll need
(all found in C:\Program Files\Microsoft Games\Zoo Tycoon 2):
- in ai.z2f,
ai > Tasks > Animals > Your animals BEH and TSK files.
- in entities.z2f, entities > units > animals
> ai and *RECOLOURED ANIMALS NAME* (in ai, only take the XML
documents you need) and the animalfadvict.xml file in the animnals
folder.
- in lang.z2f, lang > 1033 > animal_entries
and entity xml files only.
- in ui.z2f, ui > zoopedia > entries >
animals.xml
Ai.z2f is
the behaviours, entities.z2f is animal preferences and animations
(among other things), lang.z2f is part of making the animal show
up, and ui.z2f is the zoopedia entry. Open the files in WinZip.
Make a new zip file with all these files inside (save it as.z2f
file).
2.
Now
that you have an animal file, let's filter out all the info. Starting
in entities and working your way down, go through all the xml
files and look through them. Your animal will have a new name,
and therefore a new codename. For example, the Common Peafowl's
codename is "peafowlcommon" or "PeafowlCommon".
Make up a new code name for your animal and insert it in all instances
where the animal you're recolouring's name is. If your are doing
this, be sure to also do it on all the files whose names contain
the code name. If you see any extra bits of info for other animals,
those are unecessary and can be deleted.
3.
Now
comes our recolouring part of the tutorial. Remember how I said
you need that DirectX update at the top of the tutorial? Well,
if it's installed, this is what you'll use to open the animals
skin or texture file, which has the extension ".dds".
It will also allow you to open these files in Paint Shop Pro.
There is another tutorial here
that discusses exactly how that works. At the bottom it shows
you how to save it as a dds file once you're done. Then, just
insert it back into your animal file.
Have questions
about this or any other tutorial? Ask at our forums.
