Welcome to Mod the Galaxy! I've tried to answer your questions as best as I can, hopefully I didn't go too overboard
Xelek said:
What programs would be best to use? maybe for introducing items into the game or maybe changing the textures of the item?
The first program you're going to want is
TRE Explorer. This allows you to open the .TRE files (stored in the same place as the EXE) which contain the files used by the game (textures, models, strings etc.).
Although TRE Explorer can edit a few of the files with a nice interface for a lot of them you're going to need some understanding of Hex Editing (which you may already have from your previous modding experiences).
To edit the game's DDS texture files you're going to need Adobe Photoshop and the
NVIDIA Plugin.
Xelek said:
how do i implement them into a game code?
is there a way to get items from SWG like barc speeders and maybe some of the trading card game loot items to become in-game items without the use of loot cards?
For the game to make use of new files you simply need to replicate the folder structure found in the TRE Files inside your game directory (where the EXE is). So for example if you want the game to use a new texture replacing atat_f.dds (found in the 'texture' folder in the TRE Files) then you would place your new file (also named atat_f.dds) into a new folder called 'texture' that you have created in your SWG directory.
It is 100% possible to bring in items and vehicles etc. from the CU and NGE (though multi-passenger doesn't work in SWGEmu). In order to access those files you'll need a copy of the game (or at least the TRE's AND TOC's) where that item had been implemented. To access the files for almost everything after the CU happened you will need to open sku_0.toc (with TRE Explorer) as the individual TRE files cannot be opened without it after that point.
Next you will need to find the item's object file (usually found in the objects/[itemtype] folder) so for example the file for the BARC MIGHT be found in objects/vehicles/player/and called object_vehicle_player_speeder_barc.iff) note, that it probably isn't called that but TRE Explorer has a search functionality
. You can then right click that file (in TRE Explorer) and click 'Export File Chain' (or something along those lines) and it will (messily) export all the files that object needs to function and display in-game to a location of your choosing. Of course, you will also need to add server-side code for the object to spawn in-game.
If you wanted to simply replace the appearance of an already in-game item (e.g. replace a swoop with a barc) you could use a similar method except export the filechain from the appearance file of the object, this will be called something like vehicle_barc and will EITHER be an SAT or an APT file. Once exported and placed in the appropriate place in your SWG directory you will then need to find the name of the swoop appearance file (again, using TRE Explorer's search function) and then rename the vehicle_barc file to, for example, vehicle_swoop. This will replace the appearance of a swoop in-game to a barc, but only for you. If the item you wanted to replace something with already exists in the game currently (like you wanted to make swoops look like speederbikes) then it's as simple as exporting ONLY the SAT or APT file for the speederbike (e.g. vehicle_speederbike), putting it in the right place and renaming it to vehicle_swoop.
Xelek said:
i did see a post on adding new species to the game also what type of file do i look for and where are all these files kept?
This is a bit more complicated than most parts of modding the game so I won't really go into too much detail here, but if you continue on your modding path you will eventually figure out how the game does things and be able to logically figure out the what, where, why and how of the client.
To add new species requires the appropriate male and female models for the species to already exist (or be imported from somewhere else), also for customization to work these models must have the appropriate blend points. Then adding that species to the game requires editing several datatable files, ui files and more, in addition to server-side code.
Xelek said:
i do hope oneday to help in bringing the life back to the galaxy, and maybe help in expanding it any help toward getting the answer to my questions would be great
I hope this has expanded your knowledge somewhat and hasn't scared you away from modding the game! If you want to ask any more questions, feel free and I will again try my best to answer them
Good Luck!
