Spring RTS Engine

When using 3rd party units with spring, do you just plce them in the base directory? and if so, can you use a zip file containing multiple UFO files, which will still be read by the game? or does it have to be a HPI or UFO...

You used to be able to just dump hpi or ufo's in the root directory... but it made too much of a mess so I think they took it out...

You can try it though...

If you want to add 3rd party units the right way...

http://taspring.clan-sy.com/wiki/Simple_Mod_Tutorial

skip to Step 6...

you can still add UFO's in the base directory, I was just wondering if you could contain them all within a large archive (zip/rar/hpi/ufo/z7b etc) and the game would still read them.

adamwalker13 wrote:When using 3rd party units with spring, do you just plce them in the base directory? and if so, can you use a zip file containing multiple UFO files, which will still be read by the game? or does it have to be a HPI or UFO...

ufo are already a custom format serving the same purpose as zip. Ufo/hpi are already a compressed archive format. Zipping ufo would be like raring zip. What I mean, is, unpack all your units ufo, then repack them in a single ufo, et voilà. Here you should found tools such as HPIView/HPIDump/HPIPack/HPIwhatever, in case you don't know who to unpack and repack ufo. Oh and ufo and hpi are the same.

Of course, it would be a lot more better if, while your stuff is unpacked, you added a modinfo.tdf, before repacking. Just look and copy the modinfo.tdf of another mod, you'll see it's extremely short and easy. With a modinfo.tdf, and if the zipped/7zipd/ufoed pack is placed into /mods/ instead of the root, suddenly your mod appears in the mod drop down box of the lobby, and is a lot more easier to quickly turn on and off without having synch error every time.