Targetware: Customizing the User Interface


User Interface Basics

The User Interface (hereafter: UI) controls how players interact with the game. The default interface provided with the Targetware Engine has a Main Menu with items such as "Play Online", "Practice Offline", "Download Mods", and, of course, "Quit." Beyond the Main Menu, the UI guides players through selecting servers for online play, selecting mods and scenarios for offline play and game hosting, as well as allowing the user to enter a username and password.

Default Main Menu

Just as with almost all other parts of the Targetware experience, the UI can easily be customized, or even redesigned, by anyone interested. There are, however, some basic differences between working on the the UI and working on mods:

  • Only one UI can be used per game session.
  • The UI remains the same, no matter what Mod is being played.
  • The UI files are not stored in the Targetware/data/ directory, they are stored in the Targetware/ui/ directory.

This section of the Developer's Guide will tell you everything you need to know about creating custom User Interfaces. For tools, you need nothing more than a text editor and a basic paint program such as PaintShop Pro, GraphicsConverter, or PhotoShop.