For this tutorial it will help if you have a basic knowledge of using the Command Prompt.
If you run lotd on Windows newer than WinXP, UCC.exe wont work. To fix it you can, Load game, Go to Settings/Audio Settings/Music Volume and set the Volume to 0 (zero). You can do the same thing by opening LOTD.ini, find Music volume, and set it to 0. Or you can use the Unrealed Patch for Vista7 which will replace the Core files. You have to open&close the Editor before using UCC. Otherwise, UCC.exe wont work.
Index of contents:
Decompiling the .u files into .uc :
Compiling them back into .u files:To decompile an .u file you will have to open Notepad and copy/paste in the following command for example.Now go toCode: Select all
UCC BatchExport DOTZCharacters.u class .uc C:\LOTD\Classes\DOTZCharacters
File/Save as
and name the fileBATCHExport.bat
It can be any name. But it needs to have the.bat
extenion. and save it to your LOTD System folder.
Oke, now you can Double-click the file you created. It will open a window for a second, and the .uc file contents ofDOTZCharacters.u
will be found insideC:\LOTD\Classes\DOTZCharacters
. You can addPAUSE
at the end of the line for the window not to automatically close after it finishes decompiling.
The .uc files you will see can be loaded and edited with Notepad. You will have to figure out how to do the scripting changes yourself.
Right click and Edit theBATCHExport.bat
to change the name of the .u file you want decompiled and the path where you want it extracted at. You can add as many lines as you want, to decompile multiple .u files.
BonusTips:The pause line is important because the window closes automatically and we dont have enough time to see the results.
- After you modified your .uc files, you will want to compile them back into a new .u file.
To do that, your .uc files will have to be placed like thisLOTDROOT/NAME-OF-U-FILE/CLASSES/UC-FILES-HERE
Example:C:\Program Files\Groove Games\Land Of The Dead\TKDOTZCharactersV1\Classes\*.uc
You can just extract any .uc files directly into that path, so you wont have to move them later.
Ok. We are done with this.- Now you need to go to the System folder and load the
UW.ini
file in Notepad.
Find theEditPackages=DOTZMenu
line, and after that line, add a new one, for exampleEditPackages=TKDOTZCharactersV1
Save and close the file.- Now, for the very last step you will need to create a new
.bat
file with the following text inside:Save it in your System folder asCode: Select all
UCC MAKE PAUSE
UCCMAKE.bat
Or whatever name you wish to give it..
Now double click the file to run it and it will compile your Project back into a new .u file.
For example if it compiled it successfully and if there were any errors. The text results in the Batch window can be seen in theUCC.log
later.
If you name all your mod files (ukx, usx, utx, etc) the same, all contents will be put into the one .u file. You should keep all files though, in case you ever want to recompile the .u file. If you didnt keep them, you can use Dragon Unpacker to extract the textures from the .u file, or export them via the editor.
If the .u file has many .uc files, but you just want to modify a single .uc file, in your new .u package you will just include that one package. But you will have to specify both files in your UW.ini file. The original .u file above the new one.
This will help in reducing space and time making your new file, and also avoid this error:
Code: Select all
Critical: appError called: Critical: Can't find files matching ..\YOUR_U_FILE\Classes\*.uc Exit: Executing UObject::StaticShutdownAfterError Exit: UALAudioSubsystem::ShutdownAfterError Critical: UMakeCommandlet::Main Exit: Exiting.
- The Batch files are the easiest way to mod for LOTD imho. But you can also run them via Command Prompt as follows.
- Open CMD.
- Type the path to your LOTD System folder, but with CD Change Directory in front of it.
For Example:CD C:\Program Files\Groove Games\Land Of The Dead\System
- Now you can run commands like UCC MAKE etc.
If you have your game installed on a partition other than C:// you will have to type the letter of the partition and a collon. F.e,D:
Now, you can type the path to your system folder.
Can read more about the ucc function over here: https://wiki.beyondunreal.com/Legacy:Compiling_With_UCC
I recommend you use Notepad++ instead of the simple Notepad that comes with Windows. It is better and used by many Programers.
PS: If you are going to modify someone's mod, please ask them for their permission first.
Usually i think all will agree to remake it, but it is nice asking for permission and letting them know their work was reshaped.
Also, please avoid releasing bugged files.
That is about all i know about creating a mod.
I am looking forward to see what others may do with this information !
Good luck.