[DNSKILL5]

Given the situation the world is currently in, I've had some free time on my hands lately and I thought maybe it might be helpful to post some simple CON tutorials for beginners. I'm not an expert myself, and nothing I'll cover is really anything "new", and there's more than likely documentation elsewhere covering the exact same stuff, but I figured why not try to see if I can help anyone out.

My plan is to write CON tutorials, mostly USER CON stuff, but we'll see. I intend on adding to this post each time I have a new tutorial, instead of writing new posts/threads.

Like I said, I am not an expert and if my methods aren't right to someone then please make sure to tell me. Most of the tutorials should work in DOS and will work in EDuke32, and I'm sure they will work with just about any other port but these will be tested through EDuke32 and the tutorials assume that's what you're also going to be using. If enough people find this to be redundant or not useful then I will not continue with it, but if this helps someone at all then that's good enough for me. Please check out the EDuke32 wiki section about scripting. There's a lot of good stuff on there. There's tons of websites related to Duke that have some good tutorials, and there's even some books from the 90s if you want to feel nostalgic.

So the first two tutorials I have for now are fairly straight forward and easy to do. You don't have to be a programmer to understand either of these tutorials:

-How to edit USER.CON in 2020:

Spoiler

Editing the User Configuration file (USER.CON) is a great way to modify DN3D. There are several things that can be done with CON files, and while there are 3 different ones, we are only going to focus on USER.CON for now. Don't worry about GAME.CON and DEFS.CON for the moment. Let's just keep our sights on USER.CON.

If you installed Duke 3D through GOG then simply go to your GOG directory and look for USER.CON, move your cursor and click once over it and then right click, copy (or CTRL+C) the USER.CON file.

If you installed Duke 3D through Steam then simply go to Steam>SteamApps>Common> and look for DN3D. If you own the Megaton edition it should be:
Steam\steamapps\common\Duke Nukem 3D\gameroot\classic and you should see USER.CON.
If you have the WT edition:
Steam\steamapps\common\Duke Nukem 3D Twentieth Anniversary World Tour and you should see USER.CON.

If you have an actual copy of the Atomic Edition, then you can find the USER.CON on your disc and copy it from the disc.

Now that you have tracked down your CON file one way or another, you want to make sure that you make a copy of this file before making ANY changes to it. Copy the file and then go to your EDuke32 folder and create a new folder within the directory, we'll call it "test" folder. You can place your custom map file, midi, whatever here for testing, but for now just paste USER.CON into this folder. You'll understand why soon.


So... How do you edit these files today? Well, not too differently from how you would've done it back in the day. You just need a text editor like WordPad or NotePad, a keyboard, and a mouse! Right click the USER.CON file you just pasted into the test folder, and select "open with" and select WordPad or NotePad. Whichever you prefer. Personally, I find either to work just fine.

Take a look at the text, but don't change anything yet, read the notice at the top until you get down to "// MISC GAME SETTINGS" and from there just glance over USER.CON and see if you can make sense of anything for yourself. . .

You should notice something almost immediately, and we're going to test it out for ourselves.
Take an extra look at this:

define SWEARFREQUENCY          100      // The lower, the less.

define CAMERASDESTRUCTABLE      NO   			// YES
define FREEZERHURTOWNER 		YES

Can you guess what SWEARFREQUENCY means? The lower, the less? Let's leave it alone for now, we don't need Duke to cuss less now do we? For those unaware, the "//" is a sign that this is a "comment", so usually when you see "//" there will be some helpful information following it. Look at the very next line, which is the one we will be messing with:

define CAMERASDESTRUCTABLE      NO   			// YES

This is a very clear example of how useful USER.CON editing can be to make/add a few extra effects to your map. Read this line as if it were a question. Camera destructible (yeah, they made a typo didn't they? don't change that though)? No. This means that the security cameras you see throughout the game that usually control the security monitor screen views cannot be shot and destroyed. They are bullet proof, rocket proof, etc. What if we want our cameras to be able to break? Well, simply change the code above to this:

define CAMERASDESTRUCTABLE      YES   			// YES

You can change // YES to // NO if you want to, but the game does not read anything that is commented with "//" as a command, so the game ignores that bit. You could even just remove // YES altogether if you wanted to.

From there, save the file in the text editor with your new change. Now run EDuke32 and under "Custom Game Content Directory" to select the folder you made earlier that we chose to call "test". This will load up your custom CON file when you use your test folder, so you can also add your custom map here to test the new CON changes.

Run the game as described and warp to E1M2 and shoot at the security camera that surveys the area around the erotica book store. You will see that instead of just taking your hits, it breaks into pieces! Now, go to the monitor in the book store and you will discover that when you shoot a camera, the security camera loses the feed from that camera. Pretty cool right? Definitely would add something to Dukematch don't you think? Well, before you get too excited remember that if you intend on using your edited CONs for online play, ALL players MUST use the same edited CON, so be sure to send it to all that intend on playing in your multiplayer game.

If you want to revert back to the old behavior, simply run EDuke32 without using your test folder. If you decide that you don't want this CON change, simply revert the YES back to a NO again, and you're all set. Pretty simple so far? Let's move on to something else.

-Altering DNBETA and DNALLEN cheat codes:

Spoiler

So now you know how to open and manipulate the USER.CON. You have now seen firsthand a change in the game simply by changing a NO to a YES. Now, let's take this a step further to something that may be useful for your new level. Let's say you want to give the player a secret hint or two in your new level. Maybe Duke flicks on his night vision goggles and you cleverly put a hidden message "type DNBETA" or "type DNALLEN" that can only be seen with the goggles on. Maybe Duke uses a monitor and you put a message on the screen for the same reasons. Maybe you hide it somewhere like in E1M1 with the "867-5309" secret. These commands have no use for you the way they are now, but what if we changed what message pops up to be something useful for your map? What if you want to ensure that when someone types these cheats a message displays that tells them the map is from you? There's so many things you could do and it is a very simple edit just like the starter tutorial, and you can explore the USER.CON yourself and find other text strings that can be changed to fit your level, but for now we will focus on altering these cheat codes to be useful for your Duke scenario:

Simply click "Find" with WordPad or Edit/Find with NotePad and do a search for "MAJOR STRYKER" this is what you should find:

definequote 79        BUY MAJOR STRYKER

This is the message that displays when DNALLEN is typed in-game. Do we really need this message for our map? No, so let's change it to something else. Remember, you are limited to 64 characters, so don't write a wall of text here. I'll let you decide what you want to type in to replace "BUY MAJOR STRYKER". Keep it ALL CAPS just like the rest of the strings.

Next do a search for "PIRATES SUCK!" and you will find:

definequote 105   	PIRATES SUCK!

This is the message that displays when DNBETA is typed in-game. Once again, 1996 was a long time ago. I think we can live without this piracy taunt. Change "PIRATES SUCK!" to your own message, once again remembering 64 character limit. Keep it ALL CAPS just like the rest of the strings.

Now, save your progress and run the game as mentioned previously. Type in DNBETA as a cheat to see one message, DNALLEN to see the other. Now, you have two secret messages that can only be found by typing these codes in, and most players aren't going to expect this change. They'll either catch the message by surprise or you can make a note of it in your projects TXT file/forum post if you want to give player's a heads up, or you can find a way to convince the player to type these commands somehow through your map's design.

That's all I've got for right now but like I said, if this doesn't seem like it would be helpful then I won't go on with this but if anyone likes this idea let me know, and I'll try to make more tutorials aimed towards beginners. Maybe others could pitch in too if they have ideas of their own.

[DNSKILL5]

Here's some changes that I feel people should be doing far more often to their level sets...

-Changing Level Names and Par Times:

Spoiler

Open USER.CON and search for "E1L1.map" you should find this line:

definelevelname 0 0 E1L1.map 01:45 00:53 HOLLYWOOD HOLOCAUST

definelevelname 0 0 means just that, define the level name. The first zero means Episode 1, the second zero means it is the first map (they start from 0 instead of 1). E1L1.map (notice that Duke uses Episode/Level whereas Doom and Quake use Episode/Map) is just the name of the map file to tell the game that this is the first map in the first episode. You should leave this alone, it doesn't really need to be changed.

The numbers after E1L1.map are the par times for beating the level. 01:45 is the standard par time, while 00:53 is 3DR's "best time" par time.

HOLLYWOOD HOLOCAUST is the title of the level when it loads. You see ENTERING HOLLYWOOD HOLOCAUST when it loads up.

While you could just name your map file and have the player load it up through USERMAPS, if your plan is to make more than one level in a set then there really isn't much reason not to at least alter the par times and level names of your map set to reflect the new designs!

Simply change the min/seconds but be sure to keep it like: XX:XX (that's 5 characters) and don't try to make it longer or shorter than 5 characters. You may repeat this as many times as you need to, in any of the episodes you plan to replace the levels for.

Now, also replace the name of the level. Just be sure not to exceed 32 characters, spaces included. Be sure to save your edits and test them out in game.

-Altering Episode Names:

Spoiler

This is just as easy as changing the par times and level names. Let's say you don't want to be limited to replacing the game's scenarios (3 city episodes, 1 space episode) and want to give your episodes titles that reflect your new episodes, here's how you will do this... If you didn't already notice that the code for the episode names is only a few lines above where you changed the level and par time names:

Search for "Volume" and you should find this:

// Volume titles cannot excede 32 characters.  

definevolumename 0 L.A. MELTDOWN 

definevolumename 1 LUNAR APOCALYPSE 

definevolumename 2 SHRAPNEL CITY

 definevolumename 3 THE BIRTH

Volume is just another way of saying "Episode". Remember the warning says don't exceed (they made a typo, not me) over 32 characters. 0-3 are the same sort of situation we discussed earlier, 0 is truly "1" and so on.

Simply change the names of the episodes to your liking and save your progress, once again testing the change in-game to ensure you did everything correctly.

One more for today that follows the same theme as these two....

-Changing Difficulty Names:

Spoiler

You should be a pro by now at changing text to display what you want it to in DN3D, so if you were able to do any of the tutorials before this one, then changing the difficulty names is not any different..

Search for "Skill" (though honestly if you followed the last two tutorials, you should be able to see this section without even needing to do a search). You should see this:

// Skill titles cannot excede 32 characters.

defineskillname 0 PIECE OF CAKE
defineskillname 1 LET'S ROCK
defineskillname 2 COME GET SOME
defineskillname 3 DAMN I'M GOOD

Again, just like before, don't exceed 32 characters. You should see a pattern by now in how easy it is to change simple things like this with CON editing. Once again, don't forget to save and test your new episode selection screen!

That's it for now, but I will add a few more USER.CON tutorials tonight or tomorrow before moving on to something else like GAME.CON and DEFS.CON, as well as EDuke32 specific controls that you can add to your CON files for EDuke32 features!

So stay tuned for some extra text string tips before we move on to altering Duke, his guns, his adversaries, and more!

[DNSKILL5]

Before we move on to some more advanced (don't get scared off, you can do it) features and DEFS and GAME CON, I want to cover a little more on editing text strings first..

Remember, so far all these edits are only using USER.CON. We are still ignoring GAME.CON and DEFS.CON for the moment.


-Extra Tips for Changing Game Messages:

Spoiler

Many of the messages you may not want to change, but if you change the art of your project to reflect a certain theme, you may want to change some of these messages. For example, a "PORTABLE MEDKIT" might not make sense in an Army of Darkness inspired scenario, but something like "BAG OF HEALING" might fit the theme of your map better. If you want to change other messages, there's a few lines that say <Please leave blank> - just leave them as is! Other messages appear when Duke activates something in the game. Whether it's LOCKED/UNLOCKED or other text, these can all be changed to your liking or for use in your map. One example is this one:

definequote 102   	WE'RE GONNA FRY YOUR ASS, NUKEM!

This is displayed when you walk into the trap at the end of E1L2, and you can change the text and reuse the effect in your own map but now with a message of your own (changing the sound will be discussed at a different time)! There are a few other text strings that you can alter to display a message, so with the knowledge you have now you should be able to easily change the messages in the game to your liking.

Now, we are pretty much finished with the most basic changes you can make to USER.CON. Nothing too interesting so far is probably what some are thinking, but these are very useful edits to make your sets have a feel of their own. Let's get a little more involved with USER.CON by altering Duke Nukem himself!

-Altering Duke:

Spoiler

Duke can be altered in a few ways if you desire. Maybe you want Duke to be able to have more health, or maybe you want him to move faster/slower. Maybe Duke is injured in your map and can't get above a certain health point and can't run as fast? Whatever the case, here's a few things to look at:

Let's start with altering Duke's health values..
Do a search for "MAXPLAYERHEALTH" and you should see the following:

define MAXPLAYERHEALTH          100

Also search for "MAXPLAYERATOMICHEALTH" which is close to the above line, you'll see this code:

define MAXPLAYERATOMICHEALTH    200 	// doubles as maxarmor.

The first line defines the max health Duke can have when starting a level and through conventional health powerups, I would try to keep it between 1-999. The second line defines the max health Duke can have through Atomic Health powerups. Again, try to keep it between 1-999. Save your changes and test them out for yourself.

Here's another line that you can change to your liking - search for "RETRIEVEDISTANCE" and you will see:

define RETRIEVEDISTANCE 		844

This code determines how far Duke can "stretch" to grab items.

This is where the "advanced" stuff starts. 844 is quite a random number and if you don't understand the reasons for the number it can be confusing. So, you have to do some guess work. Obviously, you know that "844" is the distance that the game calls for and that's the standard behavior. So try doubling the number to make Duke stretch further. You'll see that the higher you raise this number, the further out Duke will grab stuff. Get it too high, and Duke will collect items that aren't even in his line of sight! Lower it to 0 and Duke can't grab anything!

So now you know how to alter Duke's health and his ability to retrieve objects. Let's mess with two other things that you might find useful for your map project!

Search for "STARTARMORHEALTH" you will see this line:

define STARTARMORHEALTH 		0

This code states that when Duke starts a level (pistol start), he starts with 0 armor. Let's say you've made a very challenging set of maps, but don't want to make the game easier by giving Duke higher amounts of health. Instead, just let Duke start out with armor when the game begins. This makes the level slightly easier, but not nearly as much as buffing up Duke's hit points. Change the code to this if you want Duke to have full armor:

define STARTARMORHEALTH 100

Alternatively, you could make it 50 or 75 to give Duke "Used Armor" instead.

Now, one other thing that you might want to alter about Duke would be his speed. Do a search for "RUNNINGSPEED" and you will find this line of code:

define RUNNINGSPEED 53200

define GRAVITATIONALCONSTANT 176

The first line controls Duke's speed, while the second line controls Duke's gravity. With the first line, lowering the number will make Duke move much slower, but decrease it too low and Duke won't move at all! Also, increasing this number of course makes Duke go faster, but you will discover that Duke's "Speed" isn't just about speed as much as it's about Duke's friction. Try raising it to just 63200 and see how hard it is to control Duke, bump it up to 73200 and Duke will almost always slide into the fence on the rooftop of E1L1 and kill himself, in the DOS game you'd receive an error instead. Personally, I would only add a little to the number, like 56600 if you want Duke to run more like Doomguy. I would lower it to 43000 if you want to "cripple" Duke into only being able to walk. Anything lower than 40000 tends to keep Duke from bobbing when walking, and he goes a little too slow if you get the number too low.

So the second line we mentioned earlier:

define GRAVITATIONALCONSTANT 176

This code changes the gravity constant in the game. Basically, the lower the number, the lighter Duke falls, the higher, the harder he falls. You'll notice that this code doesn't just change Duke's behavior, but it also makes the pipe bombs act differently as well as a lot of the other effects like blood splats and things that would "fall" to the ground. This is something you may be better off leaving alone, but if you are making a space themed episode this may be worth messing with in your case. When you increase the number Duke can't make a lot of the jumps he used to be able to make, and if you lower it then he floats down slower. So this is an effect you will want to test with your map.

Now you know how to change Duke's health, armor, and speed. Next tutorial listing will be altering Duke's enemies and weapons. I'll try to write it up later tonight and have it posted by sometime tomorrow at the latest!

[DNSKILL5]

These tutorials in this post will cover altering the weapons and enemies in DN3D through the USER.CON. Next time, I'll give a brief introduction to DEFS.CON and GAME.CON, then we will go over a couple EDuke32 specific "gamevar" commands that can be utilized to make changes that won't work in DOS (at least not through this tutorial), but will add to the tutorials in this post for extra features.. After that I will probably cool down from posting more tutorials for a few days, but even if I don't post everyday I do intend on adding more tutorials as I go on, but the ones above and the ones in this post should be enough to get a novice familiar with editing DN3D's USER.CON file.

Remember, if you want to use these online with other players, all players must use the same USER.CON. Also, I suggest testing your changes through the map "ZOO.MAP". You will be able to test out your weapon and enemy changes fairly easily in this level.

-Altering Duke's Adversaries:

Spoiler

Duke has quite the roster of enemies, but did you know that their hit points actually aren't hard-coded? There's a few things you can do to make them easier or harder to battle with.

Do a search for "// Enemy strengths (hit points)." and you will find this:

define TROOPSTRENGTH 	30

define PIGCOPSTRENGTH    100

define PIG_SHIELD_AMOUNT1  75

define PIG_SHIELD_AMOUNT2  50

You will see a lot of other hit points for the other enemies, but for this tutorial will we just go over a few things since the rest are all done just the same, but you will need to tinker around and see which ones actually have an effect and which ones are leftover code from previous versions of DN3D. Most people don't feel the need to edit the existing enemies unless they change the art files as well, but let's say you made a level where the Pig Cops are really, really prepared for Duke's arrival... Let's look at this code again:

define PIGCOPSTRENGTH 	100

define PIG_SHIELD_AMOUNT1  75

define PIG_SHIELD_AMOUNT2  50

PIGCOPSTRENGTH is the overall hit points of the Pig Cop, while PIG_SHIELD covers the two various "Used Armor" droppings the Pig Cops will occasionally drop when they die. If the Pig Cops are really ready for some action, change the code to this:

define PIGCOPSTRENGTH  175

define PIG_SHIELD_AMOUNT1  50

define PIG_SHIELD_AMOUNT2  25

Now the Pig Cops can have extra HP to simulate they have more armor on than usual and give Duke less armor % when they die. It's about as simple as that in making enemies stronger. Just make the values larger numbers, and to make them weaker just make the values smaller numbers.

Remember those annoying robot mouse things? Let's make them more or less annoying depending on how you look at it. Search for "ROBOTMOUSESTRENGTH"...
Here's the line:

define ROBOTMOUSESTRENGTH 45

45? Let's make that more like... 1... like this:

define ROBOTMOUSESTRENGTH  1

You will either be insanely amused or insanely annoyed!

Another thing to search for is "PLAYDEADTIME" and you will see that lowering the number from 120 to 0 makes the Assault Trooper/Captain come back to life quicker when they choose to "play dead", and increasing the number past 120 makes it take longer than it does in the standard game.

Also, search for "RESPAWNACTORTIME" and set that to 0 instead of 768 and check out the game on Damn, I'm Good. Makes the enemies respawn instantly! Another thing to search for as well would be "SPAWNAMMOODDS" which is at 96. Increase the number to make enemies more likely to drop ammo, decrease it or set to 0 to make them drop less or none at all.

There's not really much else to do with monsters under USER.CON for now, so let's move on to something else more interesting.

-Altering Weapons:

Spoiler

Now that you know how easy it is to change the hit points of those alien bastards, let's get to the guns!

Before we edit the weapons, let's look at how you'd make the ammo items give you more ammo than they currently do. Go back to the "// Enemy strengths (hit points)." area you were at earlier and look for this line of code:

define PISTOLAMMOAMOUNT  12

This line states that when you pick up a pistol magazine, you get 12 bullets. The rest of the ammo pickups are directly below this line. Changing these values will allow you to give Duke more or less ammo when he picks up ammo pick-ups! That's all there is to that. Now, onto changing the power and blasts of the weapons!

To start, do a search for "// Weapon Strengths" and you will see the following code for the weapon strengths. Let's take a look at part of this code:

define KNEE_WEAPON_STRENGTH   10

define PISTOL_WEAPON_STRENGTH  6

define HANDBOMB_WEAPON_STRENGTH 140

Then, directly below this you will see this:

// For direct hits with the rocket launcher,

// this amount is actually doubled.  Otherwise,

// damage values depend on distance. The

// further, the weaker.

define RPG_WEAPON_STRENGTH   140

With this in mind, let's make Duke's kick as strong as a direct RPG hit. As the text says, a direct hit from the RPG is double the integer 140. So 140x2= 280. While we're at it, let's make the Pipe bomb (code calls it HANDBOMB) have that amount of strength, too. This is what your code should look like to test these changes:

define KNEE_WEAPON_STRENGTH  280

define PISTOL_WEAPON_STRENGTH   6

define HANDBOMB_WEAPON_STRENGTH   280

Test that out and see what you think! You may notice now that Duke can kick his way through most of the common enemies and the pipe bomb has a higher chance of dealing a direct kill compared to the original. You'll also notice that the stronger kick sends enemies flying back further than they usually would! There's a problem though, while the pipe bomb may now deal more damage, it should have a wider blast radius too to compensate the added power. Do a search for "// Various blast radius distances" and here's the code you'll look for:

define PIPEBOMBRADIUS 2500

Since we doubled the strength of the pipe bomb, let's just double the blast radius too. So 2500x2= 5000. Here's your replacement code:

define PIPEBOMBRADIUS 5000

Save your progress and test this out now. You'll see that you must be a bit further away now from the pipe bomb to not hurt yourself now and the damage dealt seems to be grander than before.

So with this you should understand how to edit the weapons for the most part, but there's a few other things in USER.CON that relate to weapons you might find to be useful. Let's start with the Shrink Ray. Want to make it more like a rail gun+BFG hybrid? Simple. Go back to the weapon strength section you were just at, and change this code:

define SHRINKER_WEAPON_STRENGTH 0

to this

define SHRINKER_WEAPON_STRENGTH 1000

Now, the weapon only takes a few hits to kill bosses and one hit kills pretty much everything else! It no longer shrinks enemies though, but it instead pushes their corpses much like the kick did from before! While I prefer the Shrink Ray as is, changes like this can make it to where you can create a weapon replacement of your own. You'll be able to change the text strings relating to the Shrink Ray to match your new weapon, and adding new art will help too!

The Trip-Bombs have some really neat featues you can mess with outside of their strength and blast radius. You can alter how they appear in the game. Search for "TRIPBOMBLASERMODE". Let's take a look at the code:

define TRIPBOMBLASERMODE        0 	// 0 = always visable

// 1 = transluscense

 // 2 = invisible w/o IR goggles

 // 3 = totally invisable

By default, the game uses 0. Try changing it to 1, 2, or 3. Don't try other numbers because they won't work. This simply changes how the red laser appears in-game.

Above this Tripbomb control code you will find the max ammo amounts for the weapons in the game (which you may have already found by now on your own). Lower the numbers to limit Duke's overall ammo supply, or increase it to your liking. For example:

define MAXPISTOLAMMO  200

define MAXSHOTGUNAMMO  50

define MAXCHAINGUNAMMO  200

Double these numbers if you want the max ammo amounts from Doom.

While I could go on, most of what I haven't covered is stuff you can easily figure out just by repeating what you've been doing, but I'd like to mention one more weapon before moving on... The Freezethrower!

The Freezethrower has a lot of controls besides just the strength control within USER.CON that you can change to make the gun do a few things differently. Here are the lines in question we will be going over, to find them just search for the wording that's in ALL CAPS:

define FREEZERHURTOWNER 		YES

- this is pretty self explanatory. When this is set to YES, the freeze rays can bounce back and if they hit Duke, it will hurt him. Simply remove YES and type in NO to make it no longer do this.

define NUMFREEZEBOUNCES          3    // 0 - 255

- this is the amount of times the freeze projectiles will bounce around before shattering if they don't hit a target. Set it to a number between 0-255 and test the changes you've made.

define FROZENDRIPTIME 90

- how long it takes for the dripping effect to happen when enemies begin to thaw out. Lower it to make the effect happen sooner, increase to make it happen later, but don't make it longer than the thaw time because you won't see the effect.

define THAWTIME 138

- when the enemy will thaw out. Again, increase/decrease the value to make this take longer or less time.
That's all I have right now for weapons, but you should be able to get a lot of stuff done knowing what you know now.

-Altering Inventory:

Spoiler

Now that you know how to edit the enemy HPs, the weapon damage and ammo amounts, etc.. you pretty much already know how to do this to the inventory.

Do a search for "//Players' inventory amounts" and you will see that changing these isn't much different from changing the ammo amounts. Increase the values to make them last longer, decrease to make them last less. Remember, you will need to test your changes to see what effect they have in the game!

So now if you have followed along from the first tutorial to the last, you should have a basic understanding of how to edit USER.CON. Like I said, my next post here will introduce you to DEFS.CON and GAME.CON, as well as some special CON scripts you can pull off thanks to EDuke32! I hope the tutorials here so far will be useful for someone! I will try to get the next tutorials that I mentioned posted here by tomorrow night. Those will be a little more advanced and will introduce DEFS and GAME CON files to your test folder, in fact, if you are following along, go ahead and make copies of those now and paste them into your test folder. That way, they'll be there when you get to the next steps that'll be posted soon.

[DNSKILL5]

If you have been following along so far, you should now understand the basics of customizing a USER.CON file. If you are satisfied with all that you can do through USER.CON, then you don't really need to worry about DEFS.CON and GAME.CON. I am in the process of writing details about DEFS.CON and GAME.CON, some tutorials for getting familiar with them, and then using gamevars. So if you are interested in going beyond what USER.CON allows you to do, I will have that out sometime tomorrow for you to learn how to make changes with GAME.CON and understand the purpose of DEFS.CON and the abilities of some gamevars, but remember, my target audience here is beginners, so I will attempt to give you the groundwork in the easiest way I can think of, and then you can take what you've learned here to explore the CON files on your own, and like I said, these will be up by tomorrow at the latest. I will be sure to use examples that should go well with the examples given so far in this guide. For now there are two more things I want to discuss about USER.CON. Then I'll tie up any loose ends and conclude my USER.CON tutorial (for now), and with that you should be all set with USER.CON and can decide to continue on from there, or stick with USER.CON editing until you are ready for more advanced editing.

Anyways, here's a few things:
-Modifying Music:

Spoiler

Use this as a reference for knowing which MIDI is which.
Open USER.CON, search for "Music will not" give that a read, and then look for this code:

// Music for title and end

music 0 GRABBAG.MID BRIEFING.MID

The comment is incorrect. BRIEFING.MID plays during Episode 4's intro movie. GRABBAG.MID is Duke Nukem 3D's theme song. The "0" means that one song is the menu song and the other is the episode 4 movie song. Try switching their order around like this:

// Music for title and end

music 0 BRIEFING.MID GRABBAG.MID

Now run the game and see the change. You could replace both with GRABBAG.MID to get the song to play on the menu and in the Episode 4 movie intro like this (note that this does not loop the song):

// Music for title and end

music 0 GRABBAG.MID GRABBAG.MID

What if you want there to be no music here? Just make the code look like this:

// Music for title and end

music 0 

So really, all you need to do is change the names of the MIDI files around to change the order of the music tracks in the game. You can also remove music altogether by removing the text mentioning the .MID file.
What if you want to add your own custom music? There are a few ways of doing this:

1) When you make a USERMAP file, or play someone else's map. The default song will be DETHTOLL.MID. When you release a usermap without CON changes but want custom music all you need to do is rename the midi the same as the map file name. So for example:

nuked.map

nuked.mid

When you run the game and select user maps, select your map and the MIDI track will play.

2) You could name your MIDI the same as a midi in the game. Place it in your test folder and run EDuke32. Whenever the title of the MIDI you placed in the folder is called for from USER.CON, it will play your copy of the file instead. The problem with this method is say you want to use the song you replaced later from the original game? Follow method three

3) Place a midi in your test folder, but make sure it's not named anything from DN3D's midi tracks. For example, PASSPORT.MID. Now go to USER.CON and rename "stalker.mid" to "PASSPORT.MID" and run the game. Now PASSPORT.MIDI plays on E1L1, but you can still use stalker.mid elsewhere.

EDuke32 allows for use of other file types as well though so let's try that. Let's use this for testing (click on the 3 dot icon next to the speaker icon to download the OGG file). Place this OGG file into your test folder, and right click the OGG file, and click rename. Rename it to "spring" so the file will be called: spring.ogg

Now, go back to USERCON and let's rename GRABBAG.MID to spring.ogg. When you run the game you will now hear the OGG file through EDuke32.


Another thing you could try is replacing the music with a game sound. Rename GRABBAG.MID to roam06.voc and see for yourself!

That's about it for editing music. Let's move on to sounds.

-Editing Sounds:

Spoiler

Editing sounds isn't too different from editing music. Replacing sounds with different sounds from the game is done the same way as swapping midi files, but there are a few additional things you can change through USER.CON for sound files.

Do a search for "ABOUT CHANGING SOUND FX" give this section a good read to understand the limitations of DOS Duke, but EDuke32 allows you to use other sound file formats like OGG as we showed with the music tutorial. So with that said, let's search for "DUKE_BOOBY " you will see this code:

definesound DUKE_BOOBY          BOOBY04.voc        0   0   255  4   0

As the text you read before said:

Quote

- The first 2 numbers define a random pitch variation range. They can be positive or negative numbers.
- The 3rd number is a priority flag.
- The 4th number is a bit parsed set of technical variables that identify the type of sound it is in the game.
- The 5th number is volume adjustment.

Generally, you will want to leave these alone, but let's try something out. Replace the first two zeros with a higher number, let's say 500:

definesound DUKE_BOOBY          BOOBY04.voc        500   500   255  4   0

Run the game and warp to E1L4. You'll notice that Duke sort of sounds like the "shrunk Duke" from DNF now. Going through most of the DUKE related sounds and adding these same numbers will cause the same effect if you want Duke to be higher pitched sounding in your levels. Now try this instead:

definesound DUKE_BOOBY          BOOBY04.voc        -666   -666   255  4   0

Again, run the game and warp to E1L4. Now Duke sounds like a demon!


So generally, you won't want to edit past the first two numbers, unless you are adding a custom sound that needs to behave differently than it does in-game. You'll only want to edit the first two numbers if you want different sound pitch ranges. So if you put 100 and 500 for example, the sound will randomly play various pitches between those two numbers. Put them as the same number in both spots like in the tutorial if you want the sound to remain at a constant pitch.

That's about all I have for USER.CON for now. Like I said, I'm working on the next lot of tutorials for those that want to go further from here. The next post will be about DEFS.CON and GAME.CON. There will be several tutorials as well as some gamevar tutorials in the next post. It will be the longest post of this thread, and like I said it will still be aimed at beginners, but it is more complicated than what we've been doing here so far. At the very least, you can now say you know how to modify DN3D. I hope that this has sparked interest in someone to make a USER.CON mod of their own and I hope people found these steps to be easy to follow and understand. Please PM me with any suggestions/questions, and stay tuned for the next steps which will be posted later today.

[DNSKILL5]

This post will explain DEFS.CON, GAME.CON, and gamevar. First, I have a few more notes about the above posts, then we'll move on!

-User CON Notes:

Spoiler

*Earlier in "Changing Level Names and Par Times" I said that you shouldn't change the numbers before the map name. I should've clarified that you CAN change the .map name, but leave the numbers between definelevelname and the map name alone. You shouldn't need to change them. You can also name your map files the same as the game maps if you prefer. It's up to you, but if you plan on releasing the maps to the public in loose format, it is better to give your map files unique names.

Here's an example just in case you don't follow what I'm saying. Open up USER.CON and search for "E1L1.map" here's the line:

definelevelname 0 0 E1L1.map 01:45 00:53 HOLLYWOOD HOLOCAUST

To add your usermap change this code to look like this - replaceing "myfilename" with the name of your map file, changing the X's into numbers for your par time, and then replace MYFILENAME with the map's name without the map extension.

definelevelname 0 0 myfilename.map XX:XX XX:XX MYFILENAME

Make sure your map is in your test folder where your USER.CON is located. Now to change the song file, just follow one of the steps from above in "Modifying Music" to adjust the song for the level.
*When making changes to USER.CON, or any CON file, you should get in the habit of "//" commenting your changes in the lines if you intend on sharing your files. If you intend on becoming a programmer then you should get use to this habit. Many professors require you to comment your code, and this is an easy way to get the hang of it. Also, commenting your code is useful for you to look back on later to explain the changes you've made. You can also add in comments for extra info or credits. Remember, the game does not pay attention to comments, but other people can read what you write. That's another reason to comment your code is so that other people can learn from it and utilize it for themselves.

Here's an example of what commenting code from the tutorials above would look like:

define BOSS1STRENGTH            4500 // shoot him in the head!

Another way to comment code is through */ and */ -look at the starting text in USER.CON for an example of how that is done, but here's my example:

/*
my message - myname
*/

Just remember, don't get "/" mixed up with "\". "\" is not used. Use the "//" to comment in a line, use the "/*" "*/"

*These tutorials above and below this text use the Atomic Edition CON files. While most of what has been discussed should work just the same in other versions of DN3D, be aware that older versions of the game have more or less code within them. A few leftovers from old builds are present in the registered versions CON files, and some of this was removed to reduce file size in Atomic Edition. So you'll have to do look at the different versions CON code to determine the differences. I recommend sticking with the Atomic Edition.

*In certain parts I have mentioned DOS. While most of these tutorials above will work in DOS, not all of them will and you will have to test your changes for DOS compatibility. The tutorials below this text might also work in DOS, but not all of them. I will make a note of when a tutorial absolutely won't work in DOS when we get to Gamevars. This is why it is crucial to make backups of the original CON files from the game. I don't know of many people that still edit the DOS game, but I feel it is important to mention it. These tutorials have EDuke32 in mind, but they should work in other ports, too. I tested these tutorials in EDuke32 and Rednukem to be specific. Those are the source ports I recommend using as well.

Now you should understand the purpose and use of USER.CON, but there are two other CON files for DN3D. If you haven't done so already, copy and paste DEFS.CON and GAME.CON into your test folder like you initially did to access USER.CON. I will now explain their purpose, as well as give one last explanation about USER.CON . Then, we will get into some tutorials with these CON files and using gamevars in the next post.

Please note: The following tutorials and info below are more challenging than what has been presented above this line. If you have trouble understanding it, it takes more patience than editing USER.CON. If you are happy with USER.CON editing and feel the guides below are too tough or hard to follow, maybe you're better off just sticking with USER.CON editing for now. If you are ready for more, then here's a synopsis of each CON file:

USER.CON (User Configuration File) –

Spoiler

This is the file you've been working with so far throughout this guide. You should understand what it does now by following the guide, so let's move on once and for all from USER.CON..

DEFS.CON (Definitions Configuration File) –

Spoiler

This file is essentially a list of numbers that are defined by phrases. The reason for this is so that a programmer doesn't have to remember the numbers; they just need to remember the phrases. So when adding to DEFS.CON you would write a phrase tied to a number so you'd be able to remember the phrase without needing to remember the number, but you can look at DEFS.CON to look up a number/phrase and when the game loads DEFS.CON, the phrases are converted back to their defined numbers for the machine to understand. Unless you intend on making major changes to the game, like rewriting actors or adding in new features that are not present currently, you more than likely will not need to mess with DEFS.CON. The more you edit GAME.CON, the more likely you'll need to edit DEFS.CON, though, and if all you are doing is USER.CON edits then you usually shouldn't have to mess with DEFS.CON.

GAME.CON (Game Configuration File) -

Spoiler

This file tells the game to load up DEFS.CON and USER.CON, as well as being home to a lot of actor code. This is the instructions that tell the game to do various things like making animation sequences. This file is not as straight forward as USER and DEFS. It can be very complicated to edit and takes time to learn and understand what all is in it and what can be changed. The purpose of this tutorial session is to familiarize you with the files, but going over everything in relation to GAME.CON goes beyond the scope of this guide. I will cover what I find to be the easiest things you can change, and give you some example tutorials that you can try out on your own that are specific to GAME.CON.

Gamevars (These do not work with DOS) –

Spoiler

EDuke32 Wiki said:

A gamevar is a variable that can be used to store numerical data which can then be referenced between actors, states and events. var is hereby semantically equivalent to gamevar.

Covering Gamevars goes a lot deeper into editing the game, and if you have no programming experience it may be a very challenging task. I won't go into detail with gamevars, but I will show some examples that should get you an effect or two you might like to add with your USER.CON and GAME.CON changes. If that sparks your interests once you've managed to get the changes to work, then you will be off to learning more here.

As you can see, I have color coded the different areas we will be working with. All the yellow headers relate to USER.CON, red to GAME.CON, and blue for when we do some stuff with gamevars. In the next post, I will give some tutorials specific to GAME.CON editing, and tutorials using gamevar. From there, I will probably conclude this tutorial session once those are posted (for now, anyways). I'll have these tutorials posted later tonight or sometime tomorrow, I want to double check my writing and whatnot because these tutorials are more involved than the previous ones. I hope that you're interested in learning how to edit the other CON files, so stay tuned!

[DNSKILL5]

GAME.CON : As stated in the post above this one, GAME.CON is a much more complicated file than USER.CON. What I intend to do is show you how to do a few things with GAME.CON. Here's a couple routines to try.

-Adjust the ammo the Pistol weapon pick-up gives Duke:

Spoiler

While you were able to adjust how much ammo a pistol magazine (called a clip in the code) gives Duke in USER.CON, you may have noticed you couldn't adjust the pistol pickups. Well, that's because the way to control that is in GAME.CON.

This should at least get you familiar with how GAME.CON works. Do a search for "actor FIRSTGUNSPRITE". Then, look for this code under it:

ifgotweaponce 0

          break

        addweapon PISTOL_WEAPON 48

        ifspawnedby FIRSTGUNSPRITE

          state getweaponcode

        else

          state quikweaponget

      }

enda

This code is essentially saying "If Duke doesn't have the pistol when grabbing the weapon, give him the pistol and 48 bullets" and then "If Duke spawns with a pistol start, then Duke will crack his knuckles and equip the weapon with 48 bullets, and when picking up another pistol, it will give him 48 more bullets."

If you want to make the game more "realistic" we could change the number 48 to 12. That is the same amount that Duke's magazines for the pistol. This change makes the pistol and clip close to being the same. The only difference is if Duke doesn't have the pistol, he will grab it with 12 rounds in the gun. Go to this line:

addweapon PISTOL_WEAPON 48

and change it to

addweapon PISTOL_WEAPON 12

Now when Duke picks up a pistol, it only gives him 12 rounds. Notice that when you start pistol-start levels that Duke still has 48 rounds when starting with a pistol. So this only changes the actual weapon pickup amount.

-Enabling WACKPLAYER:

Spoiler

WACKPLAYER is a command that is off by default, but when enabled it makes the screen jilt a little at times when Duke takes damage with 25 HP or less. Do a search for "Unrem" you should see this code:

state headhitstate

// Unrem the following line to invoke screen tilting during
// low player hitpoint damage.

// wackplayer

ends

Let's do what the text said and make the code look like this now:

state headhitstate

// Unrem the following line to invoke screen tilting during
// low player hitpoint damage.

 wackplayer

ends

That's it! Run the game and when Duke is very low on HP the screen will react now.

-Making the Enforcers and Pig Cops Eject Brass:

Spoiler

This tutorial is inspired by this custom GAME.CON file.

When Duke uses his pistol, shotgun, or chain gun.. you see ejected brass casings falling to the ground. Let's give this effect to the Enforcer and the Pig Cop. We'll start with the Enforcer.

Search for "CAPT_ATTACK" and look at this code:

      ifcanshoottarget

      {

        sound CAPT_ATTACK

        shoot SHOTSPARK1

        resetactioncount

      }

      else

This is the game seeing if the Enforcer can see the player and if so, he will start this attack sequence. To make the Enforcer eject brass in between shots, edit the code to look like this:

      ifcanshoottarget

      {

        sound CAPT_ATTACK

        shoot SHOTSPARK1

        spawn SHELL

        resetactioncount

      }

      else

spawn SHELL is what makes this effect work. Putting it under "shoot" so that it happens after his shot is fired. Save, and test this out to see if it worked. The Enforcer should now have bullet casings fly around while he's attacking with his gun!

Now, let's do the same thing for the Pig Cop. Search for the second instance of "action APIGCOCK" and look for this code (there should be three instances of APIGCOCK, we only need to deal with two of them, the last two):

ifcount 24

      {

        action APIGCOCK

        sound SHOTGUN_COCK

      }

Make it look like this:

ifcount 24

      {

        action APIGCOCK

        sound SHOTGUN_COCK


        spawn SHOTGUNSHELL

      }

Then, search for the next instance of "action APIGCOCK":

ifcount 59

      {

        action APIGCOCK

        sound SHOTGUN_COCK

      }

Make that look like this:

ifcount 59

      {

        action APIGCOCK

        sound SHOTGUN_COCK

        spawn SHOTGUNSHELL

      }

What you've done here is made it to where every time the Pig Cop cocks his shotgun, he will eject a shell casing. When he's prone, the shells can't travel far with him blocking the ejection port of the gun, hey, that's at least my reasoning for why. You can attempt to make him eject brass when he is prone if you want to, but personally I would leave it as-is.

The casings seem to eject based on the direction the player and the enemy are viewing each other, so it isn't always consistent which in real life it wouldn't always be either.

-Altering Enemies With GAME.CON:

Spoiler

With USER.CON you were able to change enemy hit points and sounds, but with GAME.CON you can edit quite a bit more, but it can be difficult. I will go over some of the things I think will be most useful:

We'll stick with the Pig Cop for these examples. Do a search for "SHOTGUN_WEAPON 0" and look at this code:

ifspawnedby PIGCOP

        {

          addweapon SHOTGUN_WEAPON 0

          ifrnd 64

            addammo SHOTGUN_WEAPON 4

          else ifrnd 64

            addammo SHOTGUN_WEAPON 3

          else ifrnd 64

            addammo SHOTGUN_WEAPON 2

          else

            addammo SHOTGUN_WEAPON 1

        }

These are the Pig Cop's shells that he can possibly have in his shotgun when he drops it. Try changing the values to this:

ifspawnedby PIGCOP

{

addweapon SHOTGUN_WEAPON 0

ifrnd 64

addammo SHOTGUN_WEAPON 6

else ifrnd 64

addammo SHOTGUN_WEAPON 5

else ifrnd 64

addammo SHOTGUN_WEAPON 4

else

addammo SHOTGUN_WEAPON 3

}

Save, test the game. Now when the pig cops drop shotguns, the number of shells they may give you have been increased.

Another thing you can do is adjust enemy speed in GAME.CON, again, we will use the PIG COP as an example. Search for "move PIGWALKVELS"and look at this code:

move PIGWALKVELS 72
move PIGRUNVELS 108
move PIGSTOPPED

PIGWALKVELS is the speed of the Pig Cop when they are walking. PIGRUNVELS controls their faster moving speed. Let's raise them to this:

move PIGWALKVELS 172
move PIGRUNVELS 208
move PIGSTOPPED

Save and test the game. Now the Pig Cop moves much faster. You can find lines to adjust the other enemy speeds as well. You should have the hang of that by now to be able to find them yourself. There's another thing that connects to enemies that I want to cover, but I'll make it a separate tutorial below..

-Adjusting "JIBS":

Spoiler

I'm sure some of you were waiting for this one, so here's a few things you can do in GAME.CON to make more gore in the game. Search for "jibs" starting at the top of GAME.CON and you should find this code:

state standard_jibs

  guts JIBS2 1

  guts JIBS3 2

  guts JIBS4 3

  guts JIBS5 2

  guts JIBS6 3

  ifrnd 6

  {

    guts JIBS1 1

    spawn BLOODPOOL

  } 		// a badly drawn spine

Try editing it like this:

state standard_jibs

  guts JIBS2 10

  guts JIBS3 20

  guts JIBS4 30

  guts JIBS5 20

  guts JIBS6 30

  ifrnd 6

  {

    guts JIBS1 10

    spawn BLOODPOOL

  } 		// a badly drawn spine

Now when you blow things up, they have a lot more guts. Test it out, and if you think that it's not enough, add an extra 0 to each. Explore GAME.CON for similar strings like this one and see if you can make other effects have more bits and pieces fly around than they currently do.

Obviously, there's much more to GAME.CON than just these 5 tutorials, but I think these are some easy changes you can make that can help you make further changes elsewhere in GAME.CON with the knowledge you now have. Just be aware that you need to be very careful messing with GAME.CON. There's less room for user error here, so make sure to save often and be able to backtrack if you make a mistake.

If you were able to follow along with these GAME.CON tutorials and would like to move on to gamevars, let's begin shall we? This is just a little bit of stuff you could do to get a few features you might want, but if you want a more in-depth explanation on how to use gamevars, resort to the EDuke32 Wiki.

-GAMEVAR: Using gamevars with EDuke32 can allow you to make changes to DN3D that were initially hard coded in the game. They're still hard coded, but now you can control them with gamevar instead of having to edit the DN3D source code. I don't want to get too technical, because gamevars are still something I'm learning about myself, but I do have one tutorial for beginners to get them to see the purpose and advantages of using the gamevar options. Anyways, let's go! I've decided to go with one gamevar tutorial because the GAME.CON stuff was already more involved than I intended for this tutorial session (it's aimed at novices), but if you were able to get through it then the next tutorial shouldn't be hard for you to do. Be sure to read the author's comments to understand what's going on in the code.
-Making the NVG's Like DN64:

Spoiler

Duke Nukem 64's Night Vision Goggles seemed to be a little better at making it easier to see, whereas the PC version only tints the screen green and highlights enemies. In reality, the PC version is more "realistic" but if we follow this tutorial found here, we can make the NVG's make dark rooms bright enough to see. While you could just follow the tutorial on the wiki, I find it may be hard to follow this one if you don't know what you're doing, so I'm going to walk you through this tutorial...
Open up GAME.CON and search for "APLAYER MAXPLAYERHEALTH PSTAND 0 0" and look at the code:

move PGROWINGPOP        // Used only as a variable



actor APLAYER MAXPLAYERHEALTH PSTAND 0 0



  ifaction 0

    action PSTAND



  ifaction PFROZEN

  {

The tutorial from the wiki is telling us to declare the gamevar TEMP 0 1. That would look like this:

move PGROWINGPOP        // Used only as a variable

gamevar TEMP 0 1

actor APLAYER MAXPLAYERHEALTH PSTAND 0 0



  ifaction 0

    action PSTAND



  ifaction PFROZEN

  {

Next, you'll want to add in these lines like so:

move PGROWINGPOP        // Used only as a variable

gamevar TEMP 0 1

actor APLAYER MAXPLAYERHEALTH PSTAND 0 0

getplayer[THISACTOR].heat_on TEMP // this reads the heat_on member of the player structure into TEMP



// heat_on is 0 if the goggles are off, 1 if they are on



ifvare TEMP 1 setplayer[THISACTOR].visibility 0 // if the goggles are on, visibility is set to 0 (full)

  ifaction 0

    action PSTAND



  ifaction PFROZEN

  {

Now save the file and run the game. Get the NVG's and see the change in how they make dark areas look!

That's it for now. I feel that I have written quite a bit of info that should help someone who knew nothing... know a lot more than nothing about modding DN3D now that you've read from the start to the finish of this tutorial. You've learned all about USER.CON. You've learned what's inside of DEFS.CON (though currently we've had no reason to change anything in there). You've learned what GAME.CON is all about and have even learned a few things you can do inside of GAME.CON. Plus, you learned how to implement a gamevar. With this knowledge, you should have the ability to look around these CON files and make changes to them, testing them out along the way and seeing what works and what doesn't. You'll also be able to understand the tutorials found on EDuke32 wiki better now too.

Bottom line: You can say you know how to modify DN3D. There's still more to modding Duke than just CON files. Level design, art design, etc. have not really been covered here because they aren't really specific to CON editing.

I have plans to make a tutorial specifically about art editing in the future if anyone is interested in that, but that would be a separate topic because it would be a lot of things outside of CON. I also might add a few more gamevar tutorials to this thread later, but we'll see for now.

So even if this does become the final post for this thread, I hope you've found it all to be informative and I hope you learned a thing or two!

[-=SomeThingEviL=-]

When editing .con files having a program that tells you the line number the code is on is helpful.

Notepad++ is a good program for that. https://notepad-plus....org/downloads/

It also support custom language syntax. This will help highlight parts of the code for you.

Get a custom Con Language syntax file here http://www.mediafire...o8m4msbku0/file

To use open notepad++ go to the language pulldown menu, go to user defined language - define your language.
In the next window hit import and import the file.


Also if your edits crash eduke32 look for the eduke32.log where your exe is at.

Warnings and errors will look something like this: Code\game.CON:197: warning: empty `else' branch

That number after game.con is the line in game.con making the warning.
The game will run with warnings, but your code might not work right.

If it was an error the game would crash. You would need to go to the line in the .con file it tells you and fix something.

Hope this help anyone running into problems.



Thanks for providing all this info for people not in the know.

[ck3D]

I'm not sure if conversation in this thread is welcome or if you'd rather keep it a succession of tutorials but I want to show some appreciation for such an initiative, it is very welcome and in many ways the structure reminds me of Brett Gmoser & co.'s old mapping tutorials/FAQ's. Once you feel like it is complete, I could see it constitute a reference that would be complementary to the Infosuite, somehow. Thanks and please keep it up!

[Jimmy]

That's a good point. Something like this is worthy of it's own separate domain from the forum, ala the InfoSuite or EDuke Wiki.

I'd suggest studying and expanding upon Reaper_Man/MSleeper's old website, which I still think is the best way to get started with CON, even though it doesn't cover anything EDuke. Their emphasis on teaching programming as a language really makes it easier to understand the code in your mind, than if you think of it as something else. I don't think they'd care if you just straight up jacked portions of their guide, but you should be able to contact them rather easily if you'd prefer getting permission.

ConFAQ4.2 could be somewhat useful as well, but I've always found it clunky and some of it is just wrong.

[DNSKILL5]

Good idea, guys. I think I might just do that in some way. I might reformat the guide a bit to fit better as a single document instead of separate posts. I'm not entirely sure what steps to take to get it on a separate domain, but I'll certainly look into it.

I'm glad to see that this is appreciated by the way, so thank you for the comments.

I absolutely agree with you Jimmy about teaching programming as a language instead of trying to interpret it as something else. I personally think that's the only true way to understand exactly what's going on with a file like GAME.CON. I think many people get into programming because they grow up around computer programming and they use this knowledge to mod games, and others get into programming through modding the games they play, but I feel there are also many people that want to mod games but are not computer-savvy, and a lot of the tutorials I see are aimed at people who have at least some sort of programming experience. My attempt was to try to get them to understand the key concepts (though I have not covered art or map related topics) of modding DN3D, with the hopes that they will want to explore the files and learn on their own how to achieve even more changes to the game.

With that said, thanks for linking to Reaper_Man's old site. I remember that site from years ago, and couldn't remember what it was called.

I think I have the basics down for the most part in this guide, so I think I'd consider it finished, but if it is hosted elsewhere I would probably expand upon it since I wouldn't be limited to the forum layout. I have considered writing a few more gamevar tutorials and at least one tutorial that requires an edit of DEFS.CON (so the reader can see a demonstration of how to edit each CON file), but other than that I'm not sure what else I'd add other than SomeThingEvil's troubleshooting info (I knew I was forgetting something, so that was very much appreciated).

[Mark]

For years I have been gathering up snippets of con code "tricks" ( examples ). I have been meaning to clean up the text and combine them into a wiki addon but just can't whip up the ambition to do it. If you or someone else wants to give it a try I can send you my collection. Actual examples of usage has been a shortcoming for a long time in the wiki for many entries.

[DNSKILL5]

Mark, on 05 September 2020 - 11:43 AM, said:

For years I have been gathering up snippets of con code "tricks" ( examples ). I have been meaning to clean up the text and combine them into a wiki addon but just can't whip up the ambition to do it. If you or someone else wants to give it a try I can send you my collection. Actual examples of usage has been a shortcoming for a long time in the wiki for many entries.

I'd certainly be interested in taking a look at your collection. I can't guarantee I'd be able to clean it all up (nor how long it would take), but I could certainly try. I'll see about getting this thread formatted on the wiki one way or another, or wherever people prefer, and I could expand the guide much further and with extra examples I should be able to make it even easier for novices to understand. Also, I would credit you for the examples used.

[Mark]

I zipped them up as-is. Might as well post them here for everyone in case they want to browse thru them for ideas. About 120 files.
Some are old using deprecated commands.
Some are missing context from the thread they were taken from but still able to figure out how to use.
Some are untested but should work, according to the poster.
Many are complete and include comments or instructions.
I started cleaning up the formatting of some because they were real jumbled.

If you do eventually get them all together in a clear understandable format, you don't need to give me any credit.
All I did was copy/paste code from others in the forum over the years. I don't think any of my own code is in there.

Attached File(s)

•  con code tricks.7z (141.1K)
  Number of downloads: 349

[-=SomeThingEviL=-]

I made a Youtube video on Setting up a Workstation for Making a Total Conversion. Dissecting Duke Nukem, and Con File info.

https://youtu.be/GZ4gDTBN13A

[F!re-Fly]

Hi guys. You have good initiatives to do this and that could help me as well. I am stuck in my progress.

[eniojr]

Does anyone know if there's a code to be used directly in .CON file to add more colors to access cards (green, gray and brown) and how to make access card icons to appear with those colors in the same place as blue, red and yellow cards in the status bar? I'd love to include new colors to be used in the map I'm doing right now. Or better, if the icons of new colors for access cards in status bar to appear that they don't overlap?

[Reaper_Man]

No. That kind of functionality would require extensive work.

[eniojr]

I'm a newbie to .CON language. I imported new textures to my custom Tilesxxx.art using BAFed and even made animations in it and also new definitions in names.h file. I used texture slot values from 10000 to higher values to avoid overwrite any existing textures from the original game or mods.

What I need now are some code examples on how to transform a texture into some things like: usable buttons, destructible objects (explosives like TNT and non explosives like furniture and trash cans), simple actors with sounds (like those babes from Shadow Warrior), climbing ladder effect (as in Naferia or Shadow Warrior), new access cards and access switches or even like those analogic keys of Shadow Warrior, a bit more complex actors (scared nunning man and woman or animals with their own sounds). I also need to know on how to add new sounds and ambient sounds without overwrite existing ones. My goal is to make an addon, not an entire new mod, much less a total conversion (too complex for me). What I just need are some simple code effects for each of these things mentioned. With those I will try to understand what each code mean.

Remember that I don't know programming language, such as C++. Long ago I changed game.con sometimes, but with minimal changes, without knowing much what I was doing...

It seems to me that the most difficult codes for Duke Nukem are to make complex enemies, new characters, new sector effects and new weapons. They seem to be the most difficult to me.

[Danukem]

 eniojr, on 10 May 2024 - 08:02 PM, said:

usable buttons

Could be done with a useractor detecting hits with ifhitweapon and reseting its strength when hit, then have it display the new picnum using cactor or an action (have two different actors running same code if the former method), and have it use operactoractivators, operaterespawns and operatemasterswitches on its lotag saved to a var from the sprite in EVENT_LOADACTOR.

That would be of medium difficulty of the ones you listed and what I wrote would unpack into about 20 lines of code I think. The loading event and the activation use features of Eduke32 scripting, the rest is part of the old scripting system from 1996. A super easy one would be making new actors that explode into debris when shot.

What is hard or easy in a system is relative to how the system is constructed. Build engine itself sets some constraints on what is easy/hard, then the design of the scripting language makes some of the possible things easier than others. The easiest things to do in the language tend to be things for which specific scripting commands were created to do them. If you come at this with a wish list of things you want to do and no idea of how it works, you might be making it very hard on yourself. I suggest becoming passingly familiar with the basics in the old scripting system from the 1996 game before moving on.

[eniojr]

Ok, I am creating a map right now to be played using Legacy mod. I don't want to overwrite anything from the original game or mod, I just want to add things, because I'm making an addon, a custom episode to be played with Legacy. Legacy mod lets you make custom episodes and add extra music. But I also created new Tilesxxx.art and names.h that should be placed in the main mod folder. The new tilesxxx.art won't interfere with the mod, because the extra art will only appear in my custom episode. As for the names.h, it has extra lines for new textures, without changing anything from the mod. For now I learned how to add textures and make animations using BAFed and to create definitions in names.h. The next step will be to add the new definitions from names.h in DEFS.CON, which I already did. I created a custom .CON file and for that to work I made EDUKE.CON to load GAME.CON, USER.CON, DEFS.CON and the new .CON file I did. The new file will have new codes in a way to not interfere with the existing ones from the original game and mod.

What I want to learn about coding in sequence right now with at least one example now is:

1-) How to make destructible objects (furniture and explosive).

2-) How to make new buttons, access cards and access switches. In this case the new access card will have to interact with the new access switch for that card.

3-) How to add new sounds and ambient sounds to the game.

4-) How to make simple actors that can be killed or rescued for new babes (Duke Nukem) and girls that shoot you when you interact (Shadow Warrior).

5-) How to make non enemy actors that only run away and shout and can be killed.

6-) How to make simple animals (similar to those of Redneck Rampage).

7-) How to make a new sector effector for climbing (like in Naferia or Shadow Warrior).

8-) If possible, a code for vacuum and closing door when shooting glass inside door sector (from Lameduke).

That's what I need to know to make my custom episode for Legacy to be original and good enough in terms of gameplay.

We have a mod that mixture elements of the final game and beta versions. Now I want to make a custom episode in a way that add new elements to gameplay, but without changing the mod as a whole.

[ck3D]

It sounds like your starting point should be learning how to make basic actors/useractors and so your coded objects and NPC's. The EDuke Wiki already has all the info one needs for that (should be your number one source), or this very forum has tutorial threads that are exactly about that, e.g.. https://forums.duke4...oding-tutorial/

The reason is you're not getting direct answers and blocks of code to copy paste is this isn't DooM where everything is relatively conveniently accessible/modifiable and the way Duke works with hardcoded stuff, in order to achieve at least half of the 'simple' things you listed you want you're going to have to rewrite part of the game, make do with in-map practical effects (clever combinations of the existing dynamics), and/or reconsider your approach in that sense. The other half (e.g.. sounds) actually is simple, and also super well documented on the EDuke Wiki and on the Infosuite.

[Danukem]

 eniojr, on 11 May 2024 - 09:12 AM, said:

Ok, I am creating a map right now to be played using Legacy mod. I don't want to overwrite anything from the original game or mod, I just want to add things, because I'm making an addon, a custom episode to be played with Legacy. Legacy mod lets you make custom episodes and add extra music. But I also created new Tilesxxx.art and names.h that should be placed in the main mod folder. The new tilesxxx.art won't interfere with the mod, because the extra art will only appear in my custom episode. As for the names.h, it has extra lines for new textures, without changing anything from the mod. For now I learned how to add textures and make animations using BAFed and to create definitions in names.h. The next step will be to add the new definitions from names.h in DEFS.CON, which I already did. I created a custom .CON file and for that to work I made EDUKE.CON to load GAME.CON, USER.CON, DEFS.CON and the new .CON file I did. The new file will have new codes in a way to not interfere with the existing ones from the original game and mod.

What I want to learn about coding in sequence right now with at least one example now is:

1-) How to make destructible objects (furniture and explosive).

2-) How to make new buttons, access cards and access switches. In this case the new access card will have to interact with the new access switch for that card.

3-) How to add new sounds and ambient sounds to the game.

4-) How to make simple actors that can be killed or rescued for new babes (Duke Nukem) and girls that shoot you when you interact (Shadow Warrior).

5-) How to make non enemy actors that only run away and shout and can be killed.

6-) How to make simple animals (similar to those of Redneck Rampage).

7-) How to make a new sector effector for climbing (like in Naferia or Shadow Warrior).

8-) If possible, a code for vacuum and closing door when shooting glass inside door sector (from Lameduke).

That's what I need to know to make my custom episode for Legacy to be original and good enough in terms of gameplay.

We have a mod that mixture elements of the final game and beta versions. Now I want to make a custom episode in a way that add new elements to gameplay, but without changing the mod as a whole.

For 1, 3, 4, 5 and 6 there are already examples in GAME.CON (also DEFS.CON and USER.CON for sounds) you can look at, or ones that are pretty close. For example look at state breakobject and the actors that call that state for breakables. For actors running away, look at how they behave when shrunk using fleeenemy on their move command. Use a guide such as this one https://wiki.eduke32.com/wiki/Confaq42 combined with the examples in GAME.CON and you will get through those numbers I listed. If you are trying, you have code and it's not working even after looking carefully at examples and the guide, and there is a specific problem like a compiler error or unexpected behavior, that is when you post for help on the forum with the specific question about what is going wrong. Otherwise, there's not much we can do except tell you to learn some basic as I just have.

[eniojr]

I'm having serious problems into adding things to the game, using Eduke32. Everytime I try to add actors, there's an error. I added a line in GAME.CON, to include BREAK.CON, a new file with codes related to breakable objects. But even with simple codes I still get error messages.

Here's the BREAK.CON file for now with 2 new breakable objects, a glass furniture and an explosive barrel:

useractor GLASSPLATE
{
    states
    {
    Spawn:
        GLASSPLATE     1      noflicker    A_Look
        loop
    }

    action A_Break
    {
        GLASSPLATE     1      noflicker    A_PlaySound(10)
        A_SpawnItemEx("GlassShard1", 128, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0)
        A_SpawnItemEx("GlassShard2", 128, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0)
        A_SpawnItemEx("GlassShard3", 128, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0)
        A_SpawnItemEx("GlassShard4", 128, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0)
        vanish
        stop
    }
}

useractor SWEXPLOSIVE1
{
    states
    {
    Spawn:
        SWEXPLOSIVE1     1      noflicker    A_Look
        loop
    }

    action A_Explode
    {
        SWEXPLOSIVE1     1      noflicker    A_PlaySound(20)
        A_Explode(20, 128, 0, 0, 0)
        vanish
        stop
    }
}
}

Is there anything wrong or missing here? The new objects were included in DEFS.CON and they are also in names.h, with their own textures in a new Tiles023.ART file.

[Danukem]

There's a lot wrong there; in general it doesn't follow the syntax of the language. Start by copy pasting an existing actor in the game that already works and then experiment with adding or changing single lines of code.

[eniojr]

Ok, I'll try, but aside from the actor code, is there anything more to be added in the new .CON file, in order to avoid compilation error? It's because I'm avoiding to put the code in GAME.CON. What I know so far is that I'll have to use useractor instead of actor to add new things.

[Reaper_Man]

That code looks like it was written by ChatGPT. ChatGPT really, really doesn't understand how to write or use CON.

The compilation errors are because everything about that code is wrong. I don't know what language this is, but it isn't CON.

[quakis]

Reaper_Man, on 12 May 2024 - 05:46 AM, said:

I don't know what language this is, but it isn't CON.

Honestly looks like DECORATE to me.

@eniojr, I highly recommend you work from the basics and go from there to understand CON scripting. Start from the CONFAQ42 that Danukem already linked to and then grasp the basics of Eduke features. Refer to the tutorials here and understand code from other projects to help reinforce how things operate. It's how I managed to get a good grasp of things starting from nothing.

Edit: There's even a tutorial on breakable actors right here: https://wiki.eduke32...Breakable_Actor

[eniojr]

I found the breakable tutorial and finally I managed to make some breakable objects. Now I'm trying to make an object to alter the texture when fired. For example, I have a static doll texture. When I fire the doll, it should show an animated texture. The static texture for the doll is 12261, and the first texture of the animated doll texture is 12268. I could make an object break. Now I want to make an object texture to transform into another texture, without breaking. If I get that to work, the next step will be on how to make a wall texture to change to another texture. After that, on how to add a new dipswitch or button texture in the game, without change the textures from the original game. I already managed to create 2 new custom health items too.