Interesting Graphics Assignment Wrinkle in Midway/Guadalcanal

[ivanmoe]

I was clicking through some ship icons on the game map recently and I discovered a "feature" of the game graphics of which I was unaware.

The icons in question were destroyers and arranged in a line. As I worked my way through the formation, something odd happened, at least insofar as what I was expecting.

The "ships" were all Mahan-class and had identical graphics, excepting the last, DD/Smith, which displayed completely different panel art. I should note that the UI indicated that DD/Smith was ALSO a Mahan.

A bug in the UI perhaps? Mercifully, it proved, no, as a closer examination revealed.

Rummaging through the game files, I realized a couple of things. First, DD/Smith had it's own art panel in the game's graphics directories. Don't know why, but that was undeniably the case. Second, so long as Smith's art panel was in that directory, the game was going to use it.

The lesson in all this?

Well, it really does appear that the game has not one, but two, criteria for selecting the art that players see in the game. First, it defaults to discreet names. Second, if the ship in question has no discreet art in the graphics directories, the game uses ship class to select graphics for the subject in question.

Something to consider if the game ever presents you with some art that's somewhat different from what you'd anticipated

[GMcClellan]

You're giving me flashbacks. There's a reason the British Avro Manchester bomber is called that in Kriegsmarine. Having both a bomber and light cruiser with the same name was giving the poor thing fits! I recall opening a scenario (I think one of the alternates in the Bismarck campaign, as the HMS Manchester was in the I-UK part of the G-I-UK gap) and seeing an airplane where I expected to see a Light Cruiser!

[ivanmoe]

What REALLY got me started on this topic was a bit of a mind-bender that I had this morning.

I had edited up new panels for a Japanese CVL class, Junyo. I went in-game to check it out, and was greeted by Junyo wearing the updated art, but a sister-ship in her class, Hiyo, displaying the older-style panel.

How the heck cold such a thing happen?

Well, the original sin was that I had named the class after Junyo, rather than Hiyo. All-wised-up as I am, I checked the OOB editor, and, sure enough, the game instead cited the class as Hiyo.

So, why did I have two different ship arts displayed when BOTH belonged to the same class? Well, Junyo got its art by virtue of its name, again, the default for graphics assignment, and that associated with my graphics update.

Hiyo, on the other hand, got it's art assigned according to its class. And, sure enough, there was old-style, panel art in the graphics directories for Hiyo

It all made sense after examining the different editors and game directories, but man, this UI will really throw some twists at a fella!

[GMcClellan]

Yeah, we never did get all the calls involved in this sorted out. For the purpose of KM, it was easier (as mentioned) just to do the "quick" fix of giving the aircraft the name including the manufacturer.

Best advice I can give a modder is, when you see something strange pop up, look for shared names or the like, the culprit is likely in there.