Question about Menu.ini tga vs. dds

[ATR-42]

my question is general in nature but it was peaked because of this thread (http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=124490) . Its regarding the Menu_1024_768.ini changes.

The clocks in that mod are dds files, later in that thread is a break down of some menu entries to make the chrono smaller.

When you look closely at that menu edit the clock files it points to are dds files (the new chronos). Yet the Menu edit itself lists them as tga.

When i 'merge' mods together i always make sure that a dds points to a dds and vice versa.

What happens when a menu tga points to a dds? does it simply not work? what are the differences between the two?

[Digital_Trucker]

If I understand correctly (and I often don't:damn: ) the game doesn't care what you point to, it uses the .dds. I have, at times, deliberately left the menu.ini entry pointing to a .tga file that doesn't exist in the game but does exist in .dds format and it still displays. I have also made changes to .tga files that are pointed to and the changes do not appear in game, but if I change the corresponding .dds file, the changes miraculously appear.

[ATR-42]

I just ran a test with Nomograph...

i pointed the menu to a tga file but made sure the Nomo was dds, and it worked?! wtf? :doh:

very strange the way thats set up. like a fail safe or something?

my modding knowledge is limited, but the little merging work i do i want to be sure i do it 'cleanly' and that i fully understand whats going on....

this detail in particular is strange...

[jaketoox]

...for example...cameras.dat...you could rename it to be cameras.wtf....or even place it to a folder inside "Library" folder....and still it was causing troubles in some cases....seems like that the game is using whatever file is named close enough to original filename.....

Jake

[skwasjer]

I know more games that use this technique. Basically this behavior is for the benefit of the developers/artists. They don't always know in advance (when the game engine is built) what file types they are going to use for each and every part of the game. They made the routines that loads assets not care about extension (sortof), and allow the choice to the 3D artist. The routines generally look at the first bytes of the file to determine the filetype, and not the extension and this is also true for dat-files. There usually is a 'preferred' extension though (dds in the case of textures if i am correct), but if this file is not found other files with the same name are used.