[TEC] Getting rid of the hardcoded reticles (Yes, it can be done!!!)

[Hitman]

When I consider how simple the solution was, I feel almost stupid for the time (years!) it has taken to figure it out

I guess I'll never get accepted at MENSA ... oh well

On to the topic:

THE PROBLEM:

As most modders know, the reticles seen in the periscopes and UZO in SH3 and SH4 (german uboats, not american ones) are hardcoded and can't be removed away. This has given more of a headache to the modders who wanted to change the look of the reticles, because the old ones would still show, no matter what. The only solution we found for this was to reduce the field of view, and make it smaller than 30º for the periscopes (Because the graticle leaves a space of approximately that size in the centre, where you only see the crosshair). But that of course meant losing field of view at the expense of historical reality, where periscopes had some 38º (In the game it is 40º)

THE SOLUTION:

Well, as you also know, when you zoom in with your mouse wheel, the hardcoded reticle does NOT change its size. It is scaled to display in the proper size of the default zoom you have, which is usually 1.5x

Soooooo if you think that the high power zoom is way less than 30º (Normally 8º-9º) and will as such never show the reticle ....

the simple solution is to INVERT the order of the zoom levels in cameras.dat, making the high power (6x) the default one (First zoom entry in cameras.dat), and the low power (1.5x) the second one (Second zoom entry in cameras.dat) you get when moving the wheel mouse. That way, the reticle is scaled to the 6x default one, and actually is moved off the screen, leaving only the central crosshair And you won't see it either when switching zoom to low power, because it doesn't rescale

That's it gentlemen