Creating your first mod in 5 minutes
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Start off by opening your game directory.
Click the Coalition.rte folder, hit Ctrl + C to copy it and Ctrl + V to paste it, and then rename it with F2 to mymod.rte. The mod's name has to end with ".rte".
If you now open the game you'll see the error message "mymod.rte does not specify a supported Cortex Command version, so it is not compatible with this version of Cortex Command".
This error means that the mod didn't specify which game version it is for, and in my case it should be specifying Pre-Release 4.0, but in your case this will be different. So, remember what it says right here for you.
To edit the mod so it includes the game version, we're going to go to the website "vscode.dev".
Open the folder of the mod.
Open Index.ini, which is where the game will start looking at your mod, and this is also where you give the game general information about your mod.
Add the line "SupportedGameVersion = Pre-Release 4.0" in my case, but again, this will be different for you. Hit Ctrl + S to save it.
If you now boot game, you can hit space to skip the intro.
Go into one of the scenarios and you'll see two copies of Coalition in the buy menu.
The bottom one is yours, so we're going to edit it so it isn't a simple copy.
Start off by changing the ModuleName and the Description. Hit Ctrl + S to save it.
Now we're going to do something fun, like changing one of the weapons to be very very overpowered.
Open UberCannon.ini.
There's a whole load of text here, but you can minimize it all by just hitting Ctrl + K and then Ctrl + 0. Now you can open the lines like they're folders by clicking the arrows next to the line numbers.
Go down to RateOfFire and bump it up, and set ReloadTime to 0. Hit Ctrl + S.
If you want you can expand the lines again with Ctrl + K, Ctrl + J, but it isn't necessary. You can close the file.
And now we're going to replace all references of coalition.rte with mymod.rte.
And in order to let the game boot straight into a scenario you can open the Settings.ini file by clicking on Open File.
And then selecting Settings.ini, found in the Base.rte folder.
If you scroll down a bit you'll see "Default Activity Settings". LaunchIntoActivity is 0; we're going to set that to 1. Hit Ctrl + S to save it.
The DefaultActivityType, DefaultActivityName and DefaultSceneName can be customized, but I've chosen to launch into Ketanot Hills in Skirmish Defense.
If we now open the game we'll be booted right into the scenario and you'll see "MYMOD" - "This is my first mod!" in the build menu.
And now you get to play with your mod's Uber Cannon of doom!
So now you've made your first mod, and of course it's still pretty much a copy of the Coalition, but that's fine.
You could start removing files, you could start adding files, it's all basically just down to INI.
You don't need to learn Lua. Lua is just for the advanced stuff. INI is pretty much the bread and butter of the game.
And once you want to start spriting you'll want to probably use GIMP, for which you can follow this tutorial of mine.
If you need any help you can visit the Discord server, and good luck, and have fun!