[MOD] EEUITweaks Mod Collection - All EE (v2.2+) Platforms
AncientCowboy
Member Posts: 199
EEUITweaks User Interface Mods Collection Version 2.6
The goal of EEUITweaks is to be a collection of the individual UI.MENU (i.e. Extended Edition 2.x+) mods/patches/tweaks from the BeamDog UI Modding forum; packaged as a single WeiDU collection. The advantages are to automate the tedious manual editing of UI.MENU, simplify multiple mod installations (particularly after an update), and to provide a single source from which many EE GUI mods can be accessed. It does NOT install the full UI replacement environments, although it does support modding them.
EEUITweaks supports BGEE, BG2EE, BGEE/SoD, PST:EE, and EET with the BG2(default) and SoD (EET_gui) user interfaces. It also supports installing mods on the Dragonspear UI++, BG2EE GUI To BGEE, LeUI, Revised Dragon Scale, IWD GUI for BG2:EE and BG:EE, and IWD2 for BG2 replacement UIs. In all cases, it will skip attempting to install useless or invalid mods for a particular environment (e.g. transparent sidebars on Dragonspear UI++).
EEUITweaks-master.zip contains the usual WeiDU setup-EEUITweaks.exe installation program and EEUITweaks mod files directory and should present no problem for those who are familiar with using WeiDU. For those who are not so familiar, there is a file named 'Installation.txt' within the zip's EEUITweaks directory that contains step-by-step instructions. For EET installations, EEUITweaks mods should be installed after Finalize EET (setup-EET_end component 1) and after any optional 'full UI.MENU' GUI packages.
If you've previously installed any of the mods supported by EEUITweaks using a stand-alone WeiDU setup, Please use the same stand-alone setup to un-install the mod prior to installing it with EEUITweaks. EEUITweaks will not be able to un-install it. Similarly, if you've manually installed a mod contained in EEUITweaks, I'd recommend manually un-installing it prior to re-installing via EEUITweaks.
Something that may not be familiar (unless you've used @CamDawg's excellent 'The Tweaks Anthology' package), is that EEUITweaks makes use of mod 'Groups'. This mechanism defines a relatively small number of categories, and associates each mod in EEUITweaks with the most relevant category. When you start EEUITweaks, it will ask you select the categories of interest. This makes it easier to install only a subset of the full collection - saves wearing out the 'N' key 
. Details of the groups (and the currently included mods) is in the message below.
I would like to thank all of the folks who have developed the mods/tweaks that appear in this collection. Without their efforts - it wouldn't be much of a collection. I'd particularly like to thank @lefreut whose suggestion in another Discussion provided encouragement to move this project from the "One of these days I need to..." phase to actual development.
Enjoy!
Comments
Current EEUITweaks Mods
As mentioned in the prior message, EEUITweaks defines 5 groups into which the mods are divided. These groups are as follows:
Following are the mods supported by EEUITweaks, divided by groups. In addition, I've listed the platforms supported, the forum discussion that describes the mod, and any applicable notes regarding dependencies, known conflicts, or exclusivity. The platforms supported by a particular mod are identified using the following letters:
Game World/Maps/Travel Group
Record/Inventory/Journal Group
Leveling Progress Bar Tweaks
Stores/Dialogs/Spell Books Group
Multiplayer/General/Other Group
Note 1
lefreut's BG2 Store Screen Tweaks and Adul's Smooth Selling are incompatible.
lefreut's BG2 Store Screen Tweaks and Mr2150's Auto-Identify Items are incompatible.
lefreut's Joined Store Panels is both incompatible and unnecessary with BG2 Store Screen Tweaks.
lefreut's BG2 Store Screen Tweaks incororates lefreut's Steal Multiple Items functionality. Thus, if you install BG2 Store Screen Tweaks and WeiDU detects that Steal Multiple Items has been previously installed; the latter will be un-installed automatically.
Note 2
Leveling Progress Bars Tweaks must be installed after lefreut's Improved Record Screen in order to perform the appropriate XYWH calculations. Thus, if you install Improved Record Screen and WeiDU detects that Progress Bars Tweaks has been previously installed; the latter will be automatically un-installed and you will be given the option to re-install it afterward.
Note 3
lefreut's Customize Screens Tweaks incorporates the Customize All Characters functionality. Thus, if you install Customize Screens Tweaks and WeiDU detects that Customize All Characters has been previously installed, EEUITweaks will un-install the redundant Customize All Characters mod.
Note 4
lefreut's 1.3-ish Dialog Box and Simple Centered Dialog are now compatible. However, to use them together lefreut's 1.3-ish Dialog Box must be installed first. Thus, if you install 1.3-ish Dialog Box and WeiDU detects that Simple Centered Dialog has been previously installed; the latter will be automatically un-installed and you will be given the option to re-install it afterward.
Note 5
lefreut's Journal incorporates lefreut's Simple Journal Fixes functionality. Thus, if you install lefreut's Journal and WeiDU detects that Simple Journal Fixes has been previously installed, EEUITweaks will un-install the latter.
Mr2150's Journal Fixes and lefreut's Simple Journal Fixes are compatible. However, to use them together Mr2150's Journal Fixes must be installed first. Thus, if you install Mr2150's Journal Fixes and WeiDU detects that Simple Journal Fixes has been previously installed; the latter will be automatically un-installed and you will be given the option to re-install it afterward.
Version 1.1
Version 1.1 includes 6 additional mods (shown on the Current EEUITweaks Mods message), internal improvements, and a new model for saving the WeiDU backup files used for mod removal/re-installation
As EEUITweaks will be updated on a frequent basis; with version 1.1 I've created a system that changes the backup directory (used to restore the game whenever a mod is un-installed) from being within the EEUITweaks directory, to being in the game installation directory. This will allow updating EEUITweaks after v 1.1 without having to worry about un-installing/re-installing mods or 'moving backup/updating/moving update back'. The name of the new game directory resident backup directory is EEUITweaksbackup. It, like WeiDU.log, is managed completely by WeiDU. Unfortunately, if you've installed mods using version 1.0 of EEUITweaks, it will be necessary to un-install them with 1.0 and then re-install them using version 1.1 (along with whatever new mods strike your fancy) in order to keep everything properly organized.
One mod-specific note. If you're running Windows and, due to your security/directory configuration, find it necessary to run setup-EEUITweaks.exe as an administrator; you may see a warning when you install "Mr2150's Random PC Generator", indicating that zzzzzzz.BMP wasn't installed. This is because the WeiDU 'USER_DIRECTORY' is pointing to a non-existent user game directory for the administrative account. There are two reasonable solutions (but infinite unreasonable solutions
) to handle zzzzzzz.BMP not being installed:
Enjoy!
Version 1.2
Version 1.2 includes BillyYank's and Mr2150's portrait selection mods, support components for Mr2150's mod, and a patch supplied by Mr2150 that eliminates the 'zzzzzzz.BMP' issue in his Random Player Character Generator mod - by using 2 fixed (MAN2L and WOMAN2L) portraits instead of the 'ghost'.
The relatively quick turnaround is due to the popularity of the portrait pickers, and my desire to get the patch out as soon as possible.
As noted in the original post, it isn't necessary to un-install/re-install if you have mods installed via version 1.1. Just replace the EEUITweaks directory in your game directory/directories with the new version. The version of WeiDU (packaged as setup-EEUITweaks.exe) hasn't changed, so there's no need to replace the existing copy.
Enjoy!
Version 1.3
Version 1.3 includes several new mods authored by @Adul and @lefreut, as well as several internal improvements.
One item you may have noticed is that component group 4 is now titled "Stores/Dialogs/Spell Books". I had neglected Spell Books in my original groupings; and although there are no applicable mods yet, I wanted to reserve space (number ranges) in advance, and group 4 seemed to be most appropriate.
As noted in the original post, it isn't necessary to un-install/re-install if you have mods installed via version 1.1. Just replace the EEUITweaks directory in your game directory/directories with the new version. The version of WeiDU (packaged as setup-EEUITweaks.exe) hasn't changed, so there's no need to replace the existing copy.
Enjoy!
Version 1.4
Version 1.4 includes two new mods, fixes for issues with Progress Bar Tweaks and Transparent Sidebars, internal improvements, and a test for the existence of Override/UI.MENU that is performed prior to beginning mod installations. If this test fails, it produces an error message "Cannot find UI.MENU in override directory. Attempting to install mods will fail until this is corrected" rather than an obscure file system error.
As noted in the original post, it isn't necessary to un-install/re-install if you have mods installed via version 1.1 or later. Just replace the EEUITweaks directory in your game directory/directories with the new version. The version of WeiDU (packaged as setup-EEUITweaks.exe) hasn't changed, so there's no need to replace the existing copy.
Enjoy!
@smeagolheart Considering it - but only in the sense that it supports Dragonspear UI++. I don't 'mod the mods' that EEUITweaks installs (other than the ones for which I'm the author). I basically just test whether they work on a particular configuration and then, based on that testing, write the WeiDU code to install or forbid them for a particular configuration.
Edited for typo
Version 1.5
Version 1.5 includes support for EET - Enhanced Edition Trilogy, and a couple of installation string corrections.
It was tested using EET v. 1.0 RC5. This package and its mods have been tested, and should be installed, AFTER setup-EET_end has run and the EET Finalize component installed. Consequently, if you need to run setup-EET_end (to install other mods or change the GUI), the proper sequence is:
One further note concerning EET. EEUITweaks is packaged with WeiDU version 239 (latest released version). EET requires, and is packaged with, un-released version 239.1. When you first run EEUITweaks in an EET environment, setup-EEUITweaks.exe will update itself to 239.1. This is okay. All the EET testing of EEUITweaks was done with 239.1 and, in fact, EEEUITweaks makes use of 'GAME_IS ~eet~' .
As noted in the original post, it isn't necessary to un-install/re-install if you have mods installed via version 1.1 or later. Just replace the EEUITweaks directory in your game directory/directories with the new version. The version of WeiDU (packaged as setup-EEUITweaks.exe) hasn't changed, so there's no need to replace the existing copy.
Enjoy!
I'm sort of afraid to touch my BG2EE UI menu at this point since I've done so much manual editing. I don't think I even have a blank copy of my UI Menu anymore.
Although, out of curiosity, would I be able to manually edit my UI after installing this? I have one or two minor cosmetic changes that I've been using which I don't see here.
@swit - You're welcome. I've begun an eet 'end to end' run with a new f/m/c, partially to test the tweaks, but partially just to see what it's like to play it as a 'single game'.
Also, do you know if there is a default UI menu for the first or 2nd games floating around somewhere? I've actually never been able to extract mine the usual way for some reason - I got the one I've been using from Mr2150 when he first started editing the journal.
Although RC5 maybe isn't that bad. Just remember to not go back into SoD areas from SoA since RC5 has missing links, so you won't be able to go back.
@swit - Good to know. Fortunately (I guess) I've only had time to just get started. So restarting won't be a problem.
@ALIEN - I've been looking it over. I'll have to arrange a new hosting model so it may take a bit.