Project Manager & Template Scripts

The Project Manager is used to build a game project from predefined, customizable Template Scripts ( only available in the Gamestudio editions, but not in the standalone lite-C package). The template scripts contain functions and artwork for the user interface, effects, player movement, enemy AI, etc. for several game genres. They allow creation of games without any programming, but can also speed up game programming by providing standard functions in commercial quality. So you don't have to invent the wheel anew for every new game you create.

All template scripts can be arbitrarily combined, and can be customized for the special requirements of your game. They are permanently improved and extended. New scripts are regularly available in the template section of the user forum, as well as through the user magazine AUM. Once you know how to program in C-Script, you can create template scripts yourself (see Comment Tags).

To add a template script to your game, you must first create a game script in WED through File -> Map Properties -> Script -> New. A requester will pop up where you can select the genre of the game you want to create. You can use template scripts for all genres except A5 Template Project (which is for legacy A5 templates only) or Empty Script (which is for writing the script yourself). If you are not sure yet about the genre, select an A6 Template Project. The difference between the genres is the main game script and the template scripts that are already added.

Once you've created the game script, you can add, remove or modify the template scripts you currently need for your project through the Project Manager.

Notes	Allows to add notes and comments to your game. Use this to keep track of script changes.
Add	Add a template script. On the right side you'll see the scripts that are already added to your main script. The templates are divided in several classes for AI (enemies), player, camera, objects and so on. Each class contains several scripts, and each script can contain one or more actions that are attacheable to an entity. Select a class and a script, then click the Add Script button. Added scripts are automatically copied from the template_6/code folder into the work folder, and are included into the main game script. Please note that you can not add template scripts to an old A5 template project. The maximum number of scripts in a published game is 40 unless you use a compressed resource. Resources can contain an unlimited number of scripts.
Remove	Remove a template script if it's functions are no longer needed. In the Needed By field you'll see which scripts are dependent on the selected script. Don't remove a script that is needed by other scripts.
Customize	Select a script, then click Customize to adapt its parameters to your game. A Customize panel (see below) will pop up and allow to edit script parameters. Most template scripts contain customizable fields. If you want to create your own Customize panels for your own scripts, use Comment Tags.
Update	Update a script from a newer set of templates, without losing the customized parameters. Use this after having downloaded an update from the Gamestudio website or forum.

Click on the [?] icon in the upper right corner of the dialog. Then click on the text of one of the 'tags' in the dialog. If that tag has a "help" text it will be displayed in a pop-up window.
Click on [Save] to save the current values.
The [Restore] button allows you to reload a script with the original values. Click on [Restore] and then select the original script in the template_6/codefolder.
The [Update Script] button allows you to update your script to a new version without losing any changes you made to values. This will become more important as updates to the template scripts are released. Click on [Update Script] and then select the script in the template_6/code folder.

The currently available template scripts are listed in the Template Script section of this manual.

Example:

Create a level with a player.

Create a level in WED. Save the level under an arbitrary name.
Create an A6_Template_Project script (File->Map Properties->Script) for that level.
Insert an animated model for your player.
Add the Player Biped Script (File->Project Manager->Add Script).
Attach PlBiped01 action to player model.
Add a 3rd Person Camera Script.
Rebuild level with Update Entities and Run.

Remarks:

Scripts with the same name but different numbers (e.g. sky01 and sky00 ) can conflict with each other. At best this can give you error messages, at worst, undefined results. Don't add more then one script with the same name.
Many scripts are listed under 'Needs', like weapons00.wdl. These are "support scripts" which are used by one or more of the scripts. You do not have to add these scripts to your project, they are automatically added by Add Script as needed. Only when writing the script manually, you have to add them with the include statement.
Published projects have a limit of 40 WDL files. If you need more than 40, put several files together into one. This restriction does not apply when creating a resource file.
The template scripts and the files associated with them are located in the template_6 folder.
You can create your own genres by copying a basic game script into the template_6 folder. The name of that script will appear in the New Script requester.
You can create your own template scripts by copying the script into the template_6\code folder, and editing the template_6.xml file in the Gamestudio folder to include your script. If you want to contribute your script to the community, send it to the Conitec webmaster.